Sarah was apparently not in the mood for introductions. “What are you doing with my cat?” she demanded.
“Yourcat?” Boswell snapped. “Simon belongs to me.”
Sarah tilted down her shades and shot him a bored look over the rim. “Oh yeah? Then explain why ‘Simon’ is a girl.”
Boswell huffed a few times, then said, “How was I supposed to know? It’s awfully furry down there.”
“Her name is Posy.” Sarah held out her arms to me. I considered keeping hold of the cat to stop Sarah from bolting again, but I’m not made of stone. And when the murder mittens came out and she started to squirm, I figured I was better off handing her over. Posy went into power-headbutt mode, clonking Sarah’s jaw hard enough to hear from three feet away.
That only annoyed Boswell more. “If you’re such a doting owner, why was your cat left out here to fend for himself…herself…whatever!”
I probably would’ve taken umbrage at that question, but Sarah answered with her typical stoic blandness. “It was acalculated risk. Outside the apartment, Posy stood a chance. But inside…let’s just say I knew it wouldn’t end well.”
“Because of Sledge,” I said—and that did give Sarah pause.
She considered me for a moment, then sighed. “Posy was leverage.”
Like the myna bird.
That brought back the conversation I’d had with Haskel:It was always Sarah. Jacob dealt with a lot of domestics—he would’ve been better at handling this whole encounter. Or, with her empathic ability, Evelyn. Or, hell, pretty much anyone. That would teach me to strike out on my own. But if I didn’t get a handle on this case, Sarah would disappear for good now that she had her cat. “Is Sledge stalking you?” I flat-out asked.
She shrugged. “He would. If he knew where to find me.”
“Then, let me help. Because you can keep running, or you can give law enforcement what it needs to take Sledge out of circulation for good.”
Sarah unzipped her hoodie and the cat squirmed in and nestled against her. “I do know how to Google, y’know. The most he’d get is five years.” When I frowned in disbelief, she said, “That’s all anyone gets for assault. Plus he’s got his good-boy act down pat.”
Assault? Was it possible she didn’t know about the murder? I’d have to tread carefully so as not to scare her off for good.
“Still,” I said, “it’ll be a relief to stop looking over your shoulder.”
Sarah gave me another shrug—which was probably as much as I could hope to get. I gestured toward the end of the alleywhere I was parked a few cars down. “Let’s all go down to headquarters and the folks there can figure it all out.”
“Are you nuts?” Boswell said. “I’m not getting in that car.”
Due to the annoying sound that had developed in my suspension, a high-pitched metal-on-metal squeak that grated on my very last nerve, I’d grabbed a standard F-pimp black Lexus sedan. OK, and maybe I preferred the plush heated seat and the omnipresent new car smell to my low budget ride. I figured they were both bugged, so I might as well be spied on in style.
To Boswell, I said, “Yes, it’s a government car, and yes, it’s hooked up to their GPS. What difference does it make if they’re tracking us? We’re headed back there anyway.”
“There’s far worse out there than GPS,” Boswell said with great disdain.
Boswell might just be the main target of my assignment—but I was willing to sacrifice him to bring in Sarah. “The safest place for us is our office,” I told her, “promise. Youandyour cat are welcome.”
Sarah folded her arms protectively over the wriggling lump in her hoodie. “Okay.”
Once Sarah agreed, Boswell changed his tune. “Well, if Simon is going, then I’m going, too.”
“Fine,” I said. “We’ll all go.”
I’d figured it was all said and done, when Sarah said, “But you talked to Zach, right?” I confirmed that I had. “And is that the same car you were driving?”
“If you’re worried Sledge put a tracker on it, too—”
She barked a humorless laugh. “No, nothing that elaborate. He couldn’t even program the remote. I wanna know if he’d recognize it.”
Since she put it that way…you see one F-Pimp sedan, you’ve seen ’em all.
Which was how we ended up doing 45 down the Kennedy in a van full of pee. Me, Boswell, Sarah, and a very vocal Posy Simon. Cars swerved around us at 70-plus, laying on their horns so hard the noise oscillated like a siren, but I didn’t say a word—for fear of dislodging the cat…or the sloshing bottles.
