THE NEXT STEP was to get the gun to Shoupe and hope he would believe them. Their history indicated that there was a lack of trust with the police, but with solid evidence maybe that would change a bit.

"So y'all are telling me this is the firearm Rafe Cameron killed Peterkin with?" Shoupe questioned as the gun was placed onto his desk in front of him.

"That's exactly what we're telling you, Shoupe," JJ said.

"And the exact same firearm that Ward just used to kill Gavin," Pope added.

"And where's that corpse again?" Shoupe said.

"Isn't that your job to find out?" Carson said.

"Yeah, didn't you look?" Kiara asked.

"I checked the hospital. I went by his house. He was out," he told them.

"He was out?"

"No shit! 'Cause he's dead," JJ said.

"Listen to yourself. It makes perfect sense!" Kiara yelled. It seemed like they could never win in this fight to clear John B's name, not even when they had proof to hand to Shoupe. It was becoming increasingly frustrating, which was obvious by the way the Pogues were starting to get worked up.

"Just because he's not in his damn home does not mean he was a victim of a homicide," Shoupe said.

"Shoupe, can you just try to be on our side for once?" Carson said.

"There are no sides," he said. "I'm just trying to figure out what the hell happened and I can't just take your word for it."

"But you can take Ward's?" Carson pointed out.

"Are you at least gonna send it in for ballistics and shit, or are you just gonna sit on your ass?" Kiara said.

"He'll sit there and wax that damn mustache!" JJ said. Clearly, this just pissed Shoupe off because he stood to his feet.

"Shut up, JJ," Pope said. They were all mad, but his attitude was just making things worse.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Did I hurt his feelings?" he said.

"Shut up!" Pope screamed.

"Get out. I got work to do," Shoupe ordered. "Y'all are smelling up my damn office."

"Did Ward bribe you? This doesn't make any sense," Kiara said as she walked out. JJ just stormed past him and mumbled that he wasn't going to do shit. Carson stopped in front of Shoupe.

"Kie and I almost just died to get that gun to you," she told him. "Because that's how much we care about John B. If you can't understand why we're doing what we're doing, then maybe we really are on our own here. The least you can do is send the gun out. Just send it out, Shoupe." He just stared at her, so she turned and kept walking. There was no more use in trying to get him to understand.

✰

While Pope and Kiara went to Heyward's to clean up, JJ and Carson headed back home. Ever since everything went down, home had been at John B's. There had been no real conversation for that to have happened but Carson supposed it was just their way of feeling closer to him when they thought he was dead. Even when he was alive and in the Outer Banks, it was typical of them to have stayed at his place anyway. Her mom hadn't said anything about it because she knew that Carson wanted to be there and she trusted her enough to let her go.

Carson felt tired, defeated and dirty after the day, so she just headed straight to the shower. Usually JJ might have made a joke asking if he could go with her, but he could tell she wasn't in the mood and honestly he wasn't really either so he decided just to use the hose outside to clean up to give her some space. By the time that he had finished outside, she was walking out of the bathroom in one of his t-shirts and a pair of shorts as she ran the towel through her wet hair.

"Feeling better?" he said.

"Besides the fact that I can still taste garbage in my mouth, yeah," she said. He let out a soft laugh as he slid over on the bed for her to join him. She crawled onto the bed and he immediately wrapped his arm around her so that she was tucked into his side as she sat next to him. He could tell she was deep in thought, but once again, so much had happened that day. He wasn't going to force her to talk because he knew that if she wanted to, she would, which she eventually would. "Do you think we're actually gonna be able to clear his name?"

"We have to," he said.

"But what if we can't?" she wondered. "Rafe and Ward are getting away with everything and what if there's nothing we can do about that?"

"We're just gonna have to do whatever we have to make sure that doesn't happen," he assured her.

"We need to protect Sarah too," Carson said. It was crazy to think that not too long ago she had once disliked the blonde and never imagined being her friend. Now, she was not only her friend but her sister too. It was the only good part of finding out the truth about Ward. It had brought the girls closer together and would surely form a different kind of bond between them.

"We will," JJ said. "She's one of us now." He leaned over and pressed a kiss to her temple, and not much longer, they fell asleep in each other's arms.