“You think he’ll stop at the woman?”
His silence is answer enough.
My chest goes cold and methodical.
“Who else has copies?”
“You and me.”
“That wasn’t the question.”
Jenson exhales. “One more. Safe hold.”
“Anyone know you met me?”
“Not unless they’ve got eyes on the diner.”
I glance once at the mirror, then the window. “Assume they do.”
His mouth twitches. “You were always optimistic.”
I gather the envelope and slide it into my jacket. “What do you want for this?”
Jenson stares at me as if I’ve insulted him. “I want Cole done.”
“You’re asking me for clean or final?” I ask.
He doesn’t flinch. “I’m asking you to stop waiting for him to become less dangerous than he is.”
That, at least, is honest. I stand. He does too, slower.
We look at each other across the booth, men standing on opposite sides of a grave neither of us dug alone.
“If he knows you talked,” I say, “leave wherever you’re sleeping tonight.”
“I already did.”
“Leave farther.”
He nods once.
I head for the door, then stop without turning back. “Jenson.”
“Yeah?”
“If this gets back to him before I’m ready?—”
“It won’t.”
I believe him enough to leave.
Outside, the air hits hard and cold. I stand beside the truck, the highway humming low in the distance.
Benjamin Wren wants The Hollow.
Cole wants me ruined in public, broken in pieces, with enough witnesses to make it look like justice.
And Aurora…
