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“Why?” Delgado asked Betty when the waitress was gone. “Why do you want to give up Bailey Stone?” It sounded too good to be true. His experience told him that meant it usually was.
Betty shook her head. “He found out my secret identity,” she said with a twist of her mouth that was not quite a smile.
“Is that so bad?”
Betty snorted. “Yeah, terrible,” she said. “Listen, I got to stay anonymous, if you know what I mean? People want to contact me, I got a PO box and a fake name.” She shrugged. “Anonymous. It’s all I got for protection. Bailey Stone found my name. He found me.”
“You said you changed your name.”
She waved that off like it was a pesky fly. “So he’ll find it again,” she said. “And I got to change again. That’s who he is, you know that. So . . .” She shrugged. “He’s gotta go. Or else I’m outa business, which means maybe dead.”
Delgado just kept looking at her. In part, he was trying to get a read on her and whether he could believe her. But he also knew that just looking, silently, tended to make people nervous, and nervous people often said things they wouldn’t otherwise.
But Betty just looked back. So eventually, Delgado said, “If you know Stone, you know what might happen to you if he finds out you dropped the dime on him.”
Betty nodded. “So let’s make sure he don’t find out,” she said.
He raised an eyebrow. “Are you asking for witness protection?”
She snorted with amusement. “Shit, no,” she said. “Bailey Stone would pop that bubble in like two seconds. I can do a whole lot better on my own.”
Delgado nodded. She was probably right, which was one indication that she was telling the truth. Someone who did the work she was claiming would know that witness protection was no guarantee of safety, not against a dedicated professional with deep pockets. Himself, he had no illusions about the security of witness protection. Bailey Stone was completely ruthless and had vast resources. He would find Betty, no matter where they stashed her. Witness protection was only protection against conventional threats. For Bailey Stone, it would barely be a challenge.
“All right,” he said. “How are you going to give me Bailey Stone?”
She smiled. “That’s the beauty part,” she said. “That’s why I came to you.”
He stared at her without expression. What she said could mean anything, and consequently it meant nothing. “Why?” he said flatly.
“Because,” she said. “The way you get Bailey Stone is, first you get Riley Wolfe. And I fucking know how bad Special Agent Frank Delgado wants Riley Wolfe.”
“Who told you that?”
Her smile got bigger. “Riley Wolfe,” she said.
Delgado blinked. For him, it was a huge display of emotion. “What’s your connection to Riley Wolfe?” he asked.
“Same goddamn thing,” she said. “He got the drop on me because he’s working for Bailey Stone, and now he’s got me by the short and curlies. I want him off the board, too, so’s I can get back to making a living.” She leaned across the table. “I can give him to you, Agent Delgado. I can give you the both of ’em.”
Delgado’s expression didn’t change, but he forgot to breathe for a minute. He remembered when he saw the expression on Betty’s face, a kind of amused pity. He took a breath. “All right,” he said. “How do I get to Riley Wolfe?”
She shook her head. “Nuh-uh. Not so fast. I give you this, I walk outa here. No strings, no tricks—I leave, and you let me.”
Delgado studied her. “Why do I trust you?”
“You don’t,” she said, and then she shrugged. “You’d be stupid to trust me. But what are you risking?”
“I’m letting a criminal walk away,” he said.
She laughed, a single snort of amusement. “Get the fuck outa here,” she said. “You gotta do better than that. Look at what I’m risking. You don’t believe me, I’m in the crowbar hotel. Stone finds out I’m doing this—or Riley Wolfe finds out—the slammer starts to look good. My ass is on the line big-time, sport,” she said. She leaned in and looked very serious. “And against that—if I’m playing straight, you get the two major bad guys you want most in the world. I’m a fucking jaywalker compared to those two guys.”
“No,” he said. “I have to know it’s legit before I let you walk.”
“So we check it right here, at this table,” she said.
“How?”
“You got a phone?” she said, spreading her hands to show she thought it was a stupid question.
