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Luckily, I’m best friends with someone who’s very good at finding out things that don’t want to be found. I grab my phone and call Jillian.

As always, she answers immediately. The girl more or less lives with her phone surgically attached to her palm. “Hey there, my little Rae of Sunshine! What’s up?”

I pick at my cuticles. “I need to talk to you about something. But fair warning: It’s… kind of a lot.”

“Oh, no! What happened? Is Gideon okay?”

“Gid is fine. It’s work stuff. Really weird work stuff. I got transferred to this new position and my boss is?—”

“Shit, hold on.” There’s rustling on her end. Someone’s talking in the background. “Rae, I’m so sorry, but I’m slammed at the moment. It’s insane—I just got the craziest tip. Like, for real, this could be huge.”

“What kind of tip?”

“Can’t say yet. But if it pans out, it’s front page material. I’m talking career-defining.”

I’m not surprised in the least. Jillian Pierce and I met in fourth grade when she punched a boy who called me a “frizzy-haired freak” on the playground. He got a broken nose; she got detention; I got a best friend. We’ve been inseparable ever since.

She was there when my parents died. She showed up at my apartment with grocery bags full of Lean Cuisines and sat with me on the kitchen floor while I cried until I couldn’t breathe. She was there for Gideon’s first overdose, and also his second and his third. She held my hand in hospital waiting rooms and never once told me I should give up on him.

But unlike me, Jillian always knew what she wanted. Even back in middle school, she was starting a newspaper club and interviewing teachers about cafeteria food quality with steely-eyed determination. She majored in journalism at Columbia, did a billion prestigious internships, and clawed her way into her dream job at theNew York Timestwo years ago. Now, shecovers crime and business the same way she once defended me at recess: aggressively, with the occasional broken nose for those who dare to defy her.

I fear for anyone who gets in her way.

“That’s exciting!” I squeak half-heartedly.

“I know, I know.” she sighs. “I’m the worst. But can we do dinner or something this week? Wednesday, maybe? I’ll buy you a dirty martini or three and you can tell me everything.”

I slump back against the couch cushions. “Yeah. Fine. Wednesday. It’s a date.”

“You’re the best, RaeRae. Love you, bye!”

I toss my phone onto the coffee table and stare at the ceiling. So much for getting a second opinion.

Guess I’m all on my own here.

7

RAE

AUDIO SURVEILLANCE - Hallway 50th Floor

VOICE 1:"She's green. Jumpy as hell."

VOICE 2:"The last one lasted eight months."

VOICE 1:"I'm betting six for this one. Tops."

VOICE 2:"Just like the last one."

The next morning, I get off the elevator before the clock has even struck 7:00 A.M. Or at least, Istartto get off?—

—but before my first foot even lands on the marble acreage of the fiftieth floor, Lukas’s hand clamps around my bicep.

“Come with me.”

It isn’t a question and he isn’t waiting for an answer. He whisks me off my feet and drags me through a door I didn’t notice when I arrived here yesterday. We make our way down a completely unlit hallway. It’s small and cramped, and his sea-salt-and-mint cologne fills the space like an oil diffuser.

I’m scrambling to keep up with his huge strides until, just as suddenly as he grabbed me, he releases me.