“Oh.” The envelope felt heavy. She undid the string tying it shut and looked inside. There had to be at least a hundred pages of printouts—receipts, spreadsheets, screenshots—several photos of documents lying on a desk, and a thumb drive.
There was also a single, legal-sized envelope with Maren’s name on it.
“It’s all here. Thank you so much for keeping it safe.” She resealed the envelope with the cord, looping it back and forth between the buttons, creating the sign for infinity.
Colin was exactlywhere she’d left him outside the office. The moment she opened the door, he yanked the envelope out of her hands.
“Now what?” she snapped.
“Come with me.” He took her arm and marched her to the elevator. When the doors opened to the lobby, a man in a suit stood there, briefcase in hand, eyes flicking from Colin’s grip on Maren’s arm to the manila envelope.
Maren’s heart stopped.
Is that someone Voss sent?
Colin didn’t hesitate. He tightened his grip on Maren’s arm just enough to sell the lie.
“Move it,” he snapped.
The man stepped aside quickly, hands up. “Hey, you got it, chief.”
Maren kept her head down all the way through the lobby and out to the SUV. Colin opened the passenger door and shoved her inside hard enough to look real, not hard enough to hurt. Then he jogged around the front, got in, locked the doors, and started the engine.
For one second, he dropped the act. His hand came up to her face, his thumb brushing her cheek as his eyes searched hers. “There you are.”
“I did it,” she whispered.
“You did. Now we’re one step closer to home.”
Colin called Elissa. “Ironman. We have the package.”
“That’s the good news,” Elissa said.
“What’s the bad?”
“The handoff is in a parking garage. The same one where Mira was hit.”
Maren froze. She looked through the windshield at the bright San Diego street, the blue sky, the palm trees moving in the coastal breeze like nothing terrible had ever happened here.
“He’s making me walk where she died,” she said. “He wants me scared.”
Colin put the SUV in drive.
“Then he’s about to be disappointed.”
THIRTY-TWO
It wasthe same damn garage.
Of course it was.
Dekker knew it inside and out. He’d killed Mira there. He’d walked away from her body there. And now he wanted Maren walking into the same shadows wearing her sister’s face.
Colin’s hands tightened on the wheel.
“They’ve installed new cameras since the accident,” Elissa said, obvious air quotes around ‘accident’ in her voice. “I’m in them now. No sign of Dekker, but there are plenty of blind spots. Which I’m sure he knows.”
Elissa had sent them a photo of Karl Dekker from years ago, before he started his second career as a cleaner. The man’s eyes were absolutely dead in a face like a bulldog’s as he stared straight into the camera for his DEA ID.
