CHAPTER 3 #2
The clerk looks between us.
Dane steps forward. “Wrong person.” The stranger’s right hand remains near his coat pocket. His left hangs naturally at his side. I know that hand. Not the shape. The movement.
In the hotel footage from the Jonah Reed case, the dead man opened the minibar with his left hand while his right held the glass later recovered with his print. The left index finger did not fully straighten.
This man’s left index finger remains bent.
“Jonah Reed,” I say.
The smile disappears. His right hand enters his coat.
Dane moves. The first shot breaks a display of windshield fluid. Blue liquid splashes across the floor. The clerk drops behind the counter.
Dane hits Jonah’s gun arm and drives him into the coffee station. Hot liquid spills. Jonah turns with more speed than his age suggests and strikes Dane’s injured side.
Dane makes no sound. I grab the metal coffee pot before it falls and throw what remains toward Jonah’s face.
He recoils. Dane takes the gun. Jonah reaches beneath his coat with the damaged left hand. Dane catches him by the wrist and forces him against the refrigerated case. The glass doors tremble.
“Who sent the confirmation order?” Dane asks.
Jonah laughs once. “You did.”
Dane’s face changes. Not much. His stillness becomes complete.
Jonah looks at me. “He didn’t tell you?”
A second vehicle enters the parking lot. Headlights sweep across the store windows. Dane strikes Jonah once behind the ear. The man collapses.
“We leave.”
I crouch beside Jonah.
“What are you doing?”
“Proving who he is.”
I take Jonah’s left hand and press his index finger against the glass door beside him. The print is visible in coffee and condensation.
Then I use the camera on the clerk’s dropped phone to photograph it, the bent finger, and Jonah’s face. Dane watches me.
“What?”
“You believe me now.”
“I believe dead men are trying to kill me.”
“That is enough for tonight.”
The approaching vehicle stops outside. Dane takes the clerk’s phone from me and removes the memory card before placing the device beside him.
“You cannot steal his evidence.”
“I am leaving the phone.”
“You removed part of it.”
“I removed you.”
The front door opens. We exit through the stockroom and a rear delivery door. Cold air burns my lungs. Dane pulls me behind a dumpster as two men move along the opposite side of the building.
His vehicle is forty yards away.
“You run when I tell you,” he says.
“I run when I see an opening.”
His gaze settles on me.
“Fine.”
One man passes between the pumps. The other enters the store. I see the opening first.
“Now.”
We run. A shot strikes the asphalt behind us. Dane turns and fires once toward the station lights, plunging half the lot into darkness. We reach the vehicle. This time I get into it without being told.
Dane accelerates before his door fully closes. The gas station disappears behind snow and darkness.
My heart is beating too fast, but it is not only fear. A dead man spoke to me. A dead man recognized Dane. A dead man implied that Dane ordered something he claims to have refused.
I remove the borrowed cap. My hair falls around my face in uneven strands.
“You knew Jonah Reed,” I say.
“I knew his operational name.”
“Which was?”
“Vale.”
“One name.”
“Yes.”
“Like Rook?”
His eyes shift toward me. The answer is there.
“Is that what they call you?”
He returns his attention to the road.
“Sometimes.”
“Did you send him?”
“No.”
“He said you did.”
“He believes I betrayed the unit.”
“Did you?”
“I refused your contract.”
“That is not what I asked.”
Snow thickens. The road narrows between trees. Dane’s hands remain steady on the wheel. The white scar across his left thumb appears and disappears beneath the dashboard light.
I think of the print on the storage-unit scanner. The glass in the hotel. The abandoned car. Hands tell the truth before faces do.
“What did you do for them?” I ask.
His answer takes too long.
“Whatever they could not attach to a living person.”
The words settle over me. Not a confession. Not enough for one. I look out at the road. We drive another ten miles before the first official alert reaches the radio.
The announcer says emergency crews have recovered human remains from my vehicle. My name has not yet been released pending family notification.
The phrase is familiar. I have written it. Said it. Explained it to people who wanted names before we were certain. Pending family notification. June will be waiting for a knock at the door.
I reach for the radio and turn it off. Dane does not turn it back on.
“Where are we going?” I ask.
“A station above Kestrel Pass.”
“The place listed on my death certificate.”
“Near it.”
“So you are taking me toward the location where I am supposed to die.”
“Yes.”
“That sounds badly planned.”
“It is where they will least expect me to go after they staged the accident.”
“Unless they know you.”
“They do.”
“Then they may expect it.”
“They may.”
I look at him. “Do you ever answer a question in a way that improves the situation?”
“No.”
That may be the first deliberate joke he has made. I almost smile. The possibility feels obscene while my sister is being told I am dead. I turn away before it can happen.
My reflection in the passenger window is faint, layered over black trees and snow. A woman wearing a gray coat with a death certificate in the pocket.
A woman who spoke to her sister and made the call worse by proving she was alive without being able to say where.
A woman who willingly returned to the car of an assassin because the other dead man knew her face. The road climbs. Behind us, another set of headlights appears.
They remain distant but steady through three turns. Dane sees them. His right hand moves toward the console.
“What is it?” I ask.
“They found the route.”
“How?”
“The call. The clerk’s phone. The vehicle. Any of them.”
“You said the call would reveal us.”
“Yes.”
“You could say I told you so.”
“I don’t need to.”
I hate him a little more for that. The headlights draw closer. Ahead, the road divides. One direction continues toward a town. The other climbs toward the pass. Dane takes the mountain road.
I look at the darkness rising in front of us. At least this choice is visible. At least I understand its shape. For tonight, that is the most trust I can give him.