“Sorry.”
Javi shrugged and leaned forward, his elbows on his knees.“I did imply you might be corrupt.”
She nodded.“That would do it.I’m not, by the way.”
“I worked that out.”
“Just stupid.”
The bitterness in that statement felt worn thin, as if she’d dragged it out a lot lately.
“Do you really not remember the call?”he asked.
She shook her head.“Not much about it,” she said.“My gray matter was pink, Merlo.Nothing stuck.I didn’t call Kincaid because I can’t trust him anymore, but I don’t remember deciding not to that night.”
“When did that happen?”Javi asked.“I mean, no offense, but you were ride or die.”
Joel fumbled with the water bottle.She couldn’t quite make her fingers, bandaged and clipped, come to grips with it.Javi took it and got up to pour some into one of the miniature plastic glasses on the bedside table.
“It crept up on me,” Joel said.“Phoenix.Iboughtit, but I had to work at it.It never quite clicked.You were a smug asshole, not the sort to risk your career for love.”
Javi paused mid-pour.He was almost impressed.Joel defending his character actually made him sound worse.A quick tip of his hand topped up the glass, and he took it over to her.She took it with both hands and took a careful sip.
“But it was after SSA Lee died that things started to escalate,” she said.“Then he posted me here and told me to scuttle your career.He knows me better than that.I don’t like you—I never did—but that’s a reason not to include you on the coffee run, not to run you out of the service.I should have talked to you, but I didn’t know how involved you were in all of it.”
Javi leaned on the back of the chair.
“There’s a coffee run?”he asked.
“Yes,” Joel said.“Sorry.Do you think Eric’s still alive?”
Javi thought about it.He didn’t know.
“I think so,” he said.“For now.”
She nodded and blinked slowly, her eyelids not quite in sync.“I hope so,” she said, words slurred with exhaustion.“I always felt like it was my fault.When I talked him…talked him into informing, I promised him he’d be safe.I promised…”
She trailed off as she dozed off mid-word, her head falling forward and then jerking back up again as she startled herself awake.Her hand slipped, and she spilled water over herself.That set the machines off again, and this time, a nurse came in to check on them.
“I think that’s enough excitement for Tracy,” he told Javi as he reset the machines and wiped Tracy’s hand off.“She had a major operation.She needs rest.”
Javi nodded and grabbed his jacket off the back of the chair.He shrugged it on.
“I’ll keep you in the loop,” he promised as he headed for the door.
“Wai…wait,” Tracy said.She pushed away the nurse’s attempt to soothe her and squinted at Javi.“Is that your jacket?”
“I’m wearing it.”
“Your phone?”
“Yeah?”Javi checked on autopilot, the familiar hard oblong against his sternum.
Joel hesitated.She looked like she was second-guessing herself, but she went with her instincts.
“Kincaid had it.”
Theneedleonthedial ticked up toward the red as Javi sped along the highway out of town.The stretch of long, dark road lent itself to speed at the best of times—some pedantic part of Javi tried to interject with the actual traffic stats for the last six months—even without fear weighing down the gas.
