“Chambers is from LA,” Brady said. “I might be able to get it into somebody’s hands—and if we can crack it and figure out who might be coming down on her, we might be able to get it to the personabovethat person. It all depends on what’s on the phone.”
“Alrighty then,” Ace said. “So a lot of this is on you, Brady. You’re the one who’s going to have to figure out a way to steal the phone and who to give it to once we see who’s safe.The rest of usare in charge of getting the information, sharing it with the right people, and then keepingyouintact until the phone’s actually in the hands of somebody whoisn’tin on it, somebody with some power. I think we can do that, but it’s gonna be a challenge. You need to walk us through how to get the phone, and then we’ll go from there, what do you say?”
Brady took a breath, picked up his bagel, and munched doggedly. “I think I need more breakfast,” he said through a full mouth, and everybody stood up to stretch and to discreetly queue for the tiny bathroom.
While they were doing that, Eric leaned over Brady’s shoulder. “Whatcha thinkin’?” he asked semi-semiseriously. Brady swallowed and half turned to him.
“I’m thinking… I’m thinking the world is an iceberg,” he said after a moment.
Eric blinked and rocked back, forcing Brady to turn all the way around. “Uhm… in the desert?”
Brady gave a faint smile. “Even in the desert,” he said, but he didn’t seem happy about it. At that moment, Ace tapped Eric on the shoulder and pulled him aside, which in that tiny housemeant pulling himoutside, but Eric, tired of the terrible fear of rejection, fear for Brady’s safety, fear for hissanity, was ready to go.
As they walked through the living room—barefoot—he felt the soft drag of Brady’s fingers as he reached up for a lingering touch, and was reassured.
“How’s he doing?” Ace asked as they hit the front door.
“He just said the world is an iceberg,” Eric said, baffled.
Ace chuckled. “Oh, I get that. It’s like Victoriana. Anybody driving down the road thinks Victoriana is a gas station, a Subway, and us here. You look a little further, you got, you know, apartment buildings, small suburbs, more places to eat, schools. You look even further, you got Jason’s military base and your little gayborhood. And that don’t count the shitwedon’t know about. I mean, until Brady started coming around, I really didn’t even think about po-po, you know?”
Eric smiled at him, suddenly reassured. “I got it now,” he said. “He’s only seen the part of the world he’s been shown. And now….” He swallowed and barely refrained from looking into the little house. “He’s starting to understand it’s bigger.”
“Yeah,” Ace said. “Took me a while too. At first, all I could think about was Sonny. Last few years made me realize, if I wanted to be that man, I had to think bigger.”
Eric swallowed. “I… he still doesn’t know me,” he said, half apology because why was he talking about his two-night stand with a guy who had been nothing but kind to him?
“I am a murderer and a street racer and—once only—a thief,” Ace said without apology. “That ain’t all I am, but a man who’s gonna love me has to know them things. You gotta decide, ‘Eric,’” and Ace definitely made the false name a thing, “how much you’re willing to trust him with. And you gotta decide—are you willing to let him trustyouwith his life when he don’t know a damned thing about you?”
Eric made a sound then, one he wasn’t proud of. “I came here,” he said, trying not to cry, “for some peace.”
“Aw, son,” Ace said, “so did me and Sonny. Hell, so did all of us, ’cept maybe George, who came here for Jai, and Amal, who came here to not be alone in a city of strangers. Trouble finds you where you’re hiding—and there ain’t no peace without reckoning. You took that boy to bed, I’m guessing. Unless you was gonna dump him here and run away, that meant you was gonna have to open your suitcases and get rid of some baggage. You’re not prepared to do that, you might as well get back in your RV and go.”
Eric whimpered—yes, it was a whimper—and Ace’s sigh told him that the words hadn’t been unkindly meant.
“Not that we want you to. For one thing, this next bit looks a mite tricky, and we’re gonna need your help. But also, you been a good man this last week. We’d miss you.” His hand on Eric’s shoulder was reassuring—but it was also hard and no bullshit, and Eric had been told as compassionately as he ever had been to man up and face his responsibilities. “You coming back in?”
“Yes,” Eric said decisively. Man up. His father had said it with his fist and a belt. This man here—ten years his junior but twice his age, apparently—had just said it kindly, with faith and a firm hand. “I do hope the bathroom is free.”
“I’m about ready to tell people to use the one in the garage,” Ace confided. “We clean that thing every day, and there’s more soap.”
THEY TALKED,they laid out scenarios, and apparently they bored Ace stupid, because he and Jai stood up, announced they were taking snacks to the garage, and disappeared for about two hours, probably to help with the cars stacking up. And finally, about the time Ernie stood up and wandered into the guestroom, yawning, Jason announced it was time to give it up for the day.
“We’ve got about as far as we can go without more intel about what the department’s doing tomorrow. Burton and I can monitor their comms tonight. Everybody, go enjoy your afternoon. Eric, you might want to take off now to get that burner unit before everything closes. Brady, I suggest you stay here and wait for him—you don’t need to be on the roads any more than necessary. Jai wasn’t far wrong. In fact, you look wiped. Burton, would you mind if he napped next to Ernie?”
Burton shook his head. “Nope. You and I can get going to set up comms.” He glanced at Brady. “If this place is ever searched, you can hide under the big pedestal bed’s mattress, or exit out the window into the swamp cooler nook—there’s two bolt holes back there.”
Brady and Cotton were staring.
Burton grimaced. “I gave Ace the money to build me a place. You don’t work covert ops without places in your place.”
Eric thought of the false panels in his closet and the one that went under the couch that folded into a bed and the fact that he could climb out of the shower onto the roof of the RV—or into the space underneath where he stashed extra guns.
“Solid,” he said, meaning it, and Brady blinked… and then yawned. “I’ll take off in five, then.”
Jason frowned. “You… I think we need to switch cars for Jai. He was stopped on the way to the garage today. I’m thinking we may need to come up with a plan.”
Eric grimaced. “Okay, then—I’ll go out and start with that.”
