Page 92 of Chameleon Killer

Flint bit off a swear word before grinding out, “That isn’t the point.”

“Of course it isn’t,” I said with a shrug. “He either expects the FBI to take it before I can read it, which means it has nothing.”

Head tilted back, he exhaled a long ragged breath. “I am going to regret asking this, what is the or? You said either, so what is the or?”

“Or he knew I would see it first and what’s in here is something they will never tell me.”

He just stared. “You don’t know that.”

“And I won’t until I open it and see what it is. Maybe it’s not from him at all. In its own way, that envelope is Schrödinger’s clue and it was sent to me.”

Flint’s frustration flickered through the control he usually wore so well. “I’m starting to get what Brewster meant when he said the Auditor was manipulating me.”

I refused to be insulted. “I was aware of what he meant before now.” Petty? Maybe just a little.

Blocking me again, Flint caught my wrist once more. “He gives you something no one else has, and you feel like you have to protect the information and him giving it to you so you can protect the story.”

“This is the story.” The Auditor reaching out to me was very much the story and it would play out whether I opened the envelope or not. I would not let the FBI scoop me or shut me out.

“It’s also evidence.”

“Both can be true.” Throwing his own words back in his face was not particularly kind of me. That they were his words registered in his cool eyes. Recognizing them didn’t make him like them anymore than I had.

But he did release me. I didn’t look away from him as I pulled the envelope out in one gloved hand and used a finger to slip beneath the flap. The adhesive released without even a suggestion of resistance.

With care, I opened it to look inside. There was a single sheet of paper and a black plastic access card with no identifying marks. We both studied the card for a moment. It was shiny and almost mirror smooth. No smudges. Didn’t mean there weren’t fingerprints, but they weren’t obvious if they were.

Also, I really couldn’t imagine him planning everything else so meticulously and screwing up now. When I unfolded the paper, I scanned the page.

The message contained four lines.

You asked the wrong man about Guy Reardon.

My heartbeat stumbled.

Flint read over my shoulder.

The second line was an address.

The third was a time.

Midnight the following night.

The fourth line contained three words.

We should talk.

Flint took the page from my hand. “No.”

I looked at him. “That was fast.”

“You’re not going.”

“I haven’t said I am.”

“You decided before you even finished reading.”

He wasn’t wrong, but I refused to admit it. Instead, I took the page back and studied the address. When I sat at my desk and entered the address into the browser, I studied the location.