It was an interesting conundrum, to behold something you wanted so badly, but your moral compass demanded you to stay away. Even though it was hot and delicious and you needed it more than anything else in that moment.

Life could be so unfair.

So unfair.

"Oh, for the love of God," Leann mumbled. "Just drink the fucking coffee, Davina."

That's right, the lovely hotness was a cup of coffee. But not just any coffee. It was coffee from Sully's Diner in Fairhaven, which made it a cup of joe I never indulged in.

"No." I kept my voice firm and shot her a look. "I will not."

Leann rolled her eyes. "Look, I know it's not Blissful Brews, but it tastes good and it's free."

"It's not about the flavor or the price, Lea. It's the principle of the thing."

"Of course, I forgot," she laughed, her voice dripping with sarcasm as she fired up her computer. "You don't patronize tyranny."

The joking tone irked at me, but I stood strong. "It's a hill I will die on."

I didn't care how dramatic it sounded or probably was. I didn't support ruffian behavior, and that's all the esteemed owner of Sully's would ever be in my world.

Years ago, he set his sights on a prime piece of real estate in the center of Fairhaven. Only problem? It was occupied. But hey, problems like that don't apply to Patrick Sullivan, and he bullied the owner right out of the contract, turning her dance studio into a diner and sacrificing a chunk of his goodness in the process.

Ruffian behavior. I couldn't get behind it.

I studied the paper cup Leann had set at my workspace, filled up from one of several boxes of freshly brewed coffee that had been dropped off at the station that morning, along with a variety of pastries to share.

None of it was as good as the food from Blissful Brews. That's where they should have ordered from, whoever it was.

"Who's it from anyway?" I asked Leann.

Busy with her screen, she muttered a quick, "Mayor Sullivan."

"Well, yeah..." I couldn't help smiling at her distraction mode. "I know that's where it technically came from, Mayor Sullivan owning the diner and all." Along with almost every other large business in Fairhaven.

It didn't seem to bother anyone else that our town's biggest investor also held the highest political office. But then, he was a bully. Maybe it wasn't so hard to figure out where the votes came from.

I nudged Leann to reclaim her attention. "I meant, like, who had it brought in?"

"I just told you. Mayor Sullivan." She turned to me this time, enunciating slowly like I was hard to understand. "Doris said he spent the morning with Chief Barlow, then he left for a little while and came back with the coffee and–" she paused, frowning when she saw the look on my face, which I'm certain held a load of confusion as my stomach dropped. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," I said, turning back to my own screen. My mind was a carousel of thoughts, and I wasn't fine at all.

Mayor Sullivan spent the morning with Barlow and then brought in a shitload of goodies from his diner? That was an interesting development. Considering the arrest of his son only a few days ago, I hadn't expected such generosity.

It put me immediately on edge. I knew Spencer to be precise and accurate on all his paperwork, but there was no saying how a report could be spun once it was out of an officer's hands and the people in high places started discussing deals.

By the time it was all said and done, Mikey the troublemaker could get off with a few hours of community service, and it wouldn't surprise me at all. Damn it. At least his record would follow him around.

For a little while anyway.

My fingers did an anxious tap against my desk, itching to find the keyboard and type his name into the system. Marceline had filed the report for Mikey's arrest over the weekend, and so far—I'd resisted the temptation to look it up, not wanting to wake up my inner Debbie.

But now, well...it was getting harder to resist. I was dying to know what ended up on that report and find out what might be next for Mikey.

Too bad it went against everything I believed in. Other people's woes were not my concern, I reminded myself. I was only supposed to file them with care.

My fingers traveled to the keyboard.

What to do. What to do...

After deliberating another minute or so, I couldn't take it anymore and went in.

Sparing a glance over at Leann, I found her busy with her own work, and I was grateful it was just the two of us in the annex for the time being as Marceline and Debbie went on a smoke break together. Less people to witness my heinous curiosity.

I loaded up the online database, took a deep breath, and started typing.

Michael Patrick Sullivan

It felt like a lifetime passed as the ancient PC worked through all the files and searched up the one I was looking for. A swirly icon rotated in the center of the screen, spinning like the anxious thoughts in my head, signaling the time it was taking to load.

And then the results came in.

Only problem was, nothing came up.

There were no results for Michael Sullivan's DUI.

I stared at the screen in shock.

This can't be right.

I tried again. Nothing.

Hang on.

A lightbulb went off as something occurred to me, and I looked over at Leann. "Is the system running complete again after the computers took a shit last week?"

How could I forget? That day was so chaotic, I texted Spencer to come fuck the frustration out of me before dinner. It was the same day I found out about the whole DUI thing in the first place, and the computers seemed to be working fine when I went back to work the next day. But hey, technology. You never know.

Leann's brows scrunched together. "I think so," she said, clicking around a bit on her screen. "Everything I put in since then is still here."

"Okay." I turned back to my own screen and typed the name in again.

Nothing.

"Fuck," I muttered under my breath.

Where the hell did that report go? For as long as I'd been working in the records department, one had never just disappeared before. Ever.

***

My head was all over the place for the rest of the workday. I couldn't concentrate on anything besides that missing report, and I was dying to get home so I could run over to Spencer's house and see what he had to say about it.

After making a stop at the pharmacy for Mom, I stopped by her place to drop it off. Stayed for dinner and a chat. The visit went longer than I intended, and it was dark by the time I finally got back home.

As I stepped out of my car, my eyes took a magnetic trip across the street, finding Spence's Ducati parked haphazardly across his driveway. It was a sight that made me pause. He always took extra care with his bike and never left it outside. Was he going out again? Had he just parked in a hurry?

My mind was going off again. There were too many questions clogging it up.

I had planned to drop my shit and go straight over to see Spence, but that plan was derailed before I even turned the key.

Spinning at the sound of another vehicle, my shoulders sank with exhaustion as Dante pulled in behind my car, irritation thrumming in my veins at the mere sight of him.

"No. Not you again," I quickly declared as he stepped out of that stupid, inherited Bentley. Pretty as it was, it represented so many things I hated, so many things that hurt.

Dante rolled his eyes at my dramatics. "We need to talk."

"No," I repeated, pointing my house key at him. "I unsubscribe from your newsletter of doom, Dante. You only come to see me with bad news."

"And you only seem to associate with people I have bad news about."

I scoffed. "What does that mean?"

"Heading to Lovejoy's?" he asked, glancing quickly between me and the house across the street. "I saw you peek over there as I was pulling up. You might want to hear me out before you go knocking on his door."

"Not that it's any of your business," I muttered, letting out a weighted sigh. "But yes. I have a work matter to discuss with him."

"Oh yeah?" Dante raised a curious brow at me. "Hope everything's alright. He looked like hell when I saw him today."

That put me on alert. Whatever looking like hell entailed, it might've explained why his bike was parked out front after dark and not safe in his garage.

"What do you mean he looked like hell?"

"Just generally pissed off." Dante shrugged. "Parisi was out of sorts, too."

Well, that totally checked out for the day I'd been having. Since the moment my search for Mikey's report came up empty, everything had felt dreadfully...off.

Now, with all this new intel, my suspicions about that bribery breakfast from Sully's were amped up, and I was even more irritated that I hadn't been able to catch up with Spence yet. He'd taken a rare day off, but somehow my brother had seen him?

"Where was he?" I asked, holding my breath as the air seemed to shift all around me. Anxiety covered me like a second skin, and I wasn't sure I wanted to know the answer.

"He was down at the river with his old man," Dante announced casually, as though a statement like that held nothing of impact. 

I almost blurted out that he was probably on police business, just as he'd been the other day when he arrested Mikey. But Dante seemed to read my mind, adding quickly. "He was in street clothes. They were using the shipping terminal beside us. Saw it with my own eyes."

My stomach dipped, the words playing in my head over and over again. They made no sense. They made perfect sense. I had no idea what to believe. 

Taking slow steps off my porch, I approached my brother with hesitation. "You have proof?"

Dante laughed. "What? Like a picture?"

"Yeah," I nodded. "That would help a lot actually."

"You need tangible proof from your own brother?"

"Brother or not, you're a criminal, Dante. Your word isn't exactly trustworthy."

Finally, the look on his face turned to something other than that infuriating impassive nonsense he always had to offer. "Watch it, Davina," he snapped at me.

"You've never liked Spencer."

"I don't trust Spencer," he argued. "Or anyone he works with. Regardless of the shit they do to make our job easier, the Lovejoys and everyone else at Fairhaven PD aren't loyal to The Amato Group. Or to families like ours. At the end of the day, everyone's out for themselves. Chief Lovejoy is a clear example of that. He spent his entire career making deals with judges and thugs alike, just to fatten his wallet. How can you honestly believe that his son is any different?"

A ball of emotion grew in my throat, threatening tears and other things that would destroy the mask I'd gotten so good at wearing.

I swallowed it back. "Because I have to believe that some people are still good, Dante. I have to believe that not everyone is like Dad. I have to believe that not everyone is associated with the people who run this crooked fucking town."

"That's your hard limit, right?" He shook his head and let out a humorless laugh. "You won't accept anyone associated with the corruption?"

"No, I won't."

"But that doesn't apply to Spencer..."

"It's complicated with him."

When it came to Spencer, I was acutely aware of how blurry the lines were. I hated his father's involvement with the politics and greed, but I gave him a pass on that. I'd be a hypocrite not to, considering my own father's connection to those things.

I didn't like the questions that constantly seemed to surround Spencer's goodness, but until otherwise had been proven, I held out for him. I'd been holding out for years. Dante knew that.

"What about Dalton?" he asked, and my heart hit the concrete with a thud. At the mere mention of my departed twin's name, he hit me where he knew it would hurt. "You don't judge him like you do me and Dad."

I took a deep breath and then another one, facing off with my brother as he stood in the driveway, pulling my heartstrings like a marionette of misery. My chest ached with the reminder of loss.

"It's different with Dalton," I whispered.

Dante nodded. "Complicated. Different...those sound like Mom's excuses for us. Thought you didn't want to be like her?" He paused, glancing up at the night sky and taking a collecting breath of his own. When he looked at me again, his eyes stared me down with resolve. "You can write me off as the bad guy all you want, but I'm just looking out for you." His tone brimmed with finality as he jingled his keys and added, "Spencer's lying, Davina."

"Well, I'm headed there now," I choked out, hating how weak and frail it sounded, but at least the tears were staying at bay. "Maybe I'll find out for myself and keep you posted."

"You do that." He walked to his car, hollering over his shoulder at me before he climbed inside. "Ask him about the river, sis. Let me know how it goes."