The One Who Never Left

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Burn Them to The Ground

DAHLIA’S POV

Silence.

For a moment, that was all there was. The fluorescent lights above me buzzed like flies over a carcass. My file...the one I bled and burned for...sat unopened on his desk, like it was nothing more than trash.

My tongue felt thick in my mouth. “Captain… sir… is this a joke?”

His eyes didn’t lift.

“It’s not.”

I blinked. “You asked me here. You said—”

“I asked you here to inform you face to face. Out of respect for your years of service.”

Respect?

That word nearly made me laugh. Bitter and sharp.

“You’re telling me after I deliver the biggest case breakthrough in months, after I put Hall in the damn spotlight, that I’m fired? Just like that?”

Now he looked up. But not with guilt. Not with regret.

With relief.

“I read the file already.”

“When? I just—”

“It was uploaded to the internal server this morning. Sergeant Philips flagged it. Good work. We’ll take it from here.”

“We?” My voice dropped, low and deadly. “We? You mean they...your boys’ club of chain-of-command lapdogs who couldn’t tell a real lead from their own ass in the dark?”

His lips thinned. “Watch yourself.”

“No. No, you watch yourself.” My breath shook, but I forced every word to land like glass. “You think you can erase me? I’ve eaten bullets for this badge. Buried victims no one else wanted to remember. I lived this case. I put Hall on the damn board. And now what? You toss me out like garbage?”

He leaned back, folding his arms. “You’ve been unstable for weeks. Your last psych eval was overdue. You’ve been erratic, emotional, combative with your team—”

“My team? You mean the ones who joked about my period every time I made a call they couldn’t? The ones who made fart noises when I walked past this morning? Those team players?”

His eyes narrowed. “You’re proving my point.”

No.

I wasn’t going to cry.

Not here. Not now. Not in front of him.

My hand curled into a fist at my side. “This isn’t about my performance. This is politics. Optics. I’m not the poster child you want when the press gets involved.”

“You’ve been compromised, Quinn,” he said. “And the department can’t afford liabilities right now.”

“I cracked the case.”

“And your badge is still revoked.”

There it was.

The real sentence.

I stood there, frozen. The heat drained from my limbs. My lungs felt too small to breathe.

“So that’s it,” I said quietly. “You’re just cutting me loose.”

“You’re welcome to file a grievance,” he offered, that bland, paper-thin sympathy barely stitched across his face. “But I’d advise against it. Let this go. Walk away clean.”

Clean?

Nothing about this job ever stayed clean. But that can’t be all. There has to be more.

“I cracked this case myself,” I said again, the words a stone in my throat. “I delivered Hall on a goddamn silver platter. This…” I gestured to the closed file, “…this is what we’ve all been bleeding for the last six months. And now you’re firing me? You know I deserve to know the main reason for this. You owe me that much.”

Captain Marshall leaned back in his chair like he’d been waiting for me to ask.

“There’s been… concern.”

“Concern?”

He nodded, slow and deliberate. “About your methods. Your judgment. Your… personal boundaries.”

My eyes narrowed. “What the hell does that mean?”

He didn’t flinch. Just opened a drawer, slid out a single manila envelope, and laid it on the desk between us like a loaded weapon.

“I didn’t want to tell you this face-to-face, but you’re forcing my hand. You’ve crossed lines, Quinn. Too many. Internal Affairs received multiple complaints over the past few months. Unofficial sources. Whispers. You’ve used illegal means to extract confessions. Accessed restricted files through unauthorized backdoors. Ignored direct orders from your superiors.”

I stiffened. “And yet all of those complaints conveniently came after I started cracking this case. After I made noise Hall couldn’t bury.”

He didn’t deny it.

Didn’t have to.

Because then he said, casually…as if it were nothing—

“We also heard you traded sexual favors for that file.”

Silence.

Louder than a gunshot.

I blinked. Slowly. Once. Twice. My vision blurred with the heat behind my eyes.

“What did you just say?”

“I’m not saying it’s confirmed. But it’s out there. And once that kind of rumor takes root, it doesn't go away.”

“So you’re telling me,” I said, voice razor-thin, “that after everything I’ve done…after all the hours, the trauma, the blood…you’re going to look me in the eye and accuse me of sleeping my way to this case file?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“No,” I snapped. “You didn’t. But you implied it. And if that’s the accusation, then give me the evidence. Show me the complaint. Show me the proof.”

His mouth curled into something between disdain and faux sympathy. “We don’t owe you an explanation.”

I laughed.

Laughed so bitter it tasted like ash in my throat.

“Right. Of course you don’t. Because when it’s a man, it’s ambition. Grit. Dedication. But when it’s me…when it’s the woman who gets results you couldn’t dream of—you paint it like I must’ve spread my legs to do it.”

Marshall didn’t respond.

And that silence told me everything.

They didn’t care if it was true.

They wanted it to be.

I took a step forward, not caring how unhinged I must’ve looked. “You think you can discredit me with this garbage? You think you can bury me under whispers and shadows and walk away clean?”

He remained stone still.

“Keep the file,” I said, spitting the words like poison. “Take credit. Celebrate your little victory. But one day...maybe a week from now, maybe a year…you’re going to need someone like me. And when that day comes, remember this moment. Remember how you chose a lie over a soldier.”

Marshall didn’t blink.

So I turned, gripping the edge of the chair beside me hard enough to leave nail marks.

“I didn’t sleep my way into that file,” I said, voice shaking with fury. “I earned it. I earned every goddamn piece of it. And if the department can’t see that, then maybe it’s time someone burned this whole damn system down.”

Without another word, I reached into my coat. The badge was cold, heavy, alive with all the years it had branded me.

I dropped it on the desk. Hard enough that he flinched.

I turned, my boots echoing with hollow weight.

I walked out of his office without another word.

The door slammed behind me like the hammer of a judge.

Guilty.

Not of a crime.

But of being too much for the men who built a world that couldn’t contain me.

I went straight to my locker and cleared my belongings. Then I moved. Down the corridor. Past the men who’d mocked me. Their snickering halted when they saw my face.

I didn’t scream.

I didn’t break.

But each step was a scream in silence.

By the time I reached the parking lot, the sky had turned leaden. Clouds rolled overhead like bruises.

I got into my car, slammed the door shut, and let my head fall against the steering wheel.

This morning, I woke up with victory in my hands.

Now I had nothing.

No job.

No badge.

No relationship.

And yet, beneath the pain… something else stirred.

Something hot. Cold. Quiet.

A slow, creeping burn in my chest.

Rage.

Not loud. Not explosive.

But coiled. Patient.

I had cracked the case. They were just stealing it from me.

And so help me, even if I had to drag the whole precinct to hell myself, I’d take them all down.

No badge.

No rules.

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