McGee drove home through the city she loved.
She loved everything about it. The people on the sidewalks, already moving with morning purpose. The stores rolling up their shutters — the bodega on Eighth, the bookstore with the cat in the window, the dumpling place that had saved her life more than once during the academy. The food. God, the food. You could eat your way around the world in twelve blocks and never get bored.
This was why she'd become a cop. Not for the badge, not for the title. For this. For the city and the people in it.
She parked in her building's garage — four levels of concrete and fluorescent light that always smelled faintly of oil and rain. Her spot was on level two, third from the pillar with the chipped yellow paint. Same spot as always. The garage attendant, an old man named Pete who'd been there since before she moved in, gave her a wave from his booth.
The elevator was slow. It always was. McGee leaned against the back wall and watched the numbers climb, listening to the cables groan. An older woman got on at fourteen with grocery bags. A kid with headphones got off at nineteen. Nobody talked. That was the rule in this building — you nodded, you didn't chat.
Twenty-third floor. The hallway smelled like someone's cooking — garlic and something spicy. Her key stuck in the lock the way it always did; she had to jiggle it just right. Her studio was small and a little messy — shoes by the door, a sweater over the back of a chair, a stack of books she'd been meaning to read since college. Not horrible. Lived in. The walls were covered with framed photos — her academy graduation, a camping trip with friends, a blurry shot of her and Molly behind the counter at Rosa's, both of them laughing. A poster from a concert she'd gone to in college, edges curling. The window over the fire escape looked out across the rooftops toward downtown, the towers catching the morning light.
The kitchen was barely a kitchen — a two-burner stove, a mini-fridge that hummed too loud, a counter with barely enough room for a cutting board. But it was hers. She'd picked this place because it was in the Harlow District, the kind of neighborhood where the laundromat was next to a Vietnamese bakery next to a record store that only sold vinyl. Real people, real noise, real life. Not the glass towers downtown where men like Victor Kane worked and died.
She dropped Kane's file on the kitchen table, which had seen better days. It was already covered — electric bill, water bill, a takeout menu she'd been using as a bookmark, a birthday card from her mother she kept meaning to put up. Her father didn't send cards. He called on Sundays — or he used to, before he retired. She should call him. She didn't. An organized mess. She knew where everything was, even if nobody else would.
The file landed on top of the pile. It looked wrong there, too clean, too official. Like it belonged to someone else's life.
McGee put the kettle on and sank into the couch. Tea, not coffee. She'd had enough coffee to kill a normal person.
The morning news was on. She hadn't turned it on — it was just always on, background noise. But then she heard the name.
"...Victor Kane, found dead in his office at Meridian Tower late last night..."
She sat up.
The anchor was standing in front of a stock photo of the tower, all glass and light. "...body was discovered by cleaning staff under what police are calling suspicious circumstances. Police have refused to answer questions at this time..."
That was it. No mask. No staging. No three hours. Just "suspicious circumstances" and a refusal to comment.
McGee sipped her tea and watched them fill three minutes with nothing. A financial reporter talking about Kane's company. A shot of the tower from the street. Speculation dressed up as reporting.
They didn't know. Nobody knew. Just her, Fredericks, and a masked man in a suit who'd looked at a camera and fixed his tie.
Her eyes got heavy.
She told herself she'd just rest for a minute. Just close her eyes for a minute. The tea was warm in her hands. The news anchor kept talking, voice fading into background hum.
McGee fell asleep right there on the couch, the cup still in her hands, the city humming twenty-three floors below.
Chapter 4