Twenty-Three
Grace entered the bar and waited for the AI to confirm her age. Even before she passed the security checkpoint, she saw Heron in a booth, six rows back. He was talking into the neck of his beer bottle. Arjun had his arm slung over Heron’s shoulder.
Arjun seemed to sense her enter the bar, because he looked up and met her gaze first. Then he smiled. Grace didn’t like the way it was forced into the corners of his mouth. It made something in her tighten.
Arjun leaned over and spoke into Heron’s ear. Both men looked up.
Heron’s smile was even weaker, but he waved her over.
He looks like he’s boarding the Midnight Train, she thought.
How bad must it be? Whatever confession he was about to make . . .
Before Grace reached the booth, slowed by the thick crowd of jovial bodies,
