Chapter 36 Angelina
thirty-six
Angelina
Itake the chair beside Cole.
The team looks like they haven't slept in days, because most of them haven't.
Kade sits at the head of the table, jaw tight, dark circles visible even under the harsh overhead lights.
Damian leans against the far wall with his arms crossed.
Vanessa hunches over her laptop while Asher sits beside her, their shoulders touching.
Jax has sprawled in a chair with his leg bouncing a restless rhythm against the floor, and Xander's got his feet up on another chair, but his hands are tight on the armrests.
Miguel stands near Remy by the coffee station, still in scrubs from his last shift. Mira and Alina are with Chesca. Someone had to stay, and Alina volunteered before Mira could argue.
Kade doesn't waste time on preamble.
"Victoria Lockwood. Eight days in custody. Cooperative. Gave us Monroe, which led to the safe house, which led to Walsh." He pauses. "She also gave us fourteen dead judges."
"Fourteen that we know of." Damian's voice is flat. "She lost count."
Jax's leg stops bouncing.
"What are our options?" I ask.
"Three." Kade ticks them off. "Hand her to the FBI. Monroe's been removed, but his network might still have tendrils. Release her, and she's dead inside a week. Or we keep her. Protection in exchange for cooperation."
"We're talking about employing a serial killer." Xander's feet hit the floor.
"We're talking about a pharmaceutical expert who can identify unknown compounds in minutes, and she still has a communication channel to her handler." Kade's voice is flat. "The question is whether that's worth the moral cost."
"It's worth it to me."
Everyone looks at Vanessa.
She's staring at her hands, flat on the table, deliberately still.
"Last year." Her voice drops. "The neurotoxin."
The full story is something I've only pieced together from fragments, from the way certain topics make the team go silent.
"Vanessa." Asher's voice is gentle. A warning.
"No." She shakes her head. "She needs to hear this."
She looks at me.
"The compound was custom. Targeted to my neurochemistry. Someone knew about my ADHD, knew exactly how to shut down my dopamine pathways." She swallows. "Remy didn't recognize it. Nobody did."
"Three days." Asher's voice is rough, stripped of its usual control. "Three days of watching her seize and crash and come back and crash again. I stopped sleeping. Stopped eating. Almost killed Jax when he tried to pull me out of the room."
"You did try to kill me," Jax mutters.
"You lived."
It's not a joke. The flatness in his voice makes my stomach turn.
"She flatlined twice." His jaw is tight. "The second time, it took Kade putting me in a bear hug to keep me from destroying the medical bay."
I look at Kade. He nods once.
"I don't remember most of it." Vanessa reaches for Asher's hand. "I was unconscious. But they remember." He takes it, his knuckles going white. "Miguel remembers."
Miguel sets down his coffee cup. The ceramic clicks against the counter, too loud in the quiet room.
"I had to watch my little sister die by inches.
" He doesn't look at Vanessa. Can't, maybe.
"And I had to keep it from our parents. Couldn't tell them she was seizing every few hours, that her kidneys were failing, that we didn't know if there'd be brain damage.
" He stares at the floor. "I run differential diagnoses in my sleep. I couldn't diagnose my own sister."
Vanessa's grip on Asher's hand tightens.
"Victoria Lockwood has a PhD in pharmaceutical chemistry.
" Her voice is steady now, hard. "She synthesizes compounds for a living.
Poisons. Sedatives. Things that kill without leaving traces.
She could have identified that neurotoxin in fifteen minutes.
Could have told us exactly how to counteract it. "
No one speaks. Remy shifts his weight against the counter, looking at the floor.
"She could have saved me three days of dying. She could have saved them three days of watching."
Under the table, Cole's hand finds mine. His fingers thread through mine, and the tension I'd been holding in my shoulders releases.
I think about what it would do to him to watch me slip away for three days. The violence that would come after. The breaking that might never heal.
"That's not nothing," I say quietly.
"No." Vanessa's grip on Asher loosens slightly. "It's not."
Kade lets the silence sit for a moment before he continues. "She's the only thread to her handler. Handler doesn't know she's compromised. We could feed false intel, track communications back to whoever's running this."
"And her pharmaceutical knowledge is real," Remy adds, pushing off from the counter. "Having a poison expert on retainer isn't the worst idea."
"On retainer." Xander shakes his head. "We're really doing this."
"We're considering it," Kade corrects. "That's why we're here."
"She's killed more people than I have." Damian hasn't moved, arms still crossed, shoulder blades against the wall.
But his voice has an edge I haven't heard before.
"Doesn't make her innocent. Doesn't make the bodies disappear.
But I know what I am. She knows what she is.
" His eyes find mine. "That's useful. If you're willing to live with what it means. "
Uncle Sal's voice echoes in my head. The judgeship I didn't earn.
The verdict three years ago, the drug case where his people were the suppliers and I found a technicality to throw it out.
The defendant's face when I announced the ruling, confused at first, then slowly understanding that justice had nothing to do with it.
That's what you do for family. You protect your own.
Cole's thumb traces across my knuckles. Grounding.
"She has to agree," I say. "We offer. We don't force."
Kade nods. "Then let's make the offer."
The holding room isn't a cell, but it's close.
A bed with actual sheets, a small table with two chairs, fluorescent light that someone dimmed to something bearable. The air smells like industrial cleaner and recycled ventilation.
Victoria Lockwood sits on the edge of the bed with her hands folded in her lap. She looks up when we enter, and her shoulders draw back, chin lifting. Bracing for a verdict.
"Judge Castellano." Her voice is soft, measured. "I wasn't expecting you."
"I wasn't expecting to be here."
The corner of her mouth twitches.
Kade hangs back by the door. Damian takes the wall. This is my conversation now.
I take the chair across from her.
Up close, she looks worse than she did on the feeds. Pale green eyes red-rimmed, skin stretched tight over her cheekbones. Her hands tremble where they're folded, a constant fine tremor she can't seem to control.
"You know why we're here," I say.
"To tell me what you've decided."
"To offer you a choice."
Her hands still. She presses them flat against her thighs, steadying them by force.
"You can walk out today. We won't stop you." I let that sit. "But you know what happens. Your handler finds out you've been compromised. You know what happens to compromised assets."
She doesn't flinch. She's had eight days to think about this.
"What's the other option?"
"You stay. Work with us. Your expertise, your knowledge, your cooperation." I hold her gaze. "In exchange, we keep you safe."
"Protected." The word comes out hollow. "By the people whose colleagues I murdered."
"Some of them, yes."
She looks down at her hands. The tremor is back, visible against her thighs.
"I stopped counting." Her eyes stay on her hands. "After the first ten."
"I know. Damian told us."
She nods. Of course he did.
"Why would you help me? After everything I've done."
"Because I understand being handed a script and told it was the truth."
Victoria's hands press harder against her thighs.
"I understand making choices you can't take back because someone convinced you there was no other way." I hold her gaze. "It doesn't make you innocent. Doesn't erase the bodies. But it makes you human. And humans can choose differently."
Her hands are shaking again. One tear tracks down her cheek. She doesn't wipe it away.
"What do you need me to do?"
"For now? Rest. Eat. Let Remy check your medical status." I stand. "We'll figure out the rest."
Her shoulders drop.
I turn toward the door.
"Judge Castellano."
I stop. Look back.
"Thank you." Victoria's voice catches. "For not pretending I deserve this."
I don't have an answer for that. Because I'm not sure either of us does.
Cole is waiting in the hallway. He doesn't ask how it went, just falls into step beside me, his hand finding the small of my back.
We walk in silence. Then:
"She said she stopped counting."
His hand tightens against my spine.
"I told her I understood."
"Do you?"
Uncle Sal. The favors that keep accumulating like interest on a debt I'll never pay off.
"More than I want to."
Cole doesn't respond. But when we reach the elevator, he pulls me close and the doors slide shut.
I close my eyes and let it be enough.