“The Ballou. It’s the closest,” I say.
“It is not secure.” She glares at me, though the heat of it is tempered with concern. She must see I’ve been crying.
“No place is secure, Dani. The safest thing to do is to end this as soon as possible.”
She breaks eye contact to stare stonily out the window. After a moment, she caves. “Half hour. At most.”
Meet me at the Ballou.
I group text it to Murphy, Sam, Bryn, and Lily. I don’t specify a time, which means I expect them to drop everything and go there.
“What is this about?” Dani asks, drawing close enough to whisper.
“Not here,” I answer. She opens her mouth to argue, but I silently plead for her not to push. She must read it in my face, because she changes her mind, leading the way to the Chevelle rather than interrogating me.
I get a few return texts.
Sam:
On my way.
Murphy:
What? Why? I’m going to dinner with Bryn’s parents.
Bryn:
Who is this?
I don’t hear anything from Lily, but that’s not terribly surprising. If she shows, fine. If not, she’s probably better off.
When we get to the Ballou, I bypass the coffee bar (a first for me) and climb the stairs to my office. Dani precedes me and scouts the room as usual.
She lowers the blinds, which is fine, whatever. I push the plastic slats at eye level down an inch to see if anyone else is here yet. Looks like Sam is parking. Murphy and Bryn will take a few more minutes to get here from her parents’ house.
“Milaya,” Dani says softly as she comes up behind me.
“Don’t,” I say, putting distance between us. I can’t let myself be discombobulated by her right now. I can’t let myself worry about putting her in harm’s way, because that’s exactly where I need to put her.
“I—”
Sam’s timely arrival interrupts whatever statement she was about to melt me with.
“What happened?” he says.
“Duke Salinger is dead,” I say without preamble. “Someone shot him.”
That jolts him into silence long enough for Murphy and Bryn to join us.
“Did I hear that right?” Murphy asks, shutting the door behind them. “Salinger got shot?”
“Who shot him? When?” Dani says.
“How do you know?” Murphy says.
I tell them about going up to Duke’s office and finding him on the floor. As I’m nearing the part about the blue fairy, Lily joins us.
“What did I miss?” she says.
“Salinger got shot,” Murphy says from his corner of the office.
“What? Is he all right?” she asks.
“He’s dead,” I say. “I found him in his office.”
She shivers and pulls her jacket closer around her.
“Do you still think NWI’s legit?” Murphy asks.
“I don’t know. Mrs. Antolini is a liar, but maybe she didn’t lie about NWI. Or maybe she did. I haven’t seen any signs of shadiness. But there’s still the connection with the bartender, the numbers I texted you this morning, and the blue fairy.”
“What blue fairy?” Sam asks.
I show it to them. “Duke was holding this when I found him.”
“Do you think it’s why he was killed?” Murphy asks.
“Possibly. I think so.”
“Wouldn’t the killer have taken it if it were?” Bryn asks.
“I found him behind his desk, but he wasn’t shot there,” I say, pushing myself through my answer. “There was a trail of blood from the center of the room to where I found him, which means he probably didn’t die right away. He knew I was coming up to see him after my shift. He waited for the killer to leave and then took the fairy from its hiding place so I’d find it.”
“How do you know all this?” Dani asks.
“I don’t. It’s an educated guess. The killer could have planted it on him for all I know.”
“Are you going to call the police?” Bryn asks.
“I can’t. Not directly. But I called in an anonymous tip on our way here, like I did when Ralph’s shop was Molotoved.”
“So now what?” Bryn says. “You can’t really expect us to do anything about this. We’re high school students. Not vampire slayers.”
“I know, I know. I just need more information.”
“It’s too late,” Murphy says, swiping through his phone. “A news story from the AP wire just went viral.” He pulls the article up on his phone’s browser and shows it to us.
Duke Salinger, founder and CEO of leadership organization New World Initiative, found shot dead in his office earlier this evening, sources say. Investigation under way. No comment yet from authorities.
A sharp pang slices through me. I ignore it.
“Gets worse,” Murphy says, showing us another article.
Devi Raktabija, vice president of New World Initiative, released a statement earlier this evening. “We are in mourning, bereft,” says Dr. Raktabija. “But we will not let Duke Salinger’s death distract us from our mission. We soldier on in our efforts to bring life fulfillment and leadership to those who need it. Duke would have expected nothing less from us.”
In response to questions about the investigation into Salinger’s murder, Dr. Raktabija said that local police were pursuing all leads, and that NWI was cooperating fully with the investigation. “We will be providing police with full access to our facility, to our membership files as relevant to the case, and to the security footage from around the time of the incident.”
Security footage. Crap.
“Can I see the fairy?” Sam asks, his expression guarded. I hand it to him, and he turns it over carefully.
“Doesn’t look like any of the fairies I’ve seen at the hobby store or in any of the D&D games I’ve played,” Murphy says. “Do you recognize it, Bryn?”
Bryn budges in between Murphy and Sam, examining the blue fairy critically. “Looks a bit like Amalthea from the World of Darkness LARP last month.”
All of us but Murphy turn stunned stares on Bryn.
“What?” Bryn says. “I LARP.”
“You should see her with a plançon,” Murphy says, chest puffed with pride.
“What’s a LARP?” Lily asks.
“Live-action role-play,” Sam says. “Nerds at their nerdiest.”
“You say that like you’ve never cosplayed.” Bryn pokes him in the chest. “I happen to know you have a Captain America outfit in your—”
I can’t even with this right now. “Focus, people. Sam, what do you think?”
Sam holds the top and bottom of the fairy in each hand and pulls sharply, separating it into halves.
“What are you—?” I say, reaching for it.
But then I see. One half of the blue fairy is a cap. The other half…
“It’s a flash drive,” Lily says. “How did you know?” she asks Sam.
Sam holds my gaze as he says, “Because I’ve seen it before.”
“Where?” I say, fists clenched.
“I stole it. From a bank vault in New York.”
“You what? Why would you do something so insane? Why would you—? Wait a minute.” My stomach sinks to my shoes. “Mike was investigating a bank robbery in New York. Was Mike investigating your bank robbery?”
Sam straightens. “I haven’t had any conversations with Mike since I’ve been back, so I wouldn’t know.”
“Ugh, I am going to strangle you. Why would you do it? What could possibly be worth the risk?”
“A woman called me a few months ago. She needed my help stealing the contents of a safe-deposit box.”
“And you just agreed? For some strange woman you didn’t even—?” And then I figure it out. Suddenly. Like a Taser to the brain. I sag backward, catching myself on my desk. “Oh.”
“What?” Murphy asks, as Dani puts an arm around my shoulders. “What ‘oh’?”
Sam is wai
ting for me to say it, enduring my look of hurt and betrayal stoically.
“Why didn’t you say something?” I say.
“She gave me a good reason not to.”
“There are still a few of us on the slow track,” Murphy says. “Will someone please enlighten the rest of us as to what the hell the two of you are talking about?”
I break my gaze away from Sam’s, squashing my fury into a tiny, heavy box in my chest. I straighten up, pulling away from Dani.
“He stole the blue-fairy flash drive for my mother.”
Everyone’s incredulous stares go to Sam this time. “For real?” Lily says. “That’s messed up.”
Sam doesn’t answer.
“How did you even get into a bank vault to steal it?” I say, but then I think better of the question. “You know what? Never mind. We’ll deal with the fallout from that after we figure out what happened to Duke, what the hell is on this flash drive, and what any of it has to do with my mother.”
“How will we?” Bryn says. “What exactly do you suggest we do?”
Instead of answering, I boot up my desktop computer and plug in the flash drive. The computer’s hum is the only sound in the room as the flash drive’s file folder opens on the screen. There seems to be a single file in it, but when I click on it, a new window pops up requiring a password.
“It’s encrypted,” Sam says. “Don’t you think I’d have tried opening it after I stole it? I am a hacker, you know.”
“Well, did you hack it?” I ask, clicking the window closed angrily.
“You can’t hack encryption. You need a supercomputer, and even then it could take months if not years to break it.”
“So it’s essentially worthless,” I say.
“Your mom wanted it, so it must be valuable to her at least.”
“Speaking of that, if you gave this drive to my mother, how did Duke end up with it?”
“I don’t know,” Sam says. “It’s a one-way stream of information with your mom. I haven’t even seen her. She arranged a drop for the drive. And she called me from a burner phone that doesn’t accept return calls.”
“So you have no idea what she wanted with it.”
He shakes his head. “I’m sorry, Julep. I wanted to tell you.” His tone is resigned with an undercurrent of pleading. I give him a withering glare in response.
“Now what?” Murphy asks.
I turn an assessing look on Bryn. LARPing, huh? I can work with that.
“Now it’s time to storm the castle,” I say.
• • •
Dani drives me to the Ramirezes’ house, and we miss the five o’clock cutoff by about twenty minutes. Luckily for me, Angela’s on a twelve-hour shift rotation today, and Mike is still at work. If a girl misses curfew and no one’s around to see it, did it really happen? No. No, it didn’t.
“Do you want me to stay until the FBI arrives?” Dani asks, looking at the floor.
I nod and take a half breath, steeling myself with it. She’s not going to like what I’m about to say.
“What is it?” she says, eyeing me suspiciously as I get us Cokes from the fridge. She’s getting too good at reading me.
“I need you to let Mike help you find the person conspiring to kill me. Han’s given you access by setting up the meeting for you. But I need you to let Mike go with you.”
Dani makes an irritated noise. “If you put cops on his trail, you will scare him off. It is safer to let me go alone.”
“By ‘safer,’ you mean ‘more effective.’ Effective’s not enough for me. It’s safer if Mike goes with you. And by ‘safer,’ I mean ‘less likely I’ll end up at your funeral.’ ”
Dani mutters something in Ukrainian under her breath. I don’t catch the words, but I’ll bet none of them are milaya.
“It is safer for Ramirez if I go alone,” she tries again.
She may be right. What do I know about clandestine meetings with murderers? But I can’t send her in by herself. It’s too much to ask.
“I’m sorry, Dani. I told you before. I can’t let you go alone.”
“Why?” she asks. “Something is different. I can tell.”
I close my eyes, trying to grift up an answer that will satisfy her. But in this case, the truth has the best chance of getting me what I’m asking for.
“Knowing Mike is watching your back makes it possible for me to think about other things. It may be a false sense of security, but it’s all I have.”
“It really means that much to you?”
“You mean that much to me,” I whisper past the knives in my throat. I’ve never wanted to tell a truth so badly and keep it hidden at the same time. “I knew Tyler for only a few weeks and his death crippled me. What would happen to me if something happened to you?”
She’s silent, because she knows she can’t guarantee something won’t happen to her. “You should not feel that way,” she says instead.
I laugh, hearing the echo of my own words to Angela from just a week ago. “I don’t have any control over that.”
“I wish things—I cannot give you what you deserve.”
God, could my cheeks get hotter? My whole body is on fire.
“I know.” I take a deep breath. “I know you think of me as a child. And that’s—”
“What makes you think that?” Dani says, surprised.
“It doesn’t matter. I’m trying to—”
“It does matter,” she says. “I do not think of you as a child.”
“You told Han—”
Dani sets her Coke on the table. “I needed Han’s cooperation. I would have told her anything.”
“You don’t see me as a child?” I say like an idiot.
“No,” she says, running a hand through her hair. “I should. But my feelings are more…complicated than that.”
“Complicated how?”
She pushes away from the table and takes a step closer to me, capturing my gaze with hers. My breath catches.
“You make me want things I can never have,” she says, murmuring something in Ukrainian. “You are precious to me.”
Our noses are almost touching. “You’re precious to me,” I say, light-headed.
But then she pulls away. “This cannot be, milaya.”
“Why not?”
“I am nineteen. You are only sixteen,” she says.
I laugh in disbelief. “Between the two of us, we’ve broken almost every law there is, and you’re hung up on a technicality? Three years is not as much as you think it is.”
“I am decades older than you in experience. Besides, it’s not the only reason.”
I hear Angela in my head. “I’m not wild about you hanging out with, much less dating, anyone who does what she does for the kinds of people she does it for.”
“You have no idea of all the things I have done,” she says. “I am a criminal.”
“So am I,” I say defensively. “I’m tired of everyone making me into some kind of white knight. I’m just another grifter trying to survive.”
“Your concept of good and evil is so skewed as to be almost worthless. Your hands are clean, and whether you believe it or not, you are a good person.”
“Then so are you. You’ve been right next to me all these months, helping me help people, helping me heal from Tyler’s death. If you say I’m a good person, then you have to believe you’re good, too.”
“It is different for me,” she says, her eyes blue oceans of regret. “I am a bad person who has done good things. You are fundamentally a good person. You care about people. I only care about you.”
“If that were true, you wouldn’t have helped my dad.” I want desperately to touch her, but I know reaching out would just scare her off. “Give me any other reason, Dani, and I’ll drop it. If you don’t…want this, I’ll respect that. But don’t tell me you’re not good enough. Because you are the only person who has never left me, betrayed me, or tried to change me. For me, you’re the only one who is good enough.”
I press my hands together to hide the fact that they’re trembling. On top of everything else that’s happened tonight, I’m not sure I can handle where this conversation is going. But I can’t back out of it now, not without sending the wrong message. God, my timing is just the worst.
“I cannot protect you from your enemies and myself at the same time. Please do not ask me to.”
“I’m not asking you to.”
“I—” She reaches up, bridges the distance between us, brushes my cheek. I lean into the touch, feeling the warmth of it like electricity lighting me up.
The unmistakable sound of a car parking outside the house breaks the spell into pieces. Dani jerks back as if stung.
“I cannot,” she says, shaking her head. “I…”
“Dani—”
I try to take her hand, but she rushes out of the house, and in a blink, she’s gone. The roar of the Chevelle leaping away from the curb is the only sign she was here at all—other than the sleepless night ahead of me, that is.
A few minutes later, Mike walks in the door that Dani just slammed her way through.
“Must have been one hell of an argument,” Mike says cautiously, gauging my emotional state. “She stormed out of here like she was going to set the world on fire.”
“No,” I say, the memory of her touch branded into my skin. “Just me.”
“I’m having second thoughts about this plan,” I say as I adjust Sam’s black hoodie. “Pull your pants down more. You should have gotten a bigger size.”
Lily, Murphy, and Bryn are spread throughout the Ramirezes’ living room, prepping for today’s infiltration of the company that processes security footage for NWI. They’re not paying attention to me and Sam, so I’m not worried about throwing them off their game. Sam is different. He can handle my doubts.
He gives me a flat look. “My pants size is not going to prevent this from working.”
“It’s not that I think it won’t work. I just…Are you sure you’re okay with this?”
“Julep, we’ve done this a million times. What’s the problem?”
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