Made to Be Broken

Chapter Thirty-three

Jack expected I'd want to wait for Quinn, so I could play this ruse with a husband closer to my age, but Quinn's acting skills were minimal. As Jack said, he preferred to play things straight. A small role with little stretching, yes. This required far more. It required Jack.

Besides, Jack's age seemed more an advantage than a liability in this scenario. A middle-aged guy with a younger wife still in her "I want a baby" time of life would be smarting from his inability to provide one. Even if the problem wasn't his, people might presume he wasn't as virile as the thirty-five-year-old prospective daddy she could have married.

The waiting time would be a factor, too. Tell that thirty-five-year-old he has to wait three or four years to get a baby, and that'd be fine. For a guy we could pass off as closer to fifty-five, he'd start having visions of walking his child to school in a mobility scooter.

Calling to make an appointment using phony names was risky. We had no idea whether the agency would research couples that were only asking for preliminary information, but we had to presume they might at least run a basic name check.

We needed a genuine cover. For that, Jack suggested getting Evelyn's help again. While he was adamant there would be no cost to me – it would go on his chit, which was overpaid – I knew Evelyn wouldn't go for that. Neither would I. I kept my accounts just as carefully tabulated, and would pay them back.

This time, though, Evelyn demanded her payment in advance.

"She wants something," Jack said, as he returned to the rental car from a pay phone.

"Dare I ask?"

"To see you. Before you go home."

"Uh-huh. And the purpose of this visit is to hit me up for – no, don't tell me. She's found another vigilante job that might tempt me more than the last."

"Yeah. Had it for a while. Kept pestering me to tell you. Said I would. Eventually."

"What's the job?"

"Not telling me."

He started the engine.

I put out my hand. "Go ahead and call her back. If I refuse, I'm only postponing the inevitable, and we need that appointment. Besides, given the choice, I'd much rather deal with her in person – with you there."

He nodded and shifted into reverse.

"You already told her to go ahead, didn't you?"

"Yeah."

We'd just finished lunch when Jack got a call from Evelyn. He didn't answer it. Just checked the number, then went to find a pay phone. His cell phone was, of course, a prepaid throwaway, and fine for basic security, but "fine" wasn't good enough for Jack. Detroit was a big city, where a pay phone call was far more anonymous than it was in White Rock, so he was mixing it up.

Fifteen minutes later, he tossed my notepad onto my lap. One of the pages was covered with shorthand details of the identities we were about to assume. In the top margin, he'd written and circled 4:45.

"Dare I hope this is an appointment time?"

"It is."

"For tomorrow? Wednesday…?"

"Today."

"Today?" My voice squeaked as I checked my watch. "Four hours from now? How did you manage to get one so quickly?"

"My admin assistant."

"Ah, Evelyn. You know, you really don't give the poor woman enough credit. She's just a sweet old lady who lives to help you, Jack. And for what? Just the simple satisfaction of staying useful in her twilight years."

A snort, followed by a few choice epithets.

"Let me see how well my Evelyn radar is working today," I said. "You didn't ask her to set it up. She did it on her own, to prove how useful she can be… and to sneak a hidden charge onto my bill."

"If I didn't ask her to do it, we don't owe. She knows that. She's grandstanding."

"Are you suitably impressed?"

"I'm not her target."

"Don't worry. When I see her, I'll be sure to thank her for the speedy appointment, and to display the appropriate lack of awe."

He laughed sharply as he pulled out of the restaurant lot. Identities in hand, we needed to find suitable outfits to hang on them. Time to go shopping.

We were assuming the identities of Debbie and Wayne Abbott. Thirty-three and fifty-one years old respectively, the Abbotts had been married four years. It was his second, her first. Neither had children. He owned a successful construction company. She taught third grade.

A lovely couple, I'm sure. Rather private individuals, it seemed. According to Evelyn, their phone number was unlisted, and the only reference she could find on the Web was to Abbott's company, which didn't include photos of the owner. I'd double-check all that. I didn't mistrust Evelyn – at least, not when there would be no advantage to endangering us with false information. I'd check simply because I could.

The Abbotts lived in upstate Michigan. When Evelyn called the Byrony Agency, she'd explained that her boss and his wife were finishing a weekend getaway in Detroit where someone had mentioned their agency and recommended them. The Abbotts had to be home tomorrow, but was there any chance they might be able to speak to someone briefly?

At the mall, I went for smart casual – an Anne Klein blouse and slacks ensemble, and pumps with no special designer name attached. I chose a wig of short, dark blond hair, and added a tan from a winter sun getaway. Elegant small-frame glasses, pearl earrings, and a gold watch completed the look of the casually stylish schoolteacher who'd married into a bit of money, but hated to flaunt it.

The outfit rang up quite a bill, particularly the jewelry. It was more than I liked to spend on a pro bono job, but I'd brought money from my hidden stash, and I could easily take the watch and earrings home and add them to my costuming collection in New York. The rest of the ensemble I might be able to reuse on this job, but after that it was garbage.

As always, the male half of the act got away with a much cheaper outfit. Jack bought washout white hair color, meant for kids to add funky streaks, but equally suitable for adding more silver to his dark hair. He used my fake tanner, and bought cheap blue contacts. Expertly applied scar makeup from a joke shop added an ugly mark on his chin for interest. For clothes, he went for the kind of golf shirt, casual pants, and loafers combo that said "working-class guy turned entrepreneur."

Neither was a grade-A disguise, but they'd do.