Thankfully, the two pain killers she’d dry-swallowed as they left Connor’s apartment were starting to kick in by the time they got to the station. She’d let Connor drive, taking the time to make some sense of the order of papers in the folder on her lap. She’d snagged a hoodie from the back of one of Connor’s chairs on the way out, hiding the injury from her boss.

Connor trailed after Scarlett as she walked to the station entrance. Was he keeping an eye on the surroundings, or just not sure if he should be there? She couldn’t tell, but it was clear he was watching carefully as they crossed the parking lot. She could have parked out front; probably no one would have minded that morning, but it would also give them one more reason to bench her. If her captain got wind of any requirement for special treatment . . . no, she’d park where she always did and walk in the back like anyone else. It didn’t matter that just twelve hours prior someone had been taking pot shots at her from that exact place. She would face this. There was no way in hell she was letting some asshole chase her away ever again. That part of her life was done.

Even with the thought, a shiver went through her. Scarlett pushed it away, forcing her body to relax. Her hands clenching a little harder than they needed to on the folder was all she allowed as an outlet. She held her head up high, shoulders back and relaxed, nodding and smiling at colleagues as she maneuvered through the hall. A few of them looked a little strangely at Connor behind her, but Scarlett figured most of the station knew about her temporary reassignment to the task force at the firehouse. She was just switching it up today, needing access to the local network in the station to look up a few reports.

She sat at her desk and logged in, nodding at a chair sitting nearby for Connor. He took the cue and placed it next to hers, and by the time the lab report was opening, he was reading over her shoulder. What she had thought were air tanks had turned out to be something else entirely—portable cooling tanks. Insulated, and possibly custom made from the shape, the tanks were designed to hold something inside, something that had to be kept very cold. A latch system was built in, one she hadn’t even noticed. The surface of the polished metal was smooth, the seam only noticeable if you got right up close, and then maybe poked at it a little.

Being in the same room as they were in had given her the heebie-jeebies at the scene, and so thankfully the lab guys had been willing to fully investigate what the hell they’d found. Scarlett snorted. Having a bomb tech in the special suit on hand probably helped with their willingness. She would have been happy to get closer, too, if she didn’t think she might have been five seconds away from blowing herself up.

“So what were they moving?” Connor said over her shoulder, his voice so quiet it was almost a whisper.

The memory slammed into her hard enough to make her jump. Connor’s presence fell away, and she heard his chair scoot back on the linoleum floor. Her shoulders dropped. Great, now he thought his nearness had scared her. That wasn’t it. Could never be it. What had freaked her the fuck out was a memory of the last time she’d sat in this same chair. The last time she’d been browsing through old case files and documents for any semblance of a lead or clue.

TATP. A primary high-explosive. Extremely sensitive to shock, friction, and heat. The fucking stuff had to be mixed over ice water just to be made, and then transported wet, or at least cold, to limit the chances of the courier going boom. Not that it mattered sometimes. This case would be far from the first where an asshole managed to blow themselves up instead of the target using the stuff. One madman in Britain had stored the stuff in the family refrigerator, where one scuffle or knock could have made the whole thing explode, destroying the entire block.

She pulled her keyboard closer and started typing, her eyes widening as the first results came in—everything from warnings to how-to manuals and then videos of explosions. Some were controlled in a lab, while others looked like bored teens messing around in abandoned lots. Oddly, what scared her the most were the careful lab setups, the precise experiments. There, she could see exactly how much of the substance had been used, and an amount she could hold on the tip of one finger was enough to blow a coin right out of frame. She thought back to the size of the canisters at the last fire, and a cold hand wrapped itself around her spine, chilling her entire body. She swallowed, almost choking. If they were full, it would be enough to flatten the entire town.

Easily.

Scarlett was locked to her chair, so frozen by her search that she didn’t hear the door behind her open. It wasn’t until her captain’s voice bellowed across the space that she realized he was even there. “Christensen! My office. Now.”

Connor raised his eyebrows, and he started to stand, but she waved at him to sit back down. “Keep looking,” she hissed, she hoped quietly enough not to be overheard. If she was right, she couldn’t afford to waste a minute’s access to the databases. She hoped she’d still have her access when she stepped out of the captain’s office, but just in case . . . maybe Connor would find the missing piece while she was getting her ass chewed. She could only pray. She’d been at it for days without a break—something had to come soon. Then again, if her suspicions were right, it was likely to be a long haul, if anyone would believe her at all. Their small town had seen more than its fair share of lunatics in the last year or so; arsonists, stalkers, they were one thing. Terrorists manufacturing explosive devices were another entirely. That kind of shit just didn’t happen in her town.

Except it did. Small-town America was changing, along with the rest of the world. She couldn’t assume anywhere was safe. Not anymore.

Captain Harrelson sat behind his desk, gesturing to a chair in front of him with a grunt. Scarlett debated staying standing for a moment, but gave it up. Despite his gruff nature and his ridiculous desire to try to protect her, the captain was good police. He’d been there when she’d been a green newbie, a friend of Derek’s, too. He’d even been at their wedding. Whether it was through a misguided sense of responsibility or trying to be some kind of father figure to the younger ones under his command, she couldn’t bring herself to fault the man sitting in front of her. Under all his bluster, he’d also been the one to hold her in the rare moments she’d broken down. She’d refused to cry—to show any emotion—in front of her colleagues. She couldn’t bear it. Somehow, the captain made it easier to forget about being a cop, even for just a few moments, and just be a grieving widow.

That didn’t mean she wasn’t going to push back now. Fuck no. She’d let the man have his say, he deserved that from her, but there was no way she was backing down. This case was hers. She’d been the one to wonder first if there was something more than just a fire, and she’d run with it. They’d have to pry the case from her cold, dead hands before she’d hand it over to anyone else. Besides, Monroe wasn’t exactly a major city. The couple of detectives they had apart from here were all busy on their own tasks. If she got passed over now, the fires would likely be bumped to someone with far less experience and time to bother with anything properly. Hell, there hadn’t even been a ruling yet on the fires. That was taking nearly as long as the damn lab report had.

She glanced out the office window and over at Connor. He had shuffled over in her absence and was casually flipping through a screen she’d left open, his hand sneaking up to click the mouse every so often. She smiled. The man was good. His face was open, accepting and friendly, and anyone bumping into him outside of work greeted him with a smile, and often a friendly greeting, too. Unless he started digging through department files, it was likely no one would even look twice at him sitting at her desk.

Her eyes trailed along his arm and up to his shoulder, and she bit her bottom lip. Her desire to stay on the case, to stay working at the firehouse, had nothing to do with the sexy hunk of a firefighter squeezed into a chair at her desk. It truly didn’t. There was something going on in Monroe, way more than just a few strange fires. She knew it in her gut. That didn’t mean she couldn’t enjoy the perks of the job.

The captain cleared his throat, and Scarlett turned back. He’d poured them both a water and was smoothing over his tie. Crap. Fortunately, it looked like he hadn’t been sitting there long while she’d been gazing out the window.

“So, Christensen. Going to tell me what the hell you’re doing here today?”

Her eyes widened for a second before she could stop herself. “What, sir?”

More tie fiddling, then shuffling of papers on his desk, before he looked up and nailed her dead-on with his famous stare. “Had a little excitement outside last night. I thought you’d be smart enough to take the day off.”

Scarlett shifted in her seat. The wound on her arm itched, and she grabbed the arm of the chair to stop her hand from inching toward it to scratch. One thought of what was waiting for her back on her computer screen had her whole body twitching anyway.

If the chief was looking for an excuse to take her off the case, then even a whiff of that level of trouble would do it. No, she had to keep her suspicions to herself until she had more than just supposition. She’d tell Connor. She could trust him. Maybe the guys at the firehouse would be able to help. Scarlett took in a deep breath. Would their arson team have any training with this level of shit?

She looked back at Harrelson. Damn. He was still waiting for an answer. “Just some random idiot taking pot shots outside, Captain. Nothing to worry about.”

His hands moved from his tie to a pen lying on his desk, tapping it in an incessant rhythm against his desk. He wasn’t pleased. “See a doctor yet?”

She nodded. She’d seen Connor. He had medic training, she was almost sure. Most of them down at the firehouse did. That was close enough. “Just a graze, sir. I’m fine.”

Harrelson grunted. Scarlett could have sworn the words “Yeah, right,” were said, but he’d been too quiet for her to be sure. He spoke again, louder this time. “Have your medical clearance on my desk by the end of the week, or I’m pulling you.” His fingers moved back to the tie as he went to stand. “Do we have an understanding, Christensen?”

Scarlett’s fingers unfurled from the chair arm, and her shoulders dropped with relief. She was still on the case. She’d work the rest out later. “Yes, sir.”

He moved to his office door, then turned back, looking at her. “Don’t make me regret this decision, Scarlett. Don’t do anything stupid.” His gaze fell, and a grimace crossed his face. “I don’t need another detective’s death on my conscience.”

The captain was gone before his words impacted. Derek. She’d thrown plenty of blame on herself in the days and weeks following his murder, but she hadn’t realized her boss felt exactly the same way. Her heart ached. Coming back to work after Derek’s death had seemed like the easy way out at first—throw herself into the job so she didn’t have to think about him anymore, so she didn’t have to feel anything.

As it turned out, it had been the hardest thing she’d ever had to do. It wasn’t until just this month, until she’d met Connor, that the touch of anyone had sparked things inside her she thought long lost. Even then, she’d walled him off, kept him away from her in a misguided attempt to protect herself. Thank God he hadn’t given up until the walls she’d surrounded herself with had been fully broken down. Connor made her body, and her heart, sing. It was something she had thought was lost forever.

Was the captain still stuck in his grief, too?

She stood and pushed open the door, following him out of his office and back to the bullpen. Maybe if she solved this case, showed him that she was okay and she was moving on with her life, maybe that would help Harrelson, too. But to do that, she had to prove something that scared the hell out of her. That there were terrorists in Monroe.