4. Farrow
Chapter four
Farrow
The door closed behind Dane before I’d decided whether I regretted my words. It wasn’t the word “trouble.” That was true enough to qualify as operational reporting. Loud enough for everyone to hear was the part that could come back to bite me.
The man I slept with three weeks ago shared my profession. That was the first shock. The second was that we were now working together as a team, like a mediocre Lethal Weapon.
Dane had Cabot now, and Dane would be three plans deep before they hit the street.
I had Wiley.
Eamon Price stood near the windows with his phone in his hand, thumb moving across the screen.
I knew his reputation, but it was the first time we’d been in the same room together.
He was shorter than I’d expected and quieter.
The harbor behind him looked flat and metallic, making everything beyond the glass seem farther away than it was.
“Farrow,” he said without looking up.
“Price.”
“Call me Eamon and stay mobile for now.”
Wiley’s head turned. “Define mobile.”
“Not the Globe,“ Eamon said. “Avoid your apartment and anywhere else predictable.”
“That’s not the definition of mobile,” Wiley said. “That’s the definition of homeless.”
“I’ll send an interim location as soon as Michael clears it.”
Wiley looked at me. “Is Michael another one of you?”
“Can’t say. I’ve never met him.”
Eamon looked at us.
“I’m sure he’s lovely,” I added.
Wiley capped his pen. The sound was small and hard. ”My husband is at the apartment.”
Eamon’s thumb stopped moving across the screen. “Can he be free this afternoon?”
“He teaches until three.”
“Have him pack a bag for both of you. We’ll send someone to bring him to the new location once Michael clears it.”
Wiley folded his hands in his lap. “He’ll have questions.”
“He’s allowed to. Tell him what you can. Tell him the rest when you see him.”
“And if he doesn’t want to come?”
“Then we figure out something else. We don’t separate people from their lives when we protect them. That’s not how we work.”
Wiley wasn’t done. “But you separate them from their homes?”
Eamon didn’t budge. “Your apartment is no longer considered secure.”
“You don’t know that it isn’t.”
“We don’t know that it is.”
Wiley’s jaw tensed. I stepped between them before either man could decide winning the sentence mattered. “We’re not solving your apartment’s status from the eighteenth floor.”
Eamon’s phone buzzed. He glanced down. “Take the service elevator down. Exit on foot and cut west. “
“No car?” Wiley asked.
“No car. I don’t want two protected reporters leaving the same place the same way ten minutes apart.”
I nodded. “Good reasoning.”
Eamon looked at me. “Necessary improvisation only.”
“Sure.”
I opened the suite door and stepped into the hall first.
The corridor was quiet. Its carpet was thick enough to muffle footsteps. Somewhere behind a door, a television murmured through weather coverage. The housekeeping cart still sat at the far end with towels, spray bottles, folded sheets, and one trash bag tied in a neat knot.
Wiley came out behind me and paused with his hand near his coat pocket.
“No phone,” I said.
“I wasn’t—“
“You were.”
The service elevator was already waiting when we reached it; the call light was steady. It was Eamon’s work, or someone Eamon had called.
Wiley faced forward, shoulders slightly hunched under his coat. His unruly hair fell forward.
“Do you trust him?” he asked.
“Eamon?”
“Fletcher.”
The elevator descended. I watched the numbers change. “That’s direct.”
“It’s my job to get to the point.”
I looked over at Wiley. “Yes.”
His eyebrows lifted slightly. “Is it that simple?”
“No.”
“But your answer is yes.”
“My answer is yes.”
Wiley refused to let things sit. “And you didn’t know he was going to be here.”
“No.”
“That seems less than ideal.”
“Most things are.”
“Will it affect your work?”
“Not if we don’t let it,” I said.
The elevator doors opened onto the service corridor. It was a wide passage with industrial lighting, built to handle the world behind the pretty lobby facade.
I stepped out first, checking both ways. It was clear.
We walked by a laundry room with the door propped open and two staff members speaking quietly in Spanish. One looked up at us as we passed.
As I pushed the exterior door open, the harbor wind hit hard. It came around the side of the hotel with teeth. Atlantic Avenue ran beyond the service exit, traffic moving and braking in uneven waves.
I held Wiley inside the door for two seconds longer than he liked.
“Now?” he asked.
“Now.”
We stepped out.
“Where are we going?” Wiley asked.
“Away from here.”
“That isn’t a destination.”
“We’re following orders.”
He shoved his hands into his coat pockets and matched my pace as we cut west. He was slightly off my shoulder.
“So, you’re serious about this,” he said.
“I’m devastatingly serious.” I chuckled under my breath.
“I think you’re overselling the danger.”
I glanced at him as we stopped at the next intersection. “Do you meet sources alone?”
“Sometimes.”
“On short notice?”
“Sometimes.”
“And you go to the place they chose, telling yourself it’s controlled because you understand the person or the story. You’re wrong about the room more often than you’ll admit, but you’re right about the person often enough to keep doing it.”
His mouth had gone flat. “That’s a neat trick.”
“I’m not doing tricks.”
“No?”
“No. Tricks are for birthday magicians and men on apps who say they’re six-one.”
When the light turned, we crossed with a knot of office workers. One man had a Dunkin’ cup in each hand and a conference badge flipped backward on a lanyard. A bike courier blew through the intersection against the signal.
We passed a bank with mirrored glass and a revolving door. I caught our reflections in the windows. Wiley was narrow and intent. I was taller and more relaxed. A man in a navy pea coat walked past us, phone to his ear, head down.
I let him pass.
He had a normal gait and was speaking in an irritated voice. He wore a wedding ring, and his left shoe was scuffed at the toe.
We turned off Atlantic and cut toward Milk Street. The sidewalks narrowed. Office towers pressed close overhead, and the old brick buildings sat tucked between newer glass. Somewhere nearby, a truck backed up with a repeating beep.
Wiley’s phone buzzed. I caught his wrist before he got it out of his pocket.
He stopped.
“Don’t,” I said.
“Take your hand off me.”
I did immediately. My move was a violation.
His jaw tightened. “You don’t grab my wrist.”
“I stopped the phone. Not you.”
“That sounds better in your head.”
He stared at me for a beat, then looked away. His hand remained in his pocket.
“Who would be texting?” I asked.
“Many people. I’m popular and professionally inconvenient.”
“Try again.”
He exhaled through his nose. “My editor or my husband. It could be sources. Cabot, maybe, though I doubt he texts.”
“Why wouldn’t he text?”
“He’s the kind of man who calls. Or sends a card.”
I nodded.
“He’s better than people think.”
“I agree.”
Wiley looked at me. “You’ve read him too?”
“Yes.”
“Of course you have.”
“I’m very thorough.”
“You’re very nosy.”
I smiled. “Protection is nosiness in a tailored coat.”
The phone buzzed again.
“Could be my husband,” Wiley said.
“What’s his name?”
“Samuel.”
“Is Samuel likely to panic?”
“No.” Wiley paused. “He’ll get quiet.”
“Is that worse?”
“Yes.”
I nodded. “You can look, but don’t answer.”
We stepped into the recessed entrance of a closed tailor shop. The glass had a handwritten sign taped inside: BACK AT 1:30. It was 11:14.
I positioned myself so I could see the sidewalk in both directions.
Wiley pulled out his phone. His brow furrowed.
“What?” I asked.
“It’s not Samuel.”
“Who then?”
“An unknown number.”
“Show me.”
He didn’t argue. The text was brief.
Unknown: You are asking the wrong family.
Wiley’s thumb hovered, not touching the screen.
“Don’t reply,” I said. “Screenshot it. Send it to me. Then go into airplane mode.”
He sent the screenshot.
“Do you recognize the wording?”
“No.”
“Do you have any idea what 'wrong family' might mean?”
“It could mean I’ve been chasing the wrong shell. Or the wrong donor network. Or—“ He stopped himself. “Someone knows I’ve been pulled in to coordinate with Cabot’s coverage of the Harcourts.”
“Good.”
He looked up. “Good?”
“You included a leak as an option.”
“That doesn’t make me optimistic.”
“No, but it could be why you’re still alive.”
I took out my phone and sent the screenshot to Eamon, then to Dane. No commentary attached.
Wiley’s phone buzzed again before he could put it in airplane mode.
He looked down before I could stop him. It was Samuel. Wiley angled the phone toward me.
Samuel: Are you somewhere safe? Please don’t say probably.
Wiley closed his eyes for half a second.
“Answer him,” I said.
He opened his eyes. “You said—“
“Answer him. Four words.”
“What four?”
I watched the traffic ahead of us. “With Farrow. Moving. Safe.”
“Four words arranged into three sentence fragments.”
“Samuel will survive the grammar crimes.”
Wiley typed. “He’ll know I’m not safe,” he said.
“Probably.”
“You are terrible at reassurance.”
He sent the message anyway, and we moved again.
My phone buzzed.
Eamon: Keep moving. Interim location in progress.
Then Dane.
Fletcher: Where are you?
I typed a response at the next intersection.
Farrow: Mobile west of Milk. Wiley received unknown text. Sent screenshot.
His reply came within seconds.
Fletcher: Exact location.
Farrow: If I wanted you to have exact, I’d have sent exact.
Wiley watched my face. “Is that Fletcher?”
“Yes.”
“Are you antagonizing him?”
“Not as much as I could.”
Dane’s next message arrived.
Fletcher: This is joint coordination.
Farrow: Then coordinate. Don’t leash.
Fletcher: Keep him moving. Do not take him home.
I stared at that for a beat. He’d adjusted. It wasn’t a lecture or a demand for an address. He focused on what mattered.