Claimed

On 12/19/24, I conducted a traffic stop—

I stared at the blinking cursor.

It blinked back.

The rest of the sentence wasn’t complicated. Conducted a traffic stop after observing a silver Honda traveling seventy-one miles per hour in a forty-five. The driver had pulled over without incident. He’d been nervous. His license was suspended. No warrants. Nothing illegal in the car. Dropped a fucking baggie of cocaine on the ground when I asked him to step out. It should have been an easy report.

I deleted the sentence and started again.

On December 19, 2024, I conducted a traffic stop on a silver Honda Accord—

The words blurred together. I rubbed both hands over my face and leaned back in the chair. The report room was almost empty. Someone had left a Styrofoam cup beside the printer, and the stale smell of coffee mixed with whatever industrial cleaner the night custodian had used on the floors. The fluorescent lights hummed overhead.

My eyes burned. I looked at the clock in the bottom corner of the computer.

5:43 a.m.

Seventeen minutes. I could survive seventeen minutes. I leaned forward again.

On December 19, 2024, I conducted a traffic stop on a silver Honda Accord for excessive speed. Upon making contact with the driver—

Blood poured from TJ’s eyes, halting my fingers on the keyboard.

Blue-black. Almost too dark to be blood at all. His face had changed so quickly. One second he’d been holding me against the floor, smiling while Jackson—

I closed my eyes.

That didn’t help. It never fucking helped. TJ collapsed again behind my eyelids. His body hit the floor. Then another vampire fell somewhere behind him. And another.

My brain had spent the last few months filling in the blanks. People I’d never met dropped in kitchens and bedrooms. Someone driving a car. Someone standing in a gas station. Someone sitting beside another person who had no idea why blood suddenly started pouring from their eyes.

Eighty-three.

That was the number Caleb had given me the last time I’d asked. He’d stopped giving me updates after that. I opened my eyes.

Upon making contact with the driver—

“Valentina.”

I flinched hard enough that my knee struck the underside of the desk.

“Fuck.”

Isaiah stopped beside the doorway, finally back in uniform. I still wasn’t used to that. For months, I’d gotten used to seeing him in sweatpants, then the brace, then physical therapy clothes whenever Sarah sent me pictures of him looking miserable. He’d been back on light duty for a while before finally being cleared for patrol, but some part of my brain still expected crutches every time I saw him.

Instead, he stood there holding two paper cups of coffee.

“You good?”

“Yeah.”

His eyes dropped to where I was rubbing my knee. I took the coffee when he held it out.

“Thanks.”

He pulled the chair from the desk beside mine and sat down. His leg stretched slightly farther than the other beneath the table. Most people probably wouldn’t have noticed. I did. I noticed everything now. The shift in his weight. The door behind him that hadn’t fully latched. Footsteps somewhere in the hallway. A radio transmitting from dispatch beyond the wall. Someone laughing near the lockers.

I took a drink of coffee. Isaiah looked at my screen.

“You’ve been working on that report since I came in.”

“I’ve been doing other things.”

“You’ve been staring at that same paragraph since I came in.”

I looked at him.

“How long have you been watching me?”

“Long enough to know you’ve written less than one sentence this whole time.”

I turned back to the computer.

“I’m tired.”

“Yeah.”

I waited, but Isaiah didn’t leave. That was the problem with having a partner who knew when to shut up. Silence worked better on me than questions did. I typed another sentence. Deleted half of it. Typed it again.

Isaiah drank his coffee.

I finally looked over.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“You’re sitting there staring at me.”

His mouth moved, but the smile didn’t quite make it out. Neither did mine. I looked back at the screen. Isaiah was quiet for another few seconds.

“You’re really still not gonna tell me what’s going on with you?”

My fingers stopped again. He’d asked before. Not exactly like that. Sometimes it was a question about where I’d been. Sometimes it was Connor. Sometimes it was why Mercer and I suddenly seemed to have conversations Isaiah wasn’t allowed to hear. I’d gotten good at giving him pieces. Never enough pieces to make the picture.

“Nothing’s going on. I’m just tired.”

“You’ve been tired for three months.”

“Maybe I need a better mattress.”

“You basically live with a millionaire. I’m pretty sure he’s got a decent mattress.”

I took another drink of coffee instead of answering. Isaiah leaned back, accepting that I wouldn’t be giving him anything. Again.

My eyes went back to the report. The cursor blinked at the end of the sentence. I kept my face turned toward the computer.

Isaiah sighed.

“You know I’m not asking because I’m nosy.”

“I know.”

“You can talk to me.”

I wanted to. That was the part I couldn’t explain. There had been a time when Isaiah knew almost everything happening in my life. Not every detail, because nobody needed that kind of access, but enough. He’d known when I was pissed. When something bothered me. When I’d slept like shit. When I was pretending something didn’t hurt.

Now every conversation had walls. Behind one was Connor. Behind another were vampires. Behind another was my mother. My father. Jackson. TJ. Eighty-three people whose names I didn’t know.

I looked at Isaiah. His leg was better. Sarah was home with a healthy baby girl. Millie had recently discovered that screaming could produce adults almost instantly, according to the eleven texts Sarah had sent me yesterday. Isaiah had his life back. I wasn’t dragging him into mine.

“I’m fine.”

His jaw shifted. I hated the disappointment more than I would have hated anger. He surprised me then, rolling his chair towards me and the computer. He gestured for me to get out of the way, so I did.

“Whachya got?” He said, landing his fingertips lightly on the keyboard.

I didn’t deserve to have such good friends, and Isaiah always made that painfully obvious. I explained my traffic stop, and he typed for me. It took about twenty minutes to finish the entire report. When we finished, Isaiah made a comment about getting home to Sarah on time and headed out.

I logged out of the computer and grabbed my vest off the chair behind me, throwing it on over my shoulders as I walked out the door. The hallway was busier now. Day shift had started filtering in while everyone from nights tried to escape before somebody found another reason to keep us. I grabbed my bag from my locker, slung it over one shoulder and headed toward the exit. I made it halfway there before changing direction.

Mercer’s office door was open. He sat behind his desk with his glasses low on his nose, reading something on his computer. A second monitor beside him displayed a map covered in enough windows that I couldn’t tell what any of them were from the doorway. I knocked against the frame. Mercer looked up.

“You’re still here?”

“Barely.” I grumbled.

“You look terrible.” He took off his glasses. “You finish all your reports tonight?”

I nodded and stepped inside, closing the door behind me. He didn’t ask why.

“Anything?”

“No.”

I dropped into the chair across from him.

“Nothing?”

“Nothing new.”

Mercer leaned back and folded his hands over his stomach.

“Still New York?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“Manhattan.”

“Confirmed?”

“As much as anything involving Jackson can be confirmed.”

That wasn’t good enough. Mercer apparently saw that on my face.

“We have independent confirmation from two sources that he was in New York yesterday,” he said. “No indication he’s returned to Florida. No indication anyone directly associated with him has entered the area.”

I nodded again. My knee had started bouncing beneath the chair. I stopped it.

“Connor still has people watching?”

“Yes.” I nodded. “He hasn’t heard anything different.”

Mercer leaned forward.

“So why are you in my office asking me?”

Because Connor’s information came from vampires, and because Mercer had access to things Connor didn’t.

“I like confirmation.”

“You’ve gotten it.”

I looked toward the closed office door.

“Yesterday.”

“Liana.”

I looked back at him.

“He’s still in New York.”

“For now.”

“Yes. For now.”

Neither of us said anything. Connor’s challenge on Jackson’s cause had bought us time, that was how Connor explained it. Time, not peace. The declaration was still sitting somewhere in whatever passed for vampire bureaucracy, waiting for people older than the country to decide whether Jackson had been justified in declaring war because of me. Until they did, neither side was supposed to move openly against the other. Supposed to. Too much had happened now to find that even remotely comforting.

Mercer studied me.

“You need to go home.”

“I am.”

“I mean go home and sleep.”

“I slept yesterday.”

“For how long?”

I stood.

“See you tomorrow.”

“Valentina.”

I stopped at the door. Mercer had put his glasses back on.

“He’s in New York.”

I nodded.

“I heard you.”

I opened the door. Claire was waiting near the exit when I came down the hallway.

“You ready?” she asked.

“Yeah. You?”

Claire shoved her phone into her pocket.

“Yep.”

Claire followed me outside. The December air hit hard enough to wake me up for about three seconds. I pulled my jacket tighter and headed across the parking lot. Claire walked beside me without saying anything until we reached my patrol car.

I unlocked it and she climbed into the passenger seat. I threw my bag in the trunk and got in. For a moment, I didn’t start the engine. The parking lot was quiet. The sky beyond the station had begun turning pale along the horizon. Somewhere behind us, a door opened and shut.

Claire buckled her seat belt.

“You good?” Claire asked, knowing I wasn’t.

I turned the key in the ignition and backed out of the parking space.

“Yeah.”