“So where’s his consciousness?” asks Rita. She gestures up and down. “Whoeverthisis?”
“It’s saved in the cloud.” The man strokes Honey’s hand. If she closed her eyes, she’d think it was Barney.
“Well then, that’s murder,” says Rita. “That’s effectively murder.”
“Oh, Rita, you’ve got a great intellect, but you’ve always been held back by your reductive thinking.” The man pats Rita on the shoulder and she shrugs him away. “We’ll transfer his consciousness into a humanoid robot at some point. We just haven’t quite got there yet.”
He smiles. His teeth are white and strong. He puts his hand, firm and insistent, on Honey’s lower back. It’s Barney’s move when he wants sex. “I’m younger than you now,” he whispers in Honey’s ear.
She tastes bile. Her empty stomach churns.
“Barney, we’ve got a problem.” It’s Luisa Long, pulling the man’s sleeve.
“Not now, Luisa.” He flicks her away. “I trust these two. Don’t worry about it. It’s fine.”
“He’s wanted for a homicide in Spain.” Luisa Long is talking faster than Honey has ever heard her speak. Her hands flutter. Her face contorts. She’s so glitchy! “I’m so sorry. They’re going to extradite him. You. Him.”
His face becomes thunderous. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“We did all the checks, Barney, I promise you.”
Heavy footsteps behind them. The feeling of an icy breeze through the room.
“Santiago Rodriguez?” A dark-suited woman. She has the mildly bored tone that comes with unassailable authority, andshe’s accompanied by a small entourage of blank-faced police officers. Bulletproof vests, face shields, and guns in holsters.
“You’ve got the wrong guy,” says the man who is Barney, who is not Barney. He holds up his hands, smiling broadly. “Whatever this Santiago has done, it wasn’t me. Tell them, Honey. You tell them who I am.”
The detective turns to Honey. “You know him?”
Honey freezes.
“My cleavage was once one of the natural wonders of the world too,” murmurs Rita.
Honey meets the handsome man’s eyes and sees Barney begging for the loyalty he refused her.
Rita’s voice again: “Did he tell you the other women were for medicinal purposes only?”
Honey thinks of how she learned to please Barney, to become what he needed her to be, to say what he needed her to say, and how she allowed her personality to be incrementally ironed out of all its kinks. She thinks of the mornings she woke with her hands in clenched fists, her head aching with the remnants of half-remembered dreams that mostly involved her shouting at shadowy figures. Repressed fury is not good for sleep.
“Honey,” says the man.
It’s not like it matters. They won’t believe her if she saysThis is my husband in another man’s body.They won’t drop the murder charge. But it matters to her, and it seems to matter to him.
“I don’t know this man,” Honey tells the detective. She can feel power rushing through her body. She is surging back to life. “I’ve never met him.”
The man who is now Barney studies her. He tilts his handsome new head regretfully, and she sees the briefest flare of pain and betrayal, but then it’s gone, and he is turning tothe detective, expansive and hearty. “Look. This is going to sound strange, but I’m Barney Beckett.”
“Sure you are, Santiago,” says the detective. “Let’s go.”
“Mac?” calls Barney over his shoulder, calm but irritable, as his hands are cuffed. “Where’s Mac? We need to get this sorted out.”
But Mac is nowhere to be seen, even though Honey is sure she saw him just moments earlier. Two police officers stand on either side of Barney, grip his stolen biceps, and lead him away smoothly and efficiently, as though he’s on wheels. A murderer about to be charged with the wrong murder.
Honey finds herself once again with the three ex-wives.
“Faithful to the end,” says Meredith. She’s smoking an e-cigarette and looks disheveled and mildly exhilarated, as if she’s spent the night dancing.
Svetlana, who has removed her giant hat and reapplied her lipstick, says, “The only one who will never leave him.”
