Page 51 of Wells

"It's a beautiful night," I say. "I can't believe it's warmer here than home."

He doesn't answer right away. He watches the water.

"Coming here always makes me think of my mom," he says finally. "She used to swear the Gulf was clearer on the Florida side. Don't ask me how she landed on that."

It stops me. Of course he has a mother. It's a stupid thing to be caught by, but I've never once pictured him as anyone's boy, and he doesn't hand pieces of himself out, so I step into the opening carefully.

"Does she live in New Orleans?"

"She died when I was nine." He says it to the water, to the place his smoke went, not to me.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to pry."

"You're not." He takes another pull. "It was a long time ago. I just like thinking about her in the places she loved."

I don't move. I'm afraid that if I do, he'll catch himself and put it all back behind glass. I want to know everything there is to know about this man, every locked room of him, and I have just enough sense to know that saying so out loud would shut the door.

Nobody ever hands me the real thing. They give me the polished version and keep the truth behind glass, and I learned a long time ago to stop expecting otherwise. He just handed me his mother, unguarded, and I want to hold still long enough to be trusted with the rest.

He smokes it down, pinches it out, and tucks the butt back into the pack rather than flicking it over the rail, a fussy habit that somehow makes me like him more. Then he leans against the railing and crosses his arms, and the wind moves his hair, and for a few seconds he's nothing but a man on a balcony, close enough to touch.

The space between us has gone thin. I feel it like a storm in my teeth before it breaks, that pull toward him I keep losing arguments with. I could close the distance. I think he could too. For a second neither of us does anything but stand in it.

Then he straightens, and something in him steps back, deliberate, a man easing away from an edge he respects.

"Call it a night," he says, and his voice has dropped lower than the words need. "You've been going since this morning. I'm not going to be the guy who takes advantage of that."

Oh, but I want you to. I don't say it. I hold his eyes a beat longer than I have any business holding them, long enough that we both hear the thing I'm not saying.

"Yeah," I manage. "Probably smart."

Neither of us moves toward the door.

He breaks first, stepping aside to let me pass, careful not to touch me, and that carefulness is louder than hands would have been. I walk in ahead of him with my skin humming and the want sitting heavy and unfinished in my chest, and I already know I'm going to lie awake in that big bed replaying the half-inch we didn't cross.

FOURTEEN

Wells

The Disguised Voice: Maskers have long altered their voices to match their costumes, so the sound gives nothing away even when the face is guessed. The orders that night came through something robotic, built so no one could ever pull a man out of it.

I slip out of the suite at five thirty. It's still black outside of the windows, and Cera's still asleep in the other room. The drive from here to St. Petersburg is about twenty-five minutes at this hour, so that will give me enough time to get there and get situated before Dane gets off.

The elevator is empty. I ride down watching the floor numbers drop, and by the time I reach the lobby, my head's already on the job, compartments closing.

The driver's waiting curbside in a black Escalade as ordered, engine running. I climb into the back and pull the door shut without saying a word. He knows the address. I sent it over last night.

"East Port docks in St. Petersburg," he says, confirming. "You want me to wait or circle?"

"Park where I can see the gate."

"Got it."

He pulls into traffic. The city's still half asleep, streetlights fading in the early gray. I check my watch. Five fifty-nine. Dane works the third shift at the port and clocks out at seven. I want eyes on the gate before he walks through it.

I could've hired someone to do this. That's what most people would have done: sent an investigator with instructions and waited for a report. I don't like anyone knowing what I know before I understand exactly what's going on. I would never hand that search to a contractor who could be questioned later by police, or whoever cleaned Ronnie Louvre off the board.

I pulled everything myself, from systems I can reach without leaving anyone wiser.