Anger slides up my spine.“What do you want?”I demand.
He grins, and for a second that grin looks almost harmless.“One call.One favor.You’ll do it when I say.You won’t question.You won’t hesitate.You will obey.In exchange, I destroy the vial.I erase any link between you and my home.I will keep my mouth shut and let you walk.No charges.No prison.”
“You think I’ll be your puppet?”I say, tasting bile.“You think I’ll do your laundry and call you my master?”
He shrugs.“I think you’re a man who hates being boxed into the choice between letting men like me run free and becoming the man you swore you wouldn’t.This way, you get to keep your hands clean—on paper at least.And I get my leverage.”
I try to pull once more against the ropes.I must be naïve or reckless or both, but I always believed in right and wrong.Black and white.This negotiation is a new color.One I can’t stomach.
“Is the favor violent?”I ask.
He leans back.“I don’t want you to hurt people.Not unless absolutely necessary.You said you won’t become your father.Fine.”He taps the vial.“No one will get hurt, Hawk.Not if you keep your promise.But you do as I say when I call.”
A small part of my brain calculates.Options.Prison.Exposure.Falcon.Eagle.A dozen broken things.The thought of Falcon sitting in a cell because of me is a hot coal.The thought of Eagle dead in an alley is another.And the most important of all.
Daniela.
Reyes is a predator with a long list of sins.Letting him go feels like betrayal of the victims.Making this bargain stains me.
“If I do this,” I say finally, “it’s on the condition that the favor doesn’t involve hurting people.I need your fucking word on that point, Reyes.”
“Agreed,” he says finally.“No one gets hurt.”He eyes me, slow and appraising.“But it has to be immediate.You do it when I call.No hesitation.No questions.I don’t care if you’re in the middle of your damned honeymoon.You get on a plane and take care of business.”
I take the phone with hands that don’t quite feel like mine.It’s warm, like a living thing.The vial glints in the bulb’s light and then Reyes snaps it shut and tucks it into his pocket.He loosens one of the ropes enough so that I’ll be able to free myself.
“You have my word,” I say.
My word—my oath—settles over me like a suffocating plastic bag.
I don’t like that I said it.
I don’t like that I meant it.
Reyes stands, straightens his shirt, and smiles.“Good,” he says.“Now get out of my house, Bellamy.And when the phone rings, you take the fucking call.”
