Chapter 9 - The Ghost of Christmas Future
Six months later. December. Miami.
The Prescott mansion on Indian Creek had been seized by the government, auctioned off to a tech billionaire from Silicon Valley, and was currently being gutted — every wall torn out, every floor ripped up, every trace of the family that had lived there erased, replaced with smart glass and home automation and a wine cellar that could hold ten thousand bottles. No one wanted to live in a house where three generations of women had been beaten. Where ledgers of suffering had been kept in a safe behind a bookshelf. Where a bat had hung on the wall like a trophy.
Laura stood on the sidewalk across the street, hands in the pockets of her black HSI tactical jacket, watching the construction crews work. She didn’t come here often. She didn’t need to. The Prescotts were ghosts now. Footnotes. A warning in history books. But it was Christmas Eve, and she was in the neighborhood dropping off presents at the children’s hospital Nathan had once used as a tax shelter — the hospital her task force now funded with a large chunk of the Prescott restitution money, the hospital where Lina had come to volunteer every weekend while she was in town visiting Elara.
A figure stepped out of the shadow of a banyan tree beside her.
Laura’s hand went to the pistol at her hip before she recognized him.
Tony. The retired NYPD detective from the ship. He was heavier now, grayer, wearing a Santa hat that didn’t quite fit over his bald head, holding a wrapped present under one arm. He smiled when he saw her.
“Thought that was you,” he said, nodding at the mansion. “Still checking up on the dead?”
“Just making sure they stay dead,” Laura said, relaxing, taking her hand off her gun. “You here for the hospital too?”
“Dropping off toys for the kids. My granddaughter’s idea. Says Santa needs all the help he can get.” Tony nodded at the demolition crew. “Wild, isn’t it? Two years ago, that place was the center of the universe for the worst people in Florida. Now it’s just another rich guy’s smart house. No one remembers the Prescotts. No one wants to remember.”
“Some of us do,” Laura said quietly.
Tony’s smile faded. He knew. He’d been there. He’d seen the rooms. He’d heard the girls. He’d sat through the trial. “Yeah. Some of us do.”
He paused, then reached into his coat pocket, pulled out a small, wrapped box, and handed it to her. “Merry Christmas, Chief. From the whole task force. Elara made us chip in. Said you’d hate it if we spent too much.”
Laura laughed, taking the box. It was light. Soft. She tore the paper open.
Inside was a framed photo.
The whole task force, taken three months earlier at the one-year anniversary party of the Ocean Serenity raid. Laura in the center, laughing, a beer in one hand, her other arm slung around Elara and Lina — Lina now seventeen, tall, strong, wearing a Coast Guard hoodie, her arm fully healed. The Ranger, the firemen, the Coach, the doctor, Maria, even Vivian — who’d flown in from Santa Fe just for the party — all standing together, grinning, holding up the silver I SURVIVED pendants around their necks. Written on the bottom of the frame in Elara’s messy handwriting:
The family we chose. The monsters we beat. Merry Christmas, Chief.
Laura’s throat tightened. She’d never had a family like this. Not growing up. Not in the Coast Guard. Certainly not with the Prescotts. This — this ragtag group of survivors and fighters and people who’d refused to look away — this was hers.
“Thank you,” she said, wiping a tear from her cheek before Tony could see. “It’s perfect.”
“Elara also said to tell you there’s a hot tip waiting on your desk when you get back,” Tony said, putting his Santa hat back on straight. “Something big. Ring operating out of the Port of Palm Beach. Girls from Honduras. She didn’t want to call you on Christmas Eve, but —”
“Say no more.” Laura was already turning for her truck, the photo tucked under one arm, the warrior already sliding back into place. “I’ll meet you at the office in twenty. Call the team. Tell them to bring coffee. And Tony?”
“Yeah?”
“Merry Christmas.”
He grinned. “Merry Christmas, Chief. Go get ’em.”
Laura drove fast through the Miami streets, Christmas lights blurring past her window, the photo on the seat beside her, the silver pendant warm against her chest under her shirt. She should be tired. She should be taking the night off. She should be at home with a glass of wine and a movie, like a normal person.
But normal was still not for her.
May you like
Not when there were girls in the Port of Palm Beach. Not when there were men who still thought they could get away with it. Not when the ghost of Nathan Prescott — the ghost of every man who’d ever swung a bat at a woman, ever locked a door, ever thought power made him right — was still whispering in the back of her mind: You can’t save them all.
Watch me, she thought, pressing the gas a little harder. Just watch me.
