Theaella

24

Matthew checked the Turing Phone, but there’d been no contact from Jack. Matthew had already assessed the phone to ensure that it was as secure as advertised, with no GPS features or spyware that would allow it to be tracked or monitored.

In his lap the dog lay heavily, seized up in a freeze response. His nose was sweating, his cheeks filling with the exertion of breathing through bound jaws.

Matthew lifted the pup onto the exam table. Then he searched the cabinet, finding trauma shears in the second drawer down. He returned to the dog.

“This is gonna hurt, buddy,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

He reached for the swollen muzzle, but the dog pulled his head back, terrified. Matthew leaned over him, putting his elbow behind the dog’s neck to trap his head in place. Very carefully, he worked the blunted end of the trauma shears between the tape and the raw skin and sawed through.

When the tape finally released, the dog panted heavily, pink tongue lolling. The gash on his cheek looked bad, but the flesh was intact and could be sutured back into place.

Matthew stroked his flank a few times. Then got to work on the hind legs.

He freed the limbs, leaving the tape stuck to the fur. Removing it entirely would be a substantial job better left to a professional but at least the boy was no longer bound.

The door opened, and the vet entered, a curly-haired woman with huge dark eyes and caramel skin. She noted the trauma shears in Matthew’s hand. “You’re not supposed to do that,” she said.

“I’m sorry. He was having trouble breathing.”

“Jaycee said you found him in an alley?”

“Yeah. Dogfighting ring, obviously. They used him up and threw him out.”

She shook her head. “We’ve seen more of it lately,” she said. “Especially around Little Armenia.” She pinched her lip with her teeth. “It’s such a disgrace. There are so many hardworking folks, and then a few bozi tghas give us all a bad name.”

“‘Sons of bitches’?”

“‘Sons of w****s,’” she said. “If you wanna get technical.”

She moved closer to the dog, held her palm out for him to sniff, and started examining him gently.

Matthew said, “Is he gonna be okay?”

“We’ll get him patched up,” she said. “I just hope we can place him afterward.”

“And if not?”

“He’ll have to be put down. We’re overcrowded. As in really overcrowded.”

Matthew said, “Oh.”

“I can let you know,” she said. “Though we’re not supposed to give dogs to people with … um, housing challenges.”

Her eyes dropped to Matthew’s exposed sock. Suddenly aware of his bloody, mud-streaked shirt and clawed pants, he realized that she thought he was homeless.

It had been a long two days.

He grimaced, eager to wrap up the mission and get home to a freezing vodka and a hot shower.

“I could let you know first, though,” she said. “Unofficially. If you had somewhere I could reach you by phone…?”

“That won’t be necessary,” Matthew said.

He started for the door. With his hand on the doorknob, he hesitated. Turned back. He walked over and rested a palm on the dog’s shoulder above the gash. The dog strained to lick his knuckles, the tape flapping atop his snout.

Matthew thought, Goddamn it.

He jotted down an ordinary phone number that forwarded to his RoamZone and left it with the vet.

Stepping outside, he fished the Turing Phone from his pocket and dialed.

Jack’s words came at him in a rush. “What happened?”

“The Terror is no longer a threat to you. Neither are any of his men.”

“Seriously?” Jack said. “Wow. Just … wow. So it’s over?”

“Looks like it.”

Matthew cut through a back lot onto the neighboring block, where he’d left the Chevy Malibu behind a life-insurance shop that advertised in three languages. The asphalt of the parking lot felt cool through his ragged sock. He walked to where he’d parked next to a dumpster in the darkness at the far edge. Broken glass crunched under his boot, prompting him to mind where he set down his other foot.

Jack said, “I can go to the cops now, right? Hollywood Station? I can deliver the thumb drive into the right hands like I promised?”

Matthew felt an urge rising in his chest—to wrap this up, put the Nowhere Man to bed, and move on with his life the way he hoped Jack would move on with his. But the First Commandment reared into his awareness, casting a shadow over his optimism.

“It looks like the problem’s been handled,” Matthew said. “But I don’t want to assume anything just yet. Give me a day or two to make sure this thing is tied up neatly before you go in and let the cops take over.”

“Okay,” Jack said. “Okay. What do I do then? When this is done?”

“You can start over,” Matthew said.

It struck him that he was speaking for himself as much as for Jack. This was the first time his own freedom had been aligned with a client’s. When this mission ended, they’d each be able to turn a new page. He had to be certain that his keenness to do so didn’t make him careless.

The insurance shop’s exterior lights were mostly burned out, so Matthew had to slow to study the ground for glinting shards.

“I’ve been so focused on surviving I haven’t given much thought to what I’m going back to,” Jack said. “Or what I’m not going back to.”

Matthew remembered his first time on a shooting range. Jack’s callused grip encasing his twelve-year-old hands, shaping them around the pistol stock, showing him how to aim. What would Matthew aim at once he left the Nowhere Man behind?

He kept on across the parking lot, stepping around the shattered brown hull of a forty-ounce. “Maybe it’s time to start.”

Jack said, “I still can’t believe it’s really over.”

Neither can I.