Page 28 of Christmas with Three Firemen

His eyes land on the name and stay there one second too long.

Then he reads on, methodical, page after page, giving nothing else away.

“This is circumstantial,” he says.

“Completely,” I agree. “I’m not presenting it as anything else.”

He sets the papers down. “What do you need from me?”

“Nothing yet. I wanted you to have the picture.”

He nods once. Then he closes the folder.

That’s it. That’s the whole reaction.

“Is there something you want to tell me?” I ask because I am constitutionally incapable of leaving it alone.

“Not at this time.”

Which is not the same as “no.”

I take the folder back. He’s already returned to his paperwork by the time I reach the door, or he’s doing a convincing impression of it. I pause at the threshold.

“Grant.”

He looks up.

“If you’ve seen that name before,” I say carefully, “in a context that’s relevant to this investigation, I need to know.”

Something moves behind his eyes. It’s there and gone before I can name it.

“I’ll let you know if anything comes up,” he replies.

Which is also not the same as “no.”

I leave his office with the file under my arm and the distinct and irritating awareness that Captain Hale knows something he isn’t telling me.

Whether that’s because he doesn’t trust me yet, because he’s protecting someone, or because whatever he knows is the kind of thing that changes the scope of an investigation entirely, I don’t know yet.

But I will.

***

The Bravest Night fundraiser is held on Friday evening in the event hall attached to the neighborhood community center, two blocks from the station. Black-tie optional, everyone welcome, admission by donation. Mateo tells me it’s been a neighborhood tradition for fifteen years and that last year they raised enough to fund three local school programs and buy new equipment for the youth sports league.

He says all of this while trying to convince me to wear something other than what he calls my “investigator uniform,” which is apparently what the dark jeans-and-leather-jacket situation has come to be known as around the station.

“It’s black-tie optional,” I remind him.

“The optional is doing a lot of work in that sentence, and you know it.”

“I’ll wear the black jeans.”

He gives me a look of profound and theatrical despair.

I wear the black jeans.

The hall is warm and loud and strung with more white lights than should be legally permitted in a single room.