Chapter 2: Faces from the Ashes

I offered him a cigarette and nodded toward the chaos outside. “What’s the story with the woman out front?”

He took the smoke, lit it with a flick, and exhaled slow. “Victim’s family. They want blood. We told her to go home and wait for the results, but she’s not having it—wants to raise hell right here.”

His voice was low, tired, but I caught a glimmer of sympathy. He watched the woman a moment, then looked away, like her pain was a weight he couldn’t carry anymore.

“Is there more to this than what we’ve seen?”

Marcus flicked ash onto the pavement, squinting. “You saw the video. That’s what happened. The dead guy—Nick Foster—was a drifter, no job. He was wasted, driving, sideswiped some guy on a bike. He swung at him with a kitchen knife, but it slipped. The other guy picked it up and chased him—hacked him up bad. Guts everywhere. Died right there.”

He shook his head, jaw tight. “It was a mess. One of the worst I’ve seen.”

“Looks like a random thing so far. If there’s more, we’ll find out when we dig deeper.”

He tapped his cigarette, smoke drifting up into the muggy night. “That’s the plan. We’ll see what shakes loose.”

According to Marcus, the story was simple: Nick Foster started the fight and got killed with his own knife. The real job was figuring out if there was any beef between the two, then deciding if it was murder, excessive force, or just plain self-defense.

These cases were always a legal minefield, and Marcus knew it. He glanced at me, lines deepening around his eyes. “It’s never cut and dry.”

I asked what he really thought, but he just shook his head. “No clue yet.”

He looked away, jaw working, and I could tell he wasn’t ready to talk it through. Something about the case was eating at him, even if he couldn’t put his finger on it.

From the look on his face, I knew this was going to get complicated.

I felt it too—a cold itch crawling up my spine. The truth was hiding somewhere, and the night air felt thick enough to choke on.

I’d watched the video over and over. Nick Foster clearly started it—he came at the other guy with a knife, and that alone was enough to make it a life-or-death moment. The biker picked up the knife and fought back—so it wasn’t murder. But after two hits, Nick tried to run, and the other guy kept after him, slashing. Whether that was still self-defense was anyone’s guess.

I replayed the scene in my head, flinching at the turn. Fear, rage, panic—all mashed together in a few seconds. The law drew lines, but real life didn’t care about those lines.

Nick Foster—let’s be honest—nobody was going to miss him.

That thought left a bad taste in my mouth. What did it say about me—or about a world where some lives just didn’t count? I found myself feeling sorry for the guy on the bike.

“Can I talk to him?” I asked Marcus.

He nodded, grinding his cigarette out on the pavement. “Let’s go.”

“What’s his name?”

“David Alvarez.”

The name made me pause—there was something about it.

A flash of memory tugged at me, but I couldn’t place it right away. I followed Marcus inside, boots squeaking on the linoleum.

When I saw David Alvarez sitting in the interrogation room, it all came rushing back.

He was slumped at the metal table, hands cuffed, eyes hollow and lost. The harsh fluorescent light made every line in his face stand out. He looked like a man who’d been through hell and barely made it out.

I knew this guy!

It hit me like a punch to the gut. I’d met David Alvarez five years ago, right after college, when I was just starting out as a reporter in Maple Heights. Back then, a human trafficking ring was snatching kids left and right. Some desperate parents formed a "Child Search Support Group" to find their missing children themselves. David—then a doctor at St. Mary’s—was the one who started it all.

He was relentless, fueled by a hope that wouldn’t die. I remembered him leading rallies, comforting parents, always first to volunteer for late-night searches. He had this quiet authority, like someone who’d seen the worst but still believed in something better.

While covering those abductions, I’d interviewed David a few times and even scheduled a big sit-down. But the day before, he pulled out—stopped talking to the press, vanished from the group. After that, he just dropped off the map.