Chapter 7: Red Herring Unravels

Morning light clawed its way through the precinct’s grimy windows on December 31, 2025, painting the bullpen in weak, washed-out gray that felt more like the aftermath of a fever dream than true dawn. The snow had stopped sometime in the night, leaving the city muffled and exhausted, streets piled high with plowed drifts that glittered coldly under the rising sun. Inside, the air still carried that persistent, cloying ozone bite—sharp, metallic, impossible to ignore—now laced with something sweeter, almost cloying, like the aftermath of a storm that had passed too close to skin and left its scent behind. The fluorescents hummed unevenly, casting brief, intimate strobes that made everyone’s faces look momentarily flushed, feverish, as if the building itself were running a low-grade burn.

Rikki Fire hadn’t slept. She stood at the murder board in the same clothes from the night before—black tactical shirt wrinkled and clinging damply to her athletic frame from dried sweat and the heat she couldn’t shake, sleeves rolled high to expose toned forearms still marked with faint red lines from Sophia’s nails digging in during the cell. Her ponytail had come completely undone during the long hours, dark strands falling loose around her face, brushing her neck with every movement, sticking to the faint sheen of sweat at her temples. Her hazel eyes burned with a focus that bordered on feral hunger, pupils still slightly blown from the night’s unfinished business. Coffee—her fifth cup—sat cold and untouched on the nearest desk, steam long gone, but her body thrummed with a different kind of heat.

Victor Lang’s photo had been added overnight—pinned prominently with a red string leading to a fat file of financials and threats. Lang: Thorne’s business partner, co-owner of half the offshore accounts, the man who stood to inherit billions if Thorne died without an updated will. The emails Raley had pulled were vicious—Lang’s words dripping venom: I’ll burn every bridge you’ve built, Elias. You’ll wish you’d never crossed me ... wish you could feel the heat closing in, licking at your skin until there’s nothing left.

Raley approached cautiously, two fresh printouts in hand, eyes bloodshot from all-night digging and the lingering chill that seemed to follow them all now. “Lang’s alibi is ironclad. Hamptons estate, thirty-two guests—senators, CEOs, two federal judges. Timestamped photos from 8 p.m. onward, GPS on the helicopter, and even doorbell cam footage of him arriving. He never left.”

Esperanza dropped a thicker file beside it with a thud that made the lights flicker once, her usual sharp humor dulled by exhaustion and something else—restlessness, a flush high on her cheeks she couldn’t explain, as if the room’s tension had infected her too. “But the motive’s screaming. Lang and Thorne were suing each other over Black Veil Holdings—a shell company funneling millions into occult acquisitions. Lang claimed Thorne cut him out of a seven-figure deal last month. Emails got personal. Lang wrote, ‘I’ll see you in hell before I let you keep what’s mine ... feel the Fire licking at your skin until you beg.’”

Rikki’s jaw tightened, a muscle ticking in her cheek as she pinned a new string from Lang’s photo to the sigil—red yarn crossing the board like fresh blood, her fingers brushing the glowing image and lingering a fraction too long, chasing phantom heat that reminded her of Sophia’s skin under her mouth. “He used the word ‘burn.’ Same as Sophia’s threat. Same as what’s been crawling under my skin since she whispered it against my throat.”

Esperanza rubbed her arms, breath fogging faintly even indoors, but her voice held a new, husky edge that mirrored Rikki’s own. “Coincidence? Or someone planting breadcrumbs ... making us chase heat we can’t touch ... making us want it anyway?”

Rikki’s voice was low, dangerous, laced with raw, unfinished want. “Malachar doesn’t do coincidence. He lays blame. Makes us chase tails while he vanishes into the dark ... while he makes us burn for the wrong thing ... or the right one, so hard we can’t think straight.”

Raley glanced at the flickering lights overhead—now pulsing in slow, deliberate waves that matched the sigil’s glow and the quickening beat in his own chest. “You’re buying the witch’s story.”