Chapter Text
1.
Rose had been inside Alexandria for one month, and it still felt wrong on every level.
The streets were clean, people walked on sidewalks without a care in the world, and the houses looked squared away in a way that made her feel like she was in an old Twilight Zone episode.
The people spoke honestly, smiled quickly, trusted easily, and they kept moving through their days as if the dead world outside the walls was only a rumor. They stood in the open and chatted with their backs exposed. They left doors cracked because they wanted air.
Rose had lived too long without that kind of denial, and she couldn’t pretend it didn’t bother her. She couldn’t turn it off. She didn’t want to.
She stood near the street corner by the gate because it gave her a clear view of the gate and the street beyond it. It also gave her angles. She could see the catwalk, the tower shadows, the stretch of road outside, and the first ten yards inside where everything would turn ugly if it turned at all. She kept her posture neutral and her arms free to fight if she needed to. She kept her gaze moving so nobody could say she looked tense, and she kept her weight on the balls of her feet so she could move without telegraphing it.
She wore her jeans and a tank top, and her gun belt sat low and snug on her hips with a knife in a plain sheath where it could be seen, and the only thing left in the world that was truly hers— her snake gun.
It had been her dad’s, and it was the only thing she had left of the world before. It was a beautiful old Colt Python, with a six-inch blued barrel. These days, she was running mostly .38 specials through it, but she had a couple of extra speedloaders of .357 just in case. .357 was getting hard to come by, and unless she learned how to reload, it was just going to keep getting scarcer.
She watched the catwalk guards change shifts. She studied the hinges at the outer gate, analyzed the weld lines, the weak points, and the places where the metal looked older than the rest. She kept doing it even though she told herself she should stop.
If you stare at the gate too long, somebody might think you’re planning to leave.
Like Jack.
She made herself look away, let her eyes drift to the porches and flowerpots and the tidy little useless flower gardens. She let her face settle into the calm expression she used for Deanna’s meetings and community dinners and her patrols.
She looked harmless naturally, and it was easy to convince people she was weak when she needed to. It was easy to convince them she would listen. It was easy to let men talk over her, think she was pliable, think she was safe to underestimate. Sometimes it was a performance. Sometimes it was just the fastest way to get what she wanted.
But sometimes she couldn’t help it. Certain men made her feel helpless, and that scared her.
There was a shout on the wall and the sound of vehicles beyond.
“Open up!” the gate guard called. “It’s Aaron. He brought some newbies.”
The metal squealed a little and then groaned, and her attention locked on the gate with narrowed eyes. Her hand went toward her revolver, waiting to see whether she was going to have to escalate, descalate, or just kill.
The gate rolled open with a bang. The sound carried down the street, and it cut through the small talk and laughter.
People turned their heads to watch, and a few stepped off the curb. A kid stopped pedaling his bike and stared. A screen door creaked open somewhere behind her. Rose hated the way curiosity pulled the civilians out into the open like nothing could possibly go wrong.
Aaron stepped through first. He held his hands open and kept his shoulders relaxed, but his eyes weren’t relaxed. It told her that the group he was bringing in was tough, maybe dangerous.
Behind him came a very large group that looked dust-covered, starving, and exhausted. They moved in a tight cluster, and they took in everything. They watched the roofs. They watched the corners. They watched the people watching them.
It was dangerous bringing in such a big group.
Rose counted them without thinking. She noted weapons and watched their hands. She saw the way each person shifted their weight, how quickly they could move, and whether they had any suspicious bulges around their waists, ankles, or anywhere a weapon could be hidden.
Then she saw the savage-looking man carrying a baby in one arm and a Colt Python in the other, not quite the same as hers, but jarring just the same. She’d found plenty of semi-autos and cheaper brand revolvers, but the snake guns had all but disappeared. She figured many of them were locked away in gun safes, probably forever.
Her eyes stung when she dragged her eyes from the gun to the baby, and her breathing became shallow before she could fight it back and lock it down.
Don’t think.
He walked through the gate with the baby on his hip while the rest of the group orbited around him. They weren’t clustered randomly. They had a formation. He had the gravity in the group.
He was the leader for sure.
One of the baby’s chubby fists was twisted into his shirt collar, and his arm held her steady without any effort, like it was completely natural and he’d been doing it for a long time.
Her father, or near enough.
His beard was thick and untrimmed, and dust clung to it. His hair fell across his forehead and stuck in places from sweat. His clothes were worn and stained, and they looked chosen for function rather than comfort. He was exhausted in the eyes and hard everywhere else— a state of being that she knew all too well.
He didn’t look around wide-eyed and stunned the way most newcomers did, and he didn’t stare at the neat yards or the clean vehicles.
His eyes did what the rest of his group’s eyes had done. They swept across rooftops and windows. He tracked shadows and angles and corners. He measured the distance between people and how far the guards were from their weapons.
Rose felt her pulse pick up and kept her breathing steady against the jolt of recognition. It was the ugly comfort of seeing someone else who lived the way she lived.
He is already mapping the place and figuring out where the weak points are…and my God, he’s gorgeous!
The baby shifted, and the muscles in his forearm flexed automatically to stabilize her weight. It made Rose’s chest tighten in a way she didn’t like, and she forced her face to stay blank. She kept her expression sweet and neutral, the way she’d learned to do when eyes were on her. She let him see a harmless woman on a street corner, not the computer in her head running threat matrices.
Nicholas stepped forward beside Aaron, and Rose’s jaw set before she could stop it. He was a leader of a security team, and he carried himself as if that meant something.
He was also an asshole.
He lifted his hands and spoke in a calm voice that was very practiced and irritating as hell.
“We need you to hand over your weapons while you’re inside,” Nicholas said. “Standard procedure if you’re staying.”
The street went quieter, and the atmosphere changed.
Rose saw it in the newcomers immediately. Their bodies tightened and their eyes sharpened. The crossbow man’s hand slid lower on the stock, and his biceps flexed as he readied himself to bring it up.
The Asian man flexed his fingers once near his holster and then held them still. A woman next to him with her hair pulled back shifted half a step, and she opened a line of sight that kept Nicholas and Aaron in view while watching the Asian man’s side. Two people she hadn’t clocked as fighters a second ago stepped just slightly to change the geometry of their group, putting soft bodies behind hard bodies and hard bodies in front of the leader without anyone saying a word.
The man with the baby went very still. Rose didn’t see fear in his eyes or demeanor. She saw decision.
He walked forward a few paces like he owned the place, taking it all in, including the people closest to him.
He carried the large Colt revolver in his hands, and it looked like a natural extension of himself.
“We don’t know if we want to stay,” he drawled in a gravelly voice. “If we were gonna use them, we would have started already,” he said with a dismissive and somewhat mocking look at Nicholas.
Nicholas was sweating, and his grip shifted on his rifle.
If one person moves wrong, this whole thing turns into a bloodbath.
She started walking before she could debate it. She moved at an even pace, and she kept her hands visible though still near her belt. She didn’t rush because rushing would make them read her as part of the threat. She didn’t hesitate because hesitation would make them read her as weak.
Maybe she should have looked weak in front of them, but it was too late now. She’d already started moving, and this was her job, after all.
Nicholas noticed her first and frowned. “Rose—”
She ignored him. Not to humiliate him, but because she needed the man with the baby to keep his attention where she wanted it.
The man’s gaze snapped to her and tracked her in a steady sweep.
Revolver. Boots. Knife. Belt. Hands. Shoulders. Face.
He didn’t linger on her body. He assessed her, and her skin prickled under that look. She kept her posture loose, but it was hard.
He doesn’t miss details. I need him to see that I’m not here to make this worse.
She stopped a few feet away. Close enough to speak without raising her voice and far enough that he didn’t have to react to her presence.
Up close, he looked harder, and his presence felt more monolithic. The beard shadowed a mouth that didn’t look like it had ever smiled. His eyes were pale blue and sharp, and they had the switched-on edge of someone who had stayed alert for too long.
The man had the thousand-yard stare. He’d seen things, just like she had…probably worse things.
“Hey.” Rose nodded once to him. “You’re right to be cautious, but you don’t have to worry,” she said. “This place is really what it looks like.”
He stared at her without blinking. The stare had weight, and it felt almost clinical, not dramatic. He wasn’t trying to intimidate her, even though he did.
Rose made herself hold that gaze even though it was uncomfortable. She gave him back that same stare as much as she could, pulling from her own time outside the walls.
His eyes shifted for a fraction of a second, and she felt it when he registered the similarity between them. The color of their eyes was too close. The same pale shade and silver flecks, the same sharpness. A contained flicker crossed his gaze, and Rose felt something cold settle in her stomach.
He sees it now. He sees me.
She lowered her eyes only long enough to look at the baby. Her little chubby cheeks were red, and the sun was too bright on her head.
Rose let her face soften for one breath, and she could not stop the shaky exhale that slipped out.
“She’s getting too hot,” Rose said quietly. “There’s shade under that tree if you want to move over there.”
His eyes narrowed, but his expression didn’t change. His attention sharpened, and Rose could feel the line she had inadvertently stepped over.
She’d told the leader what to do, and she had the feeling that not many people did that.
Aaron seemed to have tried, if the big bruise on his face was any indication. He wouldn’t have purposely done anything to provoke a fight, which meant one of these people made the first move. She’d bet a thousand rounds of ammo it was the man in front of her.
She stayed still. “You can keep watching us,” she added. “We can go over there, or you can let someone else hold her over there for a minute, but babies overheat very fast, as I’m sure you know.”
He stared at her for an uncomfortably long time. Then, without taking an eye off her for a second, he made a short gesture with two fingers, and a teenage boy wearing a deputy’s Stetson hurried forward.
Rose’s eyes flicked to the other newcomers behind him, and she watched the response.
Two of them moved in, flanking the kid without discussion. The baby was transferred carefully, and the kid carried her toward the shade. The two adults stayed close to him with their bodies angled outward and their eyes on the street.
Rose nodded to herself as she watched it and felt a brief, grim approval. They were like her— same kind of instincts, same kind of people.
Rose held the man’s gaze again, then she turned her head slightly toward Aaron. “Let me talk to him for a minute,” she said.
Aaron hesitated, then nodded once. His husband limped forward, and Aaron put an arm around his waist to help him balance. She hadn’t noticed that he’d done something to his ankle.
“Eric, why don’t you go see Pete. We’ll be okay,” she called out to the gentle man.
Eric looked at Aaron uncertainly, but Aaron just gave him a small smile and murmured something to him. Eric had a gentle softness that didn’t belong out in the open when strangers were holding weapons.
Felicia, one of the wall guards, came forward and put his arm over her shoulders, and they walked off to the infirmary.
Nicholas looked irritated with their decision, but didn’t argue with them. He really didn’t have the authority to go against her wishes when it came to the rules around here, which was slightly astonishing considering he was the leader of the wall security and had been here since the beginning, and she was a relative newcomer.
Nicholas would remember this later.
Rose caught the new man’s eyes. He’d been watching her the entire time, probably coming to conclusions about her just like she had about him.
She narrowed her eyes at him for a second, then let out a breath, turned, and started walking down the street. She did it on purpose. She gave her back to the man because she wanted to show trust, and she wanted him to follow without feeling trapped.
Her shoulders tensed anyway because every instinct she had said not to do it. He still had the revolver, but it was on his hip now. And she had hers.
Fraternal twins, she thought wryly.
Still, her shoulder blades itched thinking that he could put a bullet through her back in no time flat. If she acted scared, he’d read it as weakness. If she acted tough, he’d read it as a challenge. The only safe lane was competence with no drama or pretense.
The sound of his boots behind her made her shiver. His step was brisk, but not hurried. It had that deliberate authority that made people instinctively move out of the way without being told. It reminded her of Jack in the most superficial sense— taking up space and refusing to cede it— but the resemblance ended there. Jack’s presence was volatile and moody. This man’s presence was all control and leashed violence.
She walked far enough that Nicholas couldn’t hear them clearly while staying close enough that he didn’t feel like she was trying to separate him from his baby or the group.
She stopped near the foundation of a half-built porch where the wood was pale and raw. It made the place look unfinished and too new.
Rose turned to face him.
He was closer than she expected, and she backed away, eyes flicking toward the far wall where she saw the silhouette of the man she’d come to know better than anyone else in the five months they’d been together. She felt it in her spine, the old reflex to shrink, to soften, to become less.
Rose locked it down because that could not happen here.
The wild-looking man stood in the street right in front of her with his shoulders loose and his face blank. Despite that, he felt coiled, like a rattlesnake.
His eyes stayed on her, and they were so damn familiar that it was like looking in a mirror. She could pull off that carefully opaque glance, too, when she wanted to. She could hold her face still and do violence anyway.
He didn’t speak; he just waited.
Rose took one steady breath. She didn’t like that she wanted to yield a little to him, not out of fear, but out of a strange instinctive recognition of dominance that didn’t need to announce itself like Jack’s.
She didn’t fight the feeling, but she refused to let it make her stupid.
“The place is exactly what it looks like,” she said. “Food. Water. Beds. Walls.”
His eyes tightened slightly, slight wrinkles forming from squinting at the sun for too many months. “Why should I believe a word that comes outta your mouth?”
Rose felt the corner of her mouth lift. “Because I have no reason to lie,” she said, and she knew he would not accept that alone.
“I was out there for about eight months alone. Totally alone before I found someone. I just got here with my partner a month ago, and I felt the same way you do. Actually, I know this place isn’t a trap, but I still feel uneasy sometimes. I know how bad people can get, and I know what I had to do sometimes to survive. These people are good.”
He looked skeptical, and his gaze moved over her again. He was still analyzing the street and the distance back to his group, and probably wondering if she was a lure.
She reached behind her, and she watched him tense and go completely still. She pulled a water bottle from the webbing of the bag on her back. She offered it to him, and he just narrowed his eyes.
She raised her eyebrows and took a drink, then wiped her mouth and held it out again. “Proof that it’s not poisoned. I wasn’t sure if Aaron gave you guys the supplies that he takes out with him. You guys don’t seem to be the trusting type.”
“Trusting types die fast,” the man rasped.
“True. If you didn’t take the supplies, Aaron’s probably upset right now,” she commented, glancing around him to where Aaron stood with a tiny smile on her face.
He tilted his head. “Why?”
“Because Aaron hates applesauce, and he’s been trying to get rid of it for months. Literally makes him gag just looking at it. He wanted Ruth to make apple pie filling with the apples instead, but she made applesauce just to spite him. Deanna’s going to make him eat it if he can’t unload it on unsuspecting new people. He tried to give it to my partner and me when he found us out there too.”
The man’s mouth didn’t move much, but Rose caught the smallest shift at the corner of it, almost hidden by his beard, like he wanted to laugh but strangled it out of a need to remain composed.
He lifted his chin, “And did you take it?”
She snorted, “Do I look stupid?”
He didn’t seem to be any more relaxed after their little chat than he was before. She hadn’t expected them to become best buddies, but less murderous would have been a good start.
Still, she trusted her instincts, and they told her that this man, this group, was a good one despite what they looked like. The way they moved said they had discipline. The way he held the baby said the innocent in his group were his priority. The way he watched constantly said he’d kept people alive.
She wanted to make him stay.
Rose stepped half a pace closer, careful and deliberate, and he reacted fast enough that it raised the hair on her arms. He inhaled sharply and moved back with a low, rough sound, his hand dropping to the butt of the pistol on his hip. His fingers curled, ready to draw, and his body set for a fight.
Rose’s own hand was on the butt of her revolver too. Not to threaten him. To match him. To keep the math honest. She froze and held his feral gaze until the tension eased a fraction.
“I just don’t want to be overheard,” she said, keeping her voice low and even. She didn’t go any closer. She didn’t try to soothe him with a smile. “Most of the people that live here haven’t ever been outside these walls.”
His eyes sharpened with disbelief. He thought she was lying.
“I’m serious. And your baby needs a safe place,” Rose continued. “A place with food and milk and shelter. It’s hard out there for everybody, but a baby…You’ve been on the road a long time with your people. I can tell. This place is safe. If it were fake, you would already know. You’d see it or feel it. You see everything. I can tell that too.”
He stared at her for a second, his look intense and cold at the same time. “You don’t look scared,” he said.
“I’m not,” Rose answered, a little taken aback. It wasn’t what she had been expecting him to say.
“You should be.”
Rose let out a small breath. “Probably. Maybe I’m an idiot, or maybe I don’t have anything left to lose.”
His mouth tightened as if he had just heard something he didn’t want to hear.
His gun hand didn’t move, but his fingers eased off the grip by a fraction, then curled again. He held still, and the stillness looked deliberate.
His gaze dropped to her own revolver, her gun belt, her knife, and then to her hands, and it came back to her eyes. That sharp focus didn’t soften, but it shifted to be less dismissive and more careful.
His head tilted a little. “Don’t say that,” he said flatly.
The words were not gentle, and they weren’t meant to be caring. They came with the same tone he had used at the gate when Nicholas asked for guns. It was a warning.
She kept her shoulders loose on purpose, even though the ingrained urge to fold in on herself pressed at her.
Rick’s jaw clenched once, and his eyes flicked past her shoulder toward the street and then back again, as if he was making sure nobody else could hear what she had just admitted.
“People who talk that way, people who have nothing left to lose, do dumb things,” he added quietly, ducking his head to study her eyes more carefully.
This close, Rose saw the faintest sheen of something like psychopathy bleeding through. It wasn’t madness or frothing rage. It was just the cold switch, the part of him that could decide to kill if he needed to and feel nothing about it afterward. It was clinical, and it was protective. It was terrifying for everyone except the people he claimed as his own.
“People who do dumb things usually get other people hurt. I don’t want anybody’s stupidity getting my people hurt.”
He was looking at her as a risk now, and that was the last thing she’d wanted.
Rose made her face settle back into neutral, but she didn’t apologize or backpedal. She simply corrected the impression.
“I don’t do dumb things,” she said. “I do necessary things.”
His eyes narrowed slightly, as if that answer pleased him and irritated him at the same time.
“What happened to you?” he asked, moving in closer than she would have expected for a man like him.
She huffed. It wasn’t sympathy he was offering; it was intel gathering, plain and simple. He wanted to know what kind of threat she was, what kind of weakness she had, and what kind of line she might cross. She respected him more for it.
Rose’s breath caught at his proximity and then smoothed out again. She didn’t step away, but she didn’t step into him either. She held the distance he’d established because she could feel that this was a test, and she refused to fail it by panicking.
Her eyes flicked over his shoulder to the wall. Just a quick glance to see if she was safe.
She saw Jack’s outline up there on the catwalk in the distance. She recognized the shape of his shoulders and the angle of his head.
He had been moving a second ago. Now he was still. He was looking down toward the street.
Watching.
The glance lasted a split second before Rose brought her eyes back to Rick’s face and let her expression settle into neutral. Rick had followed her line of sight, seeing what she saw.
She didn’t answer his question. She held his gaze and waited for him to decide whether he was going to press it or drop it.
Rose could still hear faint movement near the gate. A voice called out and got answered. Somewhere down the block, a kid laughed too loudly, and the sound felt wrong against the tension she was mired in right now.
Ironically, the sound of the laughing kid seemed to make the man relax just a fraction. It was only noticeable in the slight lessening of the wrinkles around his eyes.
Rose leaned in slightly and angled her mouth near his ear. She did it slowly, telegraphing, giving him time to decide whether he was going to flinch or strike. His body locked up with restraint, and the muscles along his jaw jumped once, but he let her be there. That alone told her something.
“Give them your guns so that you can stay,” she whispered. “If not for yourself, then do it for your baby. If anything feels wrong, you can take this place with knives. You don’t need firearms to do it. I guarantee it.”
She pulled back.
His jaw ticked, and he looked at her with something that was half scorn and half incredulity. “Why would you tell me that?”
“Because I don’t want you to destroy this place if you don’t have to,” Rose said. “There are families here. Kids. And your group is not the kind that hurts people for fun. I’ve seen that kind. You aren’t it. Also, I think you need this place, at least for a little while.”
His eyes searched hers slowly, looking for the lie, and Rose kept her face still.
Then he leaned in, much closer than she had been, using dominance as a tool. Rose’s hand slid to the Colt. His eyes dropped to the movement for a fraction of a second, and she was sure he knew exactly what she was doing.
A low, rough sound left his throat before he even started talking, and she had to brace herself to keep from shivering like an idiot.
“If you’re lyin’ to me,” he warned softly, “I’ll kill you in a heartbeat, let you bleed out here on the street, and forget you existed a second later. You mean nothing to me. Remember that.”
Rose’s pulse kicked once, hard. She forced herself to breathe out slowly while looking him in the eyes. “I’m not lying.”
He held her gaze for another long moment without blinking. He looked as if he was making a decision he didn’t enjoy.
Then he tilted his head in a challenge. “We’re not giving up our weapons.”
Rose studied him for a long moment.
He stood there in front of her like he had all day to wait and all night to kill. The sun hit the dust in his beard and the sweat on his hairline and made him almost shimmer in the morning light.
His eyes stayed on hers without flicking away or softening. He looked like he had made peace with doing ugly things and was only deciding whether today was the day he did another one.
Rose kept her face neutral, too, but she could feel the change in the air between them. It was not just two potential threats measuring each other. It sat lower than that, tighter in her abdomen, like a wire pulled taut. She didn’t understand why, and she didn’t let it show.
She dipped her chin.
“I’ll compromise with you,” she said, holding his eyes while she laid it out. “Talk to our leader first and then decide. You stay, then the weapons stay in the armory until you want to go outside the gate. If you leave, that’s your choice. We never hold people here who don’t want to stay; they’re a strain on resources, and we have no interest in babysitting.”
Rick’s gaze narrowed slightly in calculation. His eyes flicked past her shoulder again and then returned to her face.
“You got authority to make deals?” he asked.
“I do,” Rose said.
He held her stare for another moment. His jaw shifted as if he was locking something down before it could come out of his mouth.
He gave a short, sharp nod. “Fine,” he said. “We talk first.”
Rose offered her hand. “Deal.”
Rick’s eyes flicked down, then up. He took her hand and gave her one firm shake, then released.
Rose’s mouth twitched. “Well. Look at us.”
Rick’s voice stayed low. “Don’t make it weird.”
Rose nodded. “If you shoot me now, it’ll be considered friendly fire.”
He just stared at her, an expression of near contempt on his face.
Rose exhaled quietly through her nose. She knew he could keep his weapons after meeting Deanna anyway, if he wanted. She knew the kind of men who smiled, agreed, and then took what they wanted with gunfire and strength.
She also knew, with a certainty she didn’t fully trust, that he was not that kind. Not with kids inside these walls, anyway.
“Come on,” Rose said. She felt him follow immediately.
They walked back toward the gate at an easy pace. Rose kept her hands visible and her posture loose. She could feel him beside her, close enough that his presence made the air electric, and she could feel the way his attention stayed tuned to her movements like he was still deciding what she was.
And she was still deciding what he was, too.
She did not give him any reason to think she was afraid, and she did not give the people watching them any reason to think she had lost control of the situation.
As they approached, the street tension tightened again.
Nicholas’s shoulders were stiff, and he was holding his rifle higher like he wanted to remind everyone that he had it.
Aaron was watching Rose, then Rick, then the cluster of newcomers nearby to read the situation. Aaron was an excellent judge of character and of situations.
Rose stopped where everyone could hear her. “They’ll keep their weapons until after they talk to Deanna,” she said.
Nicholas’s face pinched instantly. “That’s not proto—”
Aaron lifted a hand, palm out, cutting him off without looking at him.
Nicholas stopped mid-word, irritated.
Aaron looked at her, then Nicholas, then Rick. “I’ll take full responsibility if anything goes wrong.”
“And me,” Rose said, glancing at Rick from the corner of her eye.
For a moment, nobody moved.
The newcomers watched the walls and the people on them. The Alexandrians watched the newcomers. The guards on the catwalk shifted and adjusted their grips on rifles. It felt like everyone was waiting for the first mistake.
Aaron looked at the kid with the baby again, then met the man’s eyes directly. “Rick,” Aaron said, and Rose’s attention sharpened at the name.
“Why don’t you go first?” Aaron suggested.
Rick didn’t answer right away. He glanced once toward his group, and Rose saw it in the way their bodies reacted to that single look.
Rick’s eyes returned to Aaron. “Fine,” he said.
“Do what you need to do, just do me a big favor and don’t burn it down on your first day. Not without giving the place a chance,” she said quietly without looking at him.
He didn’t smile, but he gave a small nod, so small that it was almost imperceptible. To her, it felt like a huge accomplishment. She’d talked to the feral leader and made it out alive.
Then he turned and walked back toward his people without looking at her again.
Rose stayed where she was for a moment longer than she needed to. She watched the space he left behind, and she felt certainty settle in her bones.
If this place ever tries to hurt what he loves, he will not hesitate to destroy it, to destroy us all— and I’m probably first on his list.
She turned back toward the gate and kept her face calm, because people were watching, and she had learned that the safest thing she could look inside Alexandria was ordinary.
Rose took three steps away and told herself that was enough. She’d said what she needed to say, and he’d made his choice.
Then something pulled at her, and she stopped.
Don’t. Leave it alone. Don’t be an idiot.
She didn’t leave it alone, and she cringed at herself even as she made the decision.
“Hey, Rick?” she called, and she kept her voice calm so it wouldn’t sound urgent.
He turned so fast it looked violent. His shoulders tightened, his stance shifted, and one hand flexed near his pistol.
Behind him, the crossbow man tensed and narrowed his eyes, taking a few steps closer to the leader. The rest of their group tightened in ways that would’ve looked casual to someone who didn’t know what to look for.
Rose felt the margin of error in her bones.
Five seconds. That’s it. Five seconds from me bleeding out on this clean pavement if I move wrong.
She slowed on purpose before she reached him, keeping her hands visible.
His eyes were cold. “What?”
She stepped close enough that she didn’t have to raise her voice. She angled her body slightly so she wasn’t squared up to him, and she kept her gaze level.
“After you see Deanna,” she murmured, “If you decide to stay, you’ll probably get a visit from Jessie. She brings new people food and supplies. That kind of thing.”
His jaw tightened. “And?”
“She’ll offer to cut your hair.”
Something shifted in his eyes. It wasn’t interest, it was suspicion. She wondered if he’d even let anyone near his head with scissors.
“She used to do it before the world fell apart,” Rose added quietly. “Hairdresser.”
He stared at her as if he was waiting for the trap to spring.
“Why’re you tellin’ me this?” he snapped, still low.
Rose lifted her gaze to his and actually looked at him for a second instead of reading him.
His hair was thick under the dust. Dark and wavy and wild from wind and sweat and weeks without care. The beard framed his face in a way that made him look harder than he already was, and it didn’t belong in a place like this, a place of social constraints and cul-de-sacs. It belonged out there beyond the walls. He was rugged and strong, functional and real.
It was part of the reason she liked it so much. A tiny smile tugged at her mouth before she could stop it. She hid it fast.
“Whatever you do,” she said, “don’t let her get her hands on that,” she said, jerking her chin up a little.
His brows pulled together. “That what?”
“Your hair, that epic beard,” Rose said, and her eyes slid over him once, slower this time, brushing past his surprisingly full lips, then came back to his. “It’s gorgeous.”
He went very still, and the street felt quieter again. Rose could hear the faint clink of metal as someone shifted.
“You flirtin’ with me?” he asked flatly, looking very uninterested and more suspicious now than he’d been since he walked through the gate.
“No,” Rose said immediately, and flinched before she could stop it.
She inhaled a jerky breath, trying to calm her racing heart. Her eyes flicked to the wall on instinct before she turned away from Rick’s intense stare.
Jack was up there on the catwalk, motionless. Still looking down toward the street. Still watching her and Rick…watching them stand close, shake hands, lean in…
Her stomach dropped, and her mouth dried at the thought.
Shit, shit, shit…
The look lasted a split second. Rose dragged her attention back to the man’s face, and she shook her head. Her hands stayed open, but her fingers trembled, and she hated that he saw it.
“No,” she said more slowly. She licked her lips, swallowed, and tried again. “No. Sorry. Nothing like that. I just… don’t want them to change you, to try to make you fit in more.”
His mouth pulled into something that resembled a sneer or disgust. “You don’t know anything about me,” he said icily.
She gave a small shrug, as if it didn’t matter. “I know,” she said. “Do whatever you want, of course. I just wanted you to know that it suits you.”
She took one step back. Then another.
He didn’t move, and he didn’t soften as she walked away. He watched her with that same hard focus, and it made her feel exposed in a way she didn’t like.
It was obvious that he was repelled by the thought of her flirting with him, and that served her right. It was as it should be. She hadn’t been flirting with him, but it definitely came across that way.
Rose turned her back on him and walked away. She kept her pace even, and she didn’t look back.
You’re such a dumbass.
Rose didn’t let herself stand there and watch them all day.
She went back to her little house and made herself do the normal things. She rinsed out a cup that didn’t need rinsing. She wiped down a counter that was already clean. She checked her knife on her belt twice and told herself she was just being thorough and to stop touching the damn thing already.
She could still feel his stare on the back of her head, and she hated that it lingered.
Get a grip. He’s a stranger. He also doesn’t like you very much and will probably kill you if he so much as trips over a curb and scrapes his knee, thinking it’s a trap.
She’d stopped by Olivia’s on the way home to pick up some things, but Jack still wasn’t home from his shift. Wouldn’t be for several more hours, thank God. The quiet in the house wasn’t peaceful— this place would always be a nightmare for her, but it was space. Space meant she could breathe without acting for a while.
She went into the bedroom and changed for her own afternoon shift.
The constable uniform still felt strange every time she put it on. It was structured. It sat neatly on her shoulders. It made her look more official than she felt. It was like she molded to it, instead of it molding to her.
The Alexandria patch on the sleeve looked like a costume some days, felt like a costume.
She checked the cylinder by habit, seated it again, and holstered it with a careful push. She checked the position of the holster and made sure the retention strap was unbuckled so she could draw easily and accurately, then put her secondary weapon on her other hip, setting up the semi-automatic in a crossdraw position.
She picked up the pack she’d put together earlier, and she slung it over her shoulder. Before she left, she stood in front of the mirror for a second and made her face settle into her normal mask of calm.
Not blank or hard because those expressions scared people. Just calm, friendly enough that people didn’t ask questions.
Harmless. That’s what they want. Give it to them.
She stepped outside and started her afternoon patrol.
The streets were warm, and the sun made the white fences and the gleaming cars in the driveways so bright that she started to get a headache. People nodded to her as she passed. Rose nodded back, waved sometimes, and kept her pace steady. She made herself look like she belonged here.
Just Andy Fucking Griffith toolin’ around Mayberry.
As she rounded the corner toward Deanna’s house, she slowed. They were still out there. Deanna must be having a great time interviewing them all.
The newcomers stood or sat clustered near the walkway and the porch, with Deanna’s people keeping a polite distance that wasn’t really distance at all. They tried to look like they weren’t guarding them, but it was pretty fuckin’ obvious that they were guarding them. People generally didn’t loiter on sidewalks and in yards with rifles for no reason.
Rose counted the group again on instinct. Everyone but the crossbow guy was there. He must be interviewing.
She saw the baby under the shade of a tree now, perched in the grass with the teen boy who looked just as hard and suspicious as the leader. The baby’s cheeks were less red than earlier, and she had her fist in her mouth, drool seeping down the front of her shirt.
Rick stood a little apart from his group, watching the baby and watching the street at the same time. His posture was deceptively relaxed, but she knew he wasn’t.
Rose stepped out onto the street from the next corner, and his eyes zeroed in on her immediately.
They narrowed as he took in the uniform.
His gaze moved from her boots to the extra pistol to the patch on her sleeve and back to her face. His jaw set like something in the sight of it irritated him.
A couple of the newcomers shifted when she approached and placed themselves in the path between her and the man.
They’re protecting him from me.
It made her want to laugh, but she didn’t.
He stepped forward without hurrying, and they moved aside when he got close, the space opening up like the parting of the Red Sea.
Rose felt another short spark of amusement.
He just moves, and everybody adjusts. Kind of like Jack…
He stopped a few feet from her. “You’re a cop?” he asked.
“Yes,” Rose said.
“And you’ve only been here a month?”
“Yes.”
He looked her up and down again, slower this time. It was likely that he was wondering how much trouble she would be if he had to go through her.
“You’re the one people call when things go bad,” he said.
It wasn’t a question.
“One of them.” Rose kept her eyes on him, letting the coldness shine through a little. “I can handle myself.”
Rick held her stare for a second, then nodded once.
Now that he knew she was one of the ones he’d have to go through to attack this place, she wondered if this afternoon was going to end with her bleeding out in the street while the man walked away, forgetting her existence before she even stopped twitching.
Rose slid the strap of the heavy pack off her shoulder and held it out.
His eyes dropped to it. “What’s that?” he said.
“Supplies,” Rose answered.
He didn’t take it right away. His gaze stayed on the pack, then lifted to her face.
“It’s not rigged to blow,” she said, cocking an eyebrow. “I can call in SWAT if you want.”
She paused for half a second, “But just so you know, our SWAT team is actually old man Gus. He’s eighty-two, half-blind, three fingers short on his left hand from the last EOD job—probably during the Civil War— and volunteers every damn time something dangerous comes up because he’s been trying to die dramatically since 2010. Keeps saying he’s outlived his welcome on this planet, and the least the universe could do is let him exit in a mushroom cloud instead of choking on oatmeal. Want me to get him over here?”
Rick’s beard twitched in the faintest little movement at that, and he held her stare for another beat. Then he took the pack.
She was careful not to touch him in case he thought she was flirting. No way was she giving him that angle again, and it was dangerous for her if Jack saw.
He opened it slowly and carefully, eyes scanning the seams and the corners first. Rose watched him do it and felt her stomach twist. She could tell he’d done this before. Too many times.
Inside were several jars of baby food, clean baby bottles, a sealed jug of water, and several large cans of formula she picked up from the pantry. She didn’t know if they had anything for her, and she didn’t want her to have to suffer while they waited.
She also felt oddly protective of the baby and didn’t want Jessie to be the one to bring her formula.
Which was fucking dumb, and she knew it.
His face didn’t soften much, but the sharp edge dulled by a fraction. His eyes moved over the stuff again, like maybe he’d missed something that made it a trick.
“Why?” he asked, looking up.
The word was suspicious and confused, and he sounded almost irritated that someone had offered something without demanding something back.
Rose’s gaze went past him to Judith.
The baby had no idea what was happening. She chewed her fist and stared at the sky through the leaves, blinking slowly and babbling a bit.
Rose’s throat tightened hard enough that it hurt, and she felt the old familiar pang of grief in her gut.
Shit.
She blinked once. Then again. She forced her face to stay composed, but she could feel her eyes burning anyway.
Don’t. Don’t do this here.
She swallowed and made herself look at him again, hardening her expression on purpose. She set her jaw and lifted her chin until her voice would come out steady.
“That’s not your business.”
It came out colder than she’d intended, but he didn’t push her on it.
The Asian man behind him glanced at the bottles and then at Rose. The redheaded woman’s gaze flicked to the baby, then back to Rose, and her mouth pressed into a thin line as she shared a look with him.
Rick’s grip on the pack tightened slightly. He looked toward the baby, then back to Rose.
“You didn’t have to,” he murmured, and it was the first time he’d spoken to her without growling. “I don’t have anything to trade.”
Rose nodded once and raised her hands to show him she didn’t want anything. “I know. You don’t owe me anything. She’s…I haven’t seen many babies since everything went down. Just…keep her fed.”
She took a step back, and she didn’t let herself stand there waiting for more. She could feel the eyes of the street again, and she could feel Jack’s wall somewhere behind all of it, even if she couldn’t see him right now.
Rose took another step back and half-turned to go, then her radio snapped to life.
“Rose,” Bill’s voice cut through urgently. “I got a 10-32. Need you here.”
Her hand went to the mic on her shoulder automatically. Her posture changed before she could stop it, her back snapping straight and her eyes already sweeping the street as she put Rick behind her and pulled her Colt.
“Where?” she snapped.
“Behind the pantry,” Bill said. “East alley.”
Rose didn’t waste breath. “Handgun?”
“Shotgun,” Bill snapped back.
Rose blew out a hard breath. Her pulse jumped into her throat, and she keyed the mic again. “Roger. I’m en route.”
She released the mic and lifted her gaze back to the man in front of her for one last second. “Get your people around the corner of the house.”
Rick’s eyes had gone to her radio the moment Bill spoke. His face tightened when Bill said shotgun.
His gaze dropped to her chest, and Rose understood it a half second later.
He’s checking for a vest.
“You got backup?” he asked.
“I am the backup,” Rose said.
He didn’t like that answer, but she’d already wasted about ten seconds conversing with him.
He took one step forward like he was going to follow, then checked himself, head turning to his people again, to the baby. The conflict on his face was clear. He didn’t like leaving an active shooter problem for someone else to deal with, but he liked leaving his people even less.
Rose didn’t give him a choice. “Stay. Your people are more important. Find cover.”
She turned and ran, sprinting down the sidewalk toward the pantry. Her hand hovered near her holster without drawing. She kept her head up, scanning ahead, already picturing a drunk man with a long gun in a narrow alley and the angles that could get her killed. Especially if he’d loaded it with slugs or buckshot.
She cut left at the next corner and drove harder, ready to put him down the second she had a clear line of fire.
She rounded the corner and saw immediately that they were going to have a problem.
Roger. Damn it.
She rounded the corner and stalked down the alley with her pistol already raised in a steady two-handed grip, sights lined up on Roger’s center mass. Her steps were low and quick, body coiled, eyes locked on his trigger finger and the wandering muzzle. Bill stood ten feet from Roger with his palms out, revolver still holstered. His voice was steady but strained.
Rose’s jaw clenched hard. Idiot. No cop experience and he’s standing there like it’s a damn traffic stop.
Roger swayed with the shotgun half-raised. He was red-faced, eyes watery with drink and anger. The muzzle wandered because his balance was failing him. He was a big guy, strong, a farmer in the old days, if she remembered correctly.
“Roger,” Bill said. “Set it down. Just set it down, and we can let you go on your way. I’m sure you have things you’d rather be doing right now.”
Roger grumbled and raised the shotgun toward Bill. “You can’t tell me what to do. You ain’t a real cop. There aren’t any cops anymore. I’m just as ‘fficial as you are,” he slurred, weaving a bit more.
Rose kept her aim rock-steady on his chest. “Drop the gun, Roger. Now.”
Roger’s head snapped toward her, too quick for how drunk he was. “The hell I will. You can’t—”
“Drop it!” she yelled, voice sharp and final.
Bill’s hand jerked toward his holster at the shout, yanking his revolver free in one abrupt motion.
Roger’s face twisted in panic. He whipped the shotgun up and fired.
The blast ripped through the alley and shot sprayed wide and ugly, chipping the bricks. Bill grunted and folded to one knee, clutching his upper arm. Pellets had grazed him. He pulled his hand away, blood already soaking his sleeve.
Bill’s face went white. His free hand fumbled for the radio on his shoulder. “Officer down—” he barked into it.
Rose returned fire instantly—two quick shots. The first hit Roger in the shoulder; he staggered but didn’t go down. The second missed his torso by inches.
Bill kept keying the radio, voice cracking. “Officer down!”
Roger racked another shell, eyes wild. Rose dove sideways as the shotgun roared again. Buckshot tore past her head. She felt the hot sting slice across her forehead right above her eye and the sudden wash of warm blood down her face, but she kept firing while she moved—three more shots. The last one slammed into his other shoulder.
Roger stayed on his feet, dazed, blood pouring down his arm, shotgun barrel dipping.
“On your knees!” she yelled, holstering the revolver and drawing the nine millimeter in a split second.
Roger sneered at her. “Or what?”
“Or I’ll put you there, you dumb son of a bitch. You want to see what a nine-mil round does to a kneecap? Want to see what a walking corpse will do to a man with two shattered kneecaps?”
“Bitch,” he spat drunkenly, but he knelt.
“All the way down on your stomach!” she ordered, and was slightly surprised when he complied.
Rose dropped a knee between Roger’s shoulder blades and yanked his arms behind him.
“Hands back!” she said as he started to struggle.
Roger bucked and thrashed, and she grabbed the hair on the back of his head and slammed his face onto the asphalt. She heard the crunch of cartilage, and he cried out, but it didn’t bother her too much.
By the time he stopped moving, she was splattered with blood— her own from the graze over her eye, Roger’s from his shoulder wounds. Bill was leaning against a wall a few feet away, clutching his bloody arm tightly to his side. Roger’s face was a mess of blood and gravel.
Asshole shot her in the face. He didn’t get nearly as much as he deserved.
Rose snapped the cuffs on.
Roger’s breathing went loud and sloppy through the blood bubbling from his nose and running into his mouth. “You can’t— I didn’t—Police brutality!”
“Yeah, I can,” Rose said. “I can be even more brutal if you want?”
Bill was still on the radio, voice a little too panicked for the injury he’d gotten. “Officer down— need—”
“You’re not down,” Rose said, and he stopped. “Stop saying you’re down. We’re both on our feet, barely grazed.”
Bill blinked at her, then winced and pushed away from the wall. “Copy,” he rasped.
Rose stood, hauled Roger up by the cuff chain and his collar, and forced him to his feet by choking him if he didn’t get up. He stumbled and tried to plant himself.
“Walk,” she ordered.
She shoved Roger forward out of the alley and kept the muzzle of her pistol leveled at the center of his back. Blood from his broken nose and shoulder wounds had soaked the front of her uniform dark and sticky, smearing across her chest in thick streaks that mixed with the steady drip from her forehead. It looked bad. Worse than it was.
“Keep walkin’,” she said.
Roger stumbled, cuffs biting his wrists. He tried to turn his head and get his mouth working again. “I’ve got rights,” he started.
“You have the right to remain silent, or I’ll make you silent forever. How’s that sound?”
Her head kept bleeding. It blinded her right side and made her blink hard every few steps. She used her shoulder to try to wipe it away, careful not to let Roger out of her sight for even a moment.
They got out onto the street before backup arrived, the wall guards running full tilt toward them. She shook her head, feeling more than a little angry that it had taken so long.
“Go,” she ordered. “Back to the wall. We’ve got it under control.”
“But you’re all bleeding!” Tom said, eyes wide on the dark mess across her chest. “This is a Code Red.”
“Tom,” she sighed. “Code Red is when someone is actively dying. Right now, we’re all still passively dying. Get back to the fuckin’ wall.”
Felicia looked shocked, too, but she smacked the man next to her with the back of her hand and said, “You heard her. C’mon. We can’t leave the wall unattended. Call again if you need help.”
“Yeah, if I need help ten years after I call for it,” Rose muttered as they went back to the wall.
Deanna’s yard came into view almost as soon as they left the alley, and the cluster at the porch stiffened all at once. The newcomers were still there. All of them were bunched in a hasty 360-degree security circle near the corner of the house where Rick had likely herded them. They were very tense, and they had their weapons ready.
Roger tried to pull his shoulders up and swagger even with his hands behind him. Rose tightened her grip on her pistol. “Don’t get brave now. You already shot two cops and got taken down. I doubt your future is very bright.”
Rick locked on her instantly.
His eyes went to the blood running down from above her right eye, then dropped straight to the heavy dark stain soaking her entire chest. His whole frame went tighter, shoulders shifting forward like he was about to move. His jaw clenched once, hard.
“What happened?” Rick asked, voice lower and rougher than before.
“He took the shot,” Rose answered. “Grazed me. Grazed Bill.”
Rick’s gaze snapped back to the wound on her forehead, then locked again on the blood drenching her chest like it was a gut shot. He took two steps forward this time before he caught himself, one hand twitching near his revolver.
“Put him on the ground,” Rick said, the words clipped and edged with something sharp.
Roger chose that moment to get loud. “I didn’t do nothin’. That old bastard moved on me and tried to take my gun and she come runnin’ in—”
“Shut up,” Rick said flatly, eyes still cutting between Roger and the blood on Rose.
Roger blinked, offended. “Who the hell are you—”
Rose stepped in and kicked the back of his knee.
Hard.
Roger went down ugly because of the cuffs, his face hitting the grass, and his knees folding under him. He tried to twist like he could muscle his way back up.
Rose brought the pistol down and centered it on the middle of his back. “Stay down, or I’ll do what I said I would do, and the rules be damned.”
Roger froze. His breathing was loud. “This is bullshit.”
“Stay,” Rose repeated.
Rick watched the kick, watched Roger collapse, then watched her. His eyes flicked to her bleeding cut, then again to the soaked front of her uniform, irritation and something darker flashing across his face.
Then the front door behind the porch opened, and Nicholas stepped out with Spencer, Deanna’s oldest son, just behind him.
He looked like he’d been hiding inside and came out because the ruckus finally forced him to. His gaze went to Roger on the ground, then to Rose’s face, then to Bill.
Rose’s stare sharpened on him so hard it felt like it could cut glass.
“You heard it,” she accused. “The officer down call.”
Nicholas blinked once. “I—”
“You heard it on your radio,” Rose continued, still not moving her pistol off Roger. “And you didn’t respond. In fact, it took several minutes for the guards to come down off the walls and make their way to us. And yet you were here, hanging out just down the street, and you didn’t respond.”
Nicholas’ face flushed, and his eyes flicked toward Rick and his people, then back to Rose. “I was watching them. They’re a large group, and they came in armed.”
Rose held his gaze without blinking. “So was the guy with the shotgun.”
Nicholas’ jaw worked. “I didn’t know what was going on, and these people are a bigger threat.”
Rick turned his head slowly toward Nicholas. “Somebody was pointin’ a shotgun at folks inside your walls, and you’re the head of wall security, and you’re standin’ here starin’ at me?”
Nicholas opened his mouth and shut it.
Behind Rick, one of the newcomers made a sound that was almost a laugh and swallowed it immediately. The hard-faced black woman exchanged a quick glance with another woman, like neither of them could believe what they were hearing. The red-haired man with the mustache seemed pretty amused and entertained.
Roger tried again from the ground. “I ain’t takin’ orders from her. She thinks she’s—”
Rick looked down at Roger. “You’re done talkin’.”
Roger spat into the grass. “Ain’t scared of you.”
“You should be,” Rick said calmly, but his eyes cut back to the blood on Rose’s chest one more time.
Rose felt that line settle in her bones because she recognized it. It wasn’t bluster. Not a bit.
Rick’s eyes lifted back to Nicholas. “Where I’m from,” he said, “you don’t ignore an officer down call.”
Nicholas’ face went redder, and he looked pissed. Rage flashed behind his eyes before he could cover it up, and she knew either she or Rick would pay for this somehow. Maybe both of them. Nicholas was petty when he wanted to be.
Rose shoved the muzzle into Roger’s back just enough to make him grunt and remind him that she was there. While she kept Roger pinned, she moved her eyes up, watching the yard, watching Rick, watching the way he’d just dressed Nicholas down like he owned the place.
Rick met her stare again, and his face stayed blank, but his eyes kept flicking to the blood on her cheek and the heavy dark stain across her chest.
“Get him up,” Rick said, nodding once at Roger. “Move him somewhere secure. Then somebody needs to look at that.”
Rose didn’t answer at first, knowing that listening to this man gave him power. But what choice did she have? It was the right call. She just tightened her grip and made her decision.
“After he sees Deanna,” she said, voice lowering as she turned back to Roger. “Get up.”
Roger groaned and started to push up.
Rose kept the pistol steady and watched Rick watch her.
His eyes dipped to the shotgun strap. “That his?”
“It was,” Rose said. “Mine now.”
“Damn,” one of his people murmured behind him.
“You can’t keep my personal property!” Roger yelled.
“Yes, I can. It’s called evidence, and if that’s not enough, consider it reparations for my pain and suffering. And if that doesn’t make sense to you— which is understandable considering how much of an idiot you seem to be, then remember that a dead man doesn’t have personal property.”
The crossbow guy snorted, and Rick tilted his head, looking a bit less angry and a little more amused now, though he still had that coldness surrounding him, the kind that absolutely scared the shit out of her. His gaze flicked one last time to the blood soaking her chest before he locked it down.
Deanna’s door opened, and her face tightened the moment she saw Roger on the grass and Rose and Bill bleeding on her sidewalk. Her gaze went straight to the shotgun on Rose’s back.
“What happened?” she snapped, showing some of the toughness that she was so good at hiding.
Rose kept her pistol on Roger and lifted her chin to look at Deanna. “He’s drunk. He fired a shotgun twice inside the walls. Grazed us both,” she took her eyes off Roger for a moment to look at Bill. “But we’re not down,” she said sarcastically.
“Bill?” Deanna asked, peering around Rose.
From behind Rose, Bill’s voice carried faintly from the street where he’d stayed behind her. He sighed. “I’m fine. I’m not down.”
“Charges?” Deanna asked.
“He brandished a firearm inside the walls. Discharged it. Struck two law enforcement officers.”
Deanna blinked. “Bill—”
“I’m not finished,” Bill said seriously. “Drunk and disorderly. Reckless endangerment. Assault with a deadly weapon. Assaulting a peace officer. Resisting arrest. Possession and discharge of an unregistered firearm within community limits.”
Rose’s mouth tightened.
He’s gonna keep going until somebody shuts him up.
Bill nodded to himself. “And if we’re being thorough, terroristic threats. He stated intent to ‘put holes in anybody who tried to take his property.’”
Roger lifted his head off the grass. “I didn’t say terroristic— Hell, she terroristic threatened me!” he said, nodding toward Rose.
“I didn’t hear her say anything like that,” Rick said, staring at the man intently. “And I’ve been here the whole time.”
“You son of a—"
“Shut up,” Rose snapped without looking at him.
Roger dropped his cheek back to the ground and muttered into the dirt.
Deanna looked between them, trying to keep her face controlled and failing. “Bill, we don’t—”
Rose cut in before Bill could build a second paragraph of charges.
“He tried to kill two constables,” Rose said, straight to Deanna. “I’d say that warrants the death penalty, but it’s up to you.”
Nicholas made a sound in the back of his throat, shocked. “Jesus, Rose.”
Deanna’s eyebrows shot up. “Rose.”
Rose didn’t soften. “He fired a 12-gauge shotgun at both of us at a distance of less than fifteen feet. If he hadn’t been drunk, he'd probably have killed us both.”
Deanna stared at Rose for a long beat. “We don’t do the death penalty.”
Rose held Deanna’s eyes.
You don’t do it because you haven’t had to yet.
“He isn’t safe,” Rick said. “You know that.”
Deanna’s mouth tightened. “I’m aware. He’s a liability.”
Rick’s eyes shifted to Deanna again. “You can call it whatever you want,” he said. “But if you let him walk around in here after that, somebody’s gonna end up dead on purpose next time.”
Then his gaze returned to Rose for a split second before he looked back down at Roger.
“Secure him,” Rick said. “Now.”
“Whoa, that is not your call,” Nicholas said.
“He’s a threat to my people, and yours, apparently. It’s the only call.”
“Rick’s right,” Deanna said, shutting Nicholas up, but only for a second.
Spencer took a half-step forward toward his mother, trying to insert himself. “We can lock him up. Put him in the holding room. Pete can—”
Rose’s eyes snapped to Spencer. “Don’t step in now.”
Nicholas looked at Deanna for backup and didn’t get it.
Deanna kept her attention on Rose. “How bad is Bill?”
Bill answered instantly. “Not bad.”
Deanna finally glanced at him, leaning around Rose. “You got buckshot in your arm.”
Bill lifted his chin. “But I’m not down.”
Rose looked back at Deanna with a smirk. “He’s not down.”
Rick’s mouth twitched again and vanished, but the hardness never left his eyes.
Deanna exhaled through her nose, regaining control by force. “We’re not executing anyone. We are going to secure him, and we are going to figure out what happened and how he got the shotgun, and then there will be consequences.”
Roger shifted under Rose’s aim. “This is bullshit. I didn’t mean—”
Rick’s head turned toward him fast. “You’re real lucky you’re still breathin’,” he said sharply. “But luck tends to run out quick when I’m around.”
Roger went still again.
Deanna pointed at Roger without looking away from Rose. “Take him to the holding room. Bill, you go to Pete. Rose, you go too. You’re both done for the day. That’s an order.”
“Do you still want this job, Rose?” Deanna asked. “Because it’d be a shame for you to switch. You did a hell of a good job today.”
“I’m gonna stay on, but I might be putting in for a raise.”
Deanna smirked a little, nodded, and turned to Bill. “Bill, I want you to take a few days off. Nicholas, you’re on patrol until I find a replacement for Bill.”
Bill started to step forward, still holding his arm to his side, still determined to keep the process official. He pulled out a little laminated card. “Do you want me to read him his Miranda rights?”
Deanna stared at him.
Rose stared at him.
Rick stared at him.
Roger lifted his head to stare at him, confused. “My what?”
Deanna rubbed her forehead. “Bill, just get him to the holding room and go see Pete to get that buckshot taken out. Nick, Spence, go help.”
Bill nodded once, serious. “Copy.”
Rose tightened her grip on Roger’s cuffs and hauled him up with Nicholas’s help. Roger wobbled, knees weak now that the alcohol and blood loss had done their job.
Rose kept her pistol close to his ribs as they moved him. “Walk,” she told him, wiping her eye on her shoulder again.
Roger grumbled, but he walked.