Page 173 of The Case of the Missing Love Stone

“I’m okay. I wasn’t exposed.”

Tom approaches, carrying the notebook’s final page inside a clear sleeve. “The annex was the processing and storage site. The Love Stone and final batch are gone.”

I picture the damaged thumbnail from Heritage Hall. The brown line didn’t end at the rectangular building. It continued past it before the file dissolved into broken pixels. “The route correction showed cypress beyond the annex,” I say.

“So the annex was never the destination.” Roman looks toward the trees south of the fence.

“It was a stop along the way.” I follow his gaze.

The public protection path ends behind us. Beyond the annex, cypress branches knit together above an old service track that the festival maps no longer show.

“The annex was only a stop,” I say. “My grandmother’s correction shows what comes after it.”

Wes keeps one arm around my waist as the alarm continues inside the fence.

I look south, toward the abandoned route. “The release site.”

Roman follows my gaze.

“That’s where they took the Love Stone.”

Chapter 41

Roman Osprey

Scarlet sits sideways across Wes’s lap in the sheriff’s office break room while I towel the sweat from the back of his neck.

He cleared decontamination twenty minutes ago. His entry gear is sealed for processing, and Tom found him an old department shirt that barely fits across the shoulders.

Scarlet runs her fingertips along the edge of his collar. “You’re sure they cleared you?”

“Yes, sweetheart.”

“And you feel normal?”

Wes catches her hand and brings her knuckles to his mouth. “I’m annoyed and hungry.”

“Don’t forget overprotective,” Scarlet replies.

“So normal,” I say. His eyes narrow at me, but the corner of Scarlet’s mouth lifts.

Worth it.

I sit beside them and drape the blanket from Heritage Hall across Scarlet’s legs. Wes opens the paper bag Tom brought from Sweet Tooth and holds a piece of honey cake near her mouth.

She takes a bite without looking away from him. “Your turn,” she says after swallowing.

Wes eats from the same piece. Scarlet watches until he finishes, then settles more fully against his chest. Her hand remains on his heart while his purr rolls beneath it.

I pour three cups of water. She reaches for mine before her own and holds it out for me. The gesture is small, but warmth moves through my chest anyway.

When she takes her cup, I brush my thumb beneath her eye. Fatigue shadows her face, but her scent has steadied since the annex. Sage and rain rest inside Wes’s cedar and my spice as though they have always belonged together.

For several minutes, we stay that way. Wes feeds her. She keeps one hand on him and one on me. I rub slow circles on her calf beneath the blanket. Then Tom knocks against the open door.

“The analyst sent the first records pull.”

Scarlet’s fingers tighten around mine.