14. Mike
MIKE
Iuse a VPN and a throwaway email account I set up for exactly this moment.
The file is clean. No metadata. No trace back to me or Janet's laptop. I attach it to a message with three words: Ryan Keller. Video. — and send it to Ryan's lawyer, Elliot Vance.
The apartment is quiet. Janet left for court an hour ago. Her coffee cup is still in the sink. There's a lipstick mark on the rim.
I don't move for a long time.
Ryan calls at noon.
"My lawyer called me." His voice is different. Lighter. "Says he got some good news. You fucking did it, my brother!" He stops. Exhales. "Mike…"
I hear him crying. "You fucking did it."
"You were right. She kept it," I say.
"You did it."
I say nothing.
"Hey." His voice drops. "He's going to reach out to Frank Liu in the DA's office in Queens."
"It's done," I say. "Try to relax."
"Frank Liu. Janet Graham. All going down for what they did to me."
"Love you."
"Love you too, man."
After I hang up, I stand at the window for a while, watching the street below. Deliveries. Cabs. A woman walking a dog that doesn't want to walk. Normal life moving in every direction.
The file is gone. It's in Vance's hands now. It's moving.
I go downstairs and pour myself a drink.
It's two in the afternoon.
Nico finds me in the corner booth at four.
Slides in across from me, looks at the glass, looks at me. The bottle is on the table. I'm not drunk yet, but I'm working on it.
"Bad day?" he says.
"It's going to be rough for a while."
"Can't tell me?"
"It's family shit."
"What? I showed up yesterday?"
"I don't want you involved."
"See, that makes me worried when you say shit like that, like it's something that you shouldn't be doing in the first place, like it's something that can jam you up."
"It's pretty much over now."
Nico leans back. He's got that look he gets — patient, steady, like he's done this a hundred times and will wait as long as it takes. He probably has. He probably will.
"Okay." He doesn't move. "I'll sit here then."
So he does. That's the thing about Nico. He doesn't push. Doesn't fill silence with noise. He stays, which is sometimes worse than pushing.
I pour another drink. He watches me pour it.
"Does it have anything to do with Janet?" he says.
I don't answer.
"So it does," he says quietly. "She works in the DA's office."
"You looked her up?"
"It's my job to know who is in the club."
"So you know."
"If you mean do I know Janet Graham is the prosecutor who put your brother away and now you're fucking her, yeah. I wish you would have told me."
"Well, now you know why I couldn't tell you."
"Whatever you're doing, you don't owe your brother shit."
"He saved me from the life that he couldn't get out of."
"I know, he made you go into the Marines to keep you off the streets like him. He's your big brother; that's his job. It shouldn't require you repaying by throwing your life away now."
"This is going to work out. Like I said, my part's over."
"And the girl?"
"The girl is burnt."
We sit there another twenty minutes. Staff moves around us prepping for the evening. Someone tests the sound system — a low bass note rolls through the room and fades. Nico doesn't leave.
"I can't tell you more than that," I say finally.
He looks at me for a long moment. Whatever he sees, he keeps it to himself. He reaches across and takes the bottle off the table, stands up, and sets it behind the bar.
"What do you want me to do when she shows up?"
"Let her in. I'll take care of it tonight."
He nods. Goes back to work.
Janet comes at nine.
She looks tired in the way she gets after a long court day, that particular tired where her shoulders sit a half-inch lower than usual, like the city has been hanging from her neck since morning.
She spots me at the bar and smiles, and for a second it's the only thing in the room.
That smile should make me feel good.
It doesn't.
I take her upstairs to my place.
We sit on the couch.
"Is everything alright?" she asks.
I try to find the words. I pour us drinks.
"I don't want a drink. You've been drinking a lot more the last few weeks."
"Just under a lot of pressure."
I drink.
"So you need a drink to talk to me?" She kicks off her heels. "Is it the business? Do you need money? I can help. How much do you need?"
"You would give me money?"
"I would if that's what you needed."
I look at her.
"Why are you looking at me like that? Is that what it is? Do you need money?"
"No, let's go to bed."
I take her hand and lead her to the bedroom.
We get undressed.
I watch her remove her blouse. Her stockings.
Because I can't look away.
There's something almost unbearable about the way she does it. Slowly. No teasing. Just fatigue and trust and that quiet permission that feels more dangerous than desire.
She gets under the sheets next to me.
She lays her head on my chest.
"You're tense," she says.
Outside sirens in the distance. The music downstairs, the low, constant hum of it all.
"Where are you?" she says.
"Right here."
"You've been somewhere else all night."
"I'm sorry. Stuff with the expansion. The second location is — it's a lot."
She's quiet for a moment. Something moves across her face, careful and deliberate, like she's making a decision.
"If you need money," she says. "I have money. I want you to know that."
I go completely still.
"Janet—"
"I'm serious." Her voice is steady. No performance in it. "I've got savings. Joe had a life insurance policy. It sits there. If the second location is the problem, if it's a cash-flow thing, I want to help."
She means it. Every word.
I look at her face in the dark — the way she's watching me, open and certain, no hesitation in it — and something in my chest caves in so completely I don't know how I'm still breathing.
"No," I say. My voice comes out even. I don't know how. "I've got it handled. But thank you."
She studies me for a second. Too closely.
"Is it me? Am I over here too much?"
"No. I like you here.”
That one comes out too fast.
She nods, lets it go, and shifts closer. Her head finds my shoulder like it belongs there, like she's done it a hundred times, like I haven't already turned her life into a loaded gun and set it on the table between us.
I put my arm around her and stare at the ceiling.
I feel the warmth of her. The softness of her hair against my jaw. The quiet faith in the way she settles into me.
That's what kills me.
Not the file. Not Ryan. Not even the lie.
Her trust.
"I can help take your mind off it for a little while."
Before I can answer, she moves down slowly, her mouth finding me in the dark. Under the sheets.
I close my eyes.
Her hands. Her mouth. The quiet, deliberate way she takes her time.
For a few seconds, I let myself disappear into it.
That's the worst part. I want to.
I want to shut off my head. I want to let her take me somewhere clean, somewhere without brothers and lawyers and old blood rising from the floorboards. Somewhere I'm a man in bed with a woman who wants him.
But I'm not clean.
And she doesn't know what I've done.
The thought hits so hard it almost knocks the breath out of me.
It feels wrong.
I stop her.
"Just hold me," I say.
She stills.
For a second, the room goes so quiet I can hear the city breathing outside the windows.
She comes back up without a word. No question. No hurt. She tucks herself against my side, her head on my chest, her hand flat over my heart.
That almost breaks me.
I could take a fight. I could take her anger. I could take her slapping me, cursing me, walking out and never looking back.
But this tenderness?
This is a knife with a velvet handle.
"Your heart is pounding," she says.
"Yours too."