Chapter Thirty-Three
Sara
The pasta aisle was colder than it needed to be and longer than I remembered. A fluorescent tundra of shapes and promises—rigatoni, penne, orecchiette, shells big enough to swaddle a toddler.
A sample cart was ladling marinara over miniature spirals, the air filled with garlic and a hint of burned tomato. A baby wailed in the next aisle. Someone needed help at the deli.
“Of all the aisles,” O’Dooley said, appearing beside me like a well-dressed ghost with a wire basket, “I expected the avocados. But I’ll admit—pasta has its lure.”
I exhaled a laugh that sounded like relief. “I never really liked avocados,” I said, still looking at the shelves. “I ate them because I thought I should. But they weren’t filling.”
“Avocados are a way of life,” she replied, solemn as scripture. “But they’re not for everyone.”
She didn’t reach for me and I didn’t reach for her. We both did the same subtle sweep—the endcaps, the mirror on the ceiling dome, the two other shoppers who hastened by. Old habits. Then, because pasta couldn’t stall forever, I took a box of penne and held it like a small, edible manifesto.
“Thanks for coming,” I said.
“I’m ‘between meetings,’” she said, little air quotes included. “It’s not the same without you at the office. I have to hide Cleft’s lunch daily and edit the security feed just to keep myself entertained.”
“You’re a menace,” I murmured.
“I might resemble that remark.”
Her hair was swept back, her suit crisp and official. “I’m getting promoted.”
“Did you have to screw anyone for it?”
She choked on a laugh. “Linde, this is why I miss you.”
“I know,” I said softly.
A kid sprinted past us with a bag of sour gummies, trailed by a mother who looked like she’d been awake since last Tuesday. My chest hurt in that old, immediate way—the ache that arrives when the world is normal around you and you are not.
“That’ll be you soon,” O’Dooley said.
“I hope so.” After a pause I set the penne in my cart. It clicked against the wire like a gavel. “I need to know that everyone we found, everything we uncovered, won’t be forgotten.”
“You’re asking me to finish the job you started,” she said, voice neutral, “and to lie for you.”
Put like that, it sounded ugly, but O’Dooley would respect the truth. “Yes,” I said. “The world won’t understand the complexity of this. They never do. There are so many victims who were pulled into this. They shouldn’t be punished for what they had no choice in.”
“I didn’t say no,” O’Dooley said. She tipped her head.
“Serial killers can be dead men. I’ve continued linking names to Jane Does.
Families will soon be getting calls.” A flicker of something warm crossed her face and vanished.
“It isn’t justice, but it’s an answer and even if it’s not the correct one, people need them. ”
O’Dooley reached past me, plucked a box of bucatini, and examined the nutrition label like it might confess something. “You sure you can live on pasta alone?” she asked.
“I’m not Max,” I said, and the words came out before I could stage them.
“I don’t need to risk everything. I would’ve died for the truth of what happened to him, but I’m not that person anymore.
I’ve been offered a chance at a real life and I want it.
All of it. The husband. The kids. The crazy extended family.
I want the lack of sleep, the constant colds, the play dates.
I never allowed myself to even imagine I could have that. ”
O’Dooley turned over the box in her hand.
I added, “I might even write a romance.”
“Now I know you’ve lost your mind.”
I chuckled and shrugged. “If this is how crazy feels, I highly suggest it.”
Then I looked at her. Really looked. The new lines at the corners of her eyes. The way her hand flexed once around the basket handle and then stilled. I wanted to hug her but I doubted she’d accept it.
She’d probably think I was going for her gun. I smiled at the thought.
After a moment she placed the pasta on the shelf and turned toward me. “I will keep digging. I’ll find out who took Max out of the equation—Gravestones, or one of our ‘friends’ at the Bureau. And when I do, I’ll settle the score.”
Tears stung. “Be careful, O’Dooley.”
She gave me a small, noncommittal smile that said both don’t tell me what to do and thank you. “It’s probably better if you don’t tell me where you’re shopping anymore,” she said.
I huffed. “Understood.”
A teenager shoved past us with an avalanche of ramen bricks, leaving behind a slipstream of Axe body spray and hope. O’Dooley watched him go, then returned to me.
“Max was a man of integrity,” she said. “That was his weakness.” She let the words sit, not as an insult but as a diagnosis. “I don’t suffer from the same affliction. Don’t judge me if you get wind of what I do.”
“You say that like I don’t know you,” I said fondly.
She cackled at that.
A cart squeaked to a stop at the end of the aisle. The overhead speaker chimed to tell us peaches were on sale like it was urgent national news. I thought about how clear my vision had been when all I’d sought was the truth about Max. That search had led to a much heavier weight.
“I don’t want to be the villain of this story,” I asked quietly. “But I’m also not the hero.”
O’Dooley sighed. “You’re not a character in a story.
This is reality. You don’t get to pick just the easy parts.
So, when you write that romance, don’t make it the fairy-tale kind we tell children.
Take all the shitty feelings you can’t talk to anyone about and put your heroine through hell. It’ll make you feel better.”
I smiled. “I might actually do that.”
She nodded.
“If you ever need me,” I said, “if it gets ugly—”
“I won’t call you,” she said. “Because I want you to have that house with a picket fence and a dog.”
“We don’t have a house yet, but we do have the dog.”
She checked the time on her watch. “I’d say invite me to the wedding, but don’t.”
“Understood.” I sighed. “I should probably wait for him to propose before I offer to send you a slice of cake in an unmarked box.”
“He’ll ask.”
“I hope so,” I said quietly.
We started to walk down the aisle toward checkout, the kind of pace you take when walking away is both the right thing and the hardest. At the end of the aisle, she stopped.
“One more thing,” she said, and the air around us went still.
I braced.
“You were a good agent,” O’Dooley said. “Not because you followed rules—God knows you didn’t—but because you knew when to break them. Don’t confuse stepping away with failure.”
My eyes burned again. “I won’t.”
The PA crackled: MANAGER NEEDED AT CUSTOMER SERVICE.
“Be careful,” I said again, because I couldn’t help it.
“You too,” she said. “And Sara?”
I looked up.
“No one will ruin your happy ending,” she said. “I’ll make sure of it.”
“That’s a little creepy, O’Dooley.”
“A little? I’ve got to work on my delivery. I’ve been watching your back for a long time, Linde. Not going to stop now.”
My eyes widened. “That’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.”
“Every breath you take. Every move you make . . .” She sang softly as she walked away.
I stood there, mouth open as a memory from my date with Ashen at the diner came flooding back. I’d told her a lot, but I hadn’t told her the details.
She wouldn’t have . . . she couldn’t have . . .
I’m just glad she’s on my side.