“Don’t give me that look—she’s been calling all damn day. You’re taking this call, Zola.”
“How do you know what my face looks like?” I shook my head. This wasn’t even a video call.
“Because I know,” Tiana said shortly. “I’m putting her through.”
And before I could say another word, the line clicked over.
“Z? Are you there?”
The single-initial thing bugged me, but she’d been doing it since we met. I pegged it as her weird little way of establishing intimacy, the way rich women did when they couldn’t do it with hugs or kisses like normal people.
“Caitlyn, I’m at work,” I huffed. “I need to get back. What is it?”
“I was surprised, that’s all, when you declined my invitation,” Caitlyn said. “I honestly thought it was too good to be true. Imagine it. You and me? Alone? A whole weekend away from your sad little shack?”
On the other end of the line, I could hear Caitlyn’s nails clinking against her glass. If I remembered correctly, they were French tipped, painfully white at the ends, paired with diamond rings so bright they could probably be seen from space.
I frowned. Insulting the house in Brooklyn that I scrimped and saved for wasn’t the best way to get on my good side. Sure, the house I shared with my sister and her kid was no palace. But in a city of renters, owning my own place was so far the crowning achievement of my financial life. I didn’t even remember telling Caitlyn about it, but that didn’t mean a few glasses of wine hadn’t loosened my tongue at some point.
“Like I told you,” I said, kicking my foot in the direction of a bunch of pigeons that instantly scattered. “I can’t get away this weekend. I’m buried in work, and I just don’t think—”
“Lover, please. It’s been eons since our last night. Don’t make me beg. It turns me into a dreadful bore.”
I rolled my eyes. We’d seen each other three days ago. I hated the ones who talked like this—like they were characters out of The Philadelphia Story. Katherine Hepburn without the smarts. Cary Grant without the swagger. I wasn’t any more special to Caitlyn than she was to me—but like so many trust funders and trophy wives, she thought she was entitled to plenty. Including my company.
“Look, we had some fun, honey, but now we can just leave it at that,” I said bluntly. “I don’t have time for anything more than the one night, and you’re, well, engaged, right? This was never going anywhere.”
There was a long pause. Long enough that I might have wondered if Caitlyn had hung up if it hadn’t been for the sound of her breathing. Good fuckin’ God. These kinds of people really couldn’t take the word no.
“I see,” Caitlyn said finally, although I wondered if she really did. “I—well, I’m not one to beg.”
Aren’t you? After all, hadn’t she been doing just that in a suite downtown just last week?
I had the good sense to keep that to myself. It was hard, let me tell you.
“You’re a class act, Cait.” I decided to be generous instead and lie. “I hope you and your fiancé can work it out. And if not—you’ll find what you need in the end. You deserve it.”
“Thank you.”
Her voice was suddenly soft, and I felt bad. I forgot sometimes how vulnerable women like her really were. So many of them were neglected, stuck in their posh apartments like museum pieces, pretty things for their husbands to look at when they tore themselves away from the stock markets and men’s clubs. Caitlyn was desperate for someone, anyone, to make her feel seen. Loved, even.
But the truth was painfully clear. I was useless to any woman but the one I couldn’t find. In the meantime, I was just another asshole, another sinner using them as much as they were using me.
“You take care, Cait.”
Maybe one day she’d find a real Prince Charming to rescue her. But that prince wasn’t me.
No sooner had the conversation ended than my phone rang again.
I groaned. “Tiana, what now?”
“Oh, no. You did not just ‘what now’ me, Mr. Attitude. I am just doing my job, and you think it’s okay to serve me that kind of mouth?”
I sighed. This fuckin’ day was never ending. “Tiana, I’m sorry. I’ll bring you a whole cheesecake from Junior’s on Monday. Thank you for dealing with my mouth.”
She sniffed. “That’s more like it. I have Leona Parker for you.”
I stood up straighter. That was actually someone I wanted to talk to. “Put her through, please.”
Leona Parker was a classmate from Officer Training School who had turned her time in Special Forces into a thriving career at the CIA. She and I had known each other for fifteen years, and she was one of the few people I would trust with my life. Mostly because I already had. After meeting with Eric, I’d sent her the full file on the de Vrieses with hopes the feds would finally pay attention to the fuckin’ disaster that was the Carson case.
“Lee,” I answered. “Tell me it’s good news.”
The long sigh told me my request was not going to be granted. “I’m sorry, Zola. I wish I could.”
“Fuck. The director too?”
We had to speak in veiled terms. I worked in a government office whose lines were probably monitored 24-7, even via cell phone. Leona was a legitimate G-man. Or, G-woman, I supposed. She lived her life under surveillance. And a conversation about John Carson wasn’t something we wanted tracked back to us. Not immediately, anyway.
“We said that’s how it might go. He’s powerful, Zo. You know that. Lots of ties to lots of people. People in government. People with very deep pockets.”
I understood immediately what she meant. John Carson’s company held about forty percent of the U.S. government’s munitions contracts. The armed forces needed him as much as he needed them.
“Still, though,” I said. “Even after Korea—”
“Stalled,” she interrupted.
When they had come home from South Korea in January, Jane and Eric had enough evidence against John Carson for ten indictments. Kidnapping. Conspiracy. But the worst by far was nuclear arms production. And here was Leona telling me that the CIA still couldn’t be moved.
“I’m so sorry I don’t have better news,” Leona said. “But that’s just the way the cookie crumbles, my friend. You know the director isn’t going to act against the DOJ. This isn’t the first time this has happened. Think about Guantanamo.”
Again, her meaning was clear. The president, in all his glory, was basically wielding the attorney general like a shield for anything he wanted. Carson had been one of the president’s largest campaign contributors. And now he was reaping the benefits.
I sighed. This was bad. Maybe not wholly unexpected, but bad, nonetheless.
Another dead end.
“Better take it back to Ramirez. He’s got the cojones, so to speak, and he’s supporting your investigation. These days a lot of justice seemed to be happening…where you are.”
I rubbed my forehead viciously. I honestly didn’t know what else to do. This was all state-level attorney generals and district prosecutors had been hearing since the last election. Suddenly our job wasn’t just fighting the bad guys in our own communities. We were doing what the feds couldn’t—not with corruption infecting Washington like a virus. I’d been an ADA for seven years, but these days, it felt more like twenty. Talk about added stakes.