“I? What? I’m not a whore!” The blonde outside my gate clucked like a hen, then pushed the damn button again.
“Bitch!” I elbowed the screen until it popped out, then shoved my gun hand out. “Do it again. I dare you.” The screen hit the pavement with a crash. Her hand reached for the damn buzzer. “What do you want?”
“I’m looking for Diamond. Please tell me you’re not her.” My Interruption wore designer black pants and an elegant white shirt. Her hair was wild in the breeze, her face one I’d never seen before.
“In the flesh. Doesn’t tell me what you want.”
“I have a problem.” Her gaze swept around the parking lot.
“Welcome to the club. Try Jack on the rocks.” I started to pull back.
“I got a note,” she said hastily.
“Good for you. I’m sure your mommy’s proud.”
“He…he said you had to read it.”
This was getting old. “Who?”
“His name is O’Rourke.” Her voice drifted. “He wants to help.”
“Then go lay on his doorbell.”
There was bite in her voice this time. “He told me you could help me.”
“He was wrong,” I said, showing teeth of my own. She tore open the letter. “Did you say that was addressed to me? You can’t open it. It’s against federal law!”
“Arrest me.” She held the paper between both hands, her brows tightening. “This doesn’t make sense.”
Don’t ask.
Don’t ask.
“What the fuck does it say?”
“It’s an IOU from you to someone named Sam Irish. Good for, and I quote, ‘One favor you can call in anytime, except the hours of two a.m. to four a.m., anyplace, except Malta, the Yucatan Peninsula, and Gary, Indiana, for any reason, unless it’s stupid.’” She looked up at me. “It’s only seven, we’re in Washington, D.C., and it’s not stupid.”
“Ha! Of course it is.” I waved the gun triumphantly, catching her in an ipso facto. “It’s all stupid!”
“My husband’s been kidnapped,” she shouted, her voice breaking on the last word. “He’s been missing for two days. The police don’t believe me. They think he’s run off with a mistress.”
I froze, my arm, head, and shoulder out the window. “Fucking Irish,” I muttered, looking to the sky. A crow circled overhead, swooping lower on each turn. “We’re not going to let him mess this up, are we?” A maniac robin appeared out of nowhere. The streak of orange raced between the buildings, banked right, hung left, and crapped on my gun hand. “Fucking karma.”
“I’m not crazy, but I am desperate. He didn’t leave me. I know he didn’t. He…he wasn’t that kind of man.” Her mouth kept moving, her words turning to blah blah blah as my gaze drifted to my husband’s face smiling out through shattered glass.
When the shaky video surfaced, showing Gavriil stumbling into the street, everyone I went to—the Italian police, the American consulate, my former employer—all of them looked at me with sympathy but without belief. I was desperate, and it made me a little crazy. I picked up his picture, stroked his arm. “I’m just going to listen, like I had wished someone had done when you died. Save my place in line. This shouldn’t take long.”
“Diamond? Where are you? O’Rourke said you were the only one who could help me. You can’t ignore me. I’m not going away.” She laid on the damn doorbell again.
“Need to electrify that. Make people pay for disturbing me.” In the small hallway, in the square connecting my back door, bedroom, bathroom, and kitchen, was a master control panel. One press of a button and the door she faced popped open.
“Listening isn’t a promise to do anything else.” I went to meet My Interruption. The back door led to a hallway shared by my living space and my working quarters. It was twenty feet long, wide enough for one person and a stack of boxes. Natural light filtered in through the bulletproof glass in the reinforced steel door at the end. On the other side, cast iron stairs connected the back entrance to the apartments, winding to the ground four floors below. Heeled shoes began to climb.
What was Irish doing sending this woman to me? I didn’t do for-hire work, and he knew it.
Those heels were three floors below now. Blonde hair crested the black staircase. Blue eyes followed, her progress stopped as she scanned the landing above.
“Are you coming up or what? I have things to do.”
“Are you planning to use that gun?” she asked suspiciously.
I looked down at the natural extension of my hand. “Nothing’s out of the question.”
“How good are you with it? On a scale of one to ten?”
A little smile grew despite my irritation. It was a good question. “I broke the scale. In or out?”
My Interruption studied my face. “In.” Her heels clicked up the last of the stairs.
When she was on the landing, I stepped into her path. “Hands out. Turn around.”
“You’re patting me down?” She complied, muttering “ridiculous.” “You’re the one with the gun, you know.”
Thorough is never ridiculous. “You got ten minutes.” I went through the door, letting her follow. Or not. Her choice. I’d hear her out, connect her to people, to the help no one gave me. Fifteen minutes, twenty tops, and we’d be nothing to each other but a memory. “Nine minutes, forty-five seconds.”
“My husband disappeared from work two days ago.” She sat in the corner of the couch, knees together, fingers working the hem of her shirt. “He told his assistant he was going to lunch, then left alone, taking only his wallet and the book he was reading. When he didn’t come home, I started looking for him.”
Worry was evidenced by the purple tint underwriting her blue eyes. She hadn’t been crying, not recently. Her eyes weren’t swollen or red; her nose wasn’t running or congested. No judgment there. Not everyone was a crier.
“This man who sent you, O’Rourke, how did you meet him?”
My Interruption rubbed the back of her neck. “The police, they are supposed to help, but no. I didn’t know how to find the kind of help I needed.” Her words had a subtle lilt. Something European perhaps? It was pleasant, slightly exotic, sounding as if every word was a secret. It added an unexpected twist to the cliché blonde hair, blue-eyed, buxom babe. “I found him on a message board. He met me at a café.”
“When?”
She looked at her watch. “Two hours ago.”
I had no doubt My Interruption met Irish—how else would she have my marker and address? But, four days ago, Irish and I said goodbye. He’d gotten a new assignment and was leaving town. Hasta la vista. Bon voyage. See ya when I see ya.