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“I handed them everything I had, certain they could use their resources to pull it all together.” I tuck a stray strand of hair behind my ear and Evan’s eyes track the movement. “They completely ignored me.”

“Those bitches,” Tamsin whispers.

“Indeed,” I reply.

“What else you got?” Tamsin asks Evan.

As if I want to relive any of my formative years with these two. Or anyone else for that matter.

“Hmmm.” He thinks aloud.

I focus on the snap of my heels against the linoleum, using the sound to calibrate my heart rate. It’s a grounding exercise—a way to drown out the noise and remind my central nervous system that I am here for work. I am a professional; I can handle the environmental variables.

I can handle Evan becoming increasingly nostalgic. I can even handle Tamsin having the time of her life at my expense.

It’s unfortunate, however, that murder is frowned upon in professional settings, especially when their conversation dissolves into a blur of muffled syllables and only the words frozen and bra manage to break through my attempt to ignore them.

Evan stops outside a door that looks too ordinary for the gravity of its contents. It’s beige, unremarkable, and marred by a laminated sign taped slightly crooked at eye level—a minor asymmetry that makes my fingers itch to correct it. Evan swipes his badge, the mechanism clicking with a hollow, metallic finality before he pushes it open. The room exhales, a sudden draft of pressurized cold air and the biting scent of antiseptic.

My natural habitat.

“This is it,” he says, stepping aside. “I’ll be making my rounds if you need me.”

He nods and disappears back down the hallway.

Mara is standing near the table, a sad, almost longing look on her face as her eyes rove over the remains. She looks up, and for half a second we just stare at each other. Then she crosses the room in three quick steps and wraps her arms around me like no time has passed at all.

Mara has never had much respect for my personal space. She wraps herself around me like the last seventeen years haven’t happened, smelling faintly floral and painfully familiar in a room that otherwise smells like death.

Every instinct I have tells me to pull away, but the deep-seated ache in my chest recognizes the pressure of her arms.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” she says into my shoulder, sounding genuinely relieved.

“I am,” I hug her back just as tightly, maybe a bit awkwardly.

She pulls back, hands still on my arms, eyes scanning my face. “You look great.”

You look great is such a broad, subjective assessment, and yet the way she says it makes me want to believe my own facade hasn't cracked. I need to re-establish my physical distance before she realizes that my unbothered exterior is currently held together by sheer force of will and a very potent SSRI.

“The evidence suggests otherwise in my case, but it’s certainly true about you,” I reply.

She rolls her eyes. “Just accept a compliment for once in your goddamn life.”

Tamsin clears her throat politely from somewhere behind me. “Hi. I am capable of accepting compliments.”

Mara laughs and steps back. “Your entire situation is excellent.”

“Thank you.” Tamsin preens.

“Thank you for bringing her home,” Mara adds, as if this was an effort that required coordination.

I glance around then, really taking it in. The stainless steel table. The remains laid out carefully, respectfully.

The environment is a sequence of familiar geometric planes. Stainless steel. Surgical lighting. The dead.

It should be a vacuum of emotion, a place where the variables are controlled and the data is absolute. Yet, the air feels thick with the residue of Mara’s presence, complicating the sensory input I rely on to stay composed.

I set my bag down and straighten the edge of the tray without thinking, aligning it with the seam in the metal table before I let myself look any closer.