Chapter 23
Jim drives. From the outside, his car is an unmarked sedan, just like any other late model Ford. But inside there are blue and red lights on the visors, and another bar of lights across the back window. The center console has a radio that squawks occasionally—the first time it happens, Alan jumps. And a laptop is strapped to a mount above the radio. At the moment the laptop is off, the lid shut.
On the other side of the laptop, in the passenger seat, Alan stares out the windshield. Black chinos replaced his lounge pants, but he kept the denim shirt. It’s comfortable and familiar at a time when everything else in the world seems a little up in the air. As Jim drives, Alan mulls over the memory of the first time Brooks directed him along this same route to pick up Kylie. She was
