Hard Beat

“In more ways than one,” Dane says, and stares sternly at me in a way I can’t read. “She called me one night while you were filing your report and told me she broke her cover with you. I was so pissed at her, told her she was risking everything, including her life. It was so hard having her there with you when I couldn’t be there to protect her,” he says, and for a moment I sympathize with him because I know that exact feeling, have failed twice in fact in doing just that. “She said you guys were talking and she forgot for a moment where she was, what she was supposed to be doing, but that she told you about her parents, her past… Fuck man, that’s like rule number one, know your backstory like the back of your hand, and she completely disregarded it.”