34. Chapter 34 #2
“I can’t,” I whispered.
“You can,” he said softly. “You’re stronger than you feel right now.”
I almost laughed. I almost screamed.
He didn’t know me. Didn’t know the kind of strength it took to keep breathing for ten years with no answers. He didn’t know the kind of weakness it took to show up tonight in the first place.
“I need you to do this,” he added.
I forced myself to stand.
My legs felt wrong, like they belonged to someone else. Like they might fold any second.
The detective keyed something in and pulled the stainless door open.
Cold air spilled out.
Not cool. Not crisp.
Cold like punishment.
Cold like the absence of living things.
I stepped inside, and the smell hit me - sterile and sharp. A clean so aggressive it felt violent. The room was too bright, too white, too quiet. The hum of refrigeration filled my ears like a warning.
I stopped just inside the doorway, unable to move further.
The detective crossed the room and pulled on a latch. He didn’t rush, and that somehow made it worse.
The drawer moved slowly, metal scraping against metal as it slid open.
I locked my knees. Curled my hands into fists so tight my nails cut crescents into my palms. My heart hammered so violently I was certain the sound would give me away, would echo off the sterile walls, announce my fear before I had time to contain it.
Don’t look, I told myself.
I looked anyway.
The sheet covered him at first, just the outline of a body, the suggestion of shoulders, the shape of feet under white fabric.
For one suspended second, my brain tried to paint John there. Tried to force his familiar weight into that outline.
Then the detective folded the sheet back.
And…
Not John.
The realization hit so fast, my lungs seized as if they’d been waiting for permission to breathe.
This man’s skin was darker, weathered, like it had been carved by the sun and years spent outside. His hair was blonde but dull, matted with neglect. A thick beard swallowed most of his face, obscuring whatever softness might have once lived there.
And then the scar.
Jagged and violent. A cruel slash cutting through his eyebrow and down his cheek, angry even in death. A mark that told a story I didn’t recognize.
I knew every line of John’s face. Every freckle. Every familiar plane and hollow. I knew the way his mouth curved when he smiled, the faint crease between his brows when he concentrated, the exact shape of his nose because I’d traced it a thousand times with my thumb.
This wasn’t him.
Relief detonated inside me, sharp and overwhelming, so strong it made my knees wobble. I gripped the edge of the metal tray to keep from collapsing.
“That’s not him,” I said, the words spilling out before the detective could even speak. “That’s not John.”
My voice sounded wrong in the room. Too loud. Too alive. Like it didn’t belong among the stainless steel and silence.
The detective studied me, searching for uncertainty, his gaze flicking between me and the body. Like grief might be making me unreliable.
“You’re sure?” he asked. “It’s been ten years.”
Rage flashed hot through the relief. “Yes, I’m sure,” I snapped, then heard how raw my voice sounded and hated it. “I would know.”
There was no doubt in me. No hesitation. Grief hadn’t erased him, not in the ways that mattered.
The drawer slid shut.
The sound wasn’t mercy.
It was finality.
My lungs remembered how to work and I sucked in a breath that burned. I pressed a hand to my mouth as if I could hold the relief in, keep it from escaping like something shameful.
Not him.
Not John.
For half a second, I wanted to laugh. To cry. To say thank God out loud and mean it with my whole body.
Then guilt seeped in, dark and immediate.
Because someone else’s loved one was still in that drawer. Someone else’s missing person. Someone else’s grief.
The relief turned sour in my chest, sharp and humiliating.
I swallowed hard, ashamed of how fiercely I’d clung to it. Ashamed that my salvation meant another family’s devastation. Ashamed that hope could still feel like this, selfish and necessary all at once.
The detective’s voice was already neutral again. “Thank you,” he said, as if I’d helped him check off an item on a list. “We’ll continue our search.”
He opened the door.
Warm hallway air rushed in, abrupt and unforgiving, washing over me like judgment.
And I stepped back into it, carrying both truths at once. That John was not dead, and that something inside me had just fractured anyway.
I stepped out and leaned against the wall like my body couldn’t remember how to stand without support.
Seth was already there.
He’d gotten closer than he was supposed to. Either someone let him pass, or he’d stopped caring about procedure. His eyes were locked on my face, desperate, searching.
“Well?” he asked, voice cracking on the word.
I swallowed. My throat felt scraped raw.
“It’s not him,” I managed with a small shake of my head.
Seth staggered back like I’d hit him.
For a moment, neither of us spoke.
The hallway buzzed. A door shut somewhere. Someone laughed faintly from a distant office like this place contained normal life too.
Seth dragged a hand down his face, slow and exhausted. “I should’ve found him,” he said quietly.
The words didn’t land softly.
They landed like a confession that didn’t know it was one.
I turned my head toward him sharply. “What?”
Seth’s eyes flicked away and his jaw clenched.
“I should’ve done more,” he said, still not looking at me. “After that night. After the fight.”
My stomach tightened again, not with nausea this time, but something colder.
“What are you saying?” I asked.
Seth finally met my eyes, and there was something in his expression that made my skin go tight.
Not answers.
Not yet.
But the outline of them.
“I’m saying…” His voice broke, and he looked past me, down the hallway toward the exit. “I’m saying I let too much time pass.”
The detective appeared at the end of the hall, walking toward us with the same folder, the same careful face.
“Ms. Larkin,” he said, “we do need to ask you a few questions. Both of you.”
My chest tightened.
Seth’s shoulders rose like he was bracing for impact.