The hum of the interrogation room’s fluorescent lights was almost louder than the man breathing hard across the table. Sweat pooled at the edge of his hairline, his fingers twitching with the kind of guilt they’d seen too many times. The look of a man that did killed his wife.

“You pushed her down the stairs, didn’t you?” Her voice sliced through the room like glass. Cold, calm, lethal. Her badge glinted under the light, the file in her hand packed with evidence she’d personally chased down.

Across from her, the man shifted uncomfortably. “I already told you. I didn’t—”

“Don’t lie to me,” she snapped. “Your daughter said she heard you shouting. The neighbors said they saw her bruised the week before. You think all of them are lying?”

In the corner, Detective Harry Styles leaned back against the wall, his charcoal suit clung to his shoulders, his jaw tense, his arms crossed. Quiet. Calculating. Watching.

The suspect glanced at him once, then twice—nervous. Everyone was. There was something about Harry’s silence that always unnerved them. The way he didn’t flinch. The way he didn’t blink. He didn’t need to speak to take control.

“She’s done playing nice,” Harry finally said, his voice low and gravelly, like it hadn’t been used all day. He uncrossed his arms, stepping forward just a little. “You’ve got one chance to talk, and it’s now.”

The man fumbled, swallowing hard.

Harry looked at her—his wife, the woman he shared a home and a life and a badge with. In the precinct, they were just partners. But outside these concrete walls, she was everything.

And even now, in the middle of a case, the softest glance between them still carried more heat than most people felt in a lifetime.

The way her hand brushed his under the table. The way he grounded her with a nod. It wasn’t in the rulebook to marry your partner. But they never cared much for rules.

She was fire. He was ice. That’s how they worked. That’s how they won.