For a few days, I think seriously of calling Elise.
We’ve moved locations in Queens twice, but Soren keeps finding surveillance devices wherever we are. We know it’s Aren. So we talk—Alesso and I talk—about just stopping. Pausing.
It’s my call. My responsibility. I’m in charge with Roberto out now, and anyway, it’s been my thing from the beginning.
I don’t know how much Alesso cares whether we quit or not.
He tells me, “I’m not worried. But maybe you should call her”—Elise. “Just the spirit of the thing.” He’s saying it’s bad business for us not to have our asses covered.
We might be okay. We just won’t know for sure unless it goes sideways. I could ask Elise. I know I could. But I find I won’t. I’m being selfish, choosing to refrain from meddling, from making Elise feel pushed, over safety for Alesso and Soren. So I start doing the exchange myself. It’s the only way to make this fair.
I’m thinking about that as I run rosa’s route in Central Park on a Saturday morning. Pretty fucking humid out here. I need to get some running shoes that have some mesh or some shit, so my feet don’t get hot. Maybe I should quit running her route. She hasn’t done it in a long while—that I know of. I keep dropping back in case she’s starting late, but why would she be starting late?
You’re getting fucking desperate, I tell myself.
When I near my car—within twenty feet of the driver’s side door—I get a text, and my phone buzzes. I pull it out of my pocket and look down at the screen, curious to see who’s pinging me at 6:45 on Saturday morning.
It’s a black heart. That’s it.
When I look up, I find Aren’s standing by my driver’s side door.
He’s so tall and thin—that’s how I know it’s him. He’s dressed in all black, wearing a scarf that covers his face. He holds up his phone as I close the space between us.
“I’m sending something to you,” he says. “On the text message. A screen shot of something you did!” He lunges toward me. Something cold presses to my side as his hand squeezes my shoulder. I’m twisting his wrist as I realize it must be a blade. I twist hard enough to hurt, because no one pulls a knife on me—not now, not ever. But the way I twist his arm makes his hand drive the blade deeper into my side.
I shove his chest and walk around the car, scanning the rooflines of nearby buildings for cams as he comes at me, this time with just raised hands.
“You trying to sell me out to your lover,” he shouts.
I laugh darkly. “I don’t have a lover.”
“How she has the video of mine and you, but I can’t see your face?”
“I don’t fucking know! Is it that FBI bitch you’re fucking? Maybe she gave it to Elise. Maybe the one making all the noise is the one who’s really a traitor. You know how I feel about a traitor.”
Now it’s his turn to laugh. “I would never fuck the FBI.”
“How do you know Elise has that video?” I arch a brow as my side throbs and I feel liquid seeping into my pants. I’d bet money that whatever anybody has is coming straight from Aren.
“I been hearing from an inside source.”
I press my hand against the sore spot on my side, not looking down yet. “I don’t trust a fucking thing you say when I know you’re double timing, talking to the FBI.”
“There is no FBI!” He laughs, shaking his head. He steps closer, and I put a hand on the stun-gun clipped to my waistband.
“You need to leave, Aren. Before you wish you had.”
He holds his hands up, laughing like a hyena in need of anger management.
“Hey, Aren? Watch your fucking back.”
“You watch your cunt. I’d hate to see it bleeding.”
I’m trembling with rage as I peel off, making a beeline for her place, where I patch myself up using my car’s first aid kit and watch the building’s front doors until Soren’s friend fixes the cameras in early afternoon.
I don’t know what Aren might do if he thinks the D.A.’s office is closing in on him—as he seems to. And I don’t want to find out.29EliseThe hearts are waiting for me every morning when I wake up. Sometimes, he’ll have something from a bakery dropped off at my front door or my office. I know he’s the sender because he sends the hearts at the same time the food comes. I send hearts back. At first it’s only in the morning, but later on, it’s any time I think of him and every time I miss him. Our text history is just rows and rows of dark hearts.
One day—it’s mid-morning on a Saturday in late August—he sends a text that says, Be careful right now. Extra careful.