Chapter 4
chapter
four
Five Years Ago
Monica's bare feet whispered across Lawson's hardwood floor. Window to couch. Couch to window. Endless pacing while two coffee mugs grew cold on the counter.
"I'm done hiding." Monica stopped at the window. Afternoon sun turned her dark hair copper at the edges. "Tired of pretending we're just partners. Tired of lying to everyone at work."
Lawson wore yesterday's jeans and a wrinkled t-shirt. The apartment smelled like weekend—coffee grounds scattered around the sink, Monica's body wash ghosting out from the bathroom. Evidence of their time together that suddenly felt incriminating.
"You know how the department works."
"I know how you think it works." Monica spun from the window. Those brown eyes carried the same stubborn fire that cracked suspects during interrogations. "Tell me one person who got fired for being gay. One."
"Richardson barely tolerates having women on the force."
"Richardson tolerates whoever brings in arrests and keeps his clearance rates up. He doesn't care what we do off the clock."
Lawson needed distance. She grabbed one of the mugs from the counter—still warm, bitter as motor oil the way Monica liked it.
"Gossip travels fast in the department."
"So let it travel." Monica followed her into the tiny kitchen. "I'd rather deal with whispers than pretend you don't matter when other people are watching."
The mug slipped in Lawson's hands. She caught it, set it down harder than necessary. Her knuckles went white against the fake granite.
"You think I don't care?"
"I think you care more about your reputation." Monica moved closer, bringing warmth and the faint scent of her perfume. "This is about holding hands at the department barbecue. Not pretending you're just my work friend."
"We agreed to keep quiet."
"Eleven months ago. Things change."
Hope and frustration battled across Monica's features. The same look she got working cold cases—patient but relentless.
"What if Richardson splits us up? Partners aren't supposed to be involved."
"Then we request different shifts. Different divisions." Monica reached for Lawson's hands. "Better to be together somewhere else than work side-by-side pretending we're strangers."
Monica's touch sent sparks racing up Lawson's arms. Those palms carried years of calluses from handling weapons, cuffs, steering wheels. Rough hands that knew exactly how to be gentle.
"Erin." Monica's voice dropped into that low register she used in bed. "I love you. I want people to know I love you."
The words should have been perfect. Instead, they lodged in Lawson's throat like stones. Love meant vulnerability. Love meant having something that could be taken away.
"I can't. Not yet."
Monica yanked her hands back like she'd grabbed hot metal. "When? After you make sergeant? Lieutenant? When Richardson retires and someone else takes over?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know." Monica's voice flattened out. "Three years as partners. Eleven months in the same bed. And you don't know when you'll be ready to admit I exist."
"That's not what I meant."
"Isn't it?" Monica snatched her jacket from the chair. "You flirted with that prosecutor last week. Played it up for the whole squad. Made jokes about my nonexistent dating life."
The blood drained from Lawson's cheeks. "Those were just jokes."
"To you." Monica jammed her arms through the jacket sleeves. "To me they felt like you were erasing us."
"Monica, wait."
But Monica was already at the door, hand on the knob. She didn't look back.
"Your badge means more to you than we do. When you figure out which one matters, call me."
The door clicked shut. Monica's engine turned over outside. Lawson stood surrounded by cooling coffee and lingering perfume, listening to tires disappear into traffic noise.
She didn't move until the silence became unbearable.
The Driftwood Tavern squatted three blocks from the precinct—close enough to walk, far enough to avoid most cops. Lawson claimed a corner stool and ordered whiskey straight. The bartender looked about twenty-two, young enough to card everyone regardless of obvious age.
Grease hung in the air mixed with stale beer.
Rock music pounded from overhead speakers just loud enough to drown conversation without completely killing it.
Saturday drinkers filled the other stools—construction workers with concrete dust under their fingernails, retirees stretching out errands, office types drowning whatever had driven them here.
Lawson fit right in.
Her phone buzzed against the scarred bar top. Monica's name on the screen: We need to talk.
Lawson stared at the message for maybe thirty seconds before flipping the phone face down. The whiskey burned going down her throat, promising to make everything simpler. Another buzz against the wood. She didn't look.
"Want another?" The bartender looked like he'd rather be anywhere else.
"Yeah."
The second shot went down easier. The third, easier than that. By the fourth, her phone had gone quiet. Evening drinkers started filtering in, voices getting louder as alcohol loosened tongues and good judgment.
Lawson checked her phone. Three missed calls. Four unread texts. Her finger hovered over Monica's contact for a long moment before sliding toward the bartender instead.
"One more."
Two weeks later
Work became arctic. Monica answered direct questions with yes or no. Filed reports without looking up. Took lunch breaks at different times. The partnership that had felt natural for three years turned mechanical overnight.
Lawson retreated to the Driftwood every evening after shift. Same corner stool, same whiskey order, same bartender who'd stopped asking questions. The routine numbed the sharp edges of regret.
"Rough day?" Tommy, the construction worker two stools down, always showed up around six. Concrete dust permanently embedded under his nails, thermos of coffee that smelled like motor oil.
"They're all rough days." Lawson signaled for another round.
"Tell me about it. My foreman's been riding us about the Henderson project. Three weeks behind schedule, but it ain't our fault the permits got held up." Tommy drained his beer and ordered another. "You in construction?"
"Cop."
"No shit. My brother-in-law's a cop up in Atlanta. Says the job'll eat you alive if you let it."
Lawson nodded and focused on her drink. Small talk felt impossible when every conversation reminded her of Monica's laugh, Monica's stories about her crazy family, Monica's theories about human nature gleaned from years of questioning suspects.
The bar filled with its usual evening crowd. Office workers loosening ties, service industry folks still wearing name tags, retirees who treated the place like their personal club. Everyone had reasons for being there. Most didn't ask about anyone else's.
"You married?" Tommy persisted despite Lawson's obvious disinterest in conversation.
"No."
"Smart. Marriage is complicated enough without throwing a badge into the mix. My ex-wife used to say I loved concrete more than her. Wasn't true, but I couldn't prove it working sixty-hour weeks."
Lawson's phone buzzed against the bar. She glanced at the screen out of habit—probably Richardson with some administrative bullshit that couldn't wait until morning.
Monica's name appeared instead.
Meet me at the old paper mill warehouse. 11 PM. Come alone.
Lawson stared at the message. Two weeks of silence and now this. The paper mill sat in the warehouse district, where drug deals went bad and bodies turned up in dumpsters. Not the kind of place for reconciliation conversations.
Another text followed: I have something on the Rafferty case. Big enough to break it open.
The Rafferty investigation. They'd been working it for months before their fight, following money trails and offshore accounts that led to dead ends. Monica had been convinced someone inside the department was protecting the operation.
Lawson's finger hovered over the reply button. Two weeks of hurt and anger and wounded pride battled against curiosity and something deeper—the hope that maybe Monica had found a reason to reach out beyond work. Or maybe it was the chance Erin needed to make amends herself.
"Another round?" The bartender appeared without being summoned.
Lawson looked at her phone again. 10:15 PM. Forty-five minutes to decide whether to show up or let Monica wait alone in that warehouse district wasteland.
"Yeah. Make it a double."
The whiskey burned going down. Tommy was still talking about construction schedules and permit delays, but his voice faded into background noise. Lawson focused on the phone screen and the messages that might represent an olive branch or just another professional obligation.
10:30 PM. Monica would be getting ready to leave, checking her weapon, grabbing keys. The same pre-operation routine they'd developed over three years of partnership.
Lawson ordered another drink.
10:45 PM. Monica's car would be pulling out of her apartment complex, heading toward the warehouse district and whatever information she'd uncovered about Rafferty.
The bar spun slightly when Lawson turned her head. Four whiskeys on an empty stomach—dinner had been a bag of pretzels and professional guilt.
"You okay there?" Tommy squinted at her with the concern of someone who'd watched too many people drink themselves stupid.
"Have to go." Lawson dropped cash on the bar and grabbed her keys. The parking lot tilted under her feet, but she managed to find her car without falling over. Four drinks wasn't blackout territory. She'd driven in worse condition.
The warehouse district looked different through whiskey-tinted vision. Darker. More threatening. But Monica was there somewhere, waiting with information that could break the Rafferty case wide open.
Lawson checked her weapon and headed into the darkness.
Lawson jerked awake, sheets soaked and wrapped around her legs. Her hand swept across the mattress to empty space where Monica used to sleep. Cool fabric that hadn't held another person's warmth in five years.
The nightmare ended. The guilt didn't.
That fight played on repeat—Monica begging for honesty while Lawson chose career safety over love. Two weeks of silence broken only by Monica's final text message and eventual death.
She'd arrived buzzed, reaction time dulled by whiskey and wounded pride. Four drinks slowing her reflexes when Monica needed her partner at full capacity.
Maybe sober Lawson would have spotted the muzzle flash sooner. Maybe she'd have tackled Monica to the ground before that first shot rang out. Maybe those four whiskeys had cost Monica her life.
Five years of carrying this weight. Five years of letting everyone think Monica's death was random violence when the truth cut deeper: Monica died because Lawson had chosen liquid courage over clear thinking.
She'd never told anyone about their relationship.
Not Richardson, not Internal Affairs, not the detectives who caught Monica's case.
Let them investigate a stranger's murder instead of her girlfriend's execution.
Never mentioned the drinking either—how she'd stumbled through that warehouse lot with whiskey on her breath while Monica bled out on concrete.
She passed off her subsequent alcoholism as grief, and everyone around her had bought it.
They just didn't know that her grief had started two weeks before Monica's death.
Now Blackwell was excavating everything, asking questions that would lead to answers Lawson couldn't afford to give. How long before she found out about Monica and Lawson? How long before someone discovered that she had been impaired when her partner died?
The bedside clock read 4:23 a.m.. Too late for sleep, too early for anything else. Lawson got up and walked to the kitchen, stepping around the bourbon bottle she'd thrown the night before. It sat against the wall, amber liquid catching light from the hallway.
She picked it up and carried it to the sink. The cap came off easily. The alcohol smell rose up, promising to make the memories stop hurting, to dull the sharp edges of what-if and maybe-if.
For maybe ten seconds, she wavered. Four months, two weeks, and four days sober versus the weight of secrets she'd been carrying alone. The bottle trembled in her hands, amber liquid sloshing against glass.
The bourbon spiraled down the drain, disappearing into darkness below.