Bzzz.

Silas checks his phone. We’re in the guest house living room, getting ready for a helicopter to take us back to the landing strip where we can board a plane for Texas. I’ve managed to drink three cups of coffee with cream and eat two pieces of crème brûlée French toast. Connie, the head chef for the Bosworths, is amazing.

I’m showered, dressed in Lindsay’s hand-me-downs, and wondering if I can really talk to her before we head back to Texas. I am about to ask when my phone buzzes.

“It’s your phone,” Silas announces.

“Me? No one texts me.”

Someone obviously is.

I look.

It’s Tara. I need to see you.

“Tara? Why the hell would Tara, of all people, want to see me?”

Silas takes the phone out of my hand. He’s rough, the action fast and aggressive. I reach for it and he pivots.

“It’s my phone!” I squeak.

He ignores me.

“How did she get your number? No one knows it. And you’re not meeting her,” he finally declares.

“Says who?”

“Says everyone. Besides, if you’re trying to scrub your reputation, being seen with her isn’t going to do you any favors.”

“Scrub my reputation? You think that’s even possible?”

“No.”

“Then what do I have to lose?”

“Why would you ever want to spend one second of energy on someone who betrayed you like that?”

“Tara didn’t betray me. She betrayed Lindsay.”

“You’re defending her?”

“No. I’m trying to explain why I’m tempted to go see her.”

“Go on.” He give me a skeptical look.

“I might get more information out of her.”

“She’s being charged with obstruction of justice and a host of other crimes, is out on her dad’s bail money, and you think you can pump her for evidence we don’t already have?”

“Yes.”

“You’re confident!” Half-mocking, half-impressed, Silas’s all-male laughter fills the air.

“Don’t mistake my desperation for confidence.”

“You wouldn’t be the first person in politics to swap them out.” I want to slap the smirk off his face.

“Or the last,” I mutter.

He shakes his head. “Drew is going to kill me when he sees this report.”

“All the more reason for me to meet her.”

“Wasn’t she a bitch to you?”

“Not really. She mostly ignored me. I was the tag-along friend.”

“The what?” Confusion in his eyes makes me realize how easy guys have it.

“I wasn’t really Tara, Jenna, and Mandy’s friend. I was Lindsay’s friend, and Lindsay brought me along to things.”

“Like the party? Five years ago?”

I frown, remembering. “Actually, no. That was a weird anomaly. John called me to invite me, personally.”

“And he’d never done that before?”

I shake my head.

“Huh.” Silas looks up at me, his long lashes making his blue eyes look striped, speckled, a mosaic appearance that is spellbinding. “You told the investigators that fact?”

“No one ever asked, actually.”

“So John had never invited you to a party before?”

“Never. I was thrilled. It felt like I was more part of the ‘in crowd,’ instead of riding Lindsay’s coattails, you know? When you’re nineteen and naive, those direct asks have more potency.”

He nodded.

“Did he say anything else?”

“He asked me about my favorite drink. Said he wanted to make sure he had plenty on hand.”

“And we know he drugged the drinks.” Silas’s focused reply makes my own mind sharpen.

“I felt weird that night. Got there and pretended to drink.”

“Pretended?”

“If I didn’t drink, the guys would have badgered me until I did. It was easier to pretend to drink and then dump some of it off in a plant, or in the bathroom sink as the night went on.”

“You never had any of the alcohol they gave you?”

“No.”

“You realize how suspicious that looks?” He’s incredulous.

“Of course I do. But it’s true–in fact, I came back and happened to find Lindsay because of my stomach problems. And thank God, too, because the doctors said if I hadn’t found her when I did, she might have–”

“Died. I know.” He pauses. “Lindsay and Drew drank whatever they provided?”

I nod.

“Lindsay and I liked the same wine coolers. I don’t know how they spiked Drew’s drink, but they did.”

“And the others? They didn’t drink the same stuff?”

“No. They were all into wine. Liked to pretend they had palates as sophisticated as their parents’. You know.”

“No, I don’t know. When I was nineteen, I was clearing out underground bunkers in Afghanistan and trying to save civilian kids from being blown up. Keggers weren’t my thing.”

“This wasn’t exactly a kegger.”

“Fine. A ‘winer’ works just as well,” he snaps, using finger quotes.

“You don’t have to get caustic about it. We were just college students trying to have fun.” I snatch the phone back, my arm rubbing against his chest for a split second. He’s freshly showered and shaved, a few pieces of his brown hair wet at the tips. He smells like mint and soap, with a touch of spice added.

I resist the urge to inhale deeply.

He goes dead silent.

Yes, I type in the chat field. Today, 2pm, Mickey’s.

Mickey’s is the same place Lindsay and I went after coffee, just seven months ago. It’s where we ran into Mandy that same day, Drew forcing her away in a show of power that helped Lindsay to start trusting him again.

My screen shows dots. She’s replying.

Great. See you then. Come alone.

I can’t, I type back. They won’t let me.

Then come as alone as you can, she replies.

She has no idea. Absolutely no idea what that means.

K, I say, as if it matters. As if that single letter means anything more than the pleasantry of acknowledgment.

“You’re really doing this?” Aggressive disapproval radiates from him.

“You don’t have to ask.”

“Of course I do. I’m going with you. I assume this means we need to postpone the plane to Texas?”

“Yes. Alice won’t mind. And that’s why you don’t have to ask, Silas.” I turn to confront him head on, a fiery feeling burning through me. My chin goes up, my eyes narrowing, and damn him if he tries to stop me.

“Why?”

“Because you’re along for the ride, right? Everywhere I go, you go. Well then, Mr. Tough Guy, we’re going to a bar at 2 pm today. I hope you like pool.”

I walk away from him and dip into the first bathroom I see, shutting the door with shaking hands. My phone buzzes one more time.

And don’t tell anyone I’m seeing you, Tara added, like a knife twist to the heart.

She doesn’t want to be associated with me.

And yet she’s taking a huge chance like this.

Why? What could be so important? And why does she want to see me, of all people?

After Drew and Silas rescued Lindsay and me from John, Stellan, and Blaine six months ago, the newspapers covered the events properly. Actual, operational facts were very clear: I delivered a phone to John, Stellan, and Blaine. Drew crashed through the wall between his apartment–where Lindsay and I were being held–and his neighbor’s apartment. We were all taken at gunpoint to the neighbor’s apartment. Drew’s rescue attempt came just as they were about to rape Lindsay and she was naked, traumatized, and bleeding.

In the middle of everything, Lindsay even killed Stellan, in a famous video clip where she stabbed him in the penis with a knife, severing an artery.

Those are the facts.

You know what isn’t fact?

The often-reported statement that I was part of John, Stellan, and Blaine’s team.

That my mother and I colluded with Nolan Corning to bring down Senator Harwell Bosworth.

That I was part of the whole scheme from the very beginning, going back to when I found Lindsay that night of the party five years ago.

That I am Senator Harwell Bosworth’s illegitimate daughter.

That I was jealous of Lindsay and did this out of revenge.

That I was the mastermind of it all.

That I am Nolan Corning’s secret love child with my mother, a Russian spy.

That I lure small children into sex trafficking, to be sent to an island in Thailand.

I know that last one sounds like the craziest of all the theories, but it’s not. Every single one of those “reports” by the media is a lie.

But lies sell newspapers. They increase ad rates. They bring in eyeballs.

If the media discover I’m meeting Tara, they’ll eat it up. Covert videos will be shot. Men and women with long telephoto lenses will hide two blocks away, the right shot worth ten grand.

Ten grand that a tech-savvy website owner can spin into six figures.

We live in a world where truth is relative. Lies can be monetized. Truth? Not so much.

All of this pours through my mind as I turn on the faucet for white noise and stare at my reflection in the mirror until I cease to exist. Seeing Tara isn’t about friendship. It’s not about appearances. It’s about getting one grain closer to the truth.

I can’t get anyone to believe the truth.

But collecting more of it keeps me from going insane.

Gone is the Silas who comforted me yesterday. Gone is the guy who defended me. He’s back to being aloof, remote, and unfeeling. The perfect man in black. If you’re going to do the hard work of government, you need a thick skin. A tough shell.

You need to give no damns.

Or at least, never let anyone know which damns you do give.

Silas knocks on the bathroom door, startling me.

“Occupied,” I shout.

“I assume this means you don’t want to schedule that meeting with Lindsay?”

“I do.”

“She’s not available until 2 pm today.”

Damn it.

“Ask her for a different time.”

“I’m not your secretary.”

“It would be so much easier if you were. What’s her number?”

“I’m not giving that to you.”

“Then what’s Drew’s number? I’ll text him.”

“I’m definitely not giving you that number.”

“Then how do I contact her?”

Silas taps on his phone. “She’ll text you.”

He walks out of the house, shaking his head. I let him go and don’t question anything.

It’s 10:54 am, plenty of time before I see Tara. Why can’t Lindsay meet me sooner?

My phone suddenly buzzes.

Can I come see u now? I have an opening in my day.

It’s Lindsay.

Sure, I tap back. No amount of coffee will give me the energy I need, but too much will turn me into an anxious hummingbird. I pour a glass of water and wait.

Five minutes later, Lindsay’s at the door.

And she’s alone.

Nervous, I open the door and greet her with a “hi” that she returns. Lindsay is the epitome of the popular girl, all long blonde hair with sun streaks and a face that looks like the sun when she smiles. If you didn’t know her history, you would think she was nothing but a beach chick, a spoiled rich girl, vacuous and freewheeling.

She is anything but. Shadows move slowly in her eyes, trapped inside an echo chamber where they can only find their way out through time. Healing is only possible when you’re given space. Drew carves that space out for her, but time is a kind of space, too.

And no one can make more time. If Drew could, he would, but even he has limits.

“I asked Silas to stay outside,” she says pre-emptively. I look toward the nearest window and sure enough, he’s there, like a sentry.

“This whole ‘must keep eyes on the client’ rule is getting old.”

“It must be bad if that’s your protocol,” she says with sympathy.

“So far today, no one has tried to kill me. Came close yesterday with your mother, though.”

“Ignore my mother.”

“Hard to do that when she turns me into her punching bag.” We share a look that makes me relax.

“Welcome to the club.” Her sarcasm is as thick as ever.

“How do I unjoin?”

“You avoid. My mom is a garden-variety narcissist. You can’t change them. Challenging a narcissist makes them double down. All you can do is avoid, ignore, and be so boring, they don’t want to poke you, Jane.”

“I see you follow your own advice,” I say dryly.

“Running off to Vegas and getting married was Drew’s idea. Not mine.”

“It worked. She can’t control you.”

“Doesn’t stop her from trying.” Lindsay twists the end of a ribbon on her blouse. “I was only half kidding about blood tests proving she’s not my mom. I think it would be a relief.”

“She loves you, Lindsay.” A pang of longing for my own mom threatens to swallow me up. “She wouldn’t fight so hard for you if she didn’t.”

“You think so? I don’t know. Sometimes I think I’m just a tool for her to use to get attention.”

I give her a sympathetic smile. I don’t know what to say to that.

We shrug in unison.

“Look. I know I’m supposed to hate you.” Her lip quivers. “And when you showed up at Drew’s apartment when John and Blaine were holding me hostage, I was so happy–and then so betrayed.”

“I swear, Lindsay–I swear I wasn’t in on it with them! Never!” Tears fill my eyes and throat, salt tinging my words. “I swear.”

“I want to believe you. I really do. I saw how you reacted when Blaine tried to–when he was on me on Drew’s bed–before Drew busted through the wall and saved me.”

“I wanted to stop them, but they–”

She holds up one hand. “I know. I’ve had six months to think about it. And I think they’re all wrong.”

“Wrong?”

“I believe you, Jane.”

I reach down and pinch the soft skin at my inner elbow. Ouch.

She’s real.

And she’s serious.

“You do? Why?”

“I was there. I saw how they tied you up, too. That wasn’t some fake performance you gave. It was real.”

“I can’t believe you believe me,” I say. “Because no one else does.”

“That’s not true.”

“Drew doesn’t. Your mother definitely doesn’t.”

“She’s biased.”

“And Drew?”

“Drew’s still angry that John and Blaine were ever able to get their hands on me. You know. Guys. When your husband protects people for a living and can’t protect you, it really fucks with his head. Drew sees villains everywhere. You’re caught in the giant net. He’s fundamentally logical and will let the evidence sway him.”

“Evidence?”

“The implant check came back. You’re clean.”

“I know.” But I’m relieved to know that my body proved me right.

And that no one planted fake evidence on me.

“I know you know, but now they can’t use that alleged evidence against you.”

“Do you really think evidence matters?” I ask her, flabbergasted. “It’s all about perception. No one really looks at evidence. Spin it however you want to make your case–it’s spin that matters. Not proof.”

“Wow.”

“Wow what?”

“You used to be so quiet. Even-keeled. Middle-of-the-road Jane. I’ve never seen you so cynical.”

“Try being the social media whipping girl for half a year and see how that feels while you cling to your optimism,” I reply, unable–no, unwilling–to keep the bitterness out of my tone.

“I do know what it’s like.” She moves her head to and fro, then adds, “To be fair, I was drugged into oblivion by the staff at the Island, so I don’t remember it.”

“Lucky you.”

Her eyes narrow. “Those four years were anything but lucky.”

I hope I don’t have to go through three and a half more years of this to be able to understand.

“You’re right,” I concede. “It’s not a suffering contest.”

“No. It’s not.” Her brow relaxes. “And I still have my mom and dad. You don’t.”

“No. I’m an orphan.” A bitter laugh escapes me. “I haven’t seen anyone spin the coverage like that yet. ‘Crazy Russian Spy Orphan Takes Down White House Contender.’” I pretend I’m reading a headline.

She just shakes her head. “I know I had plenty of headlines like that.”

“You’re Russian, too?”

We politely laugh.

“Listen,” she starts. “We really need to talk. You were my informer. While I was on the Island.”

“Yeah, I was. And when we met for the first time in the coffee shop, right after you came home, I wanted to tell you. But I’m not the only one.”

“Huh?”

“There was a man who gave me the information to give to you. I could never tell you because if I did, he’d know. I’m sure our conversations were monitored.”

“I thought the whole point of the darknet was not to be monitored!”

“These deep state guys can do anything with tech.”

She blinks rapidly, digesting that. “Okay... so you were just feeding me bullshit from some guy?”

“Not some guy. And not bullshit. You know what we talked about.”

“I do. Now I wonder how much of it was fake.”

“None of it. That’s what’s so scary, now that I know.”

“Now that you know what?”

“That he’s out there. Watching. Paying attention. I thought he was a good guy. On our side. But now...”

“What changed?”

“Me. I don’t assume anything any more.”

“Even about me?”

“Even about you, Lindsay.”

As I say the words, she nods slowly. “That’s fair. If I were in your shoes, I wouldn’t trust anyone, either.”

“I want to, though. I really do. But I can’t.”

“Are you sure you and Drew aren’t twins? Because he said those exact words last night.”

I look down. “Pretty sure.” The less I say, the better.

She smiles, looking sad. “We’ve both been through it, haven’t we?”

“Yes.”

“When I saw you in Drew’s apartment–what those guys were doing to us–I...” She chokes up. “I can’t talk about it now, but we need to.”

“Later, sure.” I reach for her hand and squeeze it. “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For treating me like I’m human.”

“Everyone deserves that.”

“Except for Blaine, Stellan, and John.”

“True.”

My phone buzzes. It’s Tara.

Can you do noon? Change of plans.

Is the bar open at noon? I ask, surprised.

Do alcoholics drink at noon? Yes, it’s open, she replies.

I look up at Lindsay.

“Uh, I have an appointment that just got moved to noon.” Some part of me feels guilty for not telling her it’s Tara. I should.

But we have a tenuous truce here. I don’t want to blow it.

“Understood. You have a busy life.”

“I have a stupid life. I spend all my time trying to avoid being caught by people who hate my guts. It’s really putting a cramp in my Etsy Slow Living hobby.”

“Since when do you like Etsy?”

“Since it became the only place on the internet where people don’t hunt me down to denigrate me.”

“Yay Etsy.”

“Exactly. Do you know how soothing it is to order earrings made from recycled belly button lint?”

“I can only imagine.”

We laugh.

She leaves and I stand there, wondering why the lie of omission about Tara hurts so much more than my other lies.

I text Silas the new time. I get back a single letter.

K.

K is quickly becoming the whatever of the late 2010s.

The short drive to Mickey’s takes place like a finger snap, a blink, a skip. It’s a fast ride and as we climb out of the SUV a block away, to make our entrance look as normal as possible, I wonder what I’m walking into. Will I be dragged into some new controversy? Is this a set-up, an ambush, a publicity stunt designed to make Tara money or to give her some strange notoriety?

Why would Tara text me about getting together after months of ignoring me?

I must be of some use to her.

If this is a set-up, Silas will mitigate it.

For the first time, I’m grateful I have a security detail when I go out into the world. Oh, how everything changes when your car has been firebombed.

Bars are funny places at the noon hour. I should know. They’re great for hiding in plain sight. If I wear no makeup, baggy clothes, and a baseball cap, I can sit in a booth and alternate between alcoholic drinks and plain iced tea, munching appetizers and pretending I’m normal again. Filled with people time forgot, it’s unreal how creepy bars are at this time of day.

Alcoholics don’t ask a lot of questions. It’s refreshing.

I generally don’t hang out in bars until later in the day, but I really shouldn’t be surprised to find people drinking already. Yet I am.

Tara turns and looks at the sound of the door opening. She gives me a sad smile, but freezes when she sees Silas next to me. He scans the room and seems to stand down, eyes on Tara.

Whatever he’s worried is here, isn’t.

But what if Tara brings a different kind of danger?

“You brought a bodyguard?” She’s upset, accusatory, and she takes one step backwards, toward the door.

“I didn’t have a choice, Tara. If you don’t like it, I can’t help it. They make me.”

“They?”

I shrug. “Who knows who ‘they’ are anymore?” I give her a raw look, hoping she’ll understand and not panic. “You know? If anyone understands, it’s you.”

Bingo.

I said the right thing.

“Oh, God, yes. Except it’s not as bad for me as it is for you. I wasn’t pulled back in like you were.” She reaches for me in a hug. Her entire body vibrates, shaking with fear. It unnerves me, but I hug her, marveling at how cold and thin she is.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispers in my ear.

“It’s okay.”

“No. It’s not. But thank you for meeting me. Ever since I saw your mom died, that you were exonerated, and the news story about your car being bombed–that made me finally reach out.” She looks around the bar, nervous as a rabbit.

She doesn’t want to be seen with me.

Seen by whom?

“Let’s sit,” I suggest, gesturing to a dark corner where the light won’t shine on us. Her expression changes to relief. I take a moment to look at her. On the surface, she and Lindsay look alike. California cool, all legs and blonde hair. That’s where the similarities end, though. Tara could be mean, and she’s ruthlessly ambitious. She and Lindsay used to be so tight. In high school, I was jealous. Ashamed of my jealousy, but still–I felt it. I wanted to have a true best friend like Lindsay and Tara seemed to be for each other.

I had to settle for being second best. I knew it, too. Lindsay turned to Tara first, and if she wasn’t free, then I got attention. That was all in the past, though.

Right? Now I’m the one who has Tara’s full attention, and Lindsay is nowhere to be seen.

We slide into a booth. Silas sits at one next to us. A waitress comes over, wiping her hands on a towel, and gives us a weary smile.

“Two cosmos,” I order.

“You remember?” Tara perks up.

“Lindsay got me drinking those,” I say with a laugh.

“It’s good to just talk to a friend,” she says, worrying the corner of a cocktail napkin. She looks behind me, nudging her chin up toward the booth where Silas sits. “What’s his deal?”

“Private security. Too many people are trying to kill me, so...”

“He’s hot. He have a brother?”

“I have no idea.”

“Sister,” says Silas, his deep voice amused. “I have one sister, and sorry, Tara–she’s taken.”

“You’re supposed to be seen and not heard,” I correct him.

“You have me confused with children. Bodyguards should be seen and avoided by bad guys.”

“Silas, can you move a few booths away? This really is private.”

Just then, the waitress delivers our drinks, winking at Silas as he makes huffing sounds of disapproval but moves one booth away, just out of earshot.

Tara drinks half hers in one long elegant series of swallows. I sip mine.

“So,” she says, giving me a strange smile. “How do we start?”

“We?”

“Okay. Me. How do I start?”

“How about at the beginning? Why are we here? Why now? Why reach out to me, Tara?”

“Because this is all going to hell in a handbasket, and I need your help.”

“My help? My help? Are you kidding me? I can’t help anyone! I can’t even help myself.”

“I know, Jane, and I’m sorry.” Her words come spilling out, tripping over each other.

“But why?”

She chugs the rest of her drink and waves at the waitress, who nods.

“It all goes back to the party.”

“I’m sure it does.”

“Look, we had no idea John, Stellan, and Blaine were like that. None. Lindsay had dated Blaine. We’d all taken them to dances as dates. You know. All but you, I guess.”

“I never went out with any of them, but sure. I liked Stellan. Crushed on him, even.” I shudder.

“Oh, trust me. We all want bleach showers now to wash off their corrosive stink. Those fuckers.”

I stay silent.

“There was no way to predict what they did, right? I just know that John asked Mandy to take us all out for dinner and leave you and Lindsay.”

“Me and Lindsay? Leave us there for what?”

My drink roils in my stomach. I’m glad I only sipped.

“What do you think?”

“No,” I rasp.

“Yes. I’m sorry. That’s our best guess. They said Drew wanted to have some fun and that Blaine thought you were hot, so they wanted time alone with you two.”

“I’ve never heard this before.”

“Because we’ve been ordered never to say it. Never, ever. They’ll kill us. Or worse.”

“Tara, you have to tell the police!”

“God, no. Are you crazy, Jane?” She looks around in terror, her head moving closer to her shoulders, like a turtle pulling back into a shell. “Even saying it now makes me want to throw up.” Her neck tightens, a dry click coming as she swallows. “I don’t have a choice.”

“Slow down. Tell me the entire story. All the way back to the party.”

“We were all there having fun for hours. Water polo was fun, and Mandy was flirting like crazy with Stellan. We decided we were starving and wanted to go get tacos. That’s when one of them–I think it was Stellan, but I’m not sure–pulled Mandy aside and told her the three of us should just go and give them an hour or so with you and Lindsay.”

“And then?”

“Then you came running out suddenly. We tried to tell you to go back in and get everyone else’s order, remember? Mandy was going to ditch you, but you insisted.” The judgment in her voice makes me irrationally pissed.

“And then at the taco place, Stellan texted and said we shouldn’t come back. To just go home. Party over. We told you, but you insisted on going back, because you’d left something there. So we dropped you off. Your car was there. And then we went to Mandy’s.

“Right after we went home, we knew something was wrong because this guy showed up at Mandy’s house, where we were crashing for the night. He had a briefcase and a folder with each of our names on it. And one with your name, but it stayed in the briefcase.”

“What was his name?”

“No idea. Just a guy with a slight accent.”

My arms go numb. “What kind of accent?”

She squinches her face as she remembers. “I don’t know. Scottish? Irish? It was like an English accent but different.”

“What did he want?”

“To pay us off.”

“But your dad has plenty of money,” I say. Tara’s dad is something like the ninth richest man in the United States.

“To pay us off to go along with pretending Lindsay asked for it, or else.”

“Or else what?”

“He’d expose our family secrets.”

“That’s not paying you off–that’s blackmail!”

“Yes.”

“And all three of you did it.”

“Jane, if you understood–those folders. They had records of horrible things about our parents. Our families. We’d have been ruined.”

“So you destroyed Lindsay because you would have been ruined?” I can’t keep the disgust out of my voice. “What were the secrets? That someone had an affair? Or your grandfather was a murderer?”

“They threatened to create fake scandals about our families.”

“Fake?”

“They–they–” Her voice goes shaky and she swallows the other half of her drink, then sighs loudly. Her voice is tinged with unbridled fury. “They showed us alleged records of downloads from my father’s computer, claiming he was downloading child pornography.”

“WHAT?”

“He wasn’t. He didn’t. He didn’t!” Tara’s face flushes a horrible red. “They said they could make it look real. All they had to do was show us that and Mandy and Jenna fell in line.”

“Whoa.”

“It killed me to do that to Lindsay. Killed me. Mandy wasn’t as bothered, but Jenna and I were devastated. We got all kinds of unasked-for help after that. Their pay-off wasn’t money. It was doors being opened. Mandy got into a competitive master’s degree program. Jenna was chosen for a big modeling contract. You know.”

“Just like John, Stellan, and Blaine rose up the ranks.” Within four years of Lindsay’s attack, Blaine was a rising California politician, Stellan a well-known actor, and John a major league baseball player. Their success was meteoric. Astronomical.

Statistically impossible.

“Who has this kind of power?” I asked her, pain radiating out of both of us.

“Someone very powerful and very rich. Someone you don’t want to piss off.”

The waitress brings Tara’s second drink, plus glasses of water for us both. Tara downs her cosmo and sips half the glass of water, running her fingers through her loose curls, sighing.

“What the hell do you expect from me?” I ask, knowing my voice is shrill and not caring. “I can’t help you! Besides, John, Stellan, and Blaine are dead. Really dead. I watched them die,” I add, putting voice to the fact for the first time in a long while.

“But the people controlling them aren’t.”

The man with the accent.

“You said the man with the accent was your contact?”

“He was the enforcer. Calm, cool, and so cold, he was creepy. I felt like any minute he’d pull a gun out of his pocket and just shoot me between the eyes.”

“He was violent?”

“Not physically. But there was a tension to him. He was devoid of emotion. Chilling.” She shudders.

“How did Mandy and Jenna handle it?”

“Mandy was the first to lock it down. She said we had to be united and take all the shit that came our way. This guy was threatening. He wasn’t bluffing.”

“And all this time, you’ve never said a word. Why now?”

“Because after Drew and Lindsay killed John, Stellan, and Blaine, the threats started up again. And this time, they were specific.”

“What do you mean?”

“They’re planning to kill you first, then me, Jenna, and Mandy.”

“I know people are after me, but it’s because I’m blamed for what happened to Lindsay. Internet shitlords and trolls want me dead. You’re saying more people than that are in line to kill me?”

“What if it wasn’t shitlords and trolls who firebombed your car, Jane?” she asks bluntly.

“What information do we have that makes people so evil? What do they have to lose that is so great they’re willing to kill for it? I never hurt anyone.”

The waitress turns up the lights just then, the dim atmosphere growing brighter as she rolls the dimmer switch slightly.

Tara doesn’t answer my question, eyes the color of a pale amber ale studying me, her head tilting. I can tell she’s taking in my features–but why?

“You don’t have a wild guess?” she asks, clearly knowing more than she’s letting on.

“No. I don’t.” I pause. “But you do, don’t you? It’s why you’re here.”

“And because you’re the only person in the world who can help,” she says, scooching out of the seat. “Listen, I need to pee. I’ll be back in a minute.”

Reflexively, I start to scooch with her, then stop myself. We used to go to the bathroom in bars in packs. My muscles remember. I don’t need to use the facilities and frankly, I could use some alone time to process what she’s just said. She waves and walks to the neon restroom sign, her chunky cork heels making her seem taller, more slender, less real and more like a doll, dressed up to be looked at but having no innate function.

Just a toy you play with until it’s no fun anymore.

“Reliving old times?” Silas asks, walking toward me, his body a shadow as a bright, low-hanging lamp wreaks havoc with how he looks. As his face comes into focus, I can see he’s assessing everything.

“You heard all that?”

“I heard some, and I–”

Bzzz.

He looks at his phone, answering it. “Sir?” he says.

Ah. It’s Drew.

Silas moves a safe distance away so he can keep an eye on me but also talk business. As I wait for two different people, I finish off my drink, willing my stomach to stop letting stress get to me. The alcohol needs time to loosen me up, so I don’t order a second drink.

The song on the radio changes to a more upbeat tempo, the next four minutes all about bass and clapping. Finally an old rock ballad comes on, and I check my phone.

Tara’s been in the bathroom for ten minutes.

I look at Silas, who glances at me and frowns, then says something about “implants” into the phone. I don’t really need to pee, but I might as well. If the next conversation with Tara is half as intense as this last one, I’ll need to be as comfortable as possible.

I walk past Silas, whose frown keeps deepening. I feel the green neon from the restroom sign change my skin, and I wonder how different life would have been if none of this had ever happened.