And especially with Reed.
If my hunch is accurate, he’s more like me than I ever could’ve imagined. He’s living each day without a vital piece of himself. Things could have been so different between us if I had known. Together, we could have filled our matching voids.
Is this really happening? Could it be true?
Unfortunately, no matter how many possibilities I envision, no other explanation holds water.
Nothingin this folder was about Reed. That’s his brother.A twin.
Reed’s a twin.
Why aren’t they together?
Then his words from today in the car answer that question for me. This must be the brother he said he was ripped away from.
A pit opens at the bottom of my stomach.
Tonight, when Reed returns, he’s gonna press me for details about the casino crime ring. And I’ll tell him.
All the while, I’ll have to pretend I don’t know his painful secret. If I tell him how I found this out, he’ll know I was searching his drawers. He’ll assume I did it to find information about the case for Silas, and it’ll cause him to distrust my honest confession about my role in the casino theft.
Isn’t this peachy? Even when I’m finally able to confess, I still have to lie to him.
This is an absolute crap storm.
Strike that. This is a shit storm.
THIRTY
In the cards
REED
Parkingin the bar district in downtown at night can be a shit show, so I opt to drive my motorcycle. However, I stow my vest for the short drive. No sense putting a target on my back by being that visible.
While driving to the bar, I envision how things might play out. If I’m the first one on the scene as SSA Chase suggested, I’ll need to enter the bar to confirm Riddick is still inside. Ideally, I’d do that without drawing attention. If I walk through the door withFBIemblazoned on my chest in bright yellow letters, slipping in unnoticed goes out the window. I’ll keep the vest stowed for now. Should be fine as long as he doesn’t recognize me and start shooting.
Maybe I’ll get lucky, and the team will arrive when I do, so I don’t have to decide. After parking near the bar, I dial Andrews.
“You there, kid?” he answers.
“Just parked. How far out are you?”
“Five minutes. And boy, do I have a lot of shit to download to you when I get there.”
“About?”
“Your Lila.”
Shit.
“How pissed will I be? Scale of one to ten.”
“It depends.”
“On what?”
“We can talk about it later. First things first. Did you get a visual on Riddick?”
