Rachel sat on the stage of her schools auditorium, doing her paint work on the cardboard props scattered around her. She'd been coming here after school so she could work by herself, as opposed to coming here during the schoolday and being around her peers. She liked the solitude, but moreso she liked not being judged. Footsteps echoed in the room, and Rachel glanced up to see a boy entering and then looking back out through the small window on the doors, as if he were hiding from someone. Rachel perked up, and dunked her brush back into her water can.

"You know, for someone trying not to be noticed, you're acting pretty conspicuous," she said, making him jump in surprise and turn to face her, hand on his chest as she chuckled.

"Holy hell you scared the crap out of me," the boy said. He started to cautiously approach the stage, as Rachel smirked and continued to paint. He stopped at its edge, looking up, hands on his hips and asked, "what are you doing in here?"

"Painting. For a school play, but still," Rachel said, "what are you doing in here?"

"I, uh...I'm hiding," the boy said, hopping up onto the stage and sitting on it, his legs dangling off the edge.

"Hiding from what?" Rachel asked.

"...I have to break up with my girlfriend, and I don't want to," the boy said, exhaling, "I'm just kind of...avoiding her right now."

"I once again reiterate my previous statement of for someone trying not to be noticed, you're acting pretty conspicuous," Rachel said, the both of them laughing; she put her paintbrush down and held her hand out, "I'm Rachel."

He took it and shook, smiling as he said, "Wyatt. I think we've met, maybe."

"Probably. Being in the same school together you're often social with people even if you aren't friends with them" Rachel said, "It's a weird adolescent ecosystem, in a way. So why do you have to break up with her? You say have to like it's not your choice."

"It isn't," he replied, "it's my fathers choice. It isn't fair. To either of us, honestly. I love her, she's amazing, and I don't want ton break up, but he will make life impossible if I don't do it, and she...she doesn't deserve to have to deal with my family, or change for them, and I don't think she'd have the resolve to put up with it either way. It sucks. Everything always sucks."

"There's that can don't teenage attitude!" Rachel said, the both of them chuckling; she tossed her hair from her eyes and added, "well, for what it's worth, we both can't be with the girls we love, so don't feel too bad."

Wyatt nodded in response, exhaling. He'd do it tonight. He'd invite her over and they'd have a discussion in the backyard. That would maybe be a bit better, but, still...he just wanted to be with Amelia. If only he could see that, in the near future, not only would he be happy with a girl who wasn't her, but she would be happy too, with the very girl he was currently talking with. It's funny how life turns out like that sometimes.

***

"Nice place," Rachel said, looking out the window.

She and Ricky have driven to the neighborhood Grudin had lived in and were currently parked across the street from his house, watching it casually from the car. Ricky was preparing his notes, his tools, and gathering his nerves. Rachel looked from his window, taking her eyes off the home, and instead now looked at him.

"Dude, you're sweating," Rachel said, sounding concerned.

"I'm allowed to sweat, it's a free country," Ricky said. Rachel put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed gently. He finally fixed his sight on her and sighed, adding, "I'm nervous as all get out. Haven't seen this woman since before getting trapped in that shed."

"You didn't even tell her you quit?"

"I resigned over the phone, said nothing was found, that she should seek therapy if she felt this paranoid," Ricky said, "which...now...saying it back to myself...that's pretty fucked up to say to a grieving woman who was actually right about her husbands murder."

"I'm sure she'll understand, especially once we lay it all bare," Rachel said.

She opened her car door and stepped out of the car, Ricky doing the same on his side, and together - all his evidence tucked under his arm - they headed across the street towards the house. Ricky was so nervous he felt like he was about to pass out, everything was spinning a bit and he was dizzy, his breathing labored. Rachel took his free hand and squeezed, smiling at him.

"You got this, partner," she said, and he laughed weakly, nodding. He really did appreciate having her along for the ride. They reached the home, walked up the porch steps and stopped at the front door, Ricky reaching out and knocking politely. Rachel glanced around at the front yard and saw evidence of the child, the little girl who lived here, Grudin's disabled daughter. How much it must hurt, she thought, to actually have a father who wanted you, loved you, and to have him ripped from you the way he had been. The door opened and a woman was standing there, well-dressed and soft-spoken.

"Hello, Miss Grudin," Ricky said, "I'm sorry to bother you on such sudden notice, but I have some things to show you, if you don't mind."

She nodded and stepped aside, allowing them entrance. Ricky and Rachel entered and Rachel was...surprised, to say the least. For the wife, and home, of a supposedly popular politician, the place was so very ordinary and reserved. She didn't expect overwhelming opulence by any means, but still. This just looked like a normal upper middle class suburban home, the kind of which she might have spent time at during high school, like it belonged to a friends parents. The woman walked past them after closing the door and locking it - 3 separate locks, Rachel noticed, which made her and Ricky look at one another - and then they followed her to the living room.

"You can sit anywhere," she said, her voice meek and reserved, following that up with the statement, "excuse the mess" which confused Rachel because the place was immaculate, but perhaps the statement was more in reference to herself, and not the house. Rachel and Ricky sat on a dark blue polka-dotted couch across from her. She didn't look at them. Instead, her eyes were fixed solely on the photographs that hugged the fireplace mantel, photos of her family, her husband and daughter. She smiled weakly. She finally said, still without making eye contact, "...I didn't think I'd hear from you again."

"To be fair, I didn't really expect to speak to you again," Ricky said, "but...things have changed. Ma'am, we're here to tell you about your husbands death. You were right in your suspicions. But...maybe not in the way you expected, and I say this with the upmost respect to his memory, but his death actually has blown open an entirely new case as a result. Your husband was-"

"It was Klepper wasn't it," she said, taking them both by surprise. Rachel's breath caught in her chest. The woman nodded slowly, sniffling, as she said, "I always knew if anything happened, it would be that man, and it would be justified. What happened was terrible, what he did...I couldn't believe it."

"What your husband did?" Ricky asked, and she shook her head.

"No," she said, "the officer."

Rachel and Ricky exchanged a nervous look.

"Chief Augustine?" Ricky asked, nervous, and she nodded.

"Yes," she said, "he's the only reason it was handled the way that it was. Rob never would've agreed to behavior like that. Frankly, I never really forgave him for caving the way that he did."

"You said it'd be justified," Rachel said, "why do you say that?"

"He lost his wife. His daughter. I look at my little girls face every single day and think how easily it could be her in that situation, if things were just somewhat different. And then we expect a man who endured that level of loss, at the hands of an avoidable mistake no less, to not want vengeance? He had every right to want vengeance. I pitied him so deeply. Where is he now?"

Ricky exhaled and loosened his tie.

"Calvin Klepper is dead. He...killed himself," Ricky said, and Rachel was surprised at Ricky hiding the truth, but...it was probably for the best. A long silence filled the room, and Leslie looked at them both, rolling her eyes.

"If you're expecting an expression of joy at the death of someone who already lost everything, then you're wasting your time. If anything, after Rob died, I only felt more akin to Klepper. I thought about seeking him out firsthand, speaking with him, but...I couldn't go down that path myself, hence why I hired you to begin with, was to maybe see if you could find who did it, if it was actually him."

"What would you have done if I'd come back with that evidence?" Ricky asked.

"...I wouldn't have gone to the police," she replied, "not with Augustine still in charge. Clearly the department is corrupt. Who knows what else he's involved in."

"Well, that's the thing, actually," Ricky said, plopping the folder down in his lap, "I know exactly what he's involved in, and you're right to be skeptical. The man who was said to be blamed for your husbands death initially, Oliver Brighton, killed himself and his entire family. The morning his body was found, a man in another city, a former teacher here named Leonard Wattson, received a phone call about Brightons death, a call that was placed by John Augustine. Augstine was instructing Wattson to come back and clean up Brightons life, because the three of them had been producing illicit material involving children together as part of a larger network. Brighton, in fact, had been using his own daughters for content, even participating in it with them himself."

"Your husband died," Rachel said, now chiming in, "but his death actually allowed the dominoes to fall to uncover all of this. Now we're involved with an FBI agent to try and bring Augustine down very soon."

"Well," Leslie said, "I suppose one has to be happy about that at least. His death will save countless kids from similar fates then."

The phone rang, and Leslie excused herself. She went to the kitchen to answer the landline, leaving Rachel and Ricky alone.

"You're doing great, man," Rachel said, whispering, patting him on the back.

"This is insane, this whole case is just...insane," Ricky said, "like, when actually said out loud, it just-"

The front door opened and a woman entered with a little girl wearing a backpack. The two stopped upon noticing Rachel and Ricky sitting on the couch and the woman laughed nervously.

"Hello," she said brightly, "I...I didn't realize Leslie would have guests. I was just bringing her daughter home."

With that, she walked the little girl to the hall and down to her room. Rachel felt such a pain in her chest, as Ricky slowly looked around the room, then looked back at Rachel, who met his gaze with a confused expression on her face.

"What?" she asked, "what is it?"

"...isn't it weird that Leslie said John is the reason things went down the way that they did? Which insinuates Robert didn't want to not take responsibility. But why? For what reason? For what reason would having Grudin in office benefit Augustine? It only just now occurred to me...what if...what if Augustine wanted Grudin in office so he could get close to the family, gain their trust? After all, you help a guy not get arrested for vehicular manslaughter, get him elected into office, they'd bound to trust you. Trust you around their family."

Ricky looked back towards the hallway, his voice low, cracking.

"Trust you with their daughter."

Rachel audibly gasped as the reality of what Ricky was suggesting started to sink in.

"You mean..."

"Yeah. I think he wanted to use Grudin's daughter in his work," Ricky said, "which is even sicker considering her mental disabilities making her ten times more vulnerable than your average child."

"Jesus."

"Rachel," Ricky said, "this man needs to go down for what he's done and what he planned to do. I can't...I can't let him get away with this. What he did...what he could still do...to children if he isn't stopped. Whatever happens, no matter what, we need to make sure he pays."

"I'm with you to the end," Rachel said, "We'll get him, no matter what."

Leslie returned and looked at Rachel and Ricky.

"If you don't mind, my daughter is home now, and I'd like to spend some time with her. But I'd really like to thank you both for your hard work, and for coming back to me for this. Maybe we could meet again," Leslie said, "I'm not my husband, but I do hold a significant amount of power even in his absence, since I knew a lot of the people he knew. Perhaps I could be of some further assistance."

"I'm going to leave you with a copy of this file," Ricky said, standing up and pushing it into her hands, "it explains everything in much deeper detail than I could. I hope you'll understand we only want the right people to pay for the crimes committed here, in the end."

Leslie nodded. Rachel and Ricky thanked Leslie for her hospitality, and after all the pleasant goodbyes were had, they found themselves outside once again. They began to walk down the pathway back to the curb, but Ricky stopped and looked at the plastic home sitting on the lawn, the one big enough for a child to be inside and pretend to be their own. Rachel came back and tugged at his sleeved arm.

"Come on, I'm hungry," she said, "all this crime fighting really builds up an appetite."

He didn't budge.

"Ricky?"

"We wanted a baby so bad," Ricky said, his voice quiet and low, weak, "we wanted a baby so badly. Kept trying, but miscarriage after miscarriage just made us more and more disillusioned, so I started doing my own research into what we could do, or what the cause might be. I started...doing my own detective work, to figure out how to right these wrongs. We finally found a doctor who listened to me, to us, to what we'd learned, and with his help, we managed to concieve."

"...ricky," Rachel whispered, hugging his arm.

"And then, 5 months in, another miscarriage. But this one...she was so far along, it..."

Rachel knew what the next sentence was, she didn't want him to have to say it, but he did anyway.

"...it took her with it," Ricky said, tears rolling down his face, Rachel fighting back tears of her own as he added, "it was my fault. It wouldn't have happened if I hadn't kept wanting to try, if we'd just given up like she wanted to after so many failures. I killed my wife, and my unborn child. So yeah, maybe this case hits a little too close to home. But I have to do it. I have to see it through to completion. We have to make sure John Augustine pays for his crimes, no matter what."

"We will, together, I promise," Rachel said, "we'll get him hook line and sinker."

With that they turned and walked to the car, deciding to go get lunch. They both needed a meal, and then...then they'd plan their next move.

***

"I think the best thing you can do," Rachel said, now sitting beside Wyatt on the edge of the stage, "is just be honest with her. Not in that cruel way either, where they disguise their cruelty as honesty then get mad at you for 'keeping it real' or whatever, but, like, ya know...actual honest. Just tell her exactly what's going on. She deserves that."

"I just wish we could all be with the people we want to be with," Wyatt said and Rachel nodded in agreement, kicking her legs.

"Yeah, me too," she said, her thoughts turning to Sun Rai.

"If honesty is the best policy, then that's what I'll do," Wyatt said, "she deserves nothing less. I hate this though, this isn't fair. Sometimes I really wanna kill my dad."

"Hey, who knows, sometimes dreams come true," Rachel said, hitting him in the arm, the both of them laughing.