“Jesus, no, Mitchell, for crying out loud. You’re reckless as hell, but you’re one of the best people I know. I was asking if you didn’t feel, like, I don’t know like you deserve her. You’re always saying how lucky you feel, mate, like it’s pure luck she’s with you, but it’s not. She chose you, okay?”
I looked at him for a long second. This conversation was making me feel raw, like Stephen had dragged something out that wasn’t ready to be exposed to the light yet. Something that had been buried for a long time, maybe.
“What if she doesn’t keep choosing me, though?” I said, swallowing around the lump in my throat. Stephen’s brow crumpled, and he pulled me into a firm hug.
“She will. She’d be an idiot not to, okay? You’re both besotted with each other, trust me.” He pulled back and gave me a crooked smile. “It’s kinda sickening sometimes.”
“Jeez, shut up,” I said, breaking into a shaky grin. He gave me a pat on the shoulder, picking up his sandwich again.
“You’ll be alright,” he said, and I nodded, more to myself than him. He was right. Whatever happened with Sam, I had a job I loved, a best friend in Stephen, and a community at Hewford that I could rely on.
The rest of lunch was lighter, and I went back into the station feeling more relaxed, a weight shifted off me. We went up to see if Keira had gotten time to check the laptop, finding her eating lunch at her desk while working away on her computer.
“I’ve handed it off to Lee over there,” she told me, gesturing behind her. “I don’t specialise in recovery. You’re better off with him.”
“Okay, thanks.”
Lee was just about to leave to have lunch when we arrived, but we persuaded him to wait ten minutes to talk us through the laptop.
“Good news is, I’ve got something off it. I don’t know how much use it’ll be, but I’ll send it over to you.”
“What’ve you got?”
“Files, mostly. I couldn’t recover the internet history or much else.”
“Anything you’ve found is helpful, thanks,” I said, though I was privately disappointed. I’d really hoped to find something about the messaging site on the laptop, but I’d take what I was offered.
The tech guy sent the files he’d recovered over to us, and Stephen and I split them between us.
“Darren!” Stephen said suddenly before hitting my arm. I’d been concentrating hard on my work, and he made me startle so badly I nearly fell off my seat.
“Damn it, Steph, what?”
“Sorry, but look at it. It shows it was all premeditated. Look, he’s got ruddy spreadsheets, graphs. See this-”
I turned his monitor towards me and stared at it, taking in all the plans. They laid out how things would escalate, what dates and times each fire would take place. ‘Experiments’ that he had done with different fuels and materials. The only thing they didn’t take into account was Mickey, it seemed, as there was no mention of him.
“These aren’t Jules’s, are they?” I said as I scanned over it.
“These ‘experiments’? No, they’re Alistair’s, surely.”
“Look at the school name. They were gonna burn a school, but it was meant to be Alistair’s, not Rose Heath.”
“Mickey’s school,” Stephen said. “They changed-”
“The plan after he betrayed them,” I finished, nodding.
“Bingo. We got them, Mitch.” Stephen grinned.
“We’ll have to link this all to Alistair and make sure Jules gets implicated too.”
“It’ll be fine, mate,” Stephen said, thumping me on the back. “Allow me to feel a little proud for a minute, will ya?”
“Proud?” I teased, giving him a crooked smile. “Who was the one who found the laptop exactly?”
He rolled his eyes at me, giving me a light shove.
“You couldn’t have done it without me,” he protested.
“I know, I know, I really couldn’t.”
We went to fill Rashford in on the find, and I went to thank the tech guy and Keira for their help. Then I headed up to Sam to let her know that there was less of a rush on the other evidence, though we’d need it eventually, of course. But at least for now, we had enough to hold Jules, Alistair, Drew, and all the others in custody until we could sort the details out.
Blame would need to be allotted, court dates set, evidence coherently put together to be examined. There was a whole lot left to do before Stephen and I could confidently call the case closed for good, but it would hopefully be the home stretch from here on out. I, personally, was looking forward to seeing Alistair’s smug expression fade when he realised what had happened. I wasn’t normally the vengeful sort, but he’d very nearly killed Mickey, and he’d been so damn sure he’d get away with it scot-free.
We’d get justice for all those the gang had terrorised over the summer, and they’d get what they deserved in the coming weeks. And in the time I had off, I’d enjoy being with Sam, making the most of her being here while we still could. What’d happen when she left, I didn’t know yet, but we’d give it our best shot, that was for sure.
Epilogue
The angle of the sun had shifted as I told the winding story, and we’d shifted our chairs to follow the shade. We were getting into the evening now, and the blasted midges were starting to emerge, replacing the wasps as the main nuisance of the summer warmth. It was still bright enough that I could’ve read a book, and the light would only start to fade after nine o’clock.
“I can’t believe a fourteen-year-old…” Liam’s dad, Douglas, started and then shook his head, trailing off.
“I know,” I agreed, giving a heavy nod. Alistair’s actions had shocked me as well that summer and many other officers.
“But he went to jail, though?” Liam said, looking at me with wide-open eyes.
“He stayed at the secure
