Theaella

49

His own words from the garage echoed in his head like a bad memory: I protect them.

Without limitation? Melanie had asked. You’ll go anywhere? Do anything?

Yes, he’d replied, like a virtue-drunk imbecile.

He’d made his pledge—to Jack, to Melanie, to himself. Now he had to back it up.

If he still had time.

Staggering forward, he leaned against a dumpster and doubled over in ostensible agony. He used the pretense of gripping the side to drop the flashbang in. The duct-taped package—Nokia and grenade—struck the inside of the metal box with a hollow clang, signaling that the dumpster was empty. When the time came, that would help the amplification.

Nearing the entrance, he took a series of rapid breaths, his best impromptu simulation of hyperventilating. He wanted his breathing to sound fast and panicked when he entered. It sent his light-headedness into overdrive, and he pulled back a bit, careful not to overdo it and trigger his other symptoms.

He moved through the door, shuffled to the desk officer. “Officer, I’m … I’m—” He cut off, bending at the waist, floating his palms trembling again above his bandage-wrapped face.

The desk officer found her feet, leaning toward the bullet-resistant screen. “What? What happened?”

“My girlfriend threw burning water on my face. She lost her … f**k … lost her f*****g mind—”

“Have you sought medical attention?”

“Not yet. Her daughter’s still in the house with her—and f**k, ow, ow…”

“Sir. Sir! I need you to calm down.”

He shuddered and straightened up, leaning against the screen. The bandages shielded his eyes, which let him peer around her without seeming too obvious. He was hoping for an open record log or a whiteboard showing which cops were occupying which interrogation rooms. But there was nothing in plain sight. The information probably resided on her computer, and there’d be no getting in there.

Matthew said, “I’m scared for her daughter, and before I go to the ER, I have to—”

“I understand. I’ll have someone speak to you immediately.”

“Thank you.” He let his shoulders tremble as if he were fighting off sobs. “Thank God.”

The desk officer called across into the bullpen, and a weary-looking detective rose, his rumpled shirt spotted with a coffee stain. He slapped down a file on his desk and blew out a breath that lifted his scraggly bangs. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll take it.”

A grating buzz sounded, and the security door clicked open. Matthew placed his RoamZone in a red plastic basket and stepped through the metal detector.

It did not alert.

Gathering his phone, he entered the inner sanctum.

Jack sat down at the table and folded his hands on the surface. Brust and Nu?ez kept their feet. Nu?ez crossed his arms and shouldered against the rear wall while Brust set his knuckles on the table and leaned in. The thumb drive rested between him and Jack like an avant-garde centerpiece.

“We’re so glad you came in,” Brust said.

Nu?ez chimed in from the back. “Really happy to see you.”

“You’re a solid citizen—”

“—who was put in a terrible position. We understand that.”

Jack cleared his throat. “You were working with my cousin?”

“Yes,” Nu?ez said. “Very smart guy. Very capable.” He scratched his cheek. His fingernail was polished, his cheeks shiny from a close shave. He grinned, but the skin around his eyes did not wrinkle in the least.

Jack shifted in the chair. Cleared his throat. “Yeah, he was. Grant was good.”

Brust placed his forefinger on the thumb drive as if it were a poker chip he was considering adding to the pot. “Do you know what this is? I mean, have you looked at what’s on here?”

“Yeah.” Jack’s unease grew, but he heard himself still talking. “They look like spreadsheets. Real and fake.” He suddenly felt detached from the situation, as if he were floating above the table looking down at himself answering the questions like a good little boy. “Some kind of money-laundering operation, from what I could tell.”

“Ah,” Brust said, the single note holding disappointment.

“That’s too bad,” Nu?ez agreed.

“Has anyone else seen this?” Brust asked. “I mean, did you share your cousin’s work with anyone?”

“No,” Jack said, shaking his head. “Just me. I went to Grant’s office, and some guy shot at me, so I got scared and I went into hiding.” Sweat trickled down his neck, burrowed beneath his collar. Something was wrong, but he couldn’t put his finger on it. And yet the conversation kept proceeding, and he felt bizarrely incapable of stopping it. “Look, is there…? I mean, is something wrong?”

Those automated smiles once more. “No,” Brust said. “Everything’s finally right. You did great. You did great bringing this here to us.”

He slid the thumb drive off the table and tossed it to his partner.

“Where did you say you went?” Nu?ez asked, coming off the wall to pocket the drive. “When you were hiding?”

Jack looked over at the bullet security camera wired into the corner of the ceiling. In the curved black lens, he caught a distorted fish-eye reflection of the room—Nu?ez’s broad shoulders stretched to Olympian proportions; Brust looming over the desk, his torso swirled; and Jack in the center, shrunken and diminutive.

His gaze caught on the sticker adhered to the camera’s side: IRONKLAD KAM. The same equipment had been installed in the hall outside Grant’s office, an unsettling coincidence. And something was different. When he noticed what, he felt the awareness as a chill tightening his flesh, making his scalp crawl.

No glowing red dot to show it was recording.

Which meant that Brust and Nu?ez had turned it off.

What reason would they have to be in here with him and not want to be recorded?