Another groan unwinds from her throat, but she stops mangling my leather interior. “How did you even find out they got me? Did your little network of informants call you up and tell you the good news?”
I pull a slip of paper from the fold of my sun visor and drop it into her lap. It’s an article fromThe New Malcolm Recorder. The paper crinkles as she studies the picture. Checkmate’s silhouette glows within it against the backdrop of downtown.
The headline reads:“HERO” FLEES CITY IN WAKE OF CORRUPTION CHARGES.
It’s bullshit, of course. Checkmate never left New Malcolm, and as for the alleged “corruption?” I’m sure someone did a tidy job of creating a paper trail.
Kaye’s fingers pass over the page, connecting the circles that decorate specific letters to form a cypher. “Am I supposed to know what this means?”
“I ran into a Rose dealer on Victory Avenue last night. He didn’t stick around to chat, but this dropped out of his pocket.” It had been a long night that turned into an even longer day. “Decoded, it’s your name and the information that led me to tonight’s little soirée. I was hoping you might be able to offer some insight.”
“What’s this part here?” She points to the half-circle of letters that closes out the code.
“A signature.” My skin tightens just thinking about it. “From a man who calls himself ‘C.’ Ever heard of him?”
She shakes her head.
“He’s not a very nice person.”
She tosses the paper onto the dash. “He can’t be that bad if he sent you to help me.”
Heat flares in my chest. “He’s a butcher, and you’d have to be an idiot to think there’s not a reason he wanted me to find you.”
“You’re an idiot then for coming to get me.”
“No…” I grin. “He dangled a carrot in front of me—one I’ll take great pleasure in shoving down his throat.You, dearest Checkmate, are going to help me find him.”
5
ZANE
It has been almost five years since I had a guest in my house. My great-grandfather built the French Provincial-style mansion for his bride so she could take a little bit of France with her when they came to the “Land of the Free.” New Malcolm was mostly Polish and Slavic immigrants then, but they welcomed their new neighbors as if they were their own. My great-grandparents never forgot the favor.
Kaye’s face reveals nothing as she takes in the mammoth structure and acres of land attached to it. Modern features like the French doors that line the front terrace on the second story mingle with original features that are more than a century old, like the iron rails covered in several generations worth of orange campsis blossoms from the gates of my great-grandmother’s garden. The scent of honeysuckle rides on the breeze from the bushes that line the south and western borders of the property.
Her gaze wavers from the cobblestone front steps to the city lights beginning to glow in the distant twilight horizon.
“I can carry you again,” I offer. “If you want.”
“I would rather die.”
I could have found a safehouse somewhere to hide her instead, but there wouldn’t have been enough time to take theproper precautions, to find just the right person to ensure her safety. No, better to bring her here, where I can keep an eye on her myself.
Having Checkmate here carries its own kind of risks, of course. Risks I’m not sure I fully considered before this moment on my family’s ornate front stoop.
“Are we still in New Malcolm?”
A tremble courses through her lithe fingers as they brush up and down her arms. Her attention is trained on the tall fence some distance away, and the road beyond it. I can almost see the calculations running through her head, tabulating the amount of time we were in the car into a distance she might have to travel on foot.
“There are two ways to do this, Kaye. Just this once, choose the easier one.”
Her attention flickers. “Is that a threat?”
“A request.” I move closer to her, drawn as always into her orbit. “I can offer you somewhere safe to lay low. You’ve wanted to find my hideout for a long time, Checkmate. I’m giving you the key.”
“Why are you doing this, Charade?”
I’m not arrogant enough to believe anything I could say right now would make her trust me, and she honestly wouldn’t want to hear the truth—that I don’t totally understand it either. That I have no explanation for the panic that gripped me the moment I decoded that message. I couldn’t let that happen to her. And maybe that worries me too.
