14. Roman Osprey #2
I lean in. He’s right; the springs, the abandoned river dock east of town, the old sweetheart paths, they’re all connected through narrow marsh channels hidden from the main roads but are fully accessible by water. It’s the same transport logic as every other GatorX site.
Scarlet stares at the map. “That would let somebody move materials without passing through town.”
“And it matches the distribution pattern from the other cases,” Wes says. “I’m thinking that whoever developed the drug either based it on compounds already tied to instability here or discovered those compounds while studying the original rites.”
I pin one of the lab reports beneath her grandmother’s journal pages. “The residue from the springs overlaps chemically with compounds used in GatorX processing.”
Nobody likes that conclusion, which probably means we’re getting closer.
I reach for another stack of photographs from the archive file and flip through them beside Scarlet’s notes, and then I stop cold. “Wait.”
Wes looks up.
I pull a black-and-white photograph from the pile. In it, packs are gathered near the springs decades earlier during festival season, offerings spread along the dock. And tied beneath the far railing are white ribbons, same placement, same knot pattern as what we found this morning.
Scarlet moves beside me fast enough that her shoulder presses against mine. “Where did that come from?”
“Archive restoration file.”
Wes takes the photograph and turns it over. Handwritten notation runs across the back in faded ink: Emergency release gathering following bond deterioration concerns. Summer of 1978.
The room quiets as everyone makes the same calculation. It’s not separate cases but one system, older than the investigation and deeper than the theft.
Scarlet reads it twice. “Bond deterioration, long before GatorX existed.”
“Like what your grandmother documented,” Wes says.
She exhales slowly. “The release rites weren’t originally malicious. They were emergency rituals.”
“To manage unstable bonds safely,” I say.
“Or try to.”
Wes pins the old photograph beside the current springs images. The past and present face each other across fifty years, of the same problem recurring in the same place.
“If somebody’s recreating these rites now, they’re not improvising,” he says. “They’re following historical precedent. And GatorX may be the pharmaceutical version of something that started here.”
Scarlet presses her fingers beneath her ribs, and her scent dampens faintly with pain.
“You okay?”
She lowers her hand too quickly. “Fine.”
Wes doesn’t say a word. He looks at her, then at the clock, then toward the kitchen. He doesn’t comment. Instead, he opens her refrigerator.
Scarlet turns. “What are you doing?”
“Cooking.”
“You don’t know what I have.”
“I know you have eggs, leftover ham, half an onion, and three kinds of cheese.”
“You inventoried my refrigerator?”
“I opened it.”
“That is how inventories begin.”
Wes removes a skillet from the lower cabinet with the confidence of an alpha on an instructional mission.
She folds her arms. “You can’t solve every emotional problem with protein.”
“No,” he says. “But I can solve the fact that none of us ate dinner.”
“That is annoyingly reasonable.”
“It’s one of his worst traits,” I tell her.
Scarlet sits at the table rather than arguing further. I look back at the wall before my expression gives away anything I haven’t decided to say yet.
Photographs and twine stretch across half the dining room wall now. The theft, the release rites, the GatorX case, her grandmother’s journals, all of it is connected through Sweetheart Haven. The investigation finally looks like something shared.
Wes sets the pan on the stove, and the butter hisses. Scarlet talks us through the differences between release customs while I make notes.
Minutes later, Wes brings plates to the table, with eggs folded around ham, onion, and cheese, and toast browned in the same pan.
Scarlet looks down at hers. “You didn’t have to do this.”
“I wanted to.”
She eats without complaint, which is its own kind of gratitude.
Afterward, Scarlet drifts to the couch with a notebook in her lap. Wes clears the dishes while I transfer my notes into the case file. She keeps explaining older rituals with the focused determination of a woman who intends to outlast her own exhaustion.
“You’re fading,” I tell her.
“I’m sitting upright.”
“Barely.”
She rolls her eyes without any particular heat behind it.
Twenty minutes later, she’s asleep mid-sentence.
“She looks different resting,” Wes says from the kitchen doorway.
Her face has released the tension she carries while awake. One hand rests curled near her cheek, the other still touching the edge of the notebook, as if she plans to resume the argument when she wakes.
“You sound like you’ve known her longer than a few days.”
He doesn’t answer. He doesn’t need to.
I reach for the quilt draped over the back of the couch. Wes stops me with a look, then crosses the room and crouches beside her. His fingers brush loose hair away from her face. Scarlet shifts toward the warmth of his hand in her sleep, cheek turning into his palm.
Wes freezes for half a breath. Then he slides one arm beneath her knees and the other behind her back. She makes a soft sound and curls against his chest.
“Bedroom?” he asks softly.
I nod.
He carries her up the stairs with deliberate care. I gather the notebook and turn off the record player before following.
The evidence remains on the wall. The old photograph still offers more questions than answers. The ribbons may matter. The archive request may matter. The theft, the bond instability, and GatorX may overlap or may only be colliding in the same frightened town. None of it is settled.
The only clear thing tonight is that Scarlet sleeps easier when we’re here. That doesn’t make her ours yet, but it does make leaving feel less simple.