The fire had been out for days, but the smoke hadn't left my lungs.

Not the kind that clings to your gear—the kind that clouds your judgment. The kind that whispers someone you know is behind this.

I sat in the corner of the records room at Station 42's temporary HQ, knees pulled up, files spread across the floor. Rafe had gotten me backdoor access to the city-wide investigation logs. All I needed was one thread. One matchstick to set the truth ablaze.

And I found it—a report buried inside a routine maintenance file from the old Vassar Mill fire.

A name in the logs that didn't belong:
Cadet Brielle Voss.

Not a civilian. Not a contractor. A fire cadet. Assigned to equipment prep the morning the mill burned. Not just present—signed in before she was ever officially on shift.

I pulled her personnel file. Squeaky clean. Overqualified. Politely competitive.

But then I saw it: her last job? Internship under my uncle Graham Vassar's logistics firm. The same company now at the center of the fire-for-insurance spiral.

My heart dropped.

"Celeste?" Quinn poked her head in. "You've been holed up here for hours."

"I found something," I breathed, standing. "A connection. Brielle. My uncle. The fire."

She stepped inside, eyes narrowing. "You're sure?"

I nodded, chest tight. "She's the smoke trail we missed."

That night, back at the firehouse, I watched Brielle laugh with the other rookies. Cool. Confident. Innocent, on the surface. But something about her smile felt off now—too rehearsed, too hollow.

I felt Rafe step up beside me, coffee in hand. "You found something."

"Yeah," I said, never taking my eyes off Brielle. "And if I'm right, one of our own has been lighting the matches all along."

Rafe was quiet for a long moment. Then he spoke, calm but razor-edged:
"Then we follow the smoke. All the way to the fire."