The Last Liberal

Chapter 1

The George N. Leighton Criminal Court Building hummed with a low, electric tension that seemed to hang in the fluorescent air. On the fifteenth floor, in a paneled courtroom that had seen too many ruined lives to count, twelve jurors leaned forward in their chairs, elbows on the worn wooden rail, eyes locked on the man pacing between counsel table and the well.

Evan Rourke’s shoes whispered across the tile. His navy suit jacket was unbuttoned, sleeves pushed back just enough to show forearms taut with nervous energy. His tie—blue with tiny white dots—was slightly loosened, not sloppy, just human. A legal pad lay abandoned on the defense table, pages dense with his looping handwriting. He hadn’t looked at it in ten minutes.

He didn’t need it.

At the defense table, his client sat, in the relaxed manner not of a scared guilty man, but a man supremely confident he is getting away with something. 

Diego Álvarez, thirty-four, Venezuelan by birth, Chicago by bad luck. A thin scar carved a pale line from his left temple to his jaw He did not sit like a man on trial for his freedom. He lounged in his chair with the easy, insolent calm of someone who had seen the inside of courtrooms too many times to count. His posture was relaxed—shoulders loose, one arm draped over the back of the chair, fingers tapping an idle rhythm. His shirt collar sat just low enough to reveal the ink coiling up his neck: crude gang markings from Caracas and Maracaibo, stamped into his skin like a résumé of violence.

His eyes were flat, empty, predatory—two dark coins giving nothing back. Every so often he turned them toward the jury, holding each gaze a second too long, daring someone to look away first. Some jurors did. A few tried not to. One woman swallowed and shifted in her seat. Diego noticed. His mouth twitched in something between amusement and contempt.

He didn’t fidget. He didn’t tremble. He didn’t seek comfort from Evan or look for reassurance. He seemed almost bored by the proceedings, a man who had slipped the noose before and expected to do it again. When the victim entered earlier in the week, he hadn’t averted his eyes in shame—he’d watched her walk with the same cold attention he gave the jurors now, as if cataloging weaknesses.

If Evan was fighting for his client’s life, Diego appeared to be waiting for everyone else to catch up to the fact that he wasn’t afraid of losing it.

At the other table, Assistant State’s Attorney Megan Kline watched Evan with a cool, measured stare. Her gray suit was precise, her red legal pad neatly tabbed, her posture perfect. Next to her, the lead detective sat in the front row, thick hands folded over his belt buckle, uniform creased razor-sharp.

The gallery was half full—victim’s family clustered to the left, a couple of reporters with small notebooks in the back row, one sketch artist working in quick strokes. The judge’s bench loomed above it all, dark oak and authority. Judge Alan Brecker, silver hair cut close, glasses low on his nose, watched from behind his elevated desk, mask of neutrality carefully in place.

Evan stopped near the jury box, palms open, voice low and steady.

“This case,” he said, “is not about whether something terrible happened. We all know something terrible happened.”

He let the words settle, let the jurors shift. He saw the youngest juror, a woman in her late twenties with soft brown hair, swallow and look down, jaw tight. The older Black man in the back row—juror number seven—met his eyes head-on, waiting.

“It’s not about whether you feel anger,” Evan continued. “How could you not? You’ve heard things in this room that will stay with you for the rest of your lives. You’ve seen photographs you’ll wish you could unsee. You’ve watched witnesses break on that stand.”

He paused, let his gaze drift to Diego for a beat, then back to the panel.

“But the law,” Evan said, the word ringing faintly off the high ceiling, “the law is not about anger. The law is about proof. The law is about process. The law is about whether the government—this enormous machine we call the State—follows its own rules before it tries to take a man’s life away.”

He turned, gesturing lightly toward the prosecution table.

“The State wants you to look at my client and see a monster. They want you to see a label: ‘violent sex offender,’ ‘gang member,’ ‘illegal immigrant.’ They want you to stop right there and let those words do all the work.”

He took a step closer to the jury, voice still even.

“But you swore an oath. Not to your gut. Not to the headlines. You swore an oath to the law and to the evidence.”

He moved back toward the defense table, letting the silence deepen. He could feel the victim’s father’s stare burning into his back from the gallery. He didn’t turn. If he did, he’d see the man’s ruined eyes, and some small, guilty part of him would agree with the State. That part could not be allowed anywhere near his closing argument.

“Let’s start with the evidence,” Evan said, pivoting. “Because if you strip away the emotion, what are we actually left with?”

He raised one finger.

“Number one: There is no physical evidence tying Mr. Álvarez to this crime. None. The DNA at the scene? It belongs to the victim and her husband. We all heard the lab tech testify to that. No DNA from Diego. No fingerprints on the window. No footprints in the mud that match his shoes. Nothing.”

He held up a second finger.

“Number two: The only identification in this case came from a single, highly suggestive photo lineup conducted twelve hours after the assault, when the victim was sedated, traumatized, and exhausted.”

He turned, eyes on juror number three, a middle-aged white man with a Cubs lapel pin. “You remember the testimony. The detective admitted he told her, ‘We think the guy’s in here.’ That’s not neutral. That’s not careful. That’s pressure.”

He walked toward the prosecution table now, his voice sharpening just a hair.

“And number three: The arrest itself. You heard me argue this in the motion to suppress. You heard the officer testify. They did not have a warrant. They did not have probable cause. They had a hunch.”

He turned back to the jury, the words coming faster now, heat threading under the control.

“They went into an immigrant neighborhood at three in the morning, rousted men from their beds, and pulled Mr. Álvarez out of his cousin’s apartment because he had the wrong accent, the wrong tattoos, the wrong immigration status. They ran his name, saw a record, saw prior deportations, and decided, ‘We got him. Case closed.’”

He spread his hands.

“That is not how justice works. That is how fear works. That is how profiling works. That is how you get wrongful convictions.”

He could feel his heart thumping harder now, the old adrenaline he knew from protests and microphones and tear gas canisters rolling at his feet. The courtroom smelled faintly of coffee gone cold and floor polish, a sterile backdrop to very human suffering.

“Judge Brecker has already ruled,” Evan continued, nodding respectfully toward the bench, “that the stop and arrest were… let’s call it what it was… unconstitutional. That’s why the initial statements Mr. Álvarez made to police were suppressed. You were not allowed to hear them. Rightly so. Because they were taken after a Fourth Amendment violation. Because the police broke the rules.”

He let that hang.

“But then,” he said quietly, “the State pivoted. They said, ‘Okay, fine. We can’t use his statements. We’ll build our case around this photo lineup instead. We’ll build our case around this one, shaky identification. We’ll try to patch up a bad stop with a bad lineup, and we’ll hope the jury doesn’t notice how we got here.’”

He stepped closer to the jury again, voice softening.

“You noticed.”

He could see it in their faces: the doubt, the discomfort. Some of them looked down at their hands. One woman bit her lip. Juror seven’s arms were crossed now, brow furrowed.

“Look,” Evan said, “none of this is easy. The State got up here and showed you my client’s record. They pointed at those prior convictions like they were destiny carved in stone. They told you he’s been deported twice. They used phrases like ‘career criminal’ and ‘serial predator.’”

He turned, eyes flicking to Megan for a second, then back to the jury.

“But prior record is not proof of this crime. Immigration status is not proof of this crime. Being poor, being brown, being from the wrong country, living in the wrong neighborhood—none of that is proof of this crime.”

He drew in a slow breath, modulated his tone.

“We live in a city that loves simple stories. Bad guys. Good guys. Lock ‘em up. Throw away the key. It makes us feel safer to believe that evil is something ‘out there’—foreign, imported, not like us. That’s why the headlines said ‘Venezuelan gang member’ and ‘illegal immigrant’ in bold type the day my client was arrested.”

A couple of jurors shifted, uncomfortable at the mention of headlines. Good, he thought. Feel that discomfort. Sit in it.

“But your job,” Evan said, “is not to write a headline. Your job is to weigh evidence. Your job is to protect the Constitution even—especially—when it’s hard. Because if the State can break the rules to go after someone like Diego, they can break the rules to go after anyone. They can break them to go after you. Your son. Your neighbor. Your coworker.”

His hand brushed the rail of the jury box, knuckles white for a moment as he leaned in.

“This isn’t about agreeing with my client’s life choices. This isn’t about endorsing his past. This is about whether the government did its job the way the law requires before it tried to take his freedom for the rest of his life.”

He straightened, letting the tightness in his chest roll out with a slow exhale.

“Let’s talk about reasonable doubt,” he said, lowering his voice again. “Because the judge is going to instruct you on that, but I want to put it in plain language.”

He looked at the jury foreperson, an older Latina woman with silver streaks in her hair.

“If you go back into that room,” he said, “and there is a voice in the back of your mind saying, ‘Something about this arrest feels wrong,’ that is reasonable doubt. If there is a part of you thinking, ‘Why didn’t they get a better lineup? Why no body-cam footage? Why no physical evidence?’ that is reasonable doubt. If there is a part of you that wonders whether the victim, under sedation, after hours of trauma, might have been influenced by the detective who said, ‘We think he’s in this lineup’—that is reasonable doubt.”

He let his hand drop to his side.

“You don’t have to be certain he’s innocent,” Evan said. “You just have to be unsure he’s guilty.”

He took a step back, giving them space

“And if you are unsure—if you have that doubt—you must say ‘not guilty.’ Not because you like my client. Not because you think what happened to the victim isn’t horrific. But because we do not send people to prison for the rest of their lives based on hunches, sloppy police work, and fear of the Other.”

He glanced briefly at Diego. The man’s eyes were flat, his mouth twitched.

“I’ve spent my career representing people the system would rather forget,” Evan said, turning back to the jurors. “People without money, without status, without the luxury of mistakes. People born on the wrong side of the line. I’ve seen what happens when we let our fear do the judging. Innocent men lose decades. Families are shattered. And the real predators stay free, because we grabbed the easiest target instead.”

He felt the familiar burn of righteous anger start to crest and forced himself to keep his voice level.

“You have power right now,” he said. “More power than almost anyone else in this building. You can tell the State: ‘Do better. Follow the rules. Bring us real evidence, or don’t bring us a case.’ You can say, ‘We will not rubber-stamp shortcuts because we are scared, because the headlines are ugly, because this man is not like us.’”

He stepped back toward his table, then stopped, turned for one final look at them.

“You cannot fix what happened to the victim,” he said quietly. “None of us can. But you can make sure that what happened in her bedroom doesn’t get used as an excuse to throw away the rule of law in this courtroom. If we let that happen, then we’ve all been violated.”

Silence flooded the room. Even the air vents seemed to hush

Evan nodded once, firmly.

“We ask you to find Mr. Álvarez not guilty,” he said. “Not because this is easy. But because it is right. Because the evidence is not there. Because the process was broken, and you are the last line of defense between that broken process and a human life.”

He held their gaze a moment longer.

“Thank you.”

He walked back to the defense table, legs suddenly heavier. As he sat, his chair creaked louder than it should have. He swallowed, throat dry, and took a sip of water that tasted like dust. Diego leaned back with a smirk.

Evan kept his eyes on the jury box as the judge cleared his throat.

“We’ll talk after,” he murmured back.

Judge Brecker shifted in his high-backed chair. “Thank you, Mr. Rourke,” he said, eyes unreadable. He turned his gaze to the prosecution table. “Ms. Kline, you may proceed with rebuttal.”

Megan Kline rose smoothly. She adjusted her jacket, smoothed an invisible wrinkle, and stepped into the well. Where Evan’s presence was all restless energy and coiled passion, hers was controlled, precise. She carried only a single sheet of paper, folded once.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” she began, her voice calm, almost gentle. “You just heard a very eloquent speech.”

She let a tiny, practiced smile touch her lips.

“Mr. Rourke is very good at what he does. He’s passionate. He’s committed. He believes, deeply, in his client and in his cause. That’s admirable.”

Her eyes sharpened.

“But your job is not to grade speeches.”

She moved a little closer to the jury, heels clicking softly.

“Your job,” she said, “is to decide what happened in that bedroom, in that small apartment on 26th Street, in the early hours of January 14th. Your job is to decide whether the State has proven, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the man who forced his way into that home, who held a knife to a woman’s throat, who raped her while her six-year-old son slept in the next room… whether that man is the one sitting right there.”

She pointed, not dramatically, just firmly, at Diego.

He stared down at the table.

“Mr. Rourke wants to talk about process,” Megan continued. “And process is important. Absolutely. That’s why we have rules. That’s why Judge Brecker suppressed the statements that were taken after the illegal stop. We followed those rules. We didn’t fight that ruling. We respected it.”

She let her gaze drift to Evan for a moment, then back to the jury.

“But the victim’s body isn’t a technicality,” she said softly. “The terror in her eyes on this stand, the way her hands shook when she pointed to the defendant and said, ‘That’s him’—that is not a technicality. The scar on her shoulder where he pressed the blade too hard? Not a technicality. Her nightmares, her therapy, her inability to sleep in her own bed anymore? None of that is a technicality.”

She took a step closer to juror number seven, then eased back, giving him space.

“Mr. Rourke said we have no physical evidence,” she went on. “He’s right that we don’t have DNA. But you heard our expert: sexual assault does not always leave behind the kind of neat, TV-show evidence that defense attorneys love to talk about. The absence of DNA does not mean the absence of a crime. If it did, rapists would walk free every day.”

She flipped her folded paper open.

“What do we have?” she asked. “We have a victim who saw her attacker’s face inches from her own. A victim who described his accent, his tattoos, his height, his build—details that were later corroborated by the arresting officers. We have a photo lineup conducted according to department procedure, using similar-looking photos, which she identified not once, but twice, with certainty.”

She let the paper fall to her side.

“Mr. Rourke calls that ‘suggestive.’ You heard the detective. He said the words, ‘We think the guy is in there.’ Should he have said it differently? Maybe. But ask yourselves this: Do you really believe that sentence somehow implanted a face in the victim’s mind? Or do you think she already had that face burned there from the moment he climbed through her window?”

Megan’s tone sharpened, but only a little.

“He wants you to focus on the defendant’s immigration status, on deportations, on buzzwords like ‘profiling’ and ‘the Other.’ As if this case is about federal policy, not about what happened to a woman whose life was split into ‘before’ and ‘after’ by one night.”

She leaned on the rail of the jury box, hands light, controlled.

“Let me be very clear,” she said. “Nobody is on trial here for being Venezuelan. Nobody is on trial here for being poor. The defendant is on trial because the evidence shows he broke into a woman’s home, raped her, and threatened to kill her if she screamed. The fact that he has done terrible things before—that he has prior convictions for similar crimes—that he has been deported twice and came back… that does not make him guilty of this crime by itself, no. But it does tell you something important: when he tells the victim, ‘I’ve done this before, nobody stops me,’ that is not an idle boast. That is a confession wrapped in arrogance.”

She let that line sit, let the weight of it drop into the silence.

“You heard the neighbor testify,” Megan resumed. “The one who saw a man climbing out of the bedroom window. He described the same man. Same jacket. Same build. Same distinctive tattoo on the neck. He picked the defendant out of the same lineup. Two identifications. Not one. Two.”

She straightened, pacing slowly in front of the box now.

“Mr. Rourke says the arrest was illegal. The court agreed and suppressed evidence obtained as a result. That is how the system corrects itself. But that does not erase the crime. That does not magically make the defendant someone else. That does not negate the testimony of a victim who had no idea about Fourth Amendment law when a stranger was on top of her, or the testimony of a neighbor who risked retaliation to tell you what he saw.”

She stopped, squared herself with the jurors.

“The law demands that we protect the rights of the accused,” she said. “I believe in that. You believe in that. But the law also demands that we protect our communities. That we protect women sleeping in their own beds. That we protect children in the next room. That we say, as a society, ‘There are lines you do not cross. And if you do, there are consequences.’”

Her voice, still calm, acquired a steely undercurrent.

“This defendant crossed every line,” she said. “Not once. Not twice. Over and over. He has been given chances. He has been given due process. He has been removed from this country and chose to break our laws to return. And when he came back, he didn’t come to work hard and keep his head down. He came back and did what he has done before: he hunted vulnerable women.”

She tilted her head slightly.

“Mr. Rourke asks you to ‘send a message’ that sloppy police work won’t be tolerated. I’m asking you to send a different message. A message to every victim who sits in that witness box and wonders if anyone will believe her. A message to every predator who thinks he can hide behind technicalities and political arguments and clever rhetoric.”

She stepped back, closer to her own table, but kept her eyes on the jury.

“The standard is not ‘beyond all doubt,’” she said. “You will hear Judge Brecker tell you that. The standard is not perfection. It is not a pristine investigation conducted by angels with body cameras and laboratory kits. The standard is ‘beyond a reasonable doubt.’”

She held out her empty hand, palm up.

“Do you really believe,” she asked quietly, “that it is reasonable to think the victim misidentified a stranger she saw face-to-face in a lit bedroom? That the neighbor just happened to pick out the same wrong man? That the defendant’s own words about ‘nobody stopping’ him were just a coincidence? That all of this, every piece, every witness, every detail, somehow pointed to the wrong guy?”

Her hand closed slowly.

“That is not reasonable doubt,” she said. “That is wishful thinking. That is fear of making a hard decision.”

Megan drew herself up, eyes steady.

“The law gives you the authority to hold this man accountable,” she said. “Use it. Find him guilty of all counts—home invasion, aggravated criminal sexual assault, armed robbery. And when you do, we will ask this court to impose the maximum sentence allowed by law. Not out of vengeance. Not because we hate him. But because he has shown, again and again, that he will not stop until someone stops him. Because the community deserves to sleep a little safer. Because the victim deserves to know that what happened to her matters.”

She let the weight of those last words rest on them.

“Justice is not abstract,” she finished softly. “It’s what you do in that jury room.”

She nodded once.

“Thank you.”

Megan returned to her table, smoothing her skirt as she sat. The room seemed to exhale all at once—chairs creaking, someone coughing faintly, a pen dropping and rolling under a bench.

Evan sat motionless, hands clasped so tight his fingers ached. He could feel the eyes of the victim’s family on the back of his neck. He could feel Diego’s breath, low and even, beside him. He made a point of not looking toward the gallery, not looking toward the press, not looking at the deputy by the door whose hand rested lightly on his holster.

Judge Brecker cleared his throat.

“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury,” he said, voice filling the courtroom, “we will now proceed to the instructions on the law.”

The bailiff stepped forward with a stack of printed pages. The jurors shifted again, the spell of the arguments giving way to the heavy, formal cadence of the process. Evan watched them, one by one, as they settled in to listen—some leaning back, some forward, all of them carrying the weight he had just helped lay on their shoulders.

He felt it too. Heavy as stone.

 

 

Three Days Later

 

The wind coming off the Chicago River had teeth that afternoon, sharp and unrelenting. It whipped between the gray slabs of the Loop and knifed up the broad stone steps of the George N. Leighton Criminal Court Building, where a dense knot of cameras, microphones, and shouting voices clustered around a small, hastily erected podium.

Evan Rourke stood at the center of it all.

His navy suit looked freshly pressed, the same one he’d worn for closing arguments, but today the jacket was buttoned, the tie tightened, the knot perfect. His hair—dark, thick, trimmed just the day before—barely moved in the gusts. The only giveaway that his heart was hammering sat just beneath the skin: a faint pulsing at the side of his neck.

Diego Álvarez stood to his right, a half-step back. He wore a borrowed charcoal sport coat over a crisp white shirt that didn’t quite fit; the collar sat loose at his throat, framing the black ink twisting up his neck. No tie. No attempt at humility. He looked like a man who’d been invited to a party he knew he didn’t deserve, and didn’t care.

He was smiling.  Arrogant. Calm. Almost preening.

His hands rested easily in his pockets as the cameras flashed, head tilted with lazy confidence. Every time a lens focused on him, he angled his body just enough that the tattoos caught the light.

To Evan’s left, Mayor Cassandra “Cass” Whitaker clung to his forearm like they were old friends at a fundraiser instead of two politicians of different kinds using each other for oxygen. She was in a bright red coat that popped against the gray stone and stainless-steel revolving doors behind them. Her dark hair was pulled into a sleek bun. Her smile showed perfect teeth: poised, photogenic, unshakeable.

Behind them, an aide held an umbrella despite the absence of rain, more for the cameras than the weather. Around the base of the steps, cluster after cluster of activists raised signs:

NO ICE IN OUR HOODS

STOP CRIMINALIZING BROWN BODIES

DUE PROCESS FOR ALL

JUSTICE, NOT DEPORTATION

The chant rolled up in waves from the sidewalk and street:

 

“NO JUSTICE—!”

“NO PEACE!”

 

“NO ICE—!”

“NO POLICE!”

The low wail of a siren somewhere distant bled into the noise.

At the front of the crowd, tightly packed together like a wall, stood the press: local TV affiliates with padded station logos on their mics, a CNN camera, a couple of print reporters clutching notebooks, and the courthouse regulars who were on a first-name basis with every bailiff on the fifteenth floor.

A deputy from the Sheriff’s Office planted near the doorway looked miserable, gloved hands tucked under his arms, scanning the crowd for trouble that he hoped wouldn’t come.

Evan felt the energy like a current running under his feet. Cameras. Attention. The smell of wet concrete and street salt and human bodies pressed together. He was in his element. This was what he did when the trial ended and the door to the jury room closed: he stepped outside and told a story to whoever would listen.

A local NBC reporter with a blue scarf and a wind-reddened nose raised her mic.

 

“Mr. Rourke, Mr. Rourke—can we get your reaction to the verdict?”

Evan leaned slightly toward her, the mayor’s hand tightening around his arm, staking her claim to the moment.

“My reaction,” Evan said, letting his voice project cleanly over the murmur, “is that today, the Constitution worked. Today, the rule of law stood up to fear.”

Microphones extended toward him like a bouquet of black, fuzzy flowers.

“Three days ago,” he went on, “twelve ordinary citizens looked at the State’s case and saw what we saw from day one: no physical evidence, a tainted identification, and a police investigation driven more by panic than by facts. They did the hard thing. They said, ‘No. We are not going to rubber-stamp this. We are not going to send a man to prison for the rest of his life because it’s politically convenient.’”

He tilted his head slightly, making sure he didn’t talk too fast. The trick was to let the phrases land, give the cameras time to drink them in.

“We are horrified by what happened to the victim,” he said, letting his voice soften. “We grieve with her and her family. But horror and grief do not entitle the government to bend the rules. They don’t entitle police to kick down doors in immigrant neighborhoods in the middle of the night, drag men from their beds without warrants, and then try to patch over their mistakes with a bad lineup.”

One of the reporters, a stocky guy with a press badge from the Tribune, raised a hand.

“Counselor, the State said your client has a history of violence—”

“—a history that he has already paid for,” Evan cut in smoothly, smiling without showing teeth. “He served his sentences. He went through the process. We do not live in a system where a record becomes automatic proof of every future accusation. At least, we’re not supposed to.”

At his side, Diego shifted his weight, eyes scanning the crowd with that same dead, appraising gaze he’d worn in the courtroom. Every so often, his smirk ticked up a little more for a particular camera, like he was savoring being the center of the storm.

The NBC reporter glanced past Evan to the mayor.

“Madam Mayor, you were in the courtroom for closing arguments and for the verdict. How do you see today’s outcome?”

Mayor Whitaker lifted her chin, her gloved hand squeezing Evan’s arm with practiced familiarity.

“What we saw in that courtroom,” she declared, voice ringing, “was a victory not just for one man, but for an entire community that has lived under a cloud of suspicion and fear.”

She slipped seamlessly into the cadence she used at rallies.

“For too long in this city, in this country, we have seen Black and brown men treated as suspects first and human beings second. We’ve seen neighborhoods over-policed and under-protected. We’ve seen federal immigration agents—many of them unaccountable to the people of Chicago—sweeping through our streets, breaking up families, terrorizing communities, all under the banner of ‘public safety.’”

Cheers rose from the activists behind the press line. A woman in a “SANCTUARY CITY NOW” hoodie pumped her fist.

“Well,” Whitaker continued, “today twelve Chicagoans said, ‘No. Not in our name.’ They said, ‘We believe in real justice, not show trials. We believe in evidence, not racial profiling. We believe that our immigrant neighbors, documented or not, have the same constitutional rights as anyone else.’

Evan felt the warmth of her words bleed into his own chest, even as a tight, quieter thought pulsed somewhere underneath: They didn’t sit in that bedroom. They didn’t smell the fear in that testimony. He buried it almost as soon as it rose.

A Fox affiliate reporter in a black coat, her expression sharp, pushed her mic forward.

“Mayor Whitaker, critics say you and Mr. Rourke are using this case to score political points against ICE and the police. What do you say to residents who feel less safe knowing a man the State called a ‘violent predator’ is walking free tonight?”

Whitaker’s smile didn’t falter, but her eyes hardened by a fraction.

“I would say this,” she replied. “The people of Chicago are safest when the police follow the law. They are safest when communities trust that officers are there to protect them, not to profile them. What makes us unsafe is when law enforcement cuts corners, when they treat whole neighborhoods as enemy territory, when they assume guilt based on accent or skin color.”

She inclined her head toward Evan.

“It is not ‘making people less safe’ to insist that the government live up to its own Constitution,” she said. “If the State has evidence, real evidence, they can bring it. If they don’t, they don’t get to ruin a man’s life because of who he is or where he was born.”

All the while, Diego’s smirk had stretched into the faint impression of a grin. He shifted closer to the mics, as if pulled forward by gravity.

A Univision reporter, camera operator on his shoulder, called out in Spanish, “Diego, ¿cómo te sientes hoy? ¿Qué quieres decirle a tu comunidad?”

Diego’s eyes flicked toward him, and for the first time all day, something like genuine pleasure sparked there.

He leaned into the microphones.

“Me siento… libre,” he said, his voice honeyed and thick with his Venezuelan accent. “I feel free. This country say ‘justice for all,’ ¿no? Today I see it. Today, they no treat me like animal. Today, they listen.”

He glanced at Evan, then out at the activists, letting the moment swell.

“A mi comunidad,” he went on, speaking directly into the Univision camera now, “no tengan miedo. No dejen que la policía entre a sus casas sin papeles, sin respeto. Tenemos derechos. Hoy, los vimos.”  (Don't be afraid. Don't let the police into your homes without papers, without respect. We have rights. Today, we saw them.)

Evan watched him, jaw tight behind his easy, professional smile. He told himself he was just proud. Proud that his client had the courage to speak. Proud that the cameras were here to carry that message back into neighborhoods where cops were more likely to be seen as invaders than protectors.

In the back of his skull, though, something icy and small whispered: He’s enjoying this too much.  He pushed it down.

Another reporter raised his voice above the crowd.

“Mr. Rourke, do you believe ICE should have any role in cases like this, where the defendant has prior deportations?”

Evan didn’t hesitate.

“No,” he said crisply. “I do not. Our criminal courts exist to determine guilt or innocence under the law. They are not supposed to be staging grounds for federal immigration crackdowns. We cannot have people in this city—any person—afraid to report crimes, afraid to come forward as witnesses, because they think doing so will bring ICE to their doorstep.”

He let his gaze sweep the crowd of cameras and activists.

“When ICE is lurking in the background of every courtroom, every traffic stop, every 911 call, the message to immigrant communities is clear: ‘We’re not here to protect you. We’re here to remove you.’ That is toxic to public safety. It is toxic to trust. And it is fundamentally at odds with our values as a sanctuary city.”

The chant from the sidewalk swelled again, like a chorus cued on his words:

“NO ICE—!”

“IN CHICAGO!”

 

“NO ICE—!”

“LET THEM GO!”

Mayor Whitaker seized the momentum, raising her free fist slightly.

“We have been clear from day one,” she said. “Chicago will not become an arm of federal immigration enforcement. Not while I am mayor. We will not have ICE agents stalking our courthouse hallways, waiting to snatch people the moment their case is done. We stand with our immigrant brothers and sisters. We stand with families. We stand with due process.”

Evan felt her weight leaning into him, physically as well as politically. The cameras adored it: the mayor and the public defender, united, framed by stone and steel and a man with gang tattoos who’d just walked out of court a free man.

He knew how this would play on the six o’clock news. He could already hear the talking heads: “Progressive coalition victorious.” “Immigrant rights advocates celebrate.” “Controversial acquittal sparks debate.”

A reporter from a conservative radio station shoved his mic forward, braving a few boos from the activists.

“Mr. Rourke,” he shouted, “the victim’s family says justice was not served today. They’re calling this a ‘mockery of the system.’ What do you say to them?”

The question hit harder than it should have. The image of the victim’s father flashed in Evan’s mind—fists white on the back of a courtroom pew, eyes like broken glass.  He swallowed once, the inside of his mouth suddenly dry.

“I say to them,” he began carefully, “that my heart breaks for what they’ve been through. No one should ever have to endure what their daughter endured. No verdict can change that. No sentence, no prison term, can erase that pain.”

He steadied his voice, anchoring himself in familiar arguments.

“But justice is not the same as punishment,” he said. “Justice means applying the law fairly, even when it hurts, even when our emotions are pulling us in a different direction. I would warn against ever turning a criminal trial into a referendum on our grief. That’s how innocent people get locked away. That’s how systems get twisted.”

He hesitated only a fraction of a second.

“I hope,” he said, “that in time, they can see that what happened in that courtroom—twelve jurors demanding real proof before condemning a man—is not an insult to their pain, but a protection for all of us. Including them.”

As he spoke, Diego turned his head slightly, eyes casting over the crowd, expression unreadable. If he felt any sympathy for the family he’d been accused of destroying, it didn’t show. His upper lip curled just a little, as though he smelled something faintly amusing.

Another journalist called out, “Mr. Álvarez, do you have anything to say to the victim?”

Diego paused, considering. His gaze flicked to Evan, as if wondering whether he should answer. Evan didn’t move, didn’t signal. His stomach twisted once and went still.

Diego leaned forward.

“I am sorry for what happen to her,” he said, his English slowing, smoothing. “I am sorry for her pain. But I not do this thing. I am innocent. The court say so. The jury say so. In this country, that mean something, ¿sí?”

He spread his hands in a little shrug.

“If they want to find who hurt her,” he added, “they need to look for the real man. Not just the easy man.”

The mayor nodded approvingly, like a teacher satisfied with a student’s answer. Evan kept his expression neutral, letting the line land. It was the kind of thing juries loved to hear: I’m innocent, find the real guy. On the courthouse steps, though, it felt thinner. Practiced.

The press scrum surged again. Questions overlapped now:

“Mayor, will this case impact your negotiations with CPD over the consent decree—”

“Mr. Rourke, are you planning any civil action against the department for the unlawful arrest—”

“Diego, ¿qué vas a hacer ahora—”

Evan raised both hands, palms out, and the noise dipped by instinct.

“One at a time,” he said, smiling. “I’m still a public defender; I can’t afford a spokesperson.”

Laughter rippled through the assembly, brief and brittle.

“To answer your question about civil action,” he went on, picking one voice at random, “that’s not my decision. My job was to defend Mr. Álvarez against criminal charges. I did that. The jury spoke. Whether he chooses to pursue a civil claim for violation of his rights—that’s a conversation for another day, with different counsel.”

He felt the mayor’s fingers flex again at that—she’d love a civil suit against CPD to run on. He didn’t look at her.

“As for broader reform,” he continued, “this case is one of many that shows why we need it. We need better training on lineups. We need mandatory body cameras that are actually turned on. We need independent oversight of police conduct in immigrant communities.”

Whitaker jumped back in smoothly.

“And that’s exactly what my administration is fighting for,” she said. “We’re pushing for deeper reforms in the consent decree. We’re working with community organizations to ensure that no neighborhood feels abandoned or targeted. Today is a reminder that when we stand together—the courts, the community, elected officials—we can push back against overreach.”

Behind them, the courthouse doors opened for a moment, spilling out a handful of lawyers and defendants from other cases. Most of them glanced at the commotion and kept walking. One young public defender with a worn leather bag caught Evan’s eye and gave a small, almost imperceptible nod.

Evan nodded back.

The chant from the street shifted, catching hold of a new refrain.

“SI SE PUEDE!”

“SI SE PUEDE!”

Diego straightened a little taller at that, chin lifting, letting the words roll over him like applause meant only for him.

The wind cut colder, slicing through Evan’s suit, but the heat from the cameras, the crush of bodies, and the weight of the mayor’s hand on his arm kept him anchored in place. This was what he believed, he reminded himself. This was the fight he’d chosen years ago, long before Diego’s name ever darkened a case file on his desk.

Due process over fear. Rights over rage. Immigrants are people, not punching bags for bad policy and bad cops.

He took one more question, then another, rhythm now automatic: push back on ICE, defend the jury, praise the community, condemn sloppy policing, reaffirm horror at the crime without conceding anything about his client’s guilt.

At some point, an aide leaned in to Whitaker and murmured something. The mayor nodded and squeezed Evan’s arm a final time.

“We have to get back to City Hall for a budget meeting,” she announced to the cameras, turning it into a joke. “But I want to say this before I go: today made me proud to be a Chicagoan. Proud of our jurors. Proud of defenders like Mr. Rourke. Proud of a city that refuses to give in to fear.”

She lifted Evan’s hand with hers, raising their joined arms a few inches. Flashbulbs popped like fireworks.

Then she turned away, already surrounded by staff, swept down the steps toward a black SUV idling at the curb.

The press began to thin, some cameras peeling off to follow her, others sticking around for one more shot of Diego, the acquitted man with the tattoos and the flat, empty eyes.

Evan stayed where he was for a moment, feeling the cold finally break through the adrenaline.

Diego leaned closer, breath warm against his ear despite the wind.

“You did good, abogado,” he murmured, voice low so the mics wouldn’t catch it. “I told you. They can’t touch me.”

Evan forced a tight smile, eyes still on the last of the departing cameras.

“Enjoy the fresh air, Diego,” he said. “It was a close thing.”

“Close,” Diego echoed, with a soft chuckle. “But not enough.”

He rolled his shoulders, stretching like a man waking from a nap, and then stepped away from the podium and down the steps, cutting through the activists like a shark passing through a school of fish. They parted for him instinctively, some clapping him on the back, some just staring.

Evan watched him go until he disappeared into the crowd and the city swallowed him whole.

The microphones lowered. The cameras powered down. The chanting drifted, then thinned as the protesters began to disperse.

The wind on the courthouse steps kept blowing, heedless, cold.

 

Chapter 2

The wind came howling off Lake Michigan like it had claws, ripping down South Dearborn Street and slamming into the crowd gathered in front of the old, concrete-faced Metcalfe Federal Building, the Chicago field headquarters for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The sky hung low, a bruised sheet of slate, and bits of ice-crusted snow skittered across the pavement like tiny white insects.

By 10:15 a.m., Dearborn between Jackson Boulevard and Van Buren was packed—shoulder to shoulder, sign to sign, bodies swaying in the cold as chants rolled like thunder, echoing between the steel and glass canyons of the Loop.

“NO ICE—!”
 “NO ICE—!”

“WE ARE ALL IMMIGRANTS!”
 “WE ARE ALL IMMIGRANTS!”

Evan Rourke was in the thick of it, dead center of the crowd, his breath steaming in the frigid air. His coat flapped open, scarf dangling wild behind him. His cheeks burned from the cold, from shouting, from adrenaline that felt like electricity pushing through his bloodstream.

He was a man on fire.

He cupped his hands around his mouth and screamed toward the line of ICE officers preparing to enter the building.

“This is FASCISM!”
 “THIS is RACISM!”
 “You don’t get to terrorize our city!”

His voice was raw, already hoarse despite barely an hour of chanting.

To his right, a young Latina protester in a wool hat yelled through a portable bullhorn.

“NO HUMAN BEING IS ILLEGAL!”

The crowd roared it back, a single wave of sound.

Drums pounded from somewhere behind Evan. A banner rippled above his head:

STOP THE RAIDS
 SANCTUARY FOR ALL

The ICE officers formed up near the Jackson intersection, a block of dark uniforms and hardened faces. Full protective gear. Helmets. Visors. Batons. Less-lethal weapons slung over their shoulders. Their vehicles were lined along Dearborn—black Suburbans idling, lights flashing but sirens silent.

Above them, on the steps leading into the building, a federal supervisor shouted into a radio, trying to coordinate entry.

“TEAM TWO, MOVE TO THE NORTH SIDE—NOW!”

Evan pushed to the front, adrenaline propelling him like a tide. He could feel the heat of the protesters behind him, their bodies pressed in tight, their voices bouncing off the federal building’s brutalist stone façade.

A reporter from the Sun-Times was somewhere behind him, trying to find an angle for a picture.

Evan didn’t look back. He wanted the cameras. He wanted the moment.

“WE WILL NOT LET YOU TAKE THEM!” he yelled. “NOT IN OUR CITY!”

A protester beside him, a bearded man in a thick parka, shouted, “THEY’RE COMING OUT—LOOK!”

The ICE team began to move forward.

Shields came up. Weapons ready but angled low. Formation tight.

“Hold the line!” someone yelled behind Evan. “HOLD THE LINE!”

Evan felt the surge before he saw it—hundreds of bodies pressing forward in a tidal push, feet scraping over pavement, boots sliding on slush, signs jabbing the air like spears.

The ICE agents were twenty feet away. Then fifteen. Then ten.

“WE ARE ALL IMMIGRANTS!”
 “WE ARE ALL IMMIGRANTS!”

The officers shouted orders Evan couldn’t hear through the roar.

Then the protesters broke.

They didn’t stop at a barricade. There was no barricade.

They surged—forward, hard, fast—into the officers’ line.

Everything snapped at once.

The first push hit the ICE shields with a crack like thunder. A woman fell sideways. Someone grabbed her arm and yanked her up before she was trampled. Another protester grabbed at an officer’s baton. Two more tried to push between the shields to block the entryway.

The ICE formation wavered—then tightened.

Evan was in the front row. Close enough to see the fear tightening around one agent’s eyes. Close enough to smell sweat under winter gear.

He shoved forward.

“GET OUT OF CHICAGO!” he yelled, spit flying with the force of it. “YOU DON’T BELONG HERE!”

The officer tried to hold the line, bracing.

Evan grabbed his forearm.

It was instinct. Rage. Righteousness. He didn’t think—didn’t process—he just reached out and shoved.

Hard.

The ICE agent stumbled backward.

Evan felt the crowd behind him cheer—an electric roar—

Then the world exploded.

POP—POP—POP.

Three sharp bursts like firecrackers, but deeper, heavier.

Pain slammed into his chest like a sledgehammer.

Evan’s body jerked backward, his breath erupting from his lungs in a single guttural scream. He felt himself falling—arms flailing—knees hitting pavement—ice slicing into his palms.

He hit the ground hard.

The cold soaked through his clothes instantly. Air refused to enter his chest.

The crowd shrieked.

“HE’S DOWN—!”
 “THEY SHOT HIM—!”
 “MEDIC! MEDIC!”

People knelt around him, hands grabbing his shoulders, trying to lift him. The world blurred into a smear of boots, signs, sirens, and spinning gray sky.

Above him, the ICE formation surged past—storming toward the building entrance, stepping around him, through the gap in the crowd his collapse had created.

Another agent shouted toward the sky.

“GO—GO—GO—!”

Evan felt boots thunder past his shoulders.

His chest burned. Three hot, bruising blooms under his ribs, thick and deep and nauseating.

He tried to speak, but all that came out was a ragged gasp.

Someone pressed a gloved hand to his shoulder.

“Sir—sir, stay down—stay down—you’re okay—”

Another voice, frantic:

“They used rubber rounds—he’s breathing—he’s breathing—”

The world tilted. The cold felt suddenly distant, like it was coming from inside him instead of outside.

He heard chanting fading behind him as ICE vanished inside the building.

He closed his eyes and let darkness wash over him.

---

CHICAGO GENERAL HOSPITAL – EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT

They wheeled him through automatic glass doors that hissed open like a stage cue.

Warmth hit him in a wave. Bright lights. The smell of antiseptic and coffee. The beeping of machines in nearby bays. Nurses shouting for a gurney. The squeal of shoes on tile.

Camera flashes.

A federal-use-of-force case was gold for local newsrooms.

By the time Evan was on a bed with a portable monitor clipped to his finger and three nurses cutting away his shirt, two TV crews were setting up lights just outside the curtain, and a reporter from Channel 7 was already recording stand-up footage with him framed in the background.

“Victim is a well-known public defender,” a nurse said, pressing a thick cold pack onto one of the mottled bruises on Evan’s chest.

“They’ll have to explain this one to City Hall.”

Evan gritted his teeth as the cold pack pressed into the swollen welt. The rubber bullet had hit directly over his sternum. It felt like a steel-toed boot had caved in half his ribcage.

Another nurse lifted his arm gently.

“You’re lucky,” she said. “These things can break bones.”

“Feels like they did,” Evan rasped, voice raw. “Maybe fascism is heavier than I thought.”

She snorted despite herself.

A doctor in scrubs arrived, snapping gloves on as he approached.

“What have we got?”

“Rubber rounds to the anterior thorax, three impacts,” a nurse said. “No fracture crepitus. Vitals stable. Complains of severe pain and difficulty breathing, but lungs sound clear.”

The doctor leaned in.

“Mr. Rourke,” he said. “I’m Dr. Khatri. Do you know where you are?”

Evan blinked into the bright exam light.

“Emergency room,” he said. “Chicago General. And probably on Channel 7 in ten minutes.”

Khatri nodded. “Good. Any numbness? Dizziness? Trouble staying conscious?”

“Just trouble believing what happened,” Evan muttered.

The curtain yanked open suddenly.

A cameraman from WGN stepped inside, followed by a reporter with hair perfect enough to suggest she kept a makeup artist in her car.

“Mr. Rourke,” she said breathlessly, “can we get a statement—?”

The charge nurse intercepted her with a controlled burst of fury.

“OUT. NOW.”

The curtain snapped shut, but the microphones and cameras pressed in against the other side, shadows shifting along the fabric like ghosts.

Evan pushed himself up slightly as another wave of pain rolled through him.

“Let them in,” he said.

The nurse froze. “Sir—”

“It’s fine,” he said. “I want them here.”

A pause. A long exhale.

Then she relented.

The curtain was drawn back just enough.

Lights flared. Mics surged forward.

Evan sat upright on the gurney, shirtless, three massive purple-black bruises blooming across his ribs and sternum like grotesque medals. His hair was mussed, face pale, breath shallow—but his eyes were alive.

The cameras loved it.

The WGN reporter stepped forward, mic raised.

“Mr. Rourke, can you tell us what happened out there today?”

Evan sucked in a breath through clenched teeth.

“What happened,” he said, voice steadying as he spoke, “is exactly what we’ve been warning this city about for years.”

He lifted a trembling finger toward one of the bruises.

“This,” he said, “is what happens when law enforcement—federal law enforcement—believes it can override the will of a city. When they think they can bypass oversight. When they think they can treat peaceful protesters like enemy combatants.”

“We saw ICE officers today,” he said, his voice growing stronger, “fire less-lethal weapons into a crowd of unarmed Chicagoans exercising their First Amendment rights. We saw them escalate a situation they created. We saw them push their way into our streets like an occupying force.”

Another wave of pain hit him, but he powered through it, gripping the side of the bed.

“This is not America,” he said. “This is a failure of democracy.”

A reporter from NBC raised her mic.

“Mr. Rourke—did you make physical contact with an ICE officer before the shots were fired?”

Evan swallowed, jaw tightening.

“I was trying,” he said, “to keep an armed agent from striking a young woman who had fallen in front of him. That’s what I was doing. Protecting a civilian who ICE had already shoved to the ground.”

It wasn’t strictly true.
 It wasn’t strictly false.
 It was what he needed it to be.

The cameras seemed to lean in.

Another reporter asked, “Do you believe federal agents should be allowed to operate in Chicago at all?”

“No,” Evan said immediately. “Not like this. Not ever.”

The curtain suddenly snapped open again.

This time it wasn’t a reporter.

It was Mayor Cassandra Whitaker.

She strode in wearing a heavy wool coat, her hair swept back by the wind outside, her expression a mix of fury and concern. Her dark eyes scanned the bruises on Evan’s chest, and something sharp tightened in her jaw.

“Evan,” she breathed, stepping to his bedside. “Oh my God.”

The cameras surged closer.

Whitaker turned on them with a practiced glare.

“You can record,” she said sharply, “but you give him space.”

Evan managed a weak grin.

“Madam Mayor,” he said. “Nice of you to drop by.”

She squeezed his shoulder gently, leaning close enough that her voice didn’t carry beyond the cameras unless someone had directional mics.

“This is exactly what the hell we were afraid of,” she whispered. “This is exactly why we’ve been fighting them.”

Then, louder—projecting for the press:

“What happened to Mr. Rourke today is not an accident. It is not a misunderstanding. It is the predictable result of unleashing a federal agency with no accountability into the streets of Chicago.”

The lights caught the icy fire in her eyes.

“This city will not,” she said, “be bullied by ICE. Not on my watch.”

She turned to Evan, gripping his hand.

“We stand with you. And we will pursue every avenue to ensure this never happens again.”

The room buzzed with the intensity of it, the energy of a political earthquake happening on live television.

The reporters shouted questions.
 The doctors protested.
 The cameras rolled.

And outside, the sirens wailed as Chicago braced for another night of chaos, politics, and rage.

 

 

CUT TO: ONSITE NEWS BROADCAST

The scene faded to the familiar studio of WGN’s early evening anchor, Daniela Arce, sitting before a glowing skyline backdrop.

“Tonight,” she said gravely, “outrage in Chicago as a well-known public defender and immigrant-rights activist is injured during a confrontation with federal ICE agents in the downtown Loop.”

Behind her, footage played of Evan on the gurney, bruised, shirtless, defiant.

“The incident raises new questions about the role of federal immigration enforcement in sanctuary cities like Chicago—and whether local activism is entering a dangerous new chapter.”

Her eyes hardened with the polished moral clarity of a practiced progressive voice.

“In a nation built by immigrants, many Chicago leaders are asking tonight: Have we lost sight of who we truly are?”

The screen faded to black.

 

 

The dishwasher hummed softly in the background, a steady white noise under the cozy chaos of the Rourke living room.

The house sat in a quiet, gated subdivision on the northwest edge of the city—brick façades, trimmed hedges, security patrols that never had much to do. Inside, though, it felt smaller, warmer. The kind of place where stray crayons still turned up under couch cushions and a stray doll shoe could ambush a bare foot.

Evan lay half on his back, half propped on an elbow on the thick gray area rug, pretending not to wince every time one of his daughters bounced near his ribs.

Avery, twelve and all limbs now, sprawled cross-legged with a sketchbook in her lap, pencil flying as she drew something intensely—eyes narrowed, tongue peeking at the corner of her mouth. On the other side of him, Molly had built an elaborate zoo out of mismatched blocks, plastic animals, and an overturned shoebox.

“Daddy, the tiger’s escaping,” she announced, pushing a chipped plastic tiger through a gap in the blocks. “You have to stop him.”

Evan reached out with one hand, caught the tiger, and made a low growl, sliding it back in.

“Nope. Sanctuary city, kiddo. Tigers get to stay.”

Molly giggled, then frowned, clearly unsatisfied with the legal nuance.

“But the zookeeper says he’s dangerous,” she insisted. “He ate three zebras.”

“Allegedly,” Evan said.

Avery snorted without looking up. “You literally can’t turn it off, can you?”

“Turn what off?” he asked.

“The lawyer voice.” She shaded harder, pressing too hard with the pencil. “You even cross-examine toy animals.”

He smiled, then sucked in a tiny breath when the motion tugged along the bruises across his chest. The ER doctor had warned him: deep tissue damage, significant bruising, rest, ice, NSAIDs, no heroics. Three swollen, ugly welts were spreading in dark blossoms under his ribs, each one a painful reminder of the morning.

“Daddy, are you okay?” Molly asked suddenly, watching his face.

“Yeah, bug,” he said quickly. “Just moved funny. Your old man’s getting creaky.”

“You’re thirty-two,” Avery muttered. “You’re not old. You’re just dramatic.”

He flicked a balled-up napkin at her. She dodged without looking, the kind of reflex that comes from years of similar warfare.

The kitchen light clicked off behind them, and Claire stepped out, drying her hands on a towel. She’d changed after dinner into soft black leggings and an oversized Northwestern sweatshirt, blonde hair pulled back into a loose knot. The domestic uniform of someone who’d done a full day already and then cooked on top of it.

She paused in the archway between kitchen and living room, watching her three favorite people in the world arranged like a little still life: Avery on the couch with her sketches, Molly’s zoo spreading like an invasion across the rug, Evan on the floor in jeans and a faded “Justice for All” T-shirt, moving like everything cost him just a little too much.

“Okay,” she said, dropping the towel on the counter. “It’s eight. Homework done?”

“Yes,” from the couch.

“I did math,” Molly said. “And reading. We had to read about bees.”

“Bees are important,” Claire said, leaning over the back of the couch to kiss Avery’s head. “They pollinate things.”

“They die,” Avery said absently, still drawing. “Like everything else.”

“Cheery,” Evan murmured.

Claire walked around the couch and sat on the arm, reaching for the remote.

“News time,” she said. “Then teeth, pajamas, bed. Deal?”

Molly wrinkled her nose. “Do we have to watch news?”

“Yes,” Claire said. “Because your father will anyway, and this way I control when it starts.”

She clicked the TV on.

CNN bloomed into the room in high definition, washing the walls in cool blues and reds.

“…you’re watching Anderson Cooper 360,” the anchor said, his silver hair immaculate, his voice smooth. “I’m Anderson Cooper in New York. Tonight, we begin with breaking developments out of Chicago…”

A graphic spun in the corner of the screen: ICE CLASH IN THE LOOP.

Evan felt his shoulders tense before the first image even flashed.

Claire slid off the arm of the couch and stepped closer, dish towel forgotten in her hand.

“What is this?” Avery asked, finally looking up, with an alarmed expression.

The screen cut to footage of Dearborn Street—crowds, signs, chanting. Then sharper, closer: a wall of ICE officers, shields up.

“And we warn you,” Anderson Cooper said, “some of what you’re about to see may be disturbing.”

Molly scooted closer to Evan, plastic tiger clutched in one fist.

On-screen, the footage zoomed. The protesters surged. Signs bobbed. Someone shouted “WE ARE ALL IMMIGRANTS!”

Claire’s hand stilled in midair.

The camera found him.

There, in the middle of the frame—hair wild, scarf flying, eyes blazing—Evan Rourke shoved an ICE officer backward.

Molly gasped. “Daddy, that’s you!”

Claire’s breath caught in her throat.

The audio carried the muffled pops.

POP—POP—POP.

On the television, Evan’s body jerked, crumpled. He went down hard. The screen shook as the camera jostled. People screamed. Someone yelled, “They shot him!”

Back in the living room, Molly let out a thin, high noise that didn’t sound like her usual whine at bedtime rules. It sounded small and animal and scared.

Claire dropped the towel.

“Oh my God,” she whispered.

On screen, the chyron changed:

ICE FIRES “LESS-LETHAL” ROUNDS AT PROTESTERS
 CHICAGO PUBLIC DEFENDER HOSPITALIZED

Claire moved before she even thought about it, instinct taking over.

“Girls,” she said, voice too bright. “Come on. Let’s go upstairs for a second.”

“But—” Avery started.

“Now, Avery.” The edge in her tone snapped the word like a twig.

Molly’s eyes were glued to the TV, where paramedics now worked over Evan’s prone figure, his face pale, eyes squeezed shut.

“Is Daddy gonna die?” she asked, voice shaking.

“No,” Claire said sharply. “He’s fine. He’s right here.”

She reached down, grabbed Molly’s hand, and practically lifted her off the ground.

“Mom,” Avery protested, “we already—”

Claire wheeled on her.

“Avery, I am not asking. Upstairs. Now.”

The girl recoiled at the steel in her mother’s eyes. She slid off the couch, snapped her sketchbook shut, and grabbed Molly’s free hand.

“Come on, Mol,” she said quietly. “It’s just old stuff. Remember? He’s okay.”

“It’s not old,” Molly said. “His shirt is different.”

“It’s fine,” Claire repeated, pushing them gently toward the hallway. “Go brush your teeth. I’ll be up in five minutes.”

They shuffled off reluctantly, casting one last look back at the TV—at their father doubled over on a gurney, shirt cut open.

Claire waited until they were out of sight, then turned back to the room, heart pounding.

On-screen, Anderson Cooper’s voiceover carried that blend of outrage and professionalism CNN had perfected.

“…video from this morning’s protest outside the Metcalfe Federal Building in Chicago, where ICE agents preparing to launch what sources say was a ‘targeted enforcement action’ encountered a large, organized crowd of demonstrators, including immigrant-rights advocates, faith leaders, and public defenders. Among them, thirty-two-year-old Cook County public defender Evan Rourke, well-known for his work defending undocumented immigrants and opposing cooperation between Chicago police and ICE…”

The footage cut to a still photo of Evan at a previous press conference, suit crisp, jaw set, Mayor Whitaker behind him.

Claire’s stomach flipped.

Cooper continued, “As ICE teams moved to enter the building, witnesses say agents aggressively pushed into the crowd. Protesters linked arms, chanting ‘No ICE in our streets’ and ‘We are all immigrants.’ What happened next is now at the center of a growing national controversy…”

Back to the fall. The pops. The collapse.

Cooper’s tone tightened.

“Federal officials insist that only ‘approved less-lethal munitions’ were used when, they say, protesters ‘physically interfered’ with agents in the line of duty. But critics—including Chicago’s own Mayor Cassandra Whitaker—are calling this a troubling example of excessive force and federal overreach in a self-declared sanctuary city.”

Claire stepped slowly toward the TV, hand pressed to her mouth.

A clip rolled of Evan in the ER, shirt off, bruises like storm clouds across his chest, cameras in his face.

“What we saw today,” the Evan on screen said, voice hoarse but firm, “is exactly what happens when you send militarized federal agents into our neighborhoods with no accountability. They think they can treat peaceful protesters as enemy combatants. This is not public safety. This is intimidation. This is what fascism looks like at the street level.”

The Anderson Cooper in their living room nodded sympathetically from his Manhattan studio.

“Powerful words tonight from a man who says he was simply trying to protect a fallen protester when he was shot with so-called ‘less-lethal’ rounds,” he said. “We reached out to ICE for comment. They declined to appear live but sent a statement—”

Evan, still on the floor, reached for the remote and hit mute.

The room went abruptly silent, save for the faint dishwasher hum from the kitchen and the girls’ distant voices upstairs.

For a moment, nobody spoke.

Evan sat awkwardly on the rug, hand still on the remote, chest heaving a little harder than it had a few seconds ago. The bruises, ugly even under his T-shirt, throbbed in time with his pulse.

Claire turned to him slowly.

“What the hell,” she said quietly, “were you thinking?”

He blinked, realizing she wasn’t talking to the TV.

“Claire—”

“No,” she cut in, walking closer, eyes blazing. “No lawyer voice. No speech. You don’t get to spin me.”

He exhaled. “I was doing what I always do. What I have to do.”

“You have to stand directly in front of armed federal agents?” she asked, voice rising. “You have to get yourself shot on national television?”

“They were pushing into the crowd,” he said, anger flickering at the edge of his words. “They were ready to trample people. Somebody had to stand in their way.”

“Somebody,” she echoed. “Somebody, sure. Why did it have to be you?”

“Because I was there,” he snapped. “Because I’ve spent my entire career fighting this. Because those people out there—my clients, their families—they don’t have anyone else.”

“You have us,” Claire shot back, stabbing a finger toward the ceiling. “You have two daughters upstairs who just watched their father get shot on TV.”

He flinched harder at that than he had at the rubber rounds.

“They’re fine,” he said weakly. “You got them out.”

“I shouldn’t have to get them out,” she said. “Do you understand that? They shouldn’t have to be protected from watching you almost die.”

“It was rubber bullets,” he said. “Not live rounds.”

“Oh, well,” she said, throwing up her hands. “Rubber bullets. Great. I feel so much better. Next time maybe they’ll just break your ribs instead of stopping your heart.”

He pushed himself up to sitting with a grimace, resting his back against the base of the couch.

“This is what it looks like,” he said, his voice quieter. “This is what standing up to them looks like. It’s not pretty. It’s not safe. That’s the point.”

“Whose point?” she demanded. “Yours? ICE’s? CNN’s?”

He stared at her.

“You think I did this for ratings?” he asked, incredulous.

“I think,” she said slowly, “that you like it.”

The word hung there, heavier than the rest.

“You like the cameras. You like being the face. The crusader. The guy who gets quoted by Anderson Cooper while his chest is covered in battle scars.”

“That’s not fair,” he said, color rising in his neck.

“Isn’t it?” she asked. “You came home from the hospital today and what was the first thing you told me? ‘Did you see Mayor Whitaker’s statement?’ Not ‘I’m okay, honey.’ Not ‘I’m sorry I scared you.’ It was about the statement. The optics.”

He opened his mouth. Closed it.

“That’s not… I was still processing,” he said lamely.

She laughed once, bitter and short.

“You have been processing for six years,” she said. “Since you got that job. Since you started going to rallies instead of dinners. Since you started chasing every protest like it was oxygen.”

“You knew who I was when you married me,” he shot back. “You loved that I cared. That I fought.”

“Yeah,” she said. “I did. I still do. I just didn’t think I was signing our kids up to watch you throw yourself in front of bullets.”

The word “kids” did something to his posture. He sagged a little, running a hand through his hair.

“I’m not trying to be reckless,” he said. “I’m not trying to hurt them. Or you. But what do you want me to do? Stay home while they raid apartments I’ve been in? While they drag my clients out in front of their children? Just sit here and watch Netflix?”

“I want you alive,” she said. “I want you here. I want you teaching Avery how to drive in four years and yelling at Molly’s first boyfriend in ten. I want you at the goddamn dinner table without bruises shaped like federal munitions.”

He looked down at his chest, at the faint, dark circles visible through the thin cotton.

“They’re not coming for us,” she went on, voice trembling. “We live in a gated suburb. You drive a hybrid. Nobody is going to knock on our door at three a.m. and drag you away. But you keep running toward the places where that can happen until I don’t know where the line is anymore.”

“That’s exactly why I have to go,” he said, lifting his head. “Because it doesn’t happen to us. Because the whole system depends on guys like me keeping our heads down and enjoying our granite countertops while they wreck everybody else’s lives.”

She folded her arms, digging her nails into her sleeves.

“And if you die?” she asked. “If one day it’s not rubber bullets? If one day some ‘less-lethal’ round hits you wrong and it’s over? Are your principles going to tuck our daughters in at night?”

He stared at her, throat working.

“That’s not going to happen,” he said, too quickly.

“You don’t know that.”

Silence stretched between them, taut and ugly.

From upstairs came the faint sound of running water, the squeak of a faucet turned off, the muffled thud of a bathroom drawer. Ordinary sounds. Safe sounds.

“Claire,” he said finally, voice low, “I can’t… I can’t not be there. It’s who I am.”

She swallowed hard, eyes shining now.

“I know who you are,” she said. “I love who you are. That’s what makes this so hard.”

He pushed himself up off the floor with a grunt, hand braced on the couch.

“I promise I’ll be careful,” he said. It sounded weak even to his own ears.

She shook her head slowly.

“You can’t promise that,” she said. “Not if you’re going to keep doing this. Not if you’re going to keep putting your body between people and guns.”

He stepped toward her, reached out, set his hand gently on her arm.

“I’ll try,” he amended.

She let out a breath that was half laugh, half sob.

“You always try,” she said. “You try to save everyone.”

“I didn’t save everybody today,” he said bitterly, images from the raid flickering behind his eyes. “They still got in. They still made arrests.”

“But you got on TV,” she said, softer now, not quite accusing, not quite forgiving.

He winced.

“It matters,” he said. “People see it. They get angry. They call their reps. They show up.”

“Do you want Avery to show up?” she asked suddenly. “In ten years? In five? You want her in that crowd next to you?”

He froze.

The thought of Avery—tall, angry, with his same stubborn jaw—standing in front of a line of armed men made his stomach roll.

“I… don’t know,” he admitted.

“Well, I do,” Claire said. “I don’t.”

They stood there, inches apart, the TV still on mute behind them. On the screen, Anderson Cooper spoke earnestly while footage of Evan’s ER interview replayed in a small box over his left shoulder.

Claire glanced at the TV, then back at her husband.

“Turn it off,” she said quietly.

He did.

The room fell into a softer darkness, lit only by the standing lamp in the corner and the faint glow from the kitchen.

From upstairs, Avery called, “Mom? Are we doing stories or what?”

Claire wiped at her eyes with the heel of her hand, steadying herself.

“I’m coming,” she called back.

She looked at Evan one more time—at the bruises, the eyes that still burned with the day’s fight, the man she married and the man the city was slowly turning him into.

“This isn’t over,” she said softly.

He nodded once.

“I know.”

She turned and walked down the hallway toward the stairs, bare feet silent on the hardwood.

He stayed where he was, alone with the muted TV screen and the hum of the dishwasher, as the house settled around him.