“I was confirming.”
“You were looking for something to criticize.”
“That too.”
Anthony pulled out the chair opposite her desk and sat down.
For a moment, neither mentioned the hearing.
Then Erin closed the report.
“I should have warned you more clearly.”
Anthony raised an eyebrow.
It was not easy for Erin Reagan to admit that legal precision had failed to account for a human cost.
He could have made her repeat it.
He decided not to.
“I should have trusted the two taps,” he said.
“You did trust them.”
“Eventually.”
“You waited.”
“I considered ignoring you.”
“But you did not.”
“That is because I am disciplined.”
Erin laughed once.
“That is not the word I would use.”
Anthony leaned back.
The partnership had not survived because they always agreed.
It had survived because their disagreements never mattered more than the truth they were trying to protect.
Erin needed Anthony’s instinct—the part of him that noticed when a document felt wrong before anyone could explain why.
Anthony needed Erin’s precision—the part of her that could turn suspicion into evidence capable of surviving a courtroom.
He pushed her when the law became too distant from the people living beneath it.
She stopped him when urgency tempted him to move before proof was ready.
Neither made the other weaker.
They made each other accountable.
Anthony stood and headed for the door.
Erin reopened the report.
“Where are you going?”
“To find out why the witness changed one detail between interviews.”
“You are not confronting anyone without calling me.”
“I would never do that.”
She looked at him over the folder.
Anthony paused in the doorway.
“I will call you from the car.”
“Anthony.”
“Fine.
Before the car.”
He left before she could answer.
Erin shook her head, but the corner of her mouth lifted as she returned to the report.
The accusation in the courtroom had been public.
The restoration of Anthony’s dignity had come through documents, testimony, procedure, and one partner refusing to let a lie become the official record.
Their friendship did not need a speech.
It was there in the sealed folder Anthony had preserved because Erin had taught him that instinct needed proof.
It was there in the two taps Erin had trusted him to understand because Anthony had taught her that loyalty could communicate before words were safe.
And it was there in the next argument already waiting for them—another case, another disagreement, and the same certainty beneath both.
Whatever challenge stood across the courtroom, neither of them would face it alone.
