“Because they didn’t have the PIN,” Renner replies, “and it’s useless without it. My intelligence suggested they were working on hacking it, and had a specialist coming in this week. Hence our window. The wallet wipes if you enter the PIN wrong.”
I was aware of that. “So tell me, Kurt. Whoisyour contractor?” Or, which agency.
“Why don’tyoutell me something, Declan. Who areyoureally working for?”
I chuckle. It seems Renner hasn’t fully bought into my story after all. “You know, don’t you?”
“Suspect, at least, yes.”
“Yet you still sent me after Raven.”
“Yes, I did.” He pauses. “She’s quite… compelling, isn’t she?”
My heart skips a beat, then thumps hard, and I have to ease up my grip on the phone before I break it. “Meaning?” I ask coldly.
“Nothing like that,” he says easily. “I assure you I have no romantic interest in her. Just that I’ve watched her these past few years, and you bring something she sorely needs.”
Sounds like he’s feeding me a line of bullshitbecause he thinks it’s what I want to hear. “Yeah? What’s that?”
“Loyalty. Excitement. Someone to challenge her.”
I sit with it for a moment, but I know he’s right. “I aspire, anyway.”
“Yeah, you do. And it’s what she needs. I know my crew, Declan.”
He does. I have to hand him that.
I let out a sigh. “Fine. We’ve both been keeping things from each other. Shall we come clean?”
“Gentleman’s agreement?”
“Sure.”
Renner doesn’t hesitate. “My contractor is the CIA. The wallet’s theirs. As I suspect you know, they can’t move against Meridian Pacific on US soil. So they came to me because it’s funds that… er… don’t exist.”
I bark a laugh. On the seat next to me is a cryptocurrency wallet of illegal CIA slush funds, no doubt measured in thehundredsof millions. That explains everything.
Kurt Renner isn’t CIA, he’s a deniable asset. There’s a story there, but this isn’t the time for it.
“Your turn,” he prompts.
“FBI,” I say. “Investigating bank robberies, not Meridian Pacific.”
“Yeah, I figured.” He goes quiet. “So I guess the big question is, what are you going to do, Agent Hale?” A short, wry laugh. “It’s not Hale, is it?”
“No, it’s not.” And that is the big question. “A smart man would take this wallet to the FBI field office in LA and get a promotion.” I want it said, sohe understands what’s at stake when I don’t.
“Are you a smart man?”
“Fuck, no. I’m one that’s helplessly, stupidly in love.”
“You poor bastard.” He chuckles. “You really are screwed, aren’t you?”
“And you set me up with her.”
“To be fair, I just gave you a nudge. You did it all yourselves without much of my involvement.”
True.
