Jane woke abruptly in the middle of the night though she couldn't say why. She had been sleeping very deeply, dreaming of distant fires and the hollow rumble of far-off explosions.
The world had been ending in her dream. She did not usually dream, but in her dream the world had been ending. There had been something else, a woman standing just behind her who Jane could not identify. The woman had been trying to tell Jane something, she had tried to turn and face her, but the distant fires had flared up, the far-off explosions ricocheted in her ears.
She's trying to say something to me. To tell me something. But the fires are getting closer, I have to get us out of here.
She shook her head, trying to clear her mind enough to identify any immediate threats. Jane did not wake up in the night unless someone was after her, unless someone was there, but she was alone. She felt strange, though, more alone than alone, as though something was missing but she couldn't identify what it was.
She slipped out of bed and padded to the kitchen for a drink of water. She could hear birds beginning to sing; it was near dawn.
"Where's Maura?" she asked, adding sugar to her coffee. Frost shrugged.
"Haven't seen her yet."
"That's weird," Jane frowned. "She's usually here before anybody.
"Maybe she didn't have anything scheduled this morning."
"Maura always has something scheduled. Even if it's a quick jaunt through the style section."
"What, she doesn't get the paper at home?"
Jane shot him a look. "How would I know?"
Frost raised his eyebrows, and shrugged. "I didn't say anything."
"Yeah, well, you sound best when you're not saying anything."
"Hey now."
"Where's the doc?" Korsak shuffled up to the counter, pouring himself a cup of coffee before realizing Jane had already made him one.
"Not here yet," Frost replied.
"That's weird."
"I told you," Jane muttered. Frost shrugged.
Jane headed down the hallway to the bullpen, worrying the phone at her hip. It wasn't like Maura to be late anywhere, especially not to work. She heard a far-off crash somewhere in the building, the low sounds of apology. She thought she caught a glimpse of a distant fire out of the corner of her eye.
Come on, Jane, it was just a dream. It was a weird dream, kind of scary, but you've had worse.
She couldn't shake the feeling of a woman standing just behind her, wanting to speak to her. Couldn't shake the feeling that she needed to hear what the woman had to say.
"Jane?"
"Yeah," she muttered, rubbing the back of her neck.
"She probably just overslept or something. Come on, we've got work to do." Frost tapped her on the elbow and kept going down the hall.
Maura, where are you?
Jane flipped the phone from its holster and hit a button. She felt her breath growing shallower with each successive unanswered ring. Her stomach turned hard and cold, she had the feeling she had when she approached a crime scene for the first time, but this time—
"Jane?" Frost paused at the doorway to the bullpen. "You okay?"
"She's not answering," Jane said, frowning. "Frost, do you think you can-"
"Yeah," he cut her off. "Sure. No problem. Just try to be back by lunch, Cavanaugh's supposed to be coming in to chew all of us shiny new assholes over improperly-filed paperwork."
"Okay, thanks," she said absently, wheeling around and striding back toward the front doors.
She drove to Maura's house, both dazed and sharply focused, her senses impossibly keen but her mind far from the road. She kept seeing the flickering of distant fires.
She pulled up to the house and moved quickly to the door, stopping so fast she moved a step backward when she saw it was half-open, no lights on inside. Her hand flew to her gun.
"Maura?"
Jane edged into the house. Everything was quiet, the songs of the birds outside amplifying the absolute stillness. She could tell Maura wasn't there. She could feel it.
She pulled out her phone and dialed Maura again. For a moment there was only the low burr of the phone ringing in her ear but then she could hear another sound, she could hear Maura's phone as it buzzed softly against the granite countertop.
There was a sudden rush of blood in her ears and for a moment she couldn't hear anything, everything was obscured by the heavy thrum of her pulse. She felt explosions ricocheting through her body. She closed her eyes and saw distant fires.
Maura, where are you?
She hung up and dialed another number. "Frost," she said, her voice tight. "She's not here."
"Like, ran-out-for-milk-and-forgot-to-text-you not there, or what?"
"Like her front door was wide open and there's nobody here."
His tone shifted instantly. "We'll be right there."
Maura, where are you? What happened to you?
She closed her eyes and felt the woman behind her, the one she could not turn to see, the one who was trying to tell her something Jane needed to hear.
Was it you, Maura? Were you standing behind me while the world was ending? Were you trying to tell me something? I'm listening, Maura, what is it? Where are you?
Forty hours.
Jane kept repeating the number over and over in her head. It had been forty hours since she'd gone to Maura's house and found her missing, it had been thirty-nine hours since they'd discovered white nylon fibers on the floor of her entryway, it had been thirty-three hours since the tire treads pulled from her driveway had come up so common as to be worthless.
It had been Jane's whole life since she'd felt like she could breathe. It had been her whole life since Maura had disappeared, had been taken, it had been her whole life.
It had been forty-five hours since she'd awoken so abruptly from a dream of the world ending.
Maura, please, what did you want to tell me? I'm listening, Maura, please.
Jane had not slept, had not eaten, had not stopped moving for an instant. When she felt herself slowing to a halt she thought of Maura's face, when she closed her eyes she heard Maura's voice, when she took a breath she could smell faintly Maura's perfume, expensive, like flowers she'd never even heard of.
Forty hours. Forty-five.
"Jane?" Frost's voice was soft, kind, hesitant. "Jane, you need to get some sleep."
"I'm fine," she snapped. "I've got this."
"He's right, Janie," Korsak said. "You're not very good right now, and you're gonna be no good at all if you keep going like this."
"I have to find her, Korsak," she nearly shouted. "She's been gone forty-five hours, and that only leaves three-"
"Forty," Frost said, his tone slightly quizzical.
Jane stopped. She hadn't told anyone about the dream, hadn't told anyone about the phantom woman who was following her everywhere, trying to tell her something Jane was sure she needed to hear. She knew how it would sound to them, to Frost and Korsak, even though she knew they trusted her, believed in her, wanted to find Maura almost as much as she did.
They want to find her just as much as you do, Jane. They love her just as much as you do.
They don't, though—
Jane shook her head. "I'm fine." She dropped the file—Maura's file—on her desk and stormed out of the room.
Maura, please—
There were distant fires and far-off explosions. Everything she saw was cratered and smoking, there were jagged, blown-out shells of buildings she'd known, twisted shells of cars, and there, at the end of a long stretch of road shimmering with apocalyptic heat, a woman standing silhouetted against the burning air, the smoke and haze dulling everything to a sickly honeyed glow. The wail of sirens and the crackling of a thousand explosions is dulled too, into a low, heavy drone. She calls out to the woman but her voice vanishes a few inches from her mouth, she can see it happen, she can see the words turn to vapor and the woman is disappearing over the skyline; the world is ending, she still does not know what it is she needs to know but the woman is disappearing over the skyline and the world is ending—
Jane jerked awake. She grabbed her phone.
Nothing.
Sixty-two hours.
She knew from experience there was a high probability that Maura was already—
Don't think it, Jane. Don't even finish the sentence. Don't let yourself start to believe it even a little bit, not even though the woman in your dream was moving away from you, all you have to do is catch up. You'll find her before she disappears. You have to.
She hadn't meant to fall asleep but she'd sat down to go through the logs of anonymous tips and suddenly she'd been there again, staring at the end of the world, suddenly she'd been bathed in heat and noise and she was watching the woman who she could almost recognize, whose face was just slightly obscured, the woman who had something to tell her that Jane knew she needed to hear, she was watching her disappear over the horizon into a sky the thick amber of honey, the shimmering crimson of blood.
Sixty-two hours.
The bullpen was deserted. Jane angrily flipped through the tip log, her eyes burning with exhaustion and fear and rage. The words began to blur together on the page, and Jane began to catch flashes of distant fires out of the corner of her eye. She took a deep breath and smelled flowers she'd never even heard of.
Maura, where are you? Do any of these people know where you are? Did any of these people take you? Did any of these people hurt you? I swear, Maura, I swear on my life, I swear if anyone hurt you I will kill them, please Maura, help me find you. Tell me where you are.
She did not notice the droplets clouding the page, making the ink run together into faded, unintelligible blurs. She did not taste the salt on her lips, she tasted only the faintest hint of acrid black smoke, the faintest breath of flowers.
Sixty-two hours.
When it happened, it happened so fast.
A gas station attendant had remembered a pretty woman with honey-colored hair paying for a heavyset bald man's gas. Remembered there had been something odd in the way he'd looked at her, the way he'd watched her until she was gone. Had remembered that the car had Vermont plates.
Had said "yes" when they'd shown him Maura's picture.
I'm coming to find you, Maura, I'm so much closer, please hold on.
Jane knew she was alive, or she hoped it so much she couldn't believe anything else. Frost and Korsak offered no speculation, merely nodded at her and went back to coordinating efforts with the Vermont authorities.
Maura, Maura, Maura, please hold on, please, I'm coming.
It had been a hundred and eighteen hours since Maura had been taken. Nearly five days.
Jane had spent nearly all of it at the precinct except for the few hours she'd spent driving aimlessly through the nearest rural areas she could find, trying to clear her head. She hadn't slept more than two or three hours in every thirty-six; when she did she was caught up in heat, in violence, in a world that was ending, the dry hiss of smoke in her nose, the honey-thickness of blood on her tongue. Always the woman whose face she could not see, whose name she could nearly touch, always the woman disappearing, or behind her, or nothing more than a soft amber haze, a low constant hum.
Maura, I'm going to find you. We're so close now. I know it. Please, please, please wait for me. I promise you I will find you, Maura, because if I don't I'm not sure what I'd do, I'm not sure if I could forgive myself, I'm not sure I'd want anyone to—
"Jane."
She looked up. Frost was leaning around the doorway, his jacket halfway on. Jane shot up. "Where?" she demanded, but she was already out the door.
"Don't you let them go in there, Frost," Jane had said. "Don't you let them fuck this up."
If he hurt you I will kill him, Maura, I won't let them take that from me, if he hurt you I swear on my life he will die right now, by my hand.
The smell of honey had permeated the air; the low drone of bees had sent a chill down Jane's spine as she approached the long, low wooden building.
Maura, I'm coming—
She kicked down the door, gun in hand. The buzzing was deafening. "Maura?" she shouted, trying to see clearly in the dim amber light. A single bulb hung from the center of the room. Smoke drifted through the air, the bees hummed incessantly, the smell of honey was making her dizzy.
"Maura?"
A sudden scuffle from the far corner of the room. Jane tried to navigate the maze of hives as best she could, barely conscious of herself. She adjusted her grip on her weapon. "Maura?"
More sounds of movement. Jane saw a dark shape flash between two boxes.
"Hey!" she yelled. "Police, stop where you are!"
The figure did not stop. The arm raised. The barrel glowed faintly red in the dim honey light.
Jane shot once, twice. She darted to the spot and saw him there on the ground, twitching, blood pooling around his body. The bees hummed ferociously.
She spared less than a glance for the dead man.
"Maura? Are you here?"
Maura please please be here, please, I am here, I killed him like I promised, Maura, please—
She was there, lying on the ground in front of a wooden chair. She was laying on her side away from Jane, her face obscured. She wasn't moving. On the floor next to her Jane caught a glimpse of something small and shiny. A needle.
Jane dropped to her knees. "Maura," she whispered, less a word than a breath, less a breath than a silent howl.
The smell of smoke is choking me. There is honey and blood and Maura I found you, please stay with me, please Maura, please—
Okay, well, here we go again, and I'm pretty excited that so many people were so into the idea of a companion piece to Honeysweet. So excited, in fact, I decided to write one! There will be three chapters, just like the other story, and they'll be roughly parallel. Thanks again for your support and your kind words, because you've probably heard it before but telling a writer you like their work is most likely the only compensation they get for writing their stories, and we cannot ever get enough. Your love is like gold, is what I'm saying. Precious to me.