James had Garrett secured, hands behind his back, when the first uniforms reached their position. Two paramedics rushed past with equipment and a stretcher, immediately going to work on Stacy Lang with urgency that suggested they understood the severity of heat stroke.
"Core temperature 104.8," one of the paramedics said, his voice tight with concern. "We need to cool her down gradually—ice packs to the neck, armpits, and groin. Start an IV, push cold saline. Let's move her out of this heat."
They worked while Isla stepped back, giving them room to work. Her hands were still shaking, adrenaline and heat exhaustion combining to make her feel unsteady on her feet. James appeared at her elbow, his face flushed and his shirt soaked through, but his blue eyes sharp with concern.
"You okay?" he asked quietly.
"I will be," Isla managed. "Once we know she'll survive."
They watched the paramedics stabilize Stacy Lang enough for transport, watched her carried up the stairs on a stretcher while Morrison read Garrett his rights in a voice that carried no emotion. The older man went quietly, his earlier desperation replaced by that same unsettling calm he'd displayed throughout.
"I tried to explain it to you," Garrett said as Morrison led him toward the stairs. "I tried to make you understand what I could see. But some people are blind to certain truths, Agent Rivers. You'll continue living in a world where you can't perceive the cold souls among you, where you have to wait until they've already caused harm before you can act. I was preventing harm. I was correcting errors before they manifested."
"You were killing people," Isla said flatly. "Based on delusions caused by neurological damage from heat stroke. There's nothing mystical about what you did—just murder dressed up in pseudoscience and the arrogance of someone who thought they could judge who deserves to live."
Garrett smiled slightly, as if she'd proven his point. "You'll see eventually. When you encounter enough of them, enough cold souls pretending to be warm. You'll understand why correction was necessary."
Morrison pulled him away before he could say more, and Isla watched him disappear up the stairs toward prosecution and imprisonment and psychiatric evaluation that would hopefully explain what combination of brain damage and ideology hadcreated a serial killer who believed he could see defective souls through their body heat.
The junction chamber was emptying out now, the crisis contained, the immediate danger past. Crime scene techs were already moving in to document the modifications Garrett had made, the sophisticated equipment he'd used to turn a maintenance junction into an execution chamber.
Isla sank down against the wall, letting the concrete cool against her overheated back, and pulled out her phone to call Kate with news that they'd caught their killer and saved his intended victim but had nearly died themselves in the process.
"You were right," James said, settling beside her with a groan that suggested his body was protesting the heat exposure as much as hers was. "About Garrett being the killer. About him engineering the surveillance gaps so he could operate freely. If you hadn't figured it out when you did—"
"Stacy Lang would be dead," Isla finished. "Along with whoever he'd targeted next. He said he'd identified seventeen people over four years. He wasn't planning to stop."
They sat in exhausted silence while the crime scene team worked around them, documenting evidence that would build the case against Thomas Garrett. Above them, Duluth was waking to news of another crisis in the steam tunnels, another serial killer operating in the city's underground infrastructure.
But unlike Robert Brune, who'd escaped to haunt Isla's nightmares with his freedom, Thomas Garrett was in custody. His victims would have justice. His would-be victim had survived.
It wasn't everything Isla had wanted from the case—catching the Lake Superior Killer still gnawed at her with unfinished urgency—but it was enough to count as victory.
For now.
Her phone buzzed with a text from Kate:Status?
Isla typed back with trembling fingers:Suspect in custody. Victim survived. We're okay.
The response came immediately:Good work. Take tomorrow off. You've earned it.
Tomorrow off. Twenty-four hours to process the case, to file reports, to decide whether she was seriously considering McCrae's offer to return to Miami or if she'd just been running from the discomfort of building something real in Duluth.
Beside her, James was checking his own messages, his expression unreadable in the harsh work lights the crime scene team had erected. Three years of partnership, of cases solved and dangers faced and the kind of professional trust that sometimes felt like it might become something more if either of them was brave enough to acknowledge it.
"James," Isla said quietly. "About Miami—"
"Tell me later," he interrupted gently. "After we're out of these tunnels and you've had time to think without heat stroke clouding your judgment. Whatever you decide, I'll..." He trailed off, not quite finishing the thought.
But Isla understood what he wasn't saying. Whatever she decided about her future, about Miami versus Duluth versus the complicated question of partnerships that mattered more than career trajectories, James would support it.
Even if it meant losing the partnership they'd built.
The realization settled over her with unexpected weight, and Isla found herself thinking about McCrae's offer in a new light. Returning to Miami had seemed like redemption, like a chance to rebuild what she'd lost after Alicia Mendez's death. But maybe what she'd lost wasn't worth rebuilding. Maybe what she'd found in Duluth—difficult cases and dangerous criminals and a partner who knew when to push and when to wait—was worth more than the career advancement Miami promised.
"Later," Isla agreed, pushing herself to her feet with effort. "After we're out of these tunnels."
They climbed the stairs together, leaving the heat and darkness behind for the December cold that felt shocking and clean against their overheated skin. Above them, Duluth's lights spread across the hillside like constellations, familiar now after three years of calling this city home.
