So that’s it. The Voss case is officially my poltergeist. Emotional, like it’s dangerous. Passionate: euphemism for sinful. My whole life, I’m taught that the only way to be taken seriously is to do my job and do it well. So I do that, and I get here, and the rules change. People like Buchanan change them. Surprise! Dedication is a detriment now. I’m supposed to detach, loosen up, lay back, back off. I’m supposed to posture for a living on top of doing work I love that I’m only allowed to love a certain way.

It’s not like I invented the whole work-ethic thing. It was taught to me, explicitly. Find something you love to do, Mom said, and do it. Then it’s not work.

Bust your ass, Dad told me. Your work will speak for itself.

I was at the station the day that girl’s parents brought her in. Chief put me in the room when she made her statement, said I’d make Kayla feel safe. I thought we wanted her to feel safe because a victim’s emotional security matters. (Emotional: a handicap.) Turns out we wanted her to feel safe so she’d talk. She was miserable, mortified, didn’t want to be here. Her parents forced her, nudged her, wept. They were pissed. Justifiably. They wanted J.R. Voss to be punished, and they wanted vengeance, damn it, on their daughter’s behalf. Meanwhile, Kayla Scott died inside every time I asked, And was that consensual? What about that? And that? She hated me, then herself, more and more with every detail pried.

Charges were filed. Noise happened. Got louder. Seemed for a while that justice might happen too. That justice might make noise too. Then, poof, out of the blue, the Scott family withdrew charges. Problem solved in private arbitration. Translation: Graham Parks and his cronies found her breaking point. Maybe it was something as simple as money. Might have been more. Might have been a splinter from the Scott family tree—something humiliating the mom or dad did in college, or some dumb thing Kayla said once, or any bit of gossip that could jeopardize or distract from their credibility. Proverbial dirty laundry to tip the proverbial scales. Whatever it was, it worked, case closed, and J.R. became a poster boy for the “wrongly” accused. Wrong is right.