The End Game

26

Federal Plaza, Lower Manhattan

Nat “Len” Lendowski was having a lousy day.

Actually, lousy might be just a touch off the mark.

He was so pissed off he was looking to rip someone’s head off. Ideally, Reilly’s.

His bruised head was still hurting from where the agent had cold-cocked him with Deutsch’s gun. To add insult to injury-literally-Reilly had taken his gun and his badge, cleaned his wallet out of almost a hundred bucks and taken a spare suit he kept in the back of his car before leaving him out on his ass in the street, handcuffed to Deutsch, their arms daisy-chained around a tree. Then came the final affront: sitting in the twenty-third floor conference room at seven in the morning, on a Saturday, and getting reamed out by Gallo in front of the whole office and a couple of stone-faced CIA douches for letting Reilly escape.

“The two of you, get your butts out to Reilly’s house,” Gallo barked at him and Deutsch as he concluded the debriefing. “I don’t want to see you back here unless he’s with you. Preferably with him wearing the handcuffs this time.”

It was understandable that the last thing Lendowski needed right now was to have another bodily orifice drilled into him. But it was unavoidable. Failing to make the call would only make things worse.

As they stepped out of the elevator and made their way to the garage, he told Deutsch, “I’ll see you down there in a minute. I need to use the john.”

He watched her disappear out of the lobby, angled away from the flow of people coming in and out of the building, then pulled out his replacement BlackBerry and dialed the number.

The familiar voice picked up after four rings. “Congratulations,” the man said, his dry tone heavy with sarcasm.

“Fuck off,” Lendowski replied.

“Oh, feeling a bit precious, are we?”

“He got the jump on me,” the agent spat back. “It wouldn’t have happened if that useless bitch they’ve got me with knew what she was doing.”

“The thing is, it did happen, and I need to know what’s being done about it.”

“We’re going to stake out his house, but he won’t show, of course. He’s not that dumb.”

“A fair assumption.”

“We’re up on his cell, but he’s not going to use it. We’re putting up a van outside their house as we speak, in case he makes contact some other way.”

“No all points then?”

“No.”

This seemed to please the man. He said, “They want to keep it under wraps.”

“Seems that way,” Lendowski replied. “Not that it makes any fucking sense. We should have every last pair of eyes looking for his mug out there. Must have been those two Agency dickheads’ doing.”

“I’m sure your boss’s bosses don’t want this hitting the news channels either. It’s not exactly something you want to advertise. You should be grateful for that. You’d be the one on center stage.”

The comment didn’t pass unnoticed. The man had never said who he was working for, but he seemed well in tune with the community’s internal politics. “You think I give a shit?” Lendowski countered. “I just want to see that dickhead locked up.”

“In one piece?”

The question caught the agent out. He paused, wondering about that. “I’m easy on that one.”

“All right. You’d better get out there. How long’s your shift?”

“Open-ended,” Lendowski said with a self-mocking grunt.

“Find him,” the voice said. “And let me know the second you do.”

Deutsch waited for Tess to pick up her phone while keeping an eye on the garage elevator.

“Come on,” she whispered. “Pick up!”

It wasn’t a conversation she wanted to have with Lendowski anywhere near her.

Tess picked up.

“Tess? Annie Deutsch. Can you talk?”

“What’s going on?”

“So you haven’t heard from him yet?” Deutsch asked, listening carefully for clues in the response.

She thought she heard a sharp little intake of breath in the brief pause before Tess answered.

“Heard from Sean? What do you mean?”

“He gave us the slip last night.”

The intake, and the break, were more significant.

“How?”

Deutsch wondered about that question. Was Tess Chaykin genuinely surprised? Or was she just playing the part? Given what she knew about Tess, given what she knew about what she and Reilly had been through, it wouldn’t surprise her if Tess had something to do with his escape. She’s been to see him, after all-although under Deutsch’s supervision. It would reflect even worse on Deutsch, she knew, if Tess had used that meet to somehow help Reilly pull it off.

She filled Tess in on what happened, briefly, then, aware that Lendowski might appear at any moment, got down to the reason for her call.

“He’s going to call you, Tess. You know it and I know it. Somehow, he’s going to make contact. And I can’t stress enough how important it is that you do the right thing here. You need to try to convince him to hand himself in-”

“You know he’s never going to do that,” Tess interjected.

“I know. But you have to try. Hard. And you have to be seen to be trying, Tess. We’re talking aiding, abetting-you know the drill. I want to keep him safe. But I want to keep you safe too. I also want you to put me in touch with him. Just me. Tell him to call me. Give me a chance to talk to him, see what he wants. Maybe broker a deal for him to come in. Will you do that for me?”

Standing by the counter in the kitchen of her house in Mamaroneck, Tess went quiet as she chewed over Deutsch’s words.

“I can tell him,” she finally offered. “I don’t think it’ll do much good.”

“You have to try,” Deutsch said. “Please. For his sake. Get him to talk to me.”

“I’ll try.”

“Good. You have my number.”

After she ended the call, Tess steadied herself against the counter. She felt a dizzying cocktail of elation and dread as the ramifications of what had happened sank in.

Reilly was out. He was free again, which, on its own and unencumbered by the bigger picture, was a huge relief-only the bigger picture was massively worrying. He was a fugitive, a suspected murderer, with all the considerable resources of law enforcement on his trail.

Her legs felt like she’d just run a marathon, but she still found herself padding through to the front of the house and tilting the slats of the plantation-style shutters so she could peer out the living room window at the street outside.

It was quiet. This early in the morning, especially on a crisp cold day like today, was when Westchester County was-for her-at its peaceful best. She took in the deserted lane, quite a change from the ERT circus it had hosted the day before. Stalwart patches of snow dotted the front lawn while a thin dusting of it clung obstinately to the bare branches of the big oak tree by the driveway.

The surveillance team was, no doubt, on their way.

She stood there in silence, enjoying the calm before the storm. The kids and Tess’s mom were asleep-no school on Saturday-blissfully unaware of the drama the day would inevitably bring. She’d need to tell them, of course; she’d need to look at their faces and watch as each word she uttered chipped away at their innocence and replaced it with fear and worry.

As she watched a lone starling hop along a low branch, she became aware of a ball of anger inside her gut, and she could feel it growing at an alarming rate no matter how tightly she tried to subdue it.

The anger she was fighting right now felt oddly similar to what she had experienced when her marriage to Doug-Kim’s father-had first begun to unravel, even before the inevitability of his subsequent affair and the divorce that quickly followed. You didn’t need your partner to screw someone else in order to feel betrayed, and the way she felt about Reilly’s total inability to let go of the past, or at least be honest with her about the intensity with which it was consuming him, was uncomfortably mirroring how she’d felt about Doug, back when she still cared.

It was a bizarre irony of human nature that only love could underpin such extreme feelings of anger and betrayal, and that was the big difference in the two situations. By the time she found out about Doug’s affair, she had already fallen out of love with him, his deception simply providing the end of a chapter and the promise of new horizons, rather than the beginning of a chapter filled with circular resentment and claustrophobic bitterness. This was very different. Despite the anger, she was more in love with Reilly than ever, which only made all the conflicting feelings churning inside her harder to calm.

She wondered where he was, how he was doing, and what he was thinking right now.

Yes, he’d definitely be in touch.

And she couldn’t wait to see him.

27

By the time I first became aware of a semblance of daylight around me, I had no idea where I was or what time of day it was. All I knew was that I was shivering. A lot.

I had the vague, disturbing conviction that I was in the cellar of El Brujo’s hacienda in Mexico, where I’d been held and force-fed a drug that was meant to extinguish my soul for all of eternity. That was quickly dismissed in favor of our house in Mamaroneck and then for my old bachelor pad in the city. My mind-struggling for handholds on a sheer climb-finally settled on a West Hollywood hotel room in which I’d spent two weeks the summer I turned nineteen. I’d taken a Greyhound to Los Angeles and, within a few hours of arriving, I’d been struck down by a flu that was so virulent that I’d had to find myself a bed and spent all the money I’d saved for three months in California on two weeks in the Econo Lodge on Vine. I barely ate for a week and couldn’t move for almost ten days. A pretty young Mexican maid named Rosita had taken pity on the poor sick guy from Chicago, checking on me at the beginning and end of every shift to ensure I was still alive and bringing me bottles of water and left-behind pizza slices. When my fever finally broke, I was so exhausted that I’d had to spend another three days in the hotel recuperating. Finally feeling well enough to venture out, I’d summoned up the courage to ask Rosita to dinner. She’d smiled kindly and told me she was engaged, though still waiting for her betrothed to save up for the ring she’d chosen.

I’d had enough dollars left to catch a Metro bus to the Greyhound terminal, from where I took the first bus back east.

My mother never asked what had happened and I’d never shared it with her. Instead, I got a summer job as a clerk at the Forty-second Precinct of the Chicago Police Department before moving to Indiana to begin my law studies at Notre Dame.

As I lay there between sleep and waking, feeling nineteen but knowing I’d traveled a very long way from who I was back then, it struck me that even though I rarely thought of that connection, those three months on Addison were probably instrumental in my later decision to apply to the Bureau. There was something about the camaraderie and sense of moral purpose at the precinct that was deeply satisfying, the idea that not only could you intend to make a difference-however small-but that you actually could make society a better and safer place.

As the Bureau came into my head, so did everything else. Clarity gradually seeped back into my mind and my surroundings fell into focus. I wasn’t at the hacienda or chewing on leftover pizza. I was curled up on myself in the car I’d stolen, wrapped up in Lendowski’s parka and using his suit as a makeshift blanket, and I realized that the shivering was simply from the cold, which was reaching me with little resistance since I’d smashed one of the car’s windows. I rubbed my arms as I tilted myself up, slowly, hesitantly, my eyes stinging, my fingertips buzzing with a mild electrical current, my head pounding like someone had pimped out my skull with a subwoofer.

I’d never taken psychedelics like LSD or any hard drugs for that matter, so I didn’t know if I was experiencing a normal comedown. If it was, I couldn’t imagine how people actually got a kick from doing these kinds of psychoactive drugs. The endless, mind-numbing all-nighters we’d pulled last week outside Daland’s place were suddenly a fond, idyllic memory by comparison.

I stepped out of the Caprice and looked around. I realized I was in the East Village, on Third Street, close to its intersection with Avenue C. I needed to get something hot inside me, ideally something loaded with caffeine. I pulled up the collar on Lendowski’s parka, then remembered it said FBI on its front breast pocket and across its back, so I quickly shrugged it off, turned it inside out, and pulled it back on. A couple of minutes later, I was basking in the warmth of a small coffee shop, my hands toasting on a big mug of heaven. Each sip seemed to jump-start a bundle of neurons in my frazzled brain, and once the egg platter started working its magic, I was starting to think maybe I’d got away with this. My body seemed to have ducked any permanent damage from the drug, though it would take years before I’d know for sure if my mind was as lucky. For now, at least, I was a reasonably sentient being once again. Which wasn’t ideal, given that the events of last night, and the bigger picture, came galloping back. I think I might have preferred to stay in wonderland.

I needed to get in touch with Tess, let her know I was OK. I also needed her to help me with a couple of things, but I had to figure out how to contact her safely. I was sure the Bureau would have a Stingray van parked outside the house, and besides not wanting to be caught, I didn’t want to get her into trouble. I thought about it while I worked on a second mug of coffee, then came up with what I thought was a halfway decent plan. I’d need to buy myself a cheap phone and a couple of prepaid SIM cards.

To say my options were narrow would be a gross understatement, but while I was still out and alive, I figured I had an advantage. I already knew more about Corrigan than made him comfortable and there was a good chance that thanks to Kurt or Kirby or my elusive deep throat, I might have some information I was as yet unaware of-information he didn’t want me to have. I thought of Kurt and how all his paranoid fieldcraft suddenly seemed not quite so crazy. In fact, along with my unwillingness to share any details with Tess, it had probably saved his-and Gigi’s-life.

On the other hand, I wondered if it had all cost Nick his life. The thought hit me like a black hole of sadness, consuming me from the inside. I raised my mug slightly and gave my dead buddy a silent toast.

“I’m sorry,” I said under my breath.

As I set the mug down and stared into its murkiness, one thing was clear. There was no way I was going to prove that I was innocent. Not without signed confessions from the perpetrators. My only course of action was to find the man pulling the strings and secure evidence that I’d been framed.

I nodded to myself, slowly. Nothing had changed when it came to the big picture. It was still brutally simple.

I had to find Corrigan.

Sandman ground over the curious text message as he stared at himself in the mirror while he shaved.

He’d spent the night at a hotel, thinking he would take the time to recharge. He’d been on the go ever since the whole affair had gone into overdrive: flying up to Boston to take care of the doc, then back to the city to pick up Reilly’s trail at Times Square, following him down to DC and on to Kirby’s, then the altercation at the CIA analyst’s house after which he’d lost Reilly. He’d spent a sleepless night staking out the agent’s home, only to then discover the agent had turned up in FBI custody. Shortly after, however, he’d had to take care of the agent’s partner but failed to retrieve the laptop. He’d welcomed the night’s break to have a shower, a decent meal, and a hard think about what his next move would be, knowing Reilly was locked away in federal custody and beyond his reach.

And then the encrypted message had come in, informing him Reilly had escaped.

Kudos, he thought. Impressive move, all the more since Sandman still didn’t know how Reilly had managed to pull it off. The information he’d received was still sketchy-Reilly had somehow faked being sick convincingly enough to be taken to a hospital.

Sandman wondered if Reilly had had inside help. He’d need to look into it, find out who had been escorting him at the time of his escape. Perhaps that thread might lead back to Reilly now that he was in the wind-if the thread that had popped up on his screen in the form of a cryptic text message didn’t pan out, a text message that had been sent to Tess Chaykin’s iPhone and snagged by the Stingray van that was now parked near Reilly and Chaykin’s house.

The FBI had been using Stingray technology for years. The system, which mimics a cell phone tower, was fitted inside an unmarked van and was able to pinpoint the exact location of all mobile devices within its range and intercept all conversations and data coming in and out of any targeted phone. The Bureau didn’t need a wire tapping warrant to deploy Stingray; instead, they used it under the authority of “pen register” orders-otherwise known as “tap and trace” orders-which were very easily granted by the courts since they only required “probable cause” under the Fourth Amendment. These orders were only supposed to allow investigators to collect metadata such as a list of the numbers communicating with a suspect’s phone. The fact that Stingray could also eavesdrop on conversations and read message traffic was an innocent, but fortunate, bonus.

The SMS had come in from a throwaway and the SIM was no longer in use. It didn’t have a history to mine, either. It had come to life for less than a minute, just enough time to type in Chaykin’s phone number, add in the short message, and hit send. The SIM would be under heavy watch, but it was pretty evident to Sandman that it would never be used again.

The meaning of the message, on the other hand, was far from evident.

I’M OUT AND OK. NEED U TO BRING SURV PACK. TONIGHT @ MONASTERY

Sandman was intrigued.

Surely Reilly had to know Chaykin’s phone would be under watch, her SMS messages monitored? And asking her to bring him his “survival pack” would risk getting her picked up and charged-assuming they could prove that she knew the message came from him and that she actually met up with him.

The question was: what did Reilly mean? Where was he telling Tess Chaykin to come meet him?

The FBI team watching the house was still working on figuring it out, but so far they didn’t have a conclusive answer. It was too vague and could refer to too many places. It wasn’t a priority for them anyway. All they’d need to do was follow Chaykin when she left the house. She’d lead them straight to Reilly.

Sandman intended to be there when the meet took place. Reilly needed to be silenced before he could be taken into custody. If necessary, he knew he could get assistance from the FBI agent his employers had on their payroll, but he preferred to do it alone. Reliability was never an issue when he was operating solo.

He stared at the words on his screen, trying to divine their hidden message. He went over everything he knew about Reilly and Tess. Then he went wider. He looked at the file he had been given about those close to him, starting with Aparo-and an unexpected association flew off the screen at him. Something that, to him, seemed like the obvious solution.

Sandman nodded with satisfaction. It would be dark soon. He needed to make a move if he was going to get there before Reilly.

28

Mamaroneck, New York

Skulking by the window of her bedroom, Tess peeked out at the sleepy, tree-lined street as the early darkness of winter settled in. She could see the unmarked sedan parked outside the house, across and slightly down the street, and knew Annie Deutsch and her partner were in it. She could also just about make out the Comcast van one house further away and knew it was the Stingray monitoring vehicle they often used in these situations-which was why she was intrigued by the text message that she’d received.

Much earlier that day, as she was leaving Federal Plaza, she had already been wondering about where and when she would meet Reilly. She knew that, if all went well, he would make contact soon after he was out. He’d want her to know he was OK and that the capsules had done their job. She also figured he would need her help. His reckless text message had seemed out of character until Kim had come into her bedroom with a curious question and it all fell into place.

She turned away from the window and edged over to the bed, on which sat Kim’s denim backpack, the one she’d personalized with small pyramid-shaped studs. She had packed it with Reilly’s jeans and Timberland low boots, a pair of thick socks, underwear, a winter shirt, a small vanity case she’d been given on an overseas flight that included a shaving kit and toothbrush, and the stash of cash-two thousand dollars’ worth-they kept in the gun safe for an emergency. She’d also put in Reilly’s personal handgun, a Glock 19, and a box of rounds.

She glanced at her watch. It was time to get ready.

She could hear a blissfully oblivious Alex laughing to the antics of Despicable Me 2-still his default movie-with his grandmother downstairs in the living room, and guessed that Kim was probably sulking in her bedroom, gorging herself on an endless stream of Snapchat messages and Instagram likes while preparing herself for the aborted fun night out at the movies with her boyfriend Giorgio and, probably far more distressing, the imminent, if temporary, loss of her prized phone.

It had been hard to convince Kim to help her, but she couldn’t see any other way around it. She needed to leave the house undetected, and she needed transportation that wouldn’t raise suspicion. Kim and Giorgio had arranged to go out to a movie, and it had presented Tess with an opportunity she couldn’t pass up.

She hadn’t yet told her mom or Alex about Reilly’s predicament-not about his capture, nor his escape. She decided she’d wait to see how tonight played out before doing so. Kim, on the other hand, now knew something was seriously wrong. When she’d come in to Tess’s bedroom to tell her about the weird message she’d received, Tess had closed the door behind her and led her into the bathroom. Talking low out of paranoia regarding long-range listening devices, she’d whispered her instructions to her daughter. Once she’d thought up the rest of her plan, she’d then told Kim about it, but hadn’t said any more than what she needed to say to get her daughter to play ball. It hadn’t been easy. The repeated hushed protests about missing out on her date were hard to put down. Eventually, though, Kim had grudgingly agreed.

Presently, Tess had to get into gear.

She went downstairs and announced that she was going to run a bath and get some “me time”, all while avoiding her mother’s dubious, probing look. She said she’d make herself a bowl of granola afterwards and left her mom to sort out dinner for just herself and Alex, since Kim was about to head out to a movie and, most likely, a pizza, with her boyfriend. Tess then headed back upstairs and began setting the scene.

She filled the bath, leaving the door open so the sound of the running water percolated downstairs. While it was running, she hastily put on Kim’s oversized tan parka, her signature beanie, snow boots and thick polka-dotted scarf, then she checked herself in the mirror. It was odd to see herself dressed like that, though there was nothing shocking about it. It was hardly an embarrassing MuDAL moment-yet another of the hip acronyms Kim had taught her with a roll of the eyes, Mutton Dressed As Lamb. Not in that garb. Had this been summer, things might have been different, but she was too covered up for the cold to feel even a tinge of a Peter Pan Syndrome moment-another one of Kim’s useful lessons.

Once she was done, she switched on the speaker system by her bed and selected a calming Coldplay playlist on her iPod. She then turned off the bedroom lights, dimmed the lights in the bathroom, and, after checking the front of the house for any signs of life from the window, she waited.

Right on cue, Giorgio’s old Jeep pulled into up outside.

She grabbed the backpack and stepped into the hallway, where she called out to Kim.

“Honey, G’s here.”

“OK,” came Kim’s halfhearted attempt at an enthusiastic reply.

“I know it’s Saturday night, but don’t be back too late,” Tess said out loud as she took the stairs down to the front hall. A wall shielded her from the couch and the TV, and she tensed up for a second as she reached the door, hoping her mom didn’t get up or come out of the kitchen to say goodbye to her granddaughter. She was clear as she stepped outside, the hood of Kim’s parka pulled over her beanie.

She did her best to imitate Kim’s teen gait as she made her way down the path to Giorgio’s waiting car. Without glancing back toward the FBI sedan or the van further away, she climbed into the car.

Giorgio’s face went all wide with surprise. “Mrs. Chaykin?”

“Just drive, Giorgio.”

“But-”

Tess shot him a firm look and pointed ahead. “Drive, will you? I’ll explain later.”

Giorgio put the Wrangler into gear and pulled away from the house. Tess hazarded a discreet glance back, although given the darkness and the steam obscuring the rear windshield, there was little chance the agents staking out the house were going to recognize her.

She allowed herself a small smile. It had worked. No one was following. She nodded to herself, pleased at how she’d been inspired by both Reilly’s recounting of Daland’s arrest and the fact that she still had the physique to pull this off. It helped that Kim was now less than an inch shorter than her own five foot seven.

She stared ahead, heart pounding at the thought of being able to feel Reilly’s arms around her again shortly.

From the unmarked sedan down the street, Lendowski watched Tess Chaykin’s daughter climb into the Jeep and head off.

Deutsch had already run the plates while the car idled outside the house. The information had matched the data coming back from Stingray, telling them the car was the girl’s boyfriend’s.

“Dad’s on the run and wanted for murder and she’s going out on a date,” he said with disdain. “Kids today. Christ.”

“Maybe she doesn’t know,” Deutsch said.

Lendowski just let out a sarcastic shrug for an answer.

His target was still inside the house. As he kept his gaze fixed on it, he wondered if Reilly would really be stupid enough to try meeting with Tess. You didn’t need to be Sherlock Holmes to know about the astonishing number of fugitives who were caught simply because they made contact with family members.

His BlackBerry vibrated. He glanced at the screen’s caller ID. He glanced at Deutsch and gestured back at the van with his thumb as he picked up. “What’s up?”

“Something’s off. We think she’s on the move.”

Lendowski didn’t get it. Why the hell would they be tracking the girl’s phone? “I know, I just saw her leave.”

“Chaykin?”

“No, numbnuts. The daughter.”

The Stingray operator in the van clarified. “Not the daughter, doofus. Chaykin herself.”

“Negative. I’ve got eyes on the house. Chaykin’s still at home. That was the daughter.”

“Then how do you explain the stream of Facebook and Instagram messages flying back and forth from her laptop?”

Her laptop? “What about her phone?”

“It’s powered down. We can’t track it.”

Which didn’t make sense. Why would the girl switch off her phone? What teenager did that-ever?

Lendowski scowled as he realized what had happened. The bitches were playing him.

“Hang on.” He turned to Deutsch. “Something’s wrong.” He thought fast. “Check the house, see if Chaykin’s still inside. I’m going after the boyfriend’s car.”

Deutsch didn’t argue. “Damn it,” she muttered as she hurried out.

She’s barely slammed the door shut as Lendowski was already powering away from the curb.

Sandman was sitting in the darkness of Aparo’s apartment when his encrypted phone vibrated with an incoming text message.

It read:

CHAYKIN’S ON THE MOVE

He deleted it, then settled back into the uncomfortable armchair that faced the front door. As he checked the silenced handgun in his lap, he ran through his plan once more, making sure there were no wrinkles.

The location Reilly had chosen to meet his woman was going to be a boon. After all, Sandman mused, what better place for an agent to commit suicide than the apartment of his recently deceased partner? A death for which, in his delusional, troubled state of mind, he could conceivably blame himself.

29

It didn’t take long for Lendowski to catch up with the Jeep. Mamaroneck was a small town and there weren’t too many options if one was aiming to leave it. North or south on the Boston Post Road if you wanted a slow amble, or the thruway if you were on any kind of schedule. Most people going anywhere took Mamaroneck Avenue up to the thruway’s on-ramps.

He caught up with the Jeep just as it was turning onto the Post Road and stayed well back, not wanting to give his quarry any chance of knowing he was there. Then he remembered his cash-only employer and what he’d been asked to do. As the Jeep turned left onto Fenimore, he pulled out his phone and dialed the number.

As before, the man answered promptly. “What’s going on?”

“I’m on Chaykin’s tail,” Lendowski told him. “She’s on her way to meet Reilly.”

“We know,” the man said. “We have an asset waiting there.”

This surprised Lendowski. “Waiting? Where?”

“In the city. Where the meet is going to take place. It should be taken care of before Chaykin gets there.”

This didn’t fit. “The city?” Lendowski asked. “That was the message in the text?”

“Correct.”

Something was definitely off. “She’s not heading into the city.”

“Say again?”

“She’s not going into the city,” Lendowski said. “Look, if that’s where she was going, she’d be jumping on I-95 or taking a train in. And I can tell you she’s not doing either. She’s turned off the road that leads to both of them as we speak.”

The voice hesitated, then asked, “You’re sure about this?”

“I’m on her fucking tail,” Lendowski fired back. “She’s going somewhere else. Somewhere local, by the looks of it. This road leads nowhere.”

“We could have a serious problem here,” the man growled. “All right. Stay on it. I might need you to step up. I’ll call you right back.”

Which was timely, as Lendowski now had a call waiting from Deutsch.

“She’s gone,” Deutsch said, her voice breathless. “They faked us. You got them yet?”

Lendowski thought fast. He was alone, following Chaykin, who was likely to lead him straight to Reilly. His employers-who seemed to have deep pockets-sounded like they were in a bit of a panic. The bit about him stepping up to the plate was still ringing in his ears.

He thought he might have an opportunity here.

“Nothing yet,” he told Deutsch, thinking he should buy himself some time. “I’ll call you as soon as I have anything.”

“I’ll put out an APB on the Jeep,” Deutsch said.

“No,” Lendowski countered. Last thing he needed right now was interference. “Let’s not spook her yet. She could well lead us to Reilly. I’ll find her. Just give me a bit more time.”

Deutsch audibly hesitated, then said, “OK. Call me the second you know, either way.”

“You got it.” He hung up.

In Aparo’s apartment, Sandman was livid. “Is he sure? How reliable is he?”

“He’s a Fed,” Roos replied. “The guy knows what he’s talking about. You can’t get there in time, can you?”

“Up to Westchester? I’m an hour away, easy. Depends on when and where they’re meeting.” He cursed under his breath, pissed off at how Reilly had played them.

“OK,” Roos said. “Get up there. I’ll keep you posted.”

Lendowski saw the Jeep’s brake lights flare up and watched as it pulled into the CITGO gas station just before the thruway’s overpass. He pulled over and killed his lights. Tess got out, then the Jeep came back out of the station, pulled a U-turn and headed back toward him. As it drove past, Lendowski’s phone rang again. It was his off-the-books employer.

“OK, here’s the deal, Len. We’ve got no assets nearby and it’s likely they can’t get to you in time, so we’re going to need you to take care of this.”

Lendowski saw Tess now walking away from the station, heading north along the quiet lane. “What do you mean?” Even as he said it, Lendowski knew what the man was going to ask him to do.

There was silence for a moment, confirming that Lendowski had indeed guessed correctly. Then the voice said, “Fifty thousand.”

Lendowski climbed out of the car, feeling a spike of unease at what he was hearing-and thinking. “For your Reilly problem to go away permanently? That’s what we’re talking about, right?”

“I knew you’d see things our way, Len.”

The strangest mixture of elation and abject terror at what he was contemplating now raced through him. “I’m not sure about this.”

“Come on, Len. We need you to do it. And you could do a lot worse than be on our team.”

“You realize what you’re asking me to do?” He was now following Tess, staying well back.

“All I’m asking is for you to take advantage of the unique situation you’re in. Think about it. This’ll wipe out what you owe your bookies-something the Bureau doesn’t know about, right? Like the IRS and those wads of cash we’ve been handing you?”

The threat was implicit. The bastards weren’t content with cajoling him into playing ball. They had to resort to threatening him. Well, screw them, he thought. Them, and Reilly. He’d turn this to his advantage, big time.

He steeled himself, greed now pumping adrenaline all through him. “One hundred. Two if she needs to go too.”

“I don’t have time to play games with you, Len. And I’m not the Sultan of Brunei either. One hundred I can do. Just him or both of them, that’s up to you. But it has to be clean, either way.”

“One fifty.”

“Len. Take the deal. It’s the clever move, trust me.”

Shit.

Still-this was still a big payday. Tax free, one shot, done.

Time was pressing.

Lendowski’s thoughts were ricocheting all over the place as he tried to make sure he had all the bases covered. “But how? I don’t know who you are. How’re you going to get me the money?”

“Check your bank balance on your phone. We’re wiring in half as we speak.”

He shouldn’t have been surprised they knew where he banked, but still the notion still made him feel sick to his stomach. “Bank account? No, fuck that. Cash only. I can’t have a deposit this big show up like that.”

“Don’t worry about it, Len. We’ll swap it for cash once it’s done and clean it up as an honest mistake. It won’t be an issue. In the meantime, it’s yours. Consider it an advance.”

He was screwed. They knew enough about him already to get him kicked out of the Bureau, if not put behind bars. And it wasn’t as if this was about someone he liked.

His face set in a scowl that could force water through ground coffee at espresso pressure, he relented. “Deal,” he said. “I’ll call you when it’s done.”

He hung up, knowing he’d need to explain his absence and his radio silence to Deutsch later. A problem with his car, maybe. Then there was another, more significant problem. His backup gun-a clean Sig P226 with the serial numbers filed off-had been concealed inside the spare of his Explorer when Reilly had driven off with it. He hadn’t yet had time to retrieve it.

He thought he might just have to kill Reilly with his bare hands.

30

New Rochelle, New York

I’d made it as far as Baychester before the urge to close my eyes had become overwhelming. I’d pulled into the Bay Plaza parking lot, smeared a couple of handfuls of halite-dirtied snow across each license plate, then slept in my stolen Caprice for a couple of hours, this crashing-out-in-cars thing becoming far too much of a habit for my liking.

The physical exertion and adrenaline-fuelled nature of the previous few hours seemed to have conspired to mean that, instead of experiencing IMAX-style waking visions of my past lives, I was in fact sound asleep.

Presently, I was sitting in the darkness off Pinebrook Boulevard and reminisced about happier times, specifically the time Tess was screaming at the top of her voice: “It’s all crap. I’m going to smash this laptop to pieces so I never have to write such appalling trash ever again.”

Happier times, indeed.

Tess had been beyond frustrated. She’d been working on her second book and had written herself into a corner. I had saved the day by shutting down the laptop before it was permanently retired and making Tess join me on a brisk walk.

It was obvious that Tess could tell a story-the sales figures from her first book had made that clear-but the sea change from archaeologist-adventurer to desk-bound author had meant that Tess had some pent-up adrenaline to burn off. The bi-weekly Bikram yoga clearly wasn’t cutting it and sometimes cabin fever got the best of her. So I took her to the only trail I knew in the area and walked her from one end to the other and back again, something she now did every week on her “Zen walk,” occasionally alternating with other routes to keep things fresh.

Am I a great partner, or what?

The Leatherstocking Trail was a gorgeous haven of woods and wetlands, and the strip I was talking about, the southern section of the bigger, fifteen-mile-long Colonial Greenway loop, was where Tess let off steam instead of taking it out on a thousand bucks’ worth of MacBook.

Several of the roads that ran roughly north-south through the east-west trail gave easy access to it, which meant that, overall, the trail was a flawless way to expose a tail or physical surveillance, being no more than two hundred feet wide in most places and giving no consistent cover. Even better, the overcast weather meant that drone coverage would be difficult to pull off unnoticed-assuming they even knew we were here-which, I hoped, wasn’t the case.

Tess and I knew each other’s thought processes well enough for me to be pretty sure that she would hit the trail from somewhere near its eastern end, maybe at Fenimore, and walk west, while she would expect me to approach from the opposite end, which was exactly what I was about to do. If we needed to make a quick getaway, then either car would be an option.

I had been waiting in the Caprice for about twenty minutes and was now as sure as I could be that I was alone. I grabbed the flashlight and one of the Glocks from Lendowski’s holdall-his or Deutsch’s, I had no way of knowing which-climbed out of the car, crossed Pinebrook, and struck out along the trail. After about a thousand yards, I passed the sign stating that I had crossed from New Rochelle into the town of Mamaroneck.

There was just enough light for me to see my way without the flashlight, the combination of dull moonlight and light pollution from the town revealing islands of snow in a sea of thick foliage made up of ash, maple, oak and others trees that were beyond my limited knowledge of upstate flora. The only other thing I knew was that there was poison ivy dotted along the trail. Given how swimmingly everything had gone these last few days, I decided I wouldn’t be surprised if I fell face-first into some before the night was out.

I figured it would take me no more than twenty minutes to pick my way to the center of the trail, which was where the Sheldrake River forked. This was the part of the trail farthest from an intersecting road, and therefore a perfect place to meet. I hoped Tess would think the same.

With my line of sight constantly flicking between the ground and the trail, I continued eastwards.

When I reached the only intersecting road between where I had left the car and the river, I checked in both directions before continuing on my way. Ten minutes later the trail opened out into its widest and most isolated area, where it crossed the easternmost of the two river forks.

I slowly skirted the perimeter, eyes and ears alert for any sign of movement. Apart from assorted nocturnal creatures, I was alone. I concealed myself behind a cluster of trees on the north side of the area and waited.

After another five minutes I heard the faint sound of someone approaching from the east. Less than a minute later, the sound resolved into clearer footfalls. Then Tess appeared. Alone and carrying what I recognized to be Kim’s denim backpack.

She stopped and turned to look back the way she had come, ears straining for any sound behind her.

There was nothing but silence around us.

I watched as she moved into the clearing and waited, then I stepped out from behind the trees.

“Tess.” As low as I could say it and still be heard.

She swung her head, saw me, and walked around the edge of the clearing toward me, her pace picking up with each step.

We closed the ground toward each other in seconds, then fell into each other’s arms, Tess having dropped the backpack to the ground.

“Thank God,” she whispered.

We stayed like that for a long time. The only thing either of us needed right then and there was the warmth of the other’s body.

We finally broke apart.

Her face flooded with concern. “You’re OK, right? The drug? You’re OK?”

“It did the trick,” I said. “The jury’s still out on any long-term effects.” Then I looked her up and down, and the garb sank in. “You’re Kim?”

She half smiled. “I may decide to stick with this look. What do you think?”

“As long as you don’t go getting tats and piercings all over you, young lady,” I said, wagging my finger.

“We should stop. This is getting creepy.”

“Agreed.”

I waved at her attire. “So Kim-she helped you with all this?”

“She didn’t just help-she gave up a date with Giorgio for it.” My face obviously telegraphed my confusion, so Tess added, “He dropped me off.”

I smiled. Kim-Tess’s mini-me-she was key to why we were standing here. I gazed at Tess’s eyes, which appeared dark in the bleak light, but which I knew to be exactly the same shade of green as Kim’s.

“She’s everything that’s great about you.”

She thought about this for a moment. “And Alex has none of your obsessive traits. Yet.”

I nodded. She was right, of course. But none of that mattered. Right now, I was just so damn happy to see her. And I couldn’t have done it without Kim. Or without a silly dad-lesson I’d insisted on one rainy Sunday afternoon a couple of years back.

I’d wanted her to learn Tess and my cell phone numbers, as well as our home number, by heart. I’d explained to her that just because no one knows anyone’s number any more didn’t mean that everyone has suddenly become immune to losing things. I mean, seriously, who remembers anyone’s number these days? Lose your phone when you’re out and it’s unlikely you’d know how to contact anyone because your phone now functions on behalf of-and often instead of-your brain.

So as decreed by Kim, the three of us-we figured Alex was still too young for this-had memorized each other’s phone numbers, her flawless logic being that if she had to learn our numbers, then we should have to learn hers too, an argument she had won at the time by pouting till we agreed. And had just won again, uncontested, since I was able to send Tess the fake text message from a burner phone that didn’t have her number stored in it.

It was the other message, though, that had led Tess here.

I had decided to contact her indirectly, and thought of a couple of options. One was to go through Kurt, then something better dropped into my mind. I found an Internet café and created a fake Facebook account using some photos I’d cut and pasted off some of Kim’s friends profiles, then used that to post a comment on a recent photo of hers. The comment had to get through her rapid-fire fingers and her ruthless indifference filter, and it needed to tell her it was me, without announcing it to the guys in the Stingray van. So I’d used a name that was bound to get her attention.

One of the first times I met Giorgio when he and Kim started dating, I lightheartedly referred to him as Georgie Boy, which went down like a lead balloon. I had intended it as a term of endearment, channeling a nickname Jerry used for George on “Seinfeld.” I mean, it wasn’t like I was calling him Boy George or cracking any lame Armani puns. I’d explained its origin and, given that I get a bit evangelical when it comes to the Seinfeld canon, I’d talked about George’s other nicknames, most notably T-Bone and my favorite, Art Vandelay. Still, the resistance was noted, and “Georgie Boy” only rarely saw the light of day. I was still waiting for the day I’d be able to sit through box sets of the series with her, but there always seemed to be another Pretty Little Liars hogging any available viewing time she had.

So “Georgie Boy” had put a “Like” on one of Kim’s photos, along with a comment that asked “How’s Stacy’s mom?”-a reference to a song we liked and joked about-with a winkie face. It had taken a couple of minutes, but when she’d replied-presumably after showing it to Tess-“She’s got it going on, Art!” with a laughing emoticon, I knew she’d got it. So I commented back, “I can’t mow her lawn! How about a quickie on the Zen walk instead?” with a tongue-out emoticon. She’d replied “8OK!” with two of the tongue-out faces.

“‘A quickie on the Zen walk,’ Georgie Boy?” Tess smirked. “I dunno if Kim’s ever going to forgive you for that.”

“Hey, it did the trick, didn’t it?”

She nodded, then her expression darkened. “What’s going on, Sean? Where do we go from here?”

“I’m going to find Corrigan and prove that his guy killed Kirby. It’s the only way.”

She studied me, then just nodded. I guess she knew we were past the point of arguing about this. She gestured toward the ground. “I got what I could.”

“Maybe you and the kids should go to the ranch-” I was referring to her aunt’s place in Arizona.

“No way,” she cut me off. “You need me here. But your guys have the house under watch 24/7. Where are you going to stay?”

“I have no idea.”

“Maybe with whoever’s been helping you?”

A loaded question, by the looks of it. No point denying it now. “Nick tell you?”

She nodded.

Which reminded me of something I needed to know. “What else did he say? When you saw him?”

“What, at the house?”

“Yes, before the… before the accident?”

“He said you wanted your laptop safe.”

I nodded. “Where is it now?”

“I brought it back to the house after the accident. I hid it in the loft. I figured the ERT guys had already gone through the house, so it was safe there. I mean, I didn’t know where else to put it. Should I have brought it?”

“No, that’s fine. I just didn’t want them to have access to it to either track down the guy helping me out, or plant stuff on it. What else?”

“He told me everything you told me at Federal Plaza. About Corrigan, your dad, Azorian.”

“What else?”

“That’s it. He just said he was going to do everything he could to help clear you. That with you in custody, he’d use the Bureau’s weight to get to the bottom of this with the CIA. Maybe even ask the president to help.” She studied me, then asked, “Why are you asking me this?”

“I don’t know. It’s just… him dying, the timing if it.”

He face scrunched up with concern. “You think he was murdered?”

Before I could answer, we both heard it.

The snap of a branch.

Then silence again.

Tess motioned for me to take Kim’s backpack. “Go. Just go.”

“No.” I jabbed a finger at the trees to my right and hissed, low, “Hide. Quickly.”

Tess sprinted away as I reached for the gun tucked in the small of my back-

But before I had it fully out, a figure emerged out of the trees and came rushing at me, fast, with what looked like a gun in his hand. In a flash, he’d plowed into me, knocking us both to the ground, his left hand locked around my right forearm. Driving a knee into my gut, he levered himself upward and threw a couple of lightning jabs at my head with his gun hand, dazing me enough to let him force the gun from my hand.

He picked up the gun I’d dropped and stood up, tucking it into his belt holster and pointing his weapon directly at me.

“Get up, asshole,” Lendowski spat.

I shook my head and tried to focus my eyes, but what I saw made no sense. For one thing, he was alone.

“Where’s Deutsch?”

His expression went all weird and wry. “She couldn’t make it.”

And then all at once, disparate little observations fell into line. The call outside the bar. The gambling. The unusual levels of interest in my routine. His being here, without Deutsch.

They’d got to him-and now he was going to do their bidding.

“Len. Don’t.”

He just shrugged. “Don’t what?”

“Think about what you’re doing. They’ll never let you live.”

“Shut up.” Beyond the tension and the anger in his voice, I detected some fear, like he wasn’t totally comfortable with what he was about to do.

It was an opening, a vein to mine.

“They’ll own you,” I pressed. “And when they don’t need you anymore, they’ll put you down. You know that, right?”

He didn’t want to hear that. Instead, he shoved the gun in my face. “Enough. Call your bitch, get her back here.”

“Len-”

“Call her.”

I held his glare for a second, then said, “Go screw yourself.”

He grabbed my jacket and pulled me to my feet, looping his left arm around my neck, his right hand holding the gun to my head.

“Tess!” he bellowed. “I know you can hear me. You have five seconds to join us.” He started counting down them down, loudly.

I heard the faintest sound behind me. Lendowski was still counting, so I hoped he hadn’t heard it. Maybe Tess was working her way around us.

I yelled as loud as I could to give her cover, “Don’t! He’ll kill us both, get out of here-”

Then I heard the crunch of her feet, and Lendowski must have heard them too, and in the moment he tried to decide what to do, something slammed into the back of his head, a rock or a branch-I couldn’t tell. All I felt was the side of his skull bouncing off the back of mine, but he managed to stay on his feet. Down, but not out, he was already spinning around and taking aim at the trees, his left arm still choking me.

I shouted, “Stay down!” as I drove my right elbow as hard as I could into Lendowski’s side, then wrapped my right leg around his and pushed him over, bringing us both down.

As we hit the ground, his left arm loosened enough for me to roll to my right, trapping his right arm flat so that he couldn’t fire the gun.

“Tess! Run! Now!”

I thought I heard her take off as I balled up my left fist and slammed it against Lendowski’s right wrist. His grip on the gun loosened, and it fell away. I tried to grab the gun as I simultaneously rolled off him, but he landed a barrage of vicious blows to my midsection with his left before dragging me back from the gun, kicking me in the gut, and wrapping both hands around my neck.

I knew he was far stronger than me and would probably be able to take anything I threw at him, especially with him knowing I was weakening by the second, so I put every ounce of strength I had left into forcing myself upright so Lendowski didn’t have gravity to help him.

Kneeling on the frozen ground, Lendowski behind me, his thumbs digging into the back of my neck, I hoped that Tess was using the time to get back to her car and away.

I could feel myself starting to slip into unconsciousness-a state I had spent far too much time skirting in the past few days. I had to fight it with the idea of needing to ensure Tess, Kim and Alex were safe. But I couldn’t. His grip was too strong, and I was helpless. As I started to fall into a deep ocean of inky blackness, I thought about my dad. Maybe I’d find him. Ask him face-to-face what drove him to take his own life, when every cell of my body still wanted to live.

A loud sound reverberated through the dark water, turning everything upside down.

Suddenly the water was thinner. Lighter.

I was no longer sinking fast, but rushing toward the surface.

I felt the cold air against my face as I burst back into consciousness.

Tess was standing over Lendowski, the gun in her right hand, her whole body shaking with shock.

Lendowski lay on his side, stone cold dead. A big chunk was missing from the side of his skull. The blood oozing from the gaping hole appeared black against the dirty snow, spreading in slow motion as it seeped into it.

I pulled myself to standing, covered the ground to him, and pulled his gun from its holster and tucked it into my pants. Then I moved to Tess, put an arm around her and gently eased the gun from her grasp. She was shaking, a lot, her faraway gaze locked on Lendowski.

“Tess. Tess. Listen to me. It’s going to be OK.”

She didn’t answer. She just nodded, nervously.

“You weren’t here, all right? You were never here.” I leaned back a bit so I could look her squarely in the eyes. “Neither was Kim.”

She looked down at Lendowski’s corpse, still shivering. “I’m glad I was.”

I pulled her in and kissed her on the forehead, keeping her close, keeping my lips on her cold skin, feeling her veins throbbing away under my fingers. After a few long seconds, I pulled away and went back to his prone body. I fished through his pockets and pulled out his BlackBerry, which unsurprisingly was turned off. I stuffed both guns and his phone in the backpack.

“You need to go home. Before anyone finds him. I’ll drive you into town.”

“No. I’ll be fine. I’ll make my way back. You need to get out of here.”

I shook my head. “I don’t want you walking through the trail on your own. I’ll drop you where it’s safer. Then, just go home. They’ll be wondering where Lendowski is. Anyone asks, you went out for some air and a think. That’s it. You stick with that. You never saw me.”

She didn’t move. “What are you going to do?”

I looked down at Lendowski’s body. “Find the bastards who paid him to kill me.”

She placed a hand on my arm-her eyes locked on mine, grasping at anything. “He tried to kill you. Doesn’t that prove something?”

“They’ll just argue he was here to arrest me and I gunned him down.”

I could hear the desperation in her voice as she pleaded, “You could come back with me. I’ll sneak you in through the backyard, then you could go up into the loft space.”

“What, and watch DVDs while you sneak me up some energy bars and a carton of milk?” I threw a weak smile at her. “Go home, Kim. It’s dangerously close to your curfew.”

“How can you find them when everyone’s out looking for you?”

“I’m going to even up the odds. Don’t worry. I’ve got an advantage here. I know how this game is played.”

She threw her arms around my neck and pulled me in for a kiss. After a minute or so, I gently peeled off her. I reached into the backpack and gave her back the gun she’d brought me, along with the box of ammo. “Keep it near,” I told her as I put away the one she’d use on Lendowski. “I seem to be building up a collection of FBI Glocks.” Then I took a fresh burner phone from my jacket pocket and handed it to her. “I’ll call you on this. I dialed my number from it, so it’s stored in the call log. Call me if you don’t feel safe for any reason.”

“I won’t feel safe till you’re in the clear and back home with us.”

I nodded. There was nothing I would have liked more. “We’re going to get through this, Tess. I promise.”

She looked at me for few seconds, then nodded back.

I nodded back, then started to drag Lendowski’s body toward the tree line.

31

New York City, New York

Across the street, I could see the nightclub that Kurt had designated as our latest meeting place. All manner of leather-garbed, tattooed and pierced night creatures were standing outside, smoking. It didn’t look like where I imagined Kurt would spend his Saturday nights. Maybe Gigi was broadening his horizons.

After ensuring that Tess was safely ensconced in a cab and heading home, I’d left the stolen Caprice in a parking garage near White Plains station and taken a train into the city. Kurt had been out with his gal when I’d texted him, and he didn’t seem at all pleased that he had to interrupt their date for an urgent powwow.

I’d changed into the clothes Tess had brought me, ditching Lendowski’s suit and parka in an alleyway dumpster beside an Italian restaurant. I’d given the discarded items a generous coating of week-old pasta sauce to dissuade anyone from reclaiming them while on a high-calorie dumpster dive. I’d also taken the holdall that now carried the three Glocks and the stuff Tess had brought me and shoved it into a dark, tight spot behind it, making sure no one saw me and figuring it stood a reasonable chance of still being there when we left the club.

Satisfied as I could be that there was no one watching the place, I crossed the street and headed for the entrance, angling my face away from the CCTV cameras bolted to the building’s facade. I was well aware of our intel-gathering agencies’ capabilities when it came to finding a needle in a haystack, and I knew that, from here on, I’d need to avoid any kind of camera or even a phone call if I didn’t want the monster servers that picked through anything they could sink their claws into to get a lock on my trail.

Before I could get through the door, two hundred and fifty pounds of bouncer blocked my way. “Wrong door, buddy.”

I held up the denim backpack. “I need to change. The wife hates this side of me. Had to sneak out.”

He thought about this for a moment then nodded me in, grudgingly. “Go on.” As I stepped past him, he called after me, “You’ll have to tell her eventually, you know. One way or another, secrets always find a way out.”

Everyone’s a guru.

I maneuvered myself through a murder of Goth girls-some of them looking no older than Kim-and went inside.

Time to really screw up Kurt’s evening.

Strobing lights and bizarre electronic music pummeled my senses as I made my way through the dark and sweaty catacomb-like space. I found Kurt and his new friend seated at a small table at the back, away from the frenetic dance-floor crush. They were both dressed in full costume, but the clientele was so freakish they fit right in. I was the one who looked way out of place.

Kurt, dressed in a red tie, high-collared white jacket and blue cape, smiled weakly. “We were on our way to a Final Fantasy all-nighter at a pop-up cinema. No time to go change and not too many places we could go to dressed like this. Gigi suggested we meet here.”

Gigi looked at him quizzically, then struck a coquettish pose-chin resting on the backs of her hands. “Not Gigi. Lumina.” She flashed me a grin. “From Final Fantasy Thirteen. And he’s Cid. Cid Raines.”

So she was also averse to using real names.

Terrific.

Lumina-pink hair, black bodice reining in her hard-to-ignore chest, pink-lined sweeper tailcoat, short feathery skirt and black mid-thigh stockings-looked me up and down. “So this is the Fed?”

Kurt nodded, looking intensely uncomfortable. I assumed he had filled her in while they were waiting, and while I wasn’t massively comfortable with it, I didn’t really have time to worry about such subtleties.

Even here, with the sound system at less than full tilt, no way was anyone going to hear what we were saying, so I decided to dive right in.

“Kirby’s dead. And the evidence says I killed him.”

Kurt’s face lit up. “Jesus. What happened?”

I gave him and Lumina a brief overview-from my arrival at Kirby’s house to my escape from Federal Plaza. Keeping with my recent theme, I omitted the parts that featured Tess.

Gigi listened intently, unfazed-which surprised me. Kurt, on the other hand, looked more and more uncomfortable.

I got to the end and shrugged. “So here I am.”

Gigi gave me the raised eyebrow. “To kill one government employee may be regarded as a misfortune; to kill two looks like carelessness.”

I smiled. It was my fault. My own natural flippancy was obviously infectious. “Oscar Wilde. Nice.”

Gigi smirked with unexpected appreciation.

Kurt said, helpfully, “His wife’s a writer. She’s-”

I shot him a withering look. “I did manage to read a book or two long before I met her.”

Gigi grinned. “I have to admit I lost it myself with my adorable panda when he told me who you were, but this is all magnificently fucked-up. It’s like you guys are living some old-school ARG.”

Kurt gave me the eye roll. “Alternate Reality Game, dude.”

Gig swatted him and said, “He knows that.” Then she turned to me, all serious now. “What do you want us to do?”

“I’m not sure. Anything new with our search?”

Gigi said, “The CIA servers started running some kind of purge two hours after I started snooping around about the black ops you were interested in. I backtracked through the commands on the relevant server and it definitely wasn’t an automated systems procedure. Someone went in and told the archive to overwrite anything connected to those ops. From the way the instructions are configured, I’d say someone didn’t want their trail visible to the sys admins, which means the purge is outside standard data policy.”

My head was spinning, and not just from the music. “OK, so you’re saying you’ve hit a wall?”

Her mocking expression emasculated my question. “No wall’s impenetrable, G-boy. I’ve left some anonymous botnets running. They mimic multiple internal searches of the SCI database. I’ve asked them to trawl for anything connected to the files. They’ll come home to mama. But that might take a while.”

“A luxury I don’t have.” I felt deflated. “I don’t have anyone else to turn to. And I need to start fighting back.”

Kurt held his hands out, defensively. “Dude, seriously, we can’t-”

“I don’t mean it like that, relax. But maybe there’s stuff you can help me with.”

“Such as?” Gigi asked. I didn’t sense resistance in her tone or her expression. More like excitement.

“Listen to the chatter. See if my name comes up. This is a CIA and FBI situation, and it seems like they’re keeping the whole thing hushed up-for now. I’m thinking neither agency wants to look inept, and it’ll be much easier for whoever’s after me if the cops aren’t in the way.”

Still in something of a daze, Kurt nodded. “Sure. OK. I guess.”

Gigi put a reassuring hand on Kurt’s arm. “We can do that. It’s this guy they want. Now go get us some drinks because you’ve heard all this before while I need vodka.”

Kurt got up and headed for the bar, and I asked Gigi, “What about that reporter? The Portuguese one in the Corrigan file?”

Gigi leaned in toward me. “Octavio Camacho. I looked into that.”

“He died shortly after the meeting with Corrigan in which he was mentioned, right? Back in 1981?”

She nodded. “Yes. In a rock climbing accident. On top of being a hotshot investigative reporter, he was also an avid mountaineer. The coroner’s report found death by misadventure.”

“That’s it?”

“Well, that and some scattered references about him on the DI’s servers, but they’re heavily redacted. He was definitely someone of interest for a brief period of time. Before he died.”

She gave me a knowing look. I didn’t disagree.

“No other hits on Corrigan or Corrigam or any other obvious misspellings?” I asked.

“Nope. And nothing else in any CIA or DI files-or at least not in the ones I could get into before the purge started.”

Kurt placed a White Russian and a couple of beers on the table and sat down. I was so bummed out I picked up my beer and almost downed the whole thing in one chug.

Gigi gestured to Kurt, who handed me his beer as a chaser.

I was warming to her.

She crossed her legs, flashing me way more thigh than a happily monogamous man should ever catch sight of. “Where are you going to stay?”

I was already halfway through Kurt’s beer. “I don’t know. Some crappy motel somewhere.”

“No way. You’re coming home with me. I’ve got plenty of space.”

Kurt looked utterly crestfallen. “Hang on, hang on. Serious?”

“The man needs a pad, Snake.”

I looked at them, totally lost.

They caught it. Kurt said, “Snake Plissken?” Still nothing. “Kurt Russell’s character? Escape from New York? No?”

Clearly, I was going to need a translator around these two.

Kurt turned back to her and said, “I haven’t even stayed over yet.” There was a clear whine in both his expression and his tone.

Gigi laughed. “Hey, can’t have Mommy getting too lonely, right?”

His face fell even further.

She elbowed him in the side. “Chillax, Snake, I’m only messing with you. You can come too. And who knows… Maybe-”

I threw up my hands. “Stop. Please.”

Kurt’s expression went back to the guileless smile I had always found so appealing. It was clear my appreciation of Kurt’s many qualities had company, though there were certain qualities that would need to stay silent in my presence for this to work.

Gigi downed her White Russian and stood up. While she was taller than I expected her to be, her feathery skirt was so short I had to look away. My eyes caught sight of five guys and what looked like a drug sale going down in a dark recess of the club, away from the bustle. The negotiations seemed heated and for a second it looked like it was going to get nasty, then they settled down and got back to business. I had to remind myself to stay cool and can my instincts since I couldn’t do anything about it anyway, so I looked away, trying to find something less burdensome on which to settle my gaze, only to be drawn back to my freaky friends and the micro skirt.

Gigi grabbed Kurt’s arm, pushing him toward the door. “Come on, Cid. Lumina’s feeling frisky.”

As I trailed in their wake, the idea of being someone other than who I really was seemed immensely appealing.