The night air was colder than usual. Chicago's skyline looked sharper when the wind cut through it — all edges, no mercy. Alice drove back to her apartment with the box sitting silently on the passenger seat. She hadn't opened it yet. Maybe she was afraid of what it might say.
Her building was quiet — too quiet. Third floor, end of the hall. The elevator hummed like a bad habit. She'd lived there for years, long enough to recognise the rhythm of the walls: the neighbour's TV, the pipes moaning through winter. Tonight, they were all gone.
Alice pushed the key into the lock. It turned — smooth.
But the door was already unlatched.
Her pulse didn't spike. Training did its job. One step back. Right hand slid to her hip. She didn't wear her service weapon off duty, but the Glock she kept holstered in her jacket wasn't standard issue either.
She nudged the door open.
The place was dark. A sliver of streetlight caught the dust drifting in the air. Her couch cushions were tossed. Drawers open. The fridge door hung slightly ajar. Whoever came in hadn't been subtle.
Alice closed the door behind her and let the silence settle like a trap.
Then — a floorboard creaked.
She turned and fired once into the hallway mirror. Glass shattered, the sound ricocheting off the walls. No scream, no movement. Just her reflection bleeding light.
She scanned the corners — one hand steady, the other brushing against the wall until she found the switch. Light flooded the room.
Empty.
Almost.
A single envelope sat on her kitchen counter. Her name scrawled across it in the same hand that had marked the photos in the bag.
She didn't touch it yet. She moved room to room, clearing each one the way she was taught — tight turns, eyes low, corners first. Bedroom: empty. Bathroom: empty. Closet—
She froze.
A shadow moved behind the hanging coats.
"Step out," she said, gun raised.
The shadow hesitated.
"I said—"
A rat darted out and hit the floor, vanishing behind the dresser.
Alice exhaled, a shaky laugh escaping before she could stop it. "Figures."
When she was sure the place was clean, she lowered her weapon and finally reached for the envelope. The paper was cold, damp — like it had been outside too long.
Inside was a single photograph.
A picture of her father.
Not the smiling one from the mantel — this one was grainy, taken from a distance, Marcus standing beside a black car in an alley. He looked younger, harder. The kind of man who didn't believe in ghosts because he'd made enough of them.
On the back of the photo, in black ink:
"Stop digging."
Alice stared at it for a long time, jaw tight, heartbeat steady. Then she grabbed a lighter from the counter and set the edge of the photo on fire. The paper curled, smoke filling the room with the scent of old chemicals and something like memory.
She watched it burn until the words were gone.
Then she turned to the box on the table. The one from her mother's attic.
For a second, she almost opened it. Almost.
Instead, she locked it in her closet — top shelf, behind a stack of old case files. Out of sight, but never out of mind.
The next morning, Alice was back at the precinct before dawn. Coffee in one hand, unread texts from Rhodes blinking on her phone.
She didn't tell anyone about the break-in. Not yet. The last thing she needed was IA sniffing around her private life.
Rhodes caught her at her desk. "You look like hell."
"Didn't sleep," she said. "What's new?"
He hesitated. "There's another body. Different side of town."
"Another Broker hit?"
"Maybe."
Alice grabbed her jacket. "Then it's not a break. It's a lead."
Rhodes sighed. "Pierce—"
But she was already moving, the fire from last night buried deep beneath the calm surface.
Because that's who Alice Pierce was.
She didn't crack.
She burned quietly.
----
The wind came off the lake sharp enough to taste the rust in it. South dock, just past the shipyards — another crime scene, another body in a city that never ran out of them.
Alice ducked under the yellow tape, coffee in one hand, badge in the other. The forensics team was already at work, their voices clipped and low. Cameras flashed, capturing the shape of a man sprawled face-down against the concrete barrier.
Rhodes met her halfway, his jacket collar pulled high. "Morning, Pierce."
"You call this morning?" she muttered, kneeling beside the body.
Male. Late forties. Dock worker, by the look of the calluses and the grease under his nails. His ID was missing. His face was—
She looked closer.
Two perfect bullet holes. One through each eye.
"Execution," she said. "Close range. Precise."
"Same as the Broker jobs?" Rhodes asked.
Alice shook her head. "Cleaner. No burn marks, no residue. Whoever did this knew their tools."
The forensics lead, a wiry woman named Choi, straightened up. "No wallet, no phone. Just this."
She handed Alice a strip of cloth — torn, wet, and faintly red with embroidery.
Alice frowned. The pattern was familiar. Not the Broker's mark, but something adjacent — a sigil she'd seen once before, long ago, in one of Marcus's old notebooks.
"Where'd you find this?"
"Inside his jacket lining," Choi said. "Sewn in like a tag."
Alice pocketed it before Rhodes could see. "Good work. Log everything else."
From across the street, through the glass of an abandoned office window, someone was watching.
The camera lens adjusted — a faint mechanical whisper. The figure behind it didn't move, didn't speak. Only watched.
Alice's reflection flickered in the zoom — tall, composed, all business. The watcher marked the time on a small notebook.
**09:42 A.M. — Subject arrived. No escort. Conducted on-site analysis. Possessean's item. Did not report it.**
The hand that wrote the words was steady, efficient. Gloved.
Below the note, a photograph of Alice — taken from her apartment balcony two nights ago. Her face lit by a lighter's flame, a photo burning in her hand.
The watcher's phone buzzed once.
A text: **"Update?"**
They typed back:
**"She's active. Curious, but contained."**
Another message arrived seconds later.
**"If she digs again, remind her who she is."**
The watcher looked out through the cracked glass, the wind cutting across the docks. Down below, Alice was talking to Rhodes — serious, methodical, that old Pierce focus in her eyes.
"Remind her who she is," the watcher murmured.
There was a hint of amusement in the voice.
"Let's see if she remembers."
"Pierce," Rhodes said beside her. "You alright?"
Alice blinked. "Yeah. Just thinking."
He frowned. "About what?"
She looked past him — past the tape, the river, the cranes rusting against the skyline.
"About how the past never stays buried in this city," she said. "No matter how many times you dig new graves."
Rhodes exhaled. "That's dark, even for you."
She almost smiled. "You haven't seen dark."
That night, someone slipped an envelope under her apartment door.
Inside was a note written in clean block letters:
**"You're looking in the wrong direction."**
And beneath it — a photograph of the dock worker, taken *before* he died.