Page 69 of Fifty-Fifty

Harper took her laptop from her bag, sat on the couch beside Harry.

‘He’s got a website,’ she said. ‘Lot of articles on his work. He’s got a great rep. One of the top-ranked forensic fiber experts in the country. He’s helped design a forensic lab for spectrometer analysis in Quantico. He built the Bureau’s lab, basically. We’re not going to get any dirt on this guy – he’s the real deal.’

I finished my coffee, but instead of reaching for the pot for a refill, I picked up the bottle of Scotch. Unscrewed the cap. Began to angle the bottle to pour some into my cup. The liquid came to the neck of the bottle and I stopped. Alcohol rehab seemed a long time ago. I could drink in moderation now, but there was always the possibility that I might start to pour a glass of Scotch and never stop.

I got up. Refilled Harry’s glass with a smile on my face and then put the bottle back on my desk.

‘The basis of any good con is a single principle – everyone wants to make a free buck. Greed and green. If Shandler is clean, looks like we’ll have to dirty him up a little.’

‘How?’ said Harry.

‘We’ll get him to do what he does best.’

She looked up at me, momentarily confused.

‘I’m not going to be involved in something illegal, if that’s what you have in mind.’

‘Don’t worry.’

She looked concerned, her head went down, and her hair fell over her eyes. I didn’t want anything to trouble her. Without thinking, my hand reached out and

my fingers gently smoothed her hair away from her face.

Whatever thoughts or feelings she was having, they seemed to float away as she caught herself staring back at me. Her eyes darted around the floor, she took a step back and laughed nervously.

Now we were both embarrassed.

I could see a vein pulsing in her throat. She always wore a gold crucifix that hung around her neck on a thin gold chain. The chain looked cheap and the crucifix old and slightly tarnished at the base. I always thought it had been a gift from someone special. She wore it every day. I didn’t know who had given it to

her, or why. I wanted to know. I wanted to know every little personal thing about her. Every detail.

Fear held me back. I knew there was a line that I shouldn’t cross. No matter how much I wanted to do it, and no matter how strongly I suspected she wanted

me to step right over that line.

‘Clarence, let’s go for a walk,’ said Harry.

Clarence got up immediately and followed Harry to the door. Before Harry left he said, ‘You should try going on a date.’

I laughed, feeling like a sixteen-year-old kid again. The embarrassment, the sickening nerves.

‘He has to ask me out, first,’ said Harper, shouting though the door at Harry.

I could hear Harry’s laughter in the hallway, and Clarence’s paws on the wooden floor getting fainter as they got closer to the stairs.

‘Hypothetically, if I were to ask you out, would that be a good thing?’ I asked, trying to smile through the nerves turning my stomach to jelly.

‘It depends,’ said Harper. ‘You’d have to make an effort. My dad bought flowers once in his life – when he asked my mom out on their first date. He wasn’t the romantic type, so he must have really been in love. My mom talked

about that bunch of flowers a lot. It didn’t matter that they were cheap roses from the gas station. It was the thought that counted.’

‘I’ll see what I can do,’ I said.

TWENTY-ONE

KATE

The morning of the polygraph test, Kate sat outside the examiner’s office on a steel chair and wished with all her heart she could disappear into a hole where no one could find her. Her left hand wouldn’t stop shaking, so she tucked it behind her knee.