Made to Be Broken

Chapter Forty-nine

Jack closed the door behind him. "First thing? Before replacing his gun? Should have grabbed hers. Can't be unarmed. Not for a second. Better yet? Backup gun. Discussed that, didn't we?"

"How did you find me?"

"GPS. Put it on your cell phone. Figured that's one thing you wouldn't trash. Supposed to be a receiver, too. Piss-poor one."

"Probably interference from the cell."

"Gadgets." He shook his head as he walked over to look at the bodies. "Quick cleanup. Then go. You start – " He turned to me. "Am I allowed to help now?"

I tried to gauge whether he was angry or even annoyed. Impossible to tell, as always, so I said, "I'd appreciate it. Thanks."

There wasn't much to clean. I hadn't removed my gloves. Hadn't been hit by a bullet. Hadn't taken off my wig. My only concern was footprints in the dust that would suggest a fourth party to this lethal spat. A flashlight sweep of the floor, though, showed lots of prints, from lots of boots, presumably the people who'd been using the warehouse as an illegal dump site. I erased the most obvious of mine, and I'd discard the boots. Standard procedure.

As we were leaving, I looked back at the bodies.

"So you were outside listening?" I asked.

"Nah. GPS fucked up, too. Goddamned gadgets. Was at the mark's house. Lost you after that."

Was that the truth? Or did he just not want to take the wind out of my sails by telling me I'd had backup the whole time? As we circled through the shadows to the car, I decided it didn't matter. If he had been there, he'd stayed back, trusting me to handle it. That was enough.

Since I'd taken the rental, Jack had commandeered Evelyn's car, and parked it five blocks from the warehouse. He wanted the rental returned – another step in dissociating ourselves from the scene – so he followed me to drop that off.

Once in the car with him, I finally had the chance to explain what had happened. He'd figured out some of it, but was missing chunks, from the poor reception and from not being able to listen until he'd ditched Quinn, meaning he hadn't heard my playground meeting with MacIver.

When he found out, he cursed Evelyn. Not that he thought she'd done anything wrong intentionally. She just hadn't been careful enough, presuming that because it was clearly the correct client, then it had to be the correct job.

"Don't call her on it, okay?" I said. "I'm done with her and I want a clean break."

"Sure about that?"

"About wanting -?"

"Being done with her? That Contra-whatever lead?" His gaze bored into me as he idled at a light. "You're sure?"

As I stared down the dark street, I realized I wasn't. That morning the answer had been clear. I wanted nothing to do with Evelyn. A sensible, cool-headed, logical decision not to deal with a woman I didn't trust. But now I wondered…

Was it really logical? Or was I just telling myself that to avoid the truth – that I didn't want to hear her offer, didn't dare take the opportunity to discover what I was, what drove me, where I drew the line…

"I-I'm not sure."

"Think about it." He glanced over. "But not indefinitely. Need to give her a deadline. A week. Can you do that?"

I nodded.

"And this…?" he said. "The case?"

"Well, obviously I haven't disbanded the operation. We've got two other couples who knew what was going on, and more who've paid them – including one that has a child they think is rightfully theirs. I have names for the two couples, but they'll likely run for the hills when Keyes or MacIver don't call back tonight to say everything's been taken care of." I took a deep breath. "But that's not my concern. I can't let it be. I've got my proof on the downloaded files. Time to turn over the evidence and back out."

"You okay with that?"

I took a few long minutes considering it, then said, "Yes, I'm okay with that."