Part Two
Tuesday

Exodus 33:20

And [The Lord] said, Thou canst not see my face; for man shall not see me and live.

 

If this is typical, then Colorado summer mornings are amazing: dry, crisp and cloudless. Sky is a robin’s-egg blue. I guess most Coloradans would prefer storm clouds—water is apparently outrageously expensive now because of the drought—but the fresh morning has me upbeat and optimistic as Courtney and I walk to Mindy’s guesthouse.

Maybe this could all go smoothly.

Courtney made a pathetic effort to clean himself up before breakfast, and he looks all the worse for his failed attempt: His polo shirt is half-ironed, he missed a big spot shaving his chin, and the left corner of his mouth is blemished by a white splotch of dried toothpaste.

“So what about Rico? Did you read your half?” he asks.

“Yeah. I mean, skimmed a lot obviously, but I got the idea.”

“And?”

“I don’t think we’re dealing with a criminal mastermind here. I mean, the guy worked at a processing center for junkies for ten years without a promotion. The best I can tell, Sampson mainly hired him because he’s huge, and didn’t ask too many questions. I figure he saw the same Sampson we did yesterday, realized how desperate he’d be to get the books back and took advantage.”

Courtney frowns.

“But he’s patient.”

I snort. The highest praise Courtney can give someone is calling them “patient” or “thoughtful.”

“There’s a fine line between patient and stubborn,” I say. “Wouldn’t take a penny less than forty. But guess it’s about to pay off.”

With five pages left in the Rico file I’d slipped into a series of horrible dreams: rabid dogs lunging for my throat, angelic faces crying tears of blood, a man who had an extra pair of limbs that he used to climb up walls. But out here in the sunny yard, surrounded by an Edenic scene of grass, flowers and topiaries, the images feel distant and silly.

In fact, it’s not hard to imagine that all the unpleasantness of yesterday was an overreaction. For instance, it sure seems likely that Sampson’s missing Erector Set was some sort of optical illusion or a bad dream, because as he greets us outside the guesthouse door, shakes my hand firmly, locks his eyes onto mine, grins and asks how I slept, I find it near impossible to picture that awful stump. He looks composed, confident and healthy—in short, like a United States Senator.

Sampson then takes Courtney’s hand and gives him a hearty smack on the shoulder.

“Ready to see some action?” he teases, a far cry from the desperation he showed yesterday.

Courtney smiles weakly and manages something resembling a yes.

“Then let’s get to it.”

It’s immediately obvious that the guesthouse is solely Mindy’s domain. The cottage is packed with books. Like her strands of hair, there seems to have once been an effort to subjugate them, that’s long since been abandoned. Only about half the books are shelved, the rest lie open on the floor or coffee tables, pages dog-eared, some books serving as bookmarks for others. The walls are covered in posters for once-upcoming Phish concerts, and blown-up, framed French cartoons. I wonder if she’s really working as hard as Sampson thinks, or just taking advantage of the room and board. An argument for the latter is a large bong made of green glass sitting in the center of the kitchen table, its prominence suggesting it’s the primary reason for this home and its occupant’s existence. She’s poking at her oatmeal when we walk in, and barely acknowledges us, either lost in thought or just grumpy.

Sampson snatches the bong off the table and puts it in a cupboard.

“For heaven’s sakes,” he says. “Wouldn’t kill you to at least be discreet.”

Mindy just shrugs. She’s wearing pajama bottoms with ducks on them, and a baggy button-down shirt that I’m sure she slept in. Her hair has a little bit of an Einstein thing going on. Yesterday she was wearing a little eyeliner, not today.

“Good morning, Mindy,” says Courtney.

“Oh, hi,” she says. “How did you two sleep?” Her intonation is like she’s asking where we keep the horse tranquilizers, in case this day needs to be put out of its misery. I imagine that she wishes her cheeks weren’t so round and pink; they could give you the mistaken impression that she’s cheery.

“Fine, thanks,” I say.

“Help yourselves to some breakfast,” says Sampson, in a booming voice.

There’s a big fruit arrangement that looks catered, some boxes of cereal and a bottle of rice milk. Courtney eagerly sits down across from Mindy and fills a plate with cantaloupe. Between bites he steals glances at her. When she catches him he squints and pretends to be studying whatever is over her shoulder. She couldn’t care less. Just keeps joylessly shoveling spoonfuls of oats into her mouth, like sustaining herself is a minimum wage job she’d quit in a heartbeat if an alternative presented itself.

Sampson sits down at the head of the table, seems uninterested in the food, just watches us expectantly. I’ve hardly had a chance to start eating when Sampson says: “I have a conference call in a half hour—maybe you fellas could just go ahead and call Rico now?”

“Now?” I say, spearing a cantaloupe chunk. “I kinda figured Courtney and I would talk to you two a bit more about Rico, and take some time to strategize.”

Sampson looks strained.

“I’d prefer if you called now,” he says, his solemn tone conveying that this is more than just a strong preference.

Courtney fidgets in his seat.

“Surely a few hours of planning—” he starts.

“It will be fine,” Sampson says. “Call on speaker, alright?”

Courtney is frowning intensely. But I don’t think Sampson is open to debate on this.

“His number is 303-742-1829,” Sampson says, from memory.

I slide him the phone so he can just enter it himself. He types the numbers with great gravity, like he’s entering a nuclear launch code. When he returns the phone his enormous hand is trembling slightly.

“Okay.” I address the Senator and Mindy. Try to recall my mannerisms from years ago, when I used to regularly instruct grateful clients on details of my MO, mostly just to convince them that I knew what I was doing. “Nobody talks but me. We don’t want to spook him. Make him think we’re with the feds or something. And once we call, we have to be ready to go right away. He used to be a cop. He knows that the longer he gives us, the better our chance of setting up a sting.”

Sampson nods dutifully. I’m sure he’s both nervous and excited, but unlike last night in his office, he’s dignified enough to maintain a solemn air of nonchalance. Mindy keeps mirthlessly swallowing oatmeal, apparently still unwilling to take this whole thing seriously.

“Alright,” sighs Mindy, pushing her now empty bowl away and sitting back in her chair. “Go ahead then.”

“Don’t worry,” Courtney says to Mindy. “We have a lot of experience with this sort of thing.”

“Oh do you now?” she retorts dryly.

I roll my eyes. Watching Courtney talk to women makes me feel like I’m in a National Geographic documentary on failed mating tactics.

“Okay,” I say. “Quiet please.”

I hit call and put the phone in front of me on the tabletop. Nine long rings on speaker. Pulse jumps as someone answers abruptly. Courtney jerks to attention. Sampson is staring intently at the phone, perhaps with loathing at the source of the voice.

“Yes.”

He’s using one of those machines that makes your voice sound like Darth Vader, which immediately strikes me as odd for two reasons: One, does he always answer the phone with that thing? And two, we already know who he is.

“Is this Rico?”

“Yes.”

“Hi Rico,” I say. “My name is Ben Donovan. I’m a private investigator sitting here with Senator Sampson. He’s asked me to contact you on his behalf. And . . . we have the amount you asked for. We would like to set up an exchange.”

Heavy modified breathing.

“Are you with the police?”

“No. I’m a private investigator. I have no affiliation with the police.”

“Forty in bonds?” the voice says quickly.

“Yes.”

Heavier breathing.

“I’ll call back.”

Click as he hangs up.

Sampson wrings his hands.

“What’s going on?” he asks, voice trembling.

I shrug. “Could be anything. Maybe he’s at work and needs to step outside the office.”

“I doubt he has to work these days.” Mindy purses her lips. “The Senator has already paid him what, two million since this whole thing started?”

I jump in my seat as the phone starts ringing. I answer quickly on speaker.

“Hello?”

“Price has gone up.” He’s trying to sound intimidating I think, and the pitch shifter is helping. “Waited too long. Forty-eight now. Two per book.”

Every feature on Sampson’s face falls toward the floor. He goes pale and grips two handfuls of hair. Mindy shakes her head like what did you expect? Courtney is totally focused, staring at the phone, an impartial data processing machine.

I lick my lips.

“I’ll call right back, okay Rico?”

“As you like.”

He hangs up.

Sampson lays his glasses on the table and groans.

“Every time you gave in to him it just emboldened him,” Mindy mutters, ostensibly to herself, but loud enough for all of us to hear. “He knows he can do whatever he likes—”

“Enough.” Sampson writhes in his seat. He’s close to tears again. “I can do forty-eight,” he says softly. “I can get another eight by tomorrow—I know somewhere I can get the money.”

I shift uncomfortably in my chair.

“Listen, Senator, as much as I’d love to get the books back and collect the commission, I’m not sure it’s wise . . .”

“Something is weird,” says Courtney half to himself. “I need to hear him talk more.”

“I’ll do it,” Sampson repeats. “Tell him I can get him the other eight in unregistered stock certificates. They also don’t have the owner’s name on them. They’re nearly as anonymous as bearer bonds.”

I hesitate. Look at Mindy—her eyes are widening, like she’s starting to allow for the possibility of the Senator actually going through with this.

I look at Courtney, who’s deep in thought. “I want to hear him talk more. That voice alternator is removing most of the tells.”

“Call him,” says Sampson, quietly but forcefully. “Tell him I can give him forty-eight by tomorrow. You are working for me. I am telling you to arrange a swap for forty-eight.”

“Okay.” I half laugh nervously. “You’re the boss.”

I hit dial. Rico picks up instantly.

“Yes.”

“Rico?” I say.

“Yes.” The voice sounds surprisingly calm.

“We can get forty-eight by tomorrow. The last eight will be in unregistered stock certificates.”

Long, long pause. I think he’s hung up, but a little scratching says he’s just put his hand over the receiver for a second.

“You have the bonds now?”

“Yes.”

“Lay them out on a table. Cut up the front page of today’s Denver Post and put a piece on top of each bond. Take a high res picture and fax it to the following number: 303-555-4213. If I’m satisfied I’ll call back.”

It takes me a second.

“Fax? We don’t have a fax—”

He hangs up. Mindy scrunches her eyebrows in confusion. Sampson is confounded, terrified, but obviously excited.

Courtney’s eyes are glowing. I can tell he’s secretly thrilled that Rico is proving to be at least a nominally worthy intellectual adversary.

“Why does he want it faxed?” I ask Courtney. “Why the hell can’t we text it to him?”

Courtney shakes his head.

“I really have no idea.”

“Senator, do you have a fax machine?” I ask.

Courtney preempts me.

“There are cell phone apps that let you send faxes. That won’t be a problem.” He turns to Sampson. “The paper is to make sure the picture was taken today, and that we didn’t just Photoshop the bonds in,” he explains, wiggling his tongue inside his mouth with excitement. “I assume you have the Post, Senator?”

Sampson nods, exhales. “Yes. I read it every morning. Rico knows that.”

“Go get the bonds,” orders Courtney, all business. “Frank, find a fax app.”

Sampson runs out of the guesthouse doors. Mindy brings scissors in from the kitchen, and Courtney carefully cuts up the front page of the paper into chunks large enough to be recognizable.

“I’m not sure we should let him do this,” I say.

“Not our place to say,” Courtney says, embroiled in cutting. “He hired us.”

We turn our eyes to Mindy, asking for her tie-breaker vote. She’s on her feet, suddenly alert and on edge, shaking her head and staring at the table, as if in disbelief.

“Of course,” she says softly. “Of course we’ll let him do it. Don’t you two want to get paid?”

Sampson returns with a brown leather suitcase, flushed in the face.

Wordlessly, Courtney snatches the case, unzips it, and pulls out a bond at random to inspect it. It looks like a college diploma. Each one is for a hundred thousand Euros, redeemable only at such and such bank in Switzerland. No ID required.

So . . . there’s 400 sheets of paper in there? Or a bit less, I guess—Euro is what, $1.10?

I clear the fruit and cereal off the table while Courtney covers it in bonds, then find an app to send faxes from the smartphone. Courtney lays flat about thirty of the bonds, and stacks the rest in a pile in the middle. Places a newspaper clipping in the center of each face that’s exposed.

“Take a picture with the phone Frank,” he orders me.

“Good thinking Courtney,” I say.

I was just going to take a mental picture and send it by telepathy.

I take a few photos of the bond-covered table from different angles.

“303-555-4213,” says Courtney.

“I remember,” I lie.

I fax the photos, then set the phone on top of one of the bonds and sit down.

“What do you think fellas?” asks Sampson, face pink. “Is he going to go through with it?”

Mindy bites her thumbnail.

I shrug.

“That’s a hell of lot of money. If he doesn’t call back I’ll be shocked. Courtney, you think we can trace that fax number?”

Courtney smiles.

“He’d have to be pretty stupid to use a listed fax number. I think he’s sharper than that. But I’ll try.”

The phone vibrates. I pick it up.

“Take the one in the lower left hand corner of the table, hold it up to the light and take a close-up of the watermark. Then fax it.”

Rico hangs up.

I pick up the bond and hold it so that the morning sun seeps through it. Snap a few pics and fax them. Set the phone back down and cross my hands on the table. Sampson is breathing fast. Courtney is just frowning, staring at the idle phone, as if trying to intuit the thoughts of the man on the other end. Mindy’s eyes are darting rapidly around the room. She’s having a lot of thoughts that she doesn’t feel like sharing.

Phone rings. Sampson’s eyes go wide. Courtney just frowns. He’s in information gathering mode—his memory of this phone call will be as reliable as a tape recording. He’ll note phrasing, tone, breathing patterns . . .

“Hi Rico,” I say.

A long pause. Then:

“Who are you?” Do I detect a slightly higher tone in his voice? Is he pleased with the picture?

“As I said, my name is Ben Donovan. I was hired by James Sampson to facilitate this exchange. So—do you want to go ahead with this, or you just wasting my time with games?”

Courtney nods slightly in approval of my mild strong-arming. Rico’s response to some light pushback will betray a lot about what’s going through his head. Sampson looks petrified that I’ve just challenged his tormentor, probably worried that I’ve displeased him and he’ll renege.

“Yes. I would like to,” he says. A quick flicker of a grin escapes from Courtney’s face, but he instantly suppresses it, reverting to his default dour frown.

Sampson looks half ecstatic, half mortified at this news. Mindy’s chest is rising and falling rapidly.

“Wonderful,” I say. “Maybe you’d like to meet somewhere public next week once we’ve secured the last eight? A movie theater lobby?”

A sound sort of like a grunt. Long hiss.

“I want to meet today. Today or the price goes up.”

“Rico . . .” I say. “Be reasonable. Nobody can summon eight million dollars on a day’s notice.”

A long pause. Sampson is close to tearing out his hair.

“Tomorrow,” he says.

“Tomorrow?” I say, and look to Sampson, who quickly nods: Yes, I can get it by tomorrow. “Okay. Tomorrow. Where should we meet? Maybe a mall?”

“No . . .” He trails off for a second. “It will be a restaurant in downtown Denver. I’ll tell you the exact one at five. You’ll wear bright yellow raincoats. Bring the money in a pink gym bag.”

“Raincoats?” I ask. “It hasn’t rained here in weeks.”

A modified chuckle. This is a first from Rico.

“I’m aware. Don’t bring weapons. If I see weapons, it’s over.”

“Okay, listen, Rico, I want to tell you in advance there’s going to be three of us alright? Me, my partner, and Mindy—who you know. She’s just coming to make sure you give us the real thing okay?”

A long pause. Sampson wrings his massive hands. Crackly breathing.

“No. Three is too many. One of you and the girl. If I see three of you I’ll burn the books, and send some photos of Sampson to the Denver Post. I have a few that capture some rather unflattering angles.”

The Senator’s left eye twitches.

“We’re not going to try any shit, but there’s going to be three of us.”

I look up at Courtney, who nods in understanding. Having three would be nice, but more important is pushing him slightly—the way he reacts will tell us a lot about his intentions here.

“No. One of you and the girl.”

Sampson spreads his hands, his face like: Give him what he wants!

I await a hand gesture from Courtney to tell me whether to push again. I’m sure he’s already calculating the risks of this operation. He holds up two fingers: Two is okay.

“Fine. Two.”

He hangs up. The four of us stare at the phone for a long silent moment.

“Well,” Courtney finally says. “The good news is I’m pretty sure he’s serious. If you can get the money Senator, I’m quite confident he’ll go through with the swap.”

 

Courtney and I take Sampson’s second car, a Lexus, into downtown Aspen to shop with Sampson’s credit card. We buy canary-yellow raincoats from a sporting goods store (pretty sure this demand of Rico’s is just for humiliation purposes), and a pair of sleek walkie-talkies. We find a flamingo-pink tennis bag at a golf and tennis shop, but Courtney isn’t satisfied with the material.

“It’s too thin,” he says. “I want one with thick fabric, so I can sew in a GPS chip.”

It takes me a second to understand his angle.

“You sly dog!” I smack him on the back. “You want to track down the money for ourselves once we’re done with Sampson?”

He shrugs.

“Might as well keep our options open.”

I grin.

“Now you’re talking.”

We have to leave Aspen to find a suitably robust pink gym bag. And then with our own dwindling supply of cash we buy the items we don’t want Sampson to know about. Rico said no weapons, but everyone says no weapons. There’s no way we’re going to meet with this guy unarmed.

Courtney has permits for New York, Florida and California, which satisfies the fifth store we try. We both get small-frame Smith and Wesson .22 Magnums. They’re a little dainty, and don’t have great range, but are small enough to strap to our ankles or thighs. I also get a half-serrated ceramic hunting knife.

Once that’s over we realize there’s frustratingly little more to prepare for the following evening—especially because we don’t even know the exact place we’re meeting him. Besides, seems likely the first restaurant will just be to scope us out, then he’ll call us and tell us to go somewhere else. That’s what I’d do, anyways.

We come back to the estate in the early evening. Lights are on in Mindy’s guesthouse. Sampson’s Hummer isn’t in the driveway. Guess he’s out getting eight million dollars. Not asking how. Less I know the better. I keep reminding myself his long-term well-being is not my problem—we’ll make this swap and be out of here in two days. Don’t owe Sampson anything once the job is done. If he wants to liquidate some holdings to buy back some crazy ass books, fine.

“Court, come to the guesthouse with me,” I say. “I want to talk to Mindy.”

“Why?” he asks.

“This morning during the phone call with Rico . . .” I shake my head. “She’s not telling us everything.”

I rap on the door of the guesthouse. Nothing, but the lights are on, so I knock hard. Finally she turns the lock and pulls the door in. She stands in the entranceway, very much not inviting us in.

“What?” she asks. She’s a wreck. Eczema-pocked hands jittery like she’s over-caffeinated. Glasses smudged with what might well be peanut butter. Over her shoulder I see her open laptop on her dining room table, and a small forest’s worth of scattered papers.

“We just want to talk,” I say. Courtney opens his mouth, looks apologetic, as if to say well, he wants to talk.

“I don’t have time now,” she says.

“What are you working on?” I ask.

She squints at me like I’m crazy to ask that.

“I said I’m busy. I’m sorry. We can talk tomorrow morning.”

She starts to shut the door, but I catch it with my hand.

“What’s going on with you?” I say. “Do you even want these books back? Have you been in touch with Rico yourself?”

Her face instantly goes pink with rage.

“I’m sorry,” Courtney says. “We didn’t mean—”

“Of course I haven’t been in touch with Rico!” she shrieks, at a pitch that feels like it’s splitting my skull in half. Her shrill cry hangs in the dry air for a moment. Then she narrows her eyes. “Listen, you two have been in town what, two days? You think you have everything figured out?”

“No, of course not,” mumbles Courtney.

“We know Sampson cut off something near and dear to him,” I retort. “If that’s what you’re referring to.”

Her face darkens.

“Yes.” She nods. “And that’s just the beginning. What did I tell you? You two don’t want to get involved in this. And you’re both probably still too stubborn to take my advice, but here it is: Don’t ask any more questions. Just do your job tomorrow and then get as far away from this house as you can. I sure as hell wish someone had told that to me eight years ago.”

Courtney and I stare blankly at her. She takes a step back, and slams the door shut. We stand in the darkness for a moment, then turn and head back to the main house.

“What a peach,” I mutter.

Courtney doesn’t respond.

We enter the main house through the front door. It’s the first time we’ve been in the main body—outside our guest rooms—after the sun’s gone down. Courtney turns on the flashlight on his phone and we probe the glass walls in the foyer for light switches.

“Wait,” I say, after a few fruitless minutes. “Is it possible there just aren’t any lights in here?”

Courtney explores the pink-tinted ceiling—the floor of the second level—with his light.

“You may just be right,” he says.

“Christ,” I say. “Not exactly user friendly.”

In the glow of Courtney’s phone, we make our way to the side stairwell, neither of us particularly enthusiastic about walking down the second-floor hallway again. It takes us about ten minutes to get to our rooms.

I look at Courtney before retreating into my room.

“Do you trust Sampson?” I ask. “Just your gut.”

Courtney hesitates for a moment.

“I do, actually. I believe his desperation, and that he wouldn’t dare risk endangering the swap by not telling us everything.” He pauses. “What do you think about Mindy?” he asks.

I chuckle.

“Well, she just basically admitted that she’s holding out on us. So no, I don’t trust her.”

“No I mean, like, what do you think of her? Like . . .” Courtney clears his throat. “As a woman.”

An involuntary snort escapes my nose.

“Courtney, as your friend, I sincerely urge you to steer clear of that train wreck,” I say. “But more importantly, you need to stay focused. This job should be over tomorrow, then we’re out of here. Keep your feet on the ground.”

“Right, right.” Courtney nods quickly, abashedly. “Of course. Thanks, Frank. Good night.”

Sweet relief as I enter my opaque, illuminated room. Realize I’m too wired to just read and conk out. I’m excited about getting paid, and a new Social Security number.

I pull out the iPhone, and quickly enter Sadie’s number. Don’t allow myself to agonize over it, just grit my teeth and call my daughter for the first time in months. Two rings.

“Hello?”

My heart leaps at the smallness of her voice.

“Hey Sadie. This . . . hey, it’s Dad.”

I wish I didn’t notice the brief silence before she responds.

“Oh. Hey Dad. How are you?”

“I’m great. I mean, fine. But working. Courtney and I, we have another big job. It could be huge for us. I don’t want to get into details but I’m hoping I’ll be able to come visit you at school pretty soon.”

“Oh wow.”

“Yeah! It’s really quite a funny situation, I can’t wait to tell you all about it. But what about you? How are you? How’s school and everything?”

“It’s good. Fine. I’m actually about to crash. Have a big test in the morning, so.”

“Oh, sure sure. But listen, sweetie, really great to hear your voice. I’ll call you back soon, okay?”

“Sure. Sounds good. ’Bye.”

“I love you.”

“You too.”

I drop the phone on the bed. I’m sweating heavily, and breathing so hard I’m practically wheezing.

“Big test in the morning?” “You too?”

Disaster. Total disaster.

To calm down I draw a warm bath and float for about a half hour. Close my eyes and try not to think about that call. Instead run through the call with Rico. The extra eight he demanded.

He probably never meant for this to drag on so long. But once he realized the extent of Sampson’s desperation . . .

I dry myself off and check my watch. Ten at night.

I’m still shaken from that call with Sadie. What if I get my money and identity, fly down to see her and she doesn’t want to see me?

Better sleep before I slip too far down that rabbit hole.

I pop a Benadryl, wash it down with a couple swigs from a twenty-year-old scotch I found in Sampson’s kitchen. If he’s a recovering alcoholic, it’s almost like I’m doing him a favor.

I stare out the window at the tennis court, savoring the feeling of my brain winding down, eyes getting droopy . . .

. . . My eyes snap open. It’s still dark outside. Watch says three twenty in the morning. Don’t know how I’m this wide awake after my Benadryl cocktail. I was having a dream similar to last night’s: A creature with extra limbs scaling a wall, except this time it was Sadie’s head atop that twisted body, horrible extra arms protruding from between its shoulder blades.

I get out of bed and look out the window. I’m as alert as if somebody splashed cold water on my face.

Nearly pitch black; Sampson doesn’t keep any perimeter lights on at night.

There’s a sick kind of feeling in my chest. It’s the sort of queasy discomfort I remember feeling once sitting in the doctor’s examination room, waiting for him to come back and tell me some test results. I turn on the bedside lamp, hoping it will calm me down, but it doesn’t. Forehead damp with sweat. Am I having a panic attack?

That’s when I realize there’s been a sound this whole time. Maybe that’s what woke me up? It’s faint, but undeniable: some kind of smacking sound coming from outside my bedroom door, one crack every thirty seconds or so.

I wouldn’t be much of a detective if I just let this go . . .

I grab the flashlight out of my bag and pad out into the hall barefoot. The sound is much more distinct out here. Coming from inside the house. I rap lightly on Courtney’s door, honestly because I’m a little creeped out. Nothing. Flirt with the idea of really banging on his door, but some primordial part of my brain doesn’t want to make any noise now, in case the sound is a predator—don’t want to rouse its attention.

As soon as I turn my flashlight away from Courtney’s door, to the rest of the house, it’s like someone shined a floodlight on it. The walls magnify the weak beam like mirrors. Quickly I wrap the flashlight in my shirt, putting several layers over the glow until there’s just barely enough for me to see my way.

But there’s another light source. It’s in the wing adjacent to mine, across the yard. I squint. It’s not strong, but it’s there, flickering. I think it’s a candle.

I take a deep breath and start walking. To reach the light source I’ll have to go to the Spine, then turn left into the other wing.

The glass is cool on my feet. I find the transparent floors are less dizzying at night, because you can’t really see so much stuff below you.

The cracking becomes more distinct as I near the Spine. It’s consistent. One every half minute. With each crack I feel a slight reverberation in the glass under my feet. This house is like an echo chamber.

I turn left into the other wing, and look at the glowing disc of light which defines the candle. It’s below my feet, and perhaps fifteen meters in front of me. It’s in the second-floor hallway—the “limb” hallway, and I’m still on the top floor. I find a spiral staircase and delicately feel my way down, until I’m level with the light source. The crack is definitely coming from the source of the light, but I can’t see anything because of the glare on the several panes of glass between us. There’s another sound intermingled with the cracking. A low wail. A kind of ghostly moan.

I switch off the flashlight now. There’s enough light from the candle a few rooms away to make my way forward. I put a hand against the cold glass wall of the hallway to steady myself. The cracking and wailing grow louder. I drop to my stomach so I won’t be seen. Finally, when I’m about a meter away, I can clearly make out the source of the sound.

It’s one of the identical rooms with the blue glass floor, and intricate pipe arrangement hanging from the ceiling. Sampson is on his knees, totally naked, facing away from me. His back is pecked with a hundred red spots. Tiny lacerations. The glass immediately behind him is cloudy with bloody dots. He raises a hand to the ceiling and I see it’s grasping a kind of multi-tailed whip. He flicks his wrist, and the tendrils of the whip smack into his back, opening a host of new wounds, and sending flecks of blood shooting backwards onto the glass wall behind him.

The whole time he’s moaning softly, a mantra. It takes me some time to discern it as: “Sophnot, for my father, my king . . .” And with each flick of his wrist he gasps a number. “twenty-seven, Sophnot, for my father my king, twenty-eight . . .”

I stay flat on my stomach, observing in horror, numbers twenty-seven through thirty-two, and then retreat backwards, get back to my room as quickly as I can and lock the door.

 

I don’t sleep another second that night. Just stare at the ceiling until Courtney timidly knocks on my door a few minutes after nine.

I roll out of bed, pull on an old Dark Side of the Moon T-shirt, and a baggy pair of jeans I treated myself to with Sampson’s card; baggy enough that I can strap the Magnum to my left calf, and the ceramic knife on my right, without attracting attention. I must be wearing last night’s Sampson sighting on my face, because Courtney says:

“You need to stop taking sleeping aids, Frank. It’s not real sleep when you drug yourself.”

Courtney doesn’t look so well rested himself: dark purple bags under his eyes, high forehead more crinkled with worry than usual.

“Someday I hope to talk you into self-medicating. It will really change your life.”

“I always sleep well,” he says. “It’s because of all the greens in my diet. I just stayed up late reviewing the Rico file. Then had to sew the GPS chip in the lining.” He nods to the empty pink bag slung over his shoulder. “Was like a little surgery.”

“I guarantee I had a worse night than you,” I say, image of bloodstained glass suddenly vivid in my mind’s eye. I pull Courtney into the stone-enclosed side stairwell.

“You know what you asked, about trusting Sampson?” I ask him.

His eyes narrow.

“Yes.”

As I describe what I saw the night before, Courtney’s face contorts like he’s sucking on a lime.

“Well,” he sighs, shaking his head. “Unsettling. But is it really that surprising?” he asks. “As you put it, he’s been brainwashed. This just confirms it’s not an act.”

I rub my eyes.

“Guess you’re right. Someday it would be nice to get hired by someone with their head screwed on a little straighter.”

Courtney grins.

“They don’t pay nearly as well.”

In the guesthouse, Sampson is wearing blue slacks, a white button-down and a generic red striped tie. He’s not eating, just sipping on a Diet Pepsi, and his forehead is creased with worry. He looks exhausted, and I wish I didn’t know why.

Across the table from him, Mindy is munching on honeydew, taken from a brand-new fruit plate. Today she’s wearing a red tank top which isn’t doing much to hide the surprisingly dramatic contours of her upper body from the two undersexed private investigators sitting down across the breakfast table from her.

Maybe all this time around de-libidoed Sampson has made her forget the lurid gaze of men. Or maybe she just doesn’t give a shit. She’s perky this morning; seems surprisingly refreshed.

I shoot her a look like I don’t trust you, you know.

She half shrugs, half ignores me.

Courtney and I sit down, and he heaps a bunch of fruit onto a plate for me.

“Morning, Senator,” I say, struggling to meet Sampson’s eyes.

“I have a bunch of meetings today,” says Sampson, as if I’d asked why he’s dressed up. “Might have to fly to DC tomorrow, but hoping I can get out of it.”

Yeah, that back’s not gonna self-flagellate itself . . .

I take a few bites of slimy mango before I realize Sampson is staring at me.

“So,” he asks. “Leaving soon? Denver is a three-hour drive, but there can be traffic.”

Jesus. This guy . . .

“You think I could get some coffee?” I ask. “I don’t think you want me handling forty-eight million dollars before I have coffee.”

“Of course, of course,” Sampson says, and shoots up from his stool. “Apologies. I don’t drink coffee anymore. Anything in particular? We have a Nespresso in here—does that work?”

“Doesn’t matter. Just defibrillate me.”

Sampson walks briskly into the adjacent kitchen.

“Finish all your ‘work’ Mindy?” I ask.

“I did, thank you for asking.”

Courtney observes Mindy eating for a moment, opens his mouth to speak a few times but nothing comes out. Finally musters a stilted “So how did you sleep. Sleep alright?”

Mindy frowns in confusion.

“Sure,” she replies.

“Good,” says Courtney mechanically. “Me too.”

Watching Courtney trying to act smooth is making me physically uncomfortable.

“Alright then,” she says. “So we all slept well.”

Sampson storms back into the dining room and plops what looks like a quadruple espresso in front of me. Bless his heart.

“So you got the eight million?” I ask Sampson, after slurping down my first dose. He nods almost imperceptibly. “And . . .” I eye him dubiously. “You definitely still want to go through with this.”

“Yes,” he says.

Courtney’s skinny hands coil into tight fists. Mindy appears to have expected this.

“You’re the boss,” I say.

“And make sure you do whatever he tells you.” Sampson is slightly frantic. “Whatever it takes. Maybe get going now? There can be accidents on the highway you know.”

With a mouthful of pineapple, Courtney says: “Ten minutes to eat.”

“Of course.”

I take a bite of fruit. “Sometimes, Senator, pushing back is the best way to make sure the deal goes through,” I say. “Make him scared that we’ll back out.”

Sampson takes a desperate gulp of soda.

“Don’t do that,” he says.

While we fill up on fruits and berries, he cracks open a second Pepsi, takes off his glasses and rubs them with his napkin. Checks his watch every ten seconds. When he can take it no more he pulls the leather suitcase containing the bonds up and plunks it on the table. While we’re still eating, he hurriedly pulls the papers out and crams them into the pink duffel bag. “That’s it. Forty in bonds plus eight from yesterday.”

His hands are shaking. Eyeballs pulsing like I’ve seen before with meth heads. Checks his watch again. “Yeah, you three should really get a move on.”

Content, I wipe my lips with a napkin and say “Okay. Let’s hit the road.”

Courtney stands up off his stool and stretches for the ceiling. Mindy wolfs down another few strawberries. Her sudden zen is disquieting, calm before the storm vibes.

“Fellas.” Sampson stands up with us, looks at us seriously through his round glasses. His eyes are pleading. Then he approaches us and lays one massive hand on my head, one on Courtney’s.

Sampson closes his eyes and says aloud: “May the God who blessed Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Mohammed, Jesus Christ and the latter day saint, my teacher Sophnot, bless these men on their holy mission.”

Heads stooped, Courtney and I exchange a quick glance of discomfort. The name of his tutor immediately evokes the image of him last night.

“Guide them and protect them. Grant them the wisdom to discern between good and evil, and guide their hands to slay evil where it lies. Let them return to me with the holy writings of Sophnot, so they, with me, may dwell in the peace of his wisdom all the days of their lives. Amen.”

Courtney and I both mumble an obligatory amen. I turn and lock eyes with Mindy for a second; hard to get a good read on what she thinks of all this nonsense.

And then Sampson removes his hands from our heads and motions to the door. He’s near tears.

“Please bring them back to me,” he gasps.

We nod silently. I sling the pink bag over my shoulder. It’s heavy. Fifteen or twenty pounds’ worth of very dense paper.

We leave the guesthouse and climb into the Humvee. Courtney hops into the front passenger seat. I get in the back next to enough money to make God jealous. As we pull out of the estate, Sampson watches from the front porch like an abandoned puppy. It’s a relief to get away from him.

“That was sure a beautiful, um, blessing by the Senator, eh?” I say to Mindy, keeping sarcasm levels vague.

“Mmhmm,” she replies and reaches for the radio. Rather terrifying to watch her momentarily steer this tank down the mountainside one-handed. Some shitty country music comes on. A woman crooning about love lost.

I start dozing off, but come to about twenty-five minutes into our drive. The car is stopped. Mindy has pulled over at a rest stop and turned off the ignition.

“Let’s talk,” says Mindy.

“Shouldn’t we talk while we drive to Denver?” I ask.

“We have at least an extra hour,” Mindy says. Then looks seriously at me and then at Courtney.

“Well,” she says. “If you were planning on taking the money and skipping town, you might as well do it now, yeah?”

Courtney looks horrified at the insinuation.

“Mindy, we would never—”

She holds up a thin hand to stop him.

“You don’t have to play this game. You want it, you can fucking well take it. I obviously can’t stop you.”

Courtney looks back at me, fear in his eyes, like he’s worried I’m going to take her up on the offer and he’s going to have to question all the trust he’s ever put in me.

“Tempting,” I say. “But honestly, the money isn’t of much use to me without that new identity and a clean record. And I’m fairly sure Sampson has enough resources to hunt us down pretty quickly.”

“Okay.” Mindy closes her eyes for a second, chews on one of her knuckles. “Well then, you need to understand these books—”

“They’re not written in English are they?” Courtney interrupts. “You’re trying to translate them! Aren’t you? What is it, some kind of ancient Egyptian? Is it like a new New Testament?”

Mindy looks at him for a moment. I think she’s impressed with him. I’m weirdly proud of my partner for intuiting what—based on her tense shoulder—is close to the truth.

She rubs a hand through her speckled brown hair. When she speaks her voice is strained.

“Let me explain, because it appears this may actually happen.” She takes a deep breath. “So, it’s not precisely clear what the books are.” There’s already obvious relief in her voice. A steam valve being released. How frustrating it must be to only be able to speak about her work with an ungenitaled religious nut job. “You’re correct. I’m translating it, from what appears to be a wholly original, largely pictorial language—the characters are closer to drawings than English letters, and to my knowledge, have no sounds associated with them. They are only meant to be read silently.

“Many sections are stories, some original, some from the Old Testament, with minor changes. There are aphorisms, passages that I think are detailed instructions for types of rituals, but I can’t be sure. Can’t be sure about much at all, is the truth. But what I’m definite on is the structure of the books, which is astonishing. There is an order to them, but no beginning and no end. Rather, each book is a sort of commentary on the previous one. So they go in a circle, each commentating on the previous one, until you’re back at the start. If you could read the books perfectly—and I’m nowhere close—you would just dive in at any point and start reading, following the circle around and around again, and each time you’d read a passage the second time you’d have a much deeper insight because of the layers of commentary and explanation that came before . . . It’s a work of almost impossible scholarship. Every page assumes you’ve already read every page prior. The cross-references are mind boggling. I really—what’s most incredible is that in years of study I’ve only scratched the surface. As I said—I’ve extracted certain interesting pieces, but still have no real concept of what the work—as a whole—entails.”

Courtney quickly looks at me in the backseat, eyes wide. He loves this shit.

I look back at him like: Don’t just believe everything she says.

“So, maybe I just don’t get it,” I say. “But if I understand what you’re saying, you don’t even know the language these books are written in. So are you sure it’s not just really intricate nonsense? And that’s why it’s so hard to understand?”

“No,” she says, perhaps more vehemently than she intended. “It’s definitely a language of sorts. And I know enough that I can extract meaning from the books. I’m doing it. It just takes an extremely long time.”

“Why? If you can read it?”

“Because both the content and the language itself are complex. Each character has a meaning that is dependent on context—and so I need to cross-reference tons of other pages to make sure I’m reading it right. Just an example: There’s one pictograph that usually means hunter—but if the symbol for woman is in the same phrase, it means lioness. But after about a year, I realized that if the character which, loosely translated, is an adverb meaning carefully, is within a five-centimeter radius of hunter on the page, that original hunter character is devoid of intrinsic meaning, and only serves as an allusion to a story on page seventy-seven of a different volume.”

Courtney is leaning in so close to her that he’s straining his passenger side seat belt. He’s like an addict who’s just had his first hit. He just wants to open his brain and let her pour all the facts in.

“The language they are written in is, unbelievably, far more rich even than present-day English,” Mindy continues, “which shouldn’t be possible. Nearly all linguists agree that complete, functional languages can only be formed organically, developing to accommodate the needs of a culture over the spans of hundreds or thousands of years. If this was written by a single person over the span of a few decades—the implications are staggering. Do you follow?”

Courtney nods slowly, practically drooling.

“I guess,” I lie.

“The bottom line is, they need to be studied. I have dedicated my life to the study of language, and finding these books is the equivalent of a poet stumbling upon the previously unpublished collected works of Shakespeare. It’s not about personal glory. It’s about potentially understanding the origins of language, and humanity. Which is why we can’t bring them back to James.”

I furrow my brow.

“Why?”

She hesitates for a moment.

“What do you think will happen once James gets the books back?”

I scratch my neck.

“He’ll bring them to Oliver Vicks in prison.”

“Right. And then they’re lost from me, from the scholarly community, forever.”

“So what are you suggesting, Mindy?” I ask.

“You help me do the swap, and then the three of us will bring the books to one of my connections at a university in London. I spoke to him last night, and believe me, when we show up with these we’ll be very well taken care of.”

Courtney is frowning intensely, a sort of panic in his eyes while his brain works furiously to analyze our situation, given this new information.

“What you’re proposing, Mindy,” I say, “is, in effect, stealing forty-eight million dollars of merchandise from the man who hired us. Who also happens to be a US Senator.”

“That’s right,” she says.

I shake my head.

“Even if I was willing to screw Sampson over, and even if I thought we had a chance of outrunning him . . . He’s my only chance to get off the Interpol list. I could never come back to the States, and my daughter is here.”

Her almond eyes blaze.

“You’ve been in this two days, Frank,” she says. “Two bloody days. If Sampson had never contacted you two, you’d still be romping around Europe. This is the last seven years of my life. This is so much bigger than—”

“I don’t care,” I say. “Getting these books back to Sampson means I get to see my daughter.”

“Courtney,” she says, exasperated. “Explain to him what I’m saying.”

“I . . .” Courtney swivels his face between us like a captured fly, as spiders approach from opposite directions. “I mean, I suppose you both make a certain amount of sense . . .”

I gape at him.

“Why would you believe a word she says?” I say, voice cracking. “She probably just has another buyer lined up overseas!”

“That doesn’t make any sense! If I wanted the money, I’d suggest taking the massive amount of money beside you in the seat.”

“We’re not stealing these things from a United-States-Fucking-Senator,” I yell, jabbing a finger at her. “You want your made-up language? I’ll make one up for you. Quap. That means turn the fucking car back on.”

Her jaw drops in righteous indignation.

“You buffoon,” she shrieks. “You think you’re qualified to—”

“Quap,” I say. “Quap, quap.”

“Guys, please. Guys—” I realize that Courtney has been attempting to intervene for some time. Finally Mindy and I go quiet. “Please,” he says, eyes wet. “There’s nothing to even argue about yet. We’re counting our eggs. We all agree on the first step, which is retrieving the books from Rico. So can we please cooperate?”

I glare at him. Using the royal goddamn we like a kindergarten teacher. Our eyes are locked. My look saying I can’t believe you’re taking her side.

His clenched lips and pleading eyes respond: Please. We need her help right now.

“Alright Mindy.” The words are physically difficult for me to form. “Let’s get the books back, then figure out what to do with them. Deal?”

She stares me down for a moment, like from across a poker table.

“Fine.”

She starts the car back up, and merges onto a highway with no regard for the flow of traffic.

I rub my eyes wearily. Those sleepless hours from last night are finally hitting me. I lean my head back and try to sleep, but am assailed by images of blood droplets smacking against clear glass . . .

Sophnot. My father, my king.

 

We park outside a Barnes and Noble for a few hours, until we get the message from Rico at exactly five. It’s a prerecorded voice message, with him talking through that filter:

“Trattoria Marcos at six. Sit in a booth and wait. Don’t forget the raincoats.”

We drive to a downtown Denver short-term parking garage, about a three-minute walk from the Trattoria. We have forty-five minutes to spare.

I step out and stretch, fill my lungs with hot, dry air. Then I climb back into the backseat to wait.

“Should we call him back, just to confirm we’re coming?” Mindy asks Courtney.

“This isn’t junior prom,” I say. “No need to make ourselves look desperate.”

Courtney cracks his knuckles one by one. He’s frowning and scanning the rows of parked cars which we, in our Humvee, mostly tower over.

“Are you sure the bonds are real?” he asks, glancing at the duffel bag beside me in the backseat.

“Court, relax,” I say. This always happens. The closer we get to the moment of truth, the more doomsday scenarios start materializing somewhere behind the pale-moon forehead.

“Alright,” Courtney says, taking off his jacket, leaving only a very unassuming plain grey T-shirt draped over his bones. “It’s 5:15. I’m going to go scope the area around the restaurant, then want to sit down at least twenty minutes before you two. See you in there.”

“Review your hand signals,” he says to me. I’m supposed to subtly pass on whatever Rico tells me on the phone.

“I got it, champ.”

“Good luck,” Mindy says, and pats his shoulder. It’s pretty platonic, but Courtney blushes, and because he can’t force himself to respond, quickly opens the passenger side door and slides out. He opens the trunk to get his red acrylic bag full of tools that he never goes into the field without. Contains things like lock picks, latex gloves, binoculars, a makeup kit, colored contacts, and sunglasses. Then he slams the trunk closed and Mindy and I watch his hunched shoulders and tiny ass recede into the labyrinth of parked cars.

As soon as Courtney leaves a near-palpable tension descends on us. He was the buffer between us, and now her proposed grand larceny is back front and center.

I can hear her breathing from the backseat, and her small shoulders are tense under her tank top. She’s nervous.

We need to be on the same page when we go to meet Rico.

“Maybe I overreacted back there,” I say. “Sorry. I’m exhausted.”

She responds with a sound like mmm—the bare minimum expenditure of air to acknowledge that I spoke. What a ray of sunshine.

“What’s Rico like?” I push. “Did you two get along?”

This at least elicits a response.

“That’s like asking if I was friends with a brick wall,” she says.

“What do you mean?”

She cranes her head to the side to crack her neck, but doesn’t turn around to face me.

“We didn’t have much to talk about. He’s a meathead. Frankly, even this whole scheme surprises me. I never thought he had ambitions beyond watching American Football and doing push-ups.”

How is Courtney attracted to this crabby woman?

“Gotcha.”

A few minutes of silence. I’m a little worried about Courtney, but probably shouldn’t be. In my experience, he just doesn’t commit mental errors in the heat of battle. Especially when he doesn’t have to talk to anyone. For probably the twentieth time since getting in the car, I check that my knife and Magnum are still strapped around my ankles. Mindy checks her watch for the fiftieth time since we parked. She can’t stop fidgeting.

“So . . . you’ve been working from photocopies since the books were stolen?” I ask.

“No,” she answers immediately. She likes talking about the books. “All I have are about twenty pages I meticulously hand-copied. It can’t be photocopied.”

“You mean Sampson wouldn’t let you?”

“No, no. It quite literally cannot be photocopied faithfully. It’s written partially in shades of near-white ink which are visible only from certain angles. Some backgrounds are filled in with tight multicolored patterns. It’s a technique called prismatic coloring, which makes documents difficult to forge. When a machine tries to photocopy them it blotches the shapes and colors. It’s used when printing things like passports or driver’s licenses, but to my knowledge these books are the only known example of such a sample being produced by hand. Of course, my hand copies aren’t perfect, but they’re good enough to try to decipher.”

“So,” I say, “how do you account for one guy, a guy in prison no less, being able to create something like this? In a made-up language? He’s just some kind of freak uber-genius?”

Mindy rubs a hand through her hair, rustling up the scent of lemony shampoo.

“I’ve given a lot of thought to it, and my personal belief isn’t totally scientific. Essentially, it can’t have been written by just him. The sheer scale is simply inconceivable. The layers of even a single page are like an hour-long orchestral score. And the language itself—as I explained most linguist theorists agree that even a team of a hundred academics, working for a hundred years, wouldn’t be able to compose a language as wholly original as this.”

“So—he must have some pretty brilliant colleagues in Saddleback Correctional Facility, eh?”

Mindy is silent.

I prod: “I suppose Sampson would say that it all came from a higher power or something.”

Mindy doesn’t respond.

“Do you believe that?” I ask. After a long pause she says:

“Let’s just say, I haven’t ruled it out.” Mindy finally turns around to look at me with suddenly soft brown eyes. “I suppose you think that makes me a fool?”

“Actually no,” I sigh. “I kinda get it.”

She narrows her eyes, surprised.

“Oh?”

“Yeah.” I shift in my seat. “Courtney and I had a case together. About five years ago. Made me reconsider some of these things myself.”

She raises an eyebrow.

“What happened?”

I bite my lower lip. Would certainly like to get some of that off my chest. But I should probably wait for a conversational partner who’s bound by doctor/patient confidentiality.

“Some other time. We have to go,” I say.

We put on our yellow raincoats, lock up the Humvee and proceed out of the garage. We’re in what seems to be an upscale shopping/touristy district. Light foot traffic—although ever since I left New York five years ago, anything less than a total mob on the pavement feels light.

I use the phone to guide us toward the Trattoria, passing retro furniture stores, craft beer pubs, Starbucks. Almost everyone is white. Most of the men have facial hair. The women don’t wear heels. A lot of people are smoking pot in the street.

The pink duffel packed with money is strapped over my shoulder. I grip it like it’s a small child, not wanting to even think about scenarios where we get mugged.

The air is hot and dry on my tongue, and I’m already sweating inside my raincoat. Just a few blocks away from the restaurant, I pull the photo of Rico that Sampson provided from my pocket and refresh my memory for a few seconds.

“I’ll recognize him,” says Mindy.

I glare at her.

“Let me do my job,” I say.

She seems to consider a retort, but swallows it.

I’d underestimated how visible the pink bag and yellow raincoats would be, and I’m definitely feeling exposed. If Rico has a pal here reconnoitering, we’ve been spotted already. I grip the duffel tighter to my chest.Six minutes till we’re supposed to meet, and nothing else from Rico. Guess that means we’re on for the Trattoria.

My adrenaline finally fires up. I’m nervous. Haven’t done anything like this for five years.

“Make sure you don’t give him the money until you have the books,” she says.

“Wow. Good thing we have a PhD here.”

She wrings her eczema-pocked hands.

“I’m just saying, don’t fuck this up.”

“I’m not trying to be an ass,” I say in a low voice. “But please stay out of my way and let me do this. That’s what I was hired for. All you have to do is tell me if they’re the real books. That’s your only job. Don’t say anything to him.”

She mutters something unintelligible under her breath. She’s breathing fast, and trying hard to hide her anxiety.

We turn onto the busy outdoor mall that contains the Trattoria. I hug the bag to my chest as we navigate past shoppers and families. Two kids with ice cream all over their faces sit on benches and cry, a street performer plays guitar, singing so softly that he’s nearly inaudible.

Trattoria de Marcos is nestled between a trendy bookstore and an expensive-looking macaron boutique. The Trattoria has a green awning and well-groomed waitstaff. A family of four is eating outside, and that’s it. Not dinnertime yet.

I can’t decide whether I want more people around or fewer . . . depends how likely Rico is to just whip out a gun in broad daylight, I suppose. We approach the maître d’, a young man with greasy hair.

“Two for inside, please,” I say, and try to smile.

“This way,” he says. Leads us into an interior kept dark by heavily stained windows. “Booth or table?” he asks.

“Booth,” I say, quickly scanning our surroundings. There’s an elderly couple silently picking at what looks like tiramisu; a pair of blonde girls speaking what I think is Dutch and looking at a street map; a family comprised of two parents, an infant and toddler sharing a pizza; and Courtney, with an untouched espresso, absorbed with a crossword. I don’t think he’s going to sound any alarm bells with Rico.

Maître d’ leaves and a high-school-aged girl approaches our booth and brings us water glasses.

“You can still order off our lunch menu,” she explains, as Mindy and I sit down across from each other. “Dinner doesn’t start until six. Would you like to hear our specials?”

“No,” Mindy snaps.

“You sure? We have a great duck lasagna—”

“No, we’re fine,” says Mindy, gripping a handful of hair and pulling so hard that her eyes tear up.

The waitress takes a step back.

“So,” she says weakly. “Anything to drink to besides the water?”

“We’ll just take a moment with the menus,” I say. “Sorry about my girlfriend. She’s hungry, but also just a generally unpleasant person.”

The waitress smiles uncomfortably, then rushes away. Mindy’s hands are shaking.

“It’s okay,” I say. “Take deep breaths. Have some water.”

She’s shaking so badly she struggles to bring the cup to her lips.

I check my phone. It’s three minutes after six and no missed calls. Mindy unzips the chest of her yellow slicker to let herself get some air.

“Are these really necessary?” she asks, looking around the restaurant. “He’s not bloody here. I know what he looks like.”

“He could have a pal here doing reconnaissance. We want to look cooperative.”

Mindy peers at me over the top of her black rims like I’m an idiot, then makes a show of looking around at our fellow diners.

A different waiter comes to our table and tops off our ice water, glances at our yellow coats, but doesn’t comment. I stare at the phone, unsure if I’m hoping it rings or not. Three minutes pass. I’m just starting to feel that this has been nothing but an exercise in humiliation, when the phone buzzes. Not a call, a text. From a different number.

aquarium. Come str8 here. Confrm.

I show it to Mindy.

“There’s an aquarium in Denver?” I ask.

“One of the biggest in the country,” she says. “About a seven-minute walk away.”

I’ll be there right away.

I shoot to my feet and make a quick hand gesture on my cheek for Courtney: Second location. I’ll call him in a few minutes and he’ll follow. He’s probably being paranoid, I could probably just show him the text. But once in a while, Courtney’s paranoia turns out to be founded.

The maître d’ tries to ask what’s wrong, as I brush past him.

“You know where the aquarium is?” I ask Mindy, outside the restaurant.

In response, she just leads the way. We cross the walking mall, turn right onto a street that’s busy, but in a quaint flyover state kind of way. I keep the pink bag squeezed into my armpit. Mindy chews on an already badly mauled thumbnail as we walk.

“It will be fine,” I say.

She doesn’t respond.

I check the phone. No new calls or texts. I badly want to reach down to touch my weapons, but resist. I plug in the earbuds attached to the walkie-talkie in my pocket and buzz him.

“Court, we’re headed to the aquarium.”

“Okay. I’m a few minutes behind,” he says.

We rush across the street, take a left, and what must be the aquarium comes into view. It’s a giant building the size of an enclosed sports stadium. Denver Ocean Journey, proclaims enormous lettering. We stride across acres of parking lot. I’m sweating heavily from the baking sun on my raincoat. We’re in serious field trip territory here—a fleet of yellow school buses is clustered near the front entrance. Little kids in double-file buddy-system being led in and out of the hive by exasperated, hoarse teachers. There’s an all-American eatery clumped onto the complex, and pasty families in baseball hats are enthusiastically streaming from the aquarium exit into the restaurant.

The line to buy tickets isn’t too long; probably because it’s already late in the day. I buy us two all-access passes with Sampson’s credit card, which come in the form of orange paper bracelets. Then I grab Mindy’s arm and pull her behind me through the entrance.

Shit.

There’s security.

Probably why Rico picked this place. Let someone else make sure we’re unarmed.

We’ll have to put the bag through a conveyor belt x-ray machine, and also step through a metal detector.

“Go ahead and wait for me,” I instruct Mindy. “Take the bag as soon as it comes out of the machine.”

I watch her walk through the metal detector without issue.

I fight the tide of kids and tourists back to the front entrance, and step back outside. Pretend to tie my shoe and pull my Magnum out of my ankle holster, then drop it in a blue recycling bin near the entrance. I buzz Courtney.

“There’s security,” I say. “Maybe I could get the gun in, but don’t want to risk it.”

“Crap.”

“I dropped it in the blue bin next to the entrance. Don’t come in. Stay outside with the guns. You can listen in. If anything goes bad you can catch them on the way out.”

“I don’t like that.”

“I’ll still have my knife. That’s why you get ceramic. And we have the tracer in the bag. How far away are you?”

“I’m across the parking lot. Don’t want to get too close to you.”

“I’m going.”

I rejoin the steady flow of eager fish-watchers inching their way forward. Mindy is on the other side of the x-ray machine waiting for the bag. I wave to her to make sure she’s ready, and put the pink bag on the belt. My chest tightens as I let it go. I consider the possibility that this has all been an elaborate ruse by Mindy, and she’s just going to snatch it up and disappear.

I watch the machine attendant’s eyes as the bag glides through. I doubt the bonds will be a problem—just paper—but the tiny GPS tracker might look weird on there.

No issues. Mindy grabs the bag on the other side. I rush through the metal detector to join her. It’s a relief to take the bag back from her.

“What were you doing outside?” she asks.

I pretend I didn’t hear her. Check the phone. A new text:

Come to Otters. Text when ur there.

Ok

I scan our surroundings. Signs indicate different walking paths: You choose to follow the path of a river, and get to see all the wildlife and fish that occupy their ecosystems. Choices are Colorado River, Kampar River, or African and South American freshwater creatures.

“Where are otters from?” I ask Mindy. “Africa?”

“You can’t be serious. God, American schools are terrible,” she says, and points to the Colorado River path. We enter into a narrow hallway. Walls and the arched ceiling are all glass, behind which swim what I guess are Colorado fish immersed in grainy, yellow river water: something that looks like bass, maybe a salmon? Walking through a parted sea. The water that surrounds us is not still, rushes like a river, sweeping the googly-eyed creatures first up over our heads, then back down. Kids have their palms and faces pressed hard against the glass.

Air is damp and smells like seaweed. The stone under our shoes is slippery, and I nearly stumble as Mindy and I wind our way through the aqua-tunnel. We rush past an animal-free exhibit that illustrates the phenomenon of flash floods—a huge spout of white water gushes into a rocky crevice and fills it in an instant.

An interactive station where you can actually touch real crabs . . .

Can’t believe that’s a draw.

And finally, the otters. Their habitat is amphibious: half rocky shore on which to flop around on their leathery stomachs, half yellow-colored pool. It’s structured so you can watch the otters both while they’re on land, and while they’re swimming around; they’re infinitely more graceful when they’re underwater. I look around, probing the crowd for Rico. There are only around thirty in this otter-viewing space, and he’s tall enough that he should stick out. I think I spot him from behind for an instant—recognize the buzzed head—but the guy turns around and is about seventeen. I pretend to tie my shoe again, and this time unstrap my sheathed ceramic knife. Tuck it next to my butt, under the elastic band of my decaying jockey shorts, then pull the back of my shirt over it.

I pull out the phone. Nothing new.

We’re at the otters

My stomach clenches, waiting for a response. It comes quickly.

Trn around and come through ylw tape.

“What did he say?” asks Mindy. I ignore her, and search for yellow tape. It takes me a moment to realize what he’s talking about. There’s another hallway that branches off the otter exhibit, but is cordoned off with yellow “under construction” tape.

To buy thirty seconds, I text back:

What tape?

Then plug my headphones into the walkie-talkie in my pocket and buzz Courtney.

“Meeting him now. I’ll keep the walkie on so you can hear what’s going on.”

Courtney’s voice is solemn:

“Make sure you don’t go anywhere private, Frank.”

My phone buzzes.

Yelow tape across frm otters

I approach the temporary plaque beside the taped-up entranceway explaining come fall, this will be a beaver sanctuary. Behind the tape is a narrow, cavelike tunnel.

I call Rico.

“Where are you?” he answers instantly. It’s the first time I’ve heard his voice unfiltered. It’s strained, desperate.

“I’m not going in that tunnel,” I say. Beside me Mindy gapes in disbelief. “The whole point was to meet somewhere public. We’ll be next to the otters. You have five minutes to come out and meet us, or else we’re leaving.”

I hang up before he can reply.

Mindy is staring at me, flushed from exertion and nerves.

“What the fuck are you doing?”

“He wants this deal to happen as much as we do,” I say. “He’s the one getting forty-eight million. He’ll come out.”

I lead Mindy to a bench beside the otter exhibit. A gaggle of ten-year-old kids laugh as one of the animals flops around on his stomach. The glass doesn’t extend to the ceiling, so we can clearly hear them barking and splashing. Bright red signs dissuade aquarium-goers from tossing food or anything else over the wall, threaten violators with prosecution.

“What if he doesn’t come?” Mindy mutters. “Sampson will not be happy.”

“Then we’ll pick a different location for tomorrow. Sometimes it happens like that.”

It’s pretty crowded in here. I scan the faces around us for Rico, squeezing the pink duffel against my side. Mostly kindergarten age kids, here on field trips. Tourist families, quickly snapping pics of the exhibit then moving on, as if their role here is strictly documentary.

There are self-guided tours, the ones where you rent headphones and follow them through the aquarium. A couple families are doing that. There are also real tours. A group of five men who look like they’re in a Gap commercial—short-sleeve button-downs, khakis—are listening raptly to a college-aged girl explain how smart otters are. Weird choice of corporate team-building activity.

“It’s been four minutes,” Mindy snaps. “Just do what he says.”

I grab her wrist. Rico just poked his head out of the yellow tape, and is looking for us.

“There he is,” I say without taking my eyes off of him. “Just relax. This shouldn’t take long.”

Rico spots us and makes his way through the crowd. He has a green duffel bag slung around his shoulder. He’s wearing a high black turtleneck and winter jacket, despite the weather.

“Oh my god,” Mindy whispers to me. “He looks horrible.”

It’s true. In the photos he had an athletic build. But his once round, steely face is withered and gaunt. His cheeks sag. His legs are terribly skinny, and he’s favoring one knee.

He quickly sits down next to me, and I nearly gag at his odor. It smells like he lives in that coat. Up close I can see he’s so pale that his acne-tinged face has an almost blue pallor.

He’s sick or something.

His eyes are glazed over like he’s stoned, and he’s blinking fast. Nervous.

“Hi Rico,” Mindy says. “Congrats. You’re getting what you want.”

Rico glances at her for a moment, eyes empty. I’m not sure he recognizes her.

“What I want doesn’t matter,” he says, his voice weak and strained. He unslings the bag quickly and unzips it. “Here, they’re all there.”

He’s holding the bag open, offering them with a weird kind of eagerness.

He wants to get this over with.

Mindy pulls on a pair of latex gloves, removes a penlight from her purse, then reaches over my lap, into the bag and plucks one out.

The book is bound in yellowish leather, which she caresses with a gloved hand as one might a baby’s face. The front is unmarked, although on the back I see some black etchings which roughly approximate a face: two eyes, nostrils, mouth. I look over her shoulder as she opens to the first page.

No letters of any kind. Only lines, pictures, shapes, etchings—pale blue lines and twisted marks of dark red. Some pieces are raised, like Braille—maybe these are the parts that Mindy said couldn’t be copied. After a few seconds of staring I start to get a headache, like I’m at the eye doctor.

“Is it real?” I ask Mindy.

“Of course it’s real,” says Rico. His expression is pained. He’s having a hard time breathing, I think, like that turtleneck is cutting off his air.

“Hold on . . .” Mindy mutters to me. “This looks real but . . . the twenty-four I had, only seven were already bound in leather. And this is bound now, but it’s not one of the seven that was before. If he undid the binding he easily could have removed pages.”

“Did you mess with some of them?” I ask Rico.

He flinches.

“Some . . . were bound,” he replies. “But they’re all there. I’m not trying to trick you,” he pleads. His knees are shaking, like he has to pee. “Now put it back. They belong together.”

“I need to check that each volume is complete and authentic,” she says. “A single removed page would be enough for you to force us to go through all of this again. You know that.”

He holds the bag open, stares at Mindy insistently, as she takes her time turning from page to page, inspecting the twine binding under her penlight, perhaps counting the number of pages as well.

“Rico, don’t you want to check the bonds?” I ask, nodding to the pink duffel under my arm. He’s staring into space, panting heavily.

“Yes, yes.” Rico comes back to earth, coughs into the elbow of his puffy jacket. “Of course.”

I open the pink duffel so Rico can see all the bonds, but don’t let it out of my grip.

“You can reach in and select a few at random,” I say.

Rico gropes around in the bag, and pulls out a few papers. His fingernails are yellow, his hands are peeling and dry. I watch his eyes while he examines the bonds. He feels the weight of the paper, quickly inspects the watermarks on the lower right hand corner.

He’s in a hurry. Something’s wrong.

“Okay, yeah,” he says, putting them back in the pink bag. “Fine, fine. Let’s trade.”

“What? I need to look through all of the books,” says Mindy, pointing to the green bag on Rico’s lap. This suggestion makes him recoil.

“What! They’re all there,” he rasps. “I’m not trying to trick you. Let’s do this and be done.”

“Rico,” I say gently. “We’re giving you forty-eight million dollars. We can’t trade until we know they’re all there. I’ll keep the money right here between us.”

He bites his lip, and looks like he’s about to cry with frustration.

“Of course,” he whimpers.

I take the green bag from him and hand it to Mindy. She eagerly opens it and starts stacking them on the bench. Opening each one and flipping through the pages, really taking her time.

Something catches my eye.

Across the room, someone’s looking at me. It’s one of the Gap guys on the aquarium tour. He’s staring at Mindy with some kind of disgust, as if she’s handling not some books, but an urn containing his grandmother’s ashes. When he notices me looking at him he quickly looks back to the tour guide. In fact, the tour guide is trying to move on to another room, but one of them is keeping her here, pointing at the otters and asking questions.

My stomach clenches. I knew something was off with their outfits. Their shirts should be tucked in. And I’m pretty sure I spot bulges on two of their hips.

“Are those guys with you, Rico?” I ask. “That was not part of the deal.”

He hesitates.

“They’re just checking that everything goes smoothly,” he says.

I swallow and turn slowly to Mindy.

“Mindy,” I whisper in her ear, with as much calm as I can muster. “Put the books back in the bag. We need to swap and get out of here.”

“What do you mean?” Mindy looks at me. “I haven’t gone through them all yet.”

“There’s twenty-four books there, right?” I’m trying to make sure Rico can’t hear me, but the truth is he doesn’t seem interested in our conversation. He’s struggling with his breathing. “That’s good enough for me.”

Mindy shakes her head, whispers back, exasperated. “No, no, no. There’s twenty-four volumes. But like I said, he easily could have pulled a page out.”

“I don’t give a shit about one page.” My voice cracks. “Let’s get the books and leave before these guys lose their patience.”

Her brown eyes widen.

“You don’t understand,” she hisses in my ear. “These aren’t normal books. Each page references hundreds of others. It’s a complete set, and if one piece is missing the whole thing is incomplete. If we were missing a square centimeter of the Mona Lisa, would that be close enough? He already undid the binding on some of these. I have to check.”

“How long do you need?”

“Forty-five minutes,” she says. “At least.”

I take a deep breath. If what she’s saying about one missing page is true, and Rico knows that . . .

Is that why Rico’s trying to rush us? And these guys are here to make sure she doesn’t have enough time to check all of them?

“Put the books back in the bag,” I whisper to Mindy. “We’re going to reschedule for tomorrow. On our terms.”

“No, no.” She shakes her head. “We’re not walking away without the books. I’ll just look them over and confirm—”

I snatch the book she’s holding from her hands and throw it back into the green duffel. Then quickly scoop up the ones on the bench and toss them in as well. The look she gives me has enough venom to kill an elephant.

“What in God’s name are you doing?” she snaps.

“What if you find a missing page?” I say. “You think these guys are just going to apologize for the misunderstanding?”

I turn back to Rico, hand him the bag of books and smile. “I need to go speak to Sampson in private before we finalize the swap,” I say. “Mindy and I will be back in a second.”

Before I can stand up, Rico puts a yellow hand on my knee. He leans in a little closer. I can smell whatever fungal colony is thriving under that coat.

“Don’t stand up, and don’t look at them again,” he whispers. “They’ll kill you if you try to leave with the money.”

My chest constricts and I feel my pulse pound in my neck. Two of the Gap guys are looking at us.

“Don’t be a fool. You have no idea the horrors I’ve seen. They won’t hurt us if this goes smoothly,” he mutters lowly. “Take the books and go, like you’re supposed to.”

My mind races.

“This wasn’t part of the arrangement. You were supposed to come alone.”

He raises his eyebrows in disbelief.

“Do you not understand what’s happening here?”

I don’t like any of this. We need to get the hell out of here with the money and meet again tomorrow, where he doesn’t have armed backup and Mindy won’t be rushed.

“We just need to speak to Sampson,” I say, standing up, squeezing the bag of money like it’s a life preserver. “We’ll be back in a few minutes. Mindy?”

She’s still sitting on the bench. I grab her by the elbow and jerk her to her feet. She doesn’t fight me, but her eyes stay glued to the green bag of books I handed back to Rico.

Rico remains seated. Looks up at us. His voice is bitter, and he’s choking back tears.

“Pray that Sophnot kills us quickly.”

Mindy stiffens. I’d love to ask a follow-up question, but one of the khaki-clad guys leaves the group, starts making his way toward us. I lower my right hand to my waist and grip the hilt of my knife, then tug Mindy briskly toward the walkway that leads to the front entrance. Her body is half-limp, like she’s in shock at what just happened.

We make it only a few steps before the guy steps out to block our path. He’s a bit shorter than me, but with a wrestler’s build. It’s hard to imagine the bulge at his hip, beneath his untucked shirt, being anything other than a gun he slipped past security.

“Something unsatisfactory, friend?” he asks.

“Everything’s fine,” I say. I look over my shoulder. Rico is sitting on the bench with the green bag on his lap, head in his hands. “I just want to speak with my employer for a moment to confirm he wants to go through with this.”

The wrestler smiles strangely.

“Of course he does,” he says. “He’s purchasing something with value beyond measure.”

“Not questioning that.” I try to return the smile, but my adrenaline is through the roof. “Just doing the job I was hired for.”

He reaches out and puts one hand on the pink bag.

“Why don’t you leave this here with me?”

“That doesn’t sound super prudent,” I say. “Excuse us.”

I take a half step away from him. His hand moves to his waist.

My reflexes take over. Whip my sheathed knife from my waist and slam the hilt into his left temple. He drops to one of his knees, dazed. I whack him again hard in the same spot, and this one puts him sprawled flat on the ground. Somebody behind me screams, and suddenly the hundred-odd people viewing the otter exhibit are in bedlam.

“Run!” I order Mindy, pushing her away from me. The other four khaki-clad men shove their way through the chaos toward me. Rico has left his bench, along with the green bag. I catch a flash of him dashing through the once taped up tunnel leading to the beavers. Two of the men in khaki follow him.

I whip out my headphones.

“Courtney, Rico’s wearing a puffy coat and turtleneck. The books are in a green bag. Keep on the perimeter—I think he’s headed for a side exit.”

Mindy is headed for the pathway back toward the main entrance. I take the other, upstream on the Colorado River. Past the otters is some kind of swamp exhibit. A tank that just looks like a neglected swimming pool. Two security guards rush past me toward the otters. I hear someone behind me scream something about a pink bag and yellow raincoat. I don’t slow to look behind me; I’m sure the khaki guys are close.

The Colorado River path winds uphill, spiraling upwards. The bag is really heavy. My legs are screaming as the path opens into a huge circular room with a pit in the center: a penguin exhibit.

I’m almost jerked backwards. Someone behind me got a handful of bag. I stop, whip around and crack the goon’s jaw with my elbow. He stumbles, but doesn’t release his grip until I stomp on his wrist.

The other three burst into the room. One is holding a gun low at his side.

Shit, shit.

Security has now successfully identified me, and the men pursuing me, as the source of the disturbance. But Colorado aquarium guards aren’t really accustomed to action, and the two I spot are just providing color commentary into their walkie-talkies as I scramble across the room. Chest feels like it’s going to explode. Someone screams, “He has a gun!” And the hysteria hits a new pitch. A bunch of people drop to their stomachs. I dash ahead, heading for the walkway opposite where we entered, then stop in my tracks. There’s another khaki-clad guy there, blocking my exit. He’s holding his hand under the fold of his button-up shirt; he also has a gun.

I look over my shoulder. One of the three goons has his pistol raised, trying to get a clear shot on me. The other two also are reaching for guns. Twist back around. The lone gunman just spotted me and is patiently holding his ground, well aware that he’s obstructing my only way out.

I’m at the lip of the penguin pit. About ten feet below, a couple dozen knee-height penguins flop and waddle around, unfazed by the action above.

The shoulder of the guy aiming at me twitches. I see the steely determination in his eyes and realize he’s hesitating only because I’m holding the bag of money against my chest, and he doesn’t want to damage any bonds. He fully intends to kill me.

I suddenly remember Courtney’s foresight: We can track this bag.

I heave it overhead and throw it down into the middle of the penguins. It narrowly misses one of their shallow pools. Smacks down beside one of the birds, who jumps in surprise, and then tenuously approaches the bright pink addition to her habitat.

I lock eyes with the guy who was about to shoot me. He doesn’t seem to find this development amusing. He lowers his gun and the three of them dash to the edge of the exhibit—now totally disinterested in me. All three leap over the edge without hesitation. I hear a scream—a couple broken feet probably—but I’m already shaking out of my raincoat, heading back down the Colorado River toward the front entrance, walking slowly, trying to blend in with the rest of the evacuating crowd.

 

“We had them . . .” Mindy says, for what must be the fiftieth time since the three of us regrouped. We’re on park benches, back on the walking mall. The GPS isn’t working. Courtney is staring rapt at the tracker, as if willing the chip to reveal itself. Mindy sits beside him, the two of them opposite me. I hope this doesn’t symbolize anything.

“I had them in my hands,” she says, growing more unhinged with every repetition. She’s tugging at a clump of her curly hair so hard that I can see a sliver of pale scalp. “Why would you throw the money in the water? Of all the boneheaded—”

“The chip is supposed to be waterproof. I read the user manual,” I lie.

“Water resistant,” mumbles Courtney. “It might just be waterlogged, and will show up once it dries out a bit.”

We spent the last hour combing the streets around the aquarium hoping to spot Rico or the guys in khaki. Nothing. They must have had well planned getaways, and I doubt aquarium security did much to slow them down. Sampson calls again, I hit ignore. Thirty-seven missed calls from him in the last ninety minutes. Each time his name pops up onscreen it’s like a vise clamped around my chest tightens a little bit. Don’t want to even imagine how he’d react to me explaining that not only do we not have the books, but that his forty-eight million dollars hinges on the water resistance of a thumbnail-sized GPS chip.

Forget the passport, he might just turn me in.

“I was holding the books. . .  In my hands,” Mindy says, then shoots me a look that could wither a whole field of daisies. “And you gave them back.”

“There was nothing else to do,” I say, hoping desperately that it’s true. “Rico was trying to rush us. Get us to swap before you checked them all. Like you said, they were tampered with. Why wouldn’t he have taken a few pages out? If you think they were just going to let you sit there for an hour and comb through them until you figured that out . . . The guy was going to shoot me in public!”

“And now you’ve lost both bags,” she says, voice drenched in bile. “Good work.”

“It will dry out,” says Courtney, focused on the GPS tracker. He’s desperately clawing at his cheek, like there’s gold buried under his skin. “I trust this brand. Very durable.”

“It will all be fine,” I tell Mindy, forcing a smile. Not admitting, of course, that if those guys simply decide to transfer the money to a new bag, our plan is pretty cooked. And with every passing moment, my bag toss is looking more and more dubious. But I don’t see any upside to admitting that at the moment.

Mindy pulls a little metal case out of her pocket and opens it to reveal several pre-rolled joints. The Zippo shakes in her hand as she lights it, and sucks greedily. Doesn’t offer us any.

“You better hope it will be fine,” Mindy says, exhaling a cloud of pungent smoke. “Because as it currently stands, my career is ruined, and you’ve just lost a United States Senator forty-eight million dollars. I don’t think you even comprehend the shit you’re in.”

“Instead of blaming me, you should be thanking me for saving your skin.” I jab a finger at her. “The situation was screwed from the start. Rico brought seven armed pals with him.”

“I don’t think they were his pals,” says Courtney softly, looking up from the GPS, his forehead creased with worry. “Didn’t you say Rico and two of those men ran away after you took one down?”

“Yeah.”

Courtney slowly rises from the bench, unfolding his spindly legs like a spider doing a sun salutation. There’s a look in his little eyes, like he’s staring at looming black clouds on the horizon. He hands me the GPS, apparently trusting me now that it’s worthless. He paces in a little circle between the benches.

“Who were they running from? Not from you and Mindy, certainly. I suspect Rico was running, with the books, and those two men were chasing him.”

I mull this. The Colorado dusk above us glows purple and orange. Under different circumstances I might find it soothing. Can feel the dry air on my tongue and fingertips.

Not dry enough, apparently.

“You think Rico was these guys’ stooge?”

“Well it sure seems he wasn’t too enthusiastic about doing any of this.”

“Or he’s just a great actor,” I say.

Mindy shakes her head and ashes her joint.

“They’re all stooges. Sophnot’s stooges.”

I frown.

“What do you mean? He’s in prison.”

“That didn’t stop James from drinking his Kool-Aid,” Mindy says.

“C’mon,” I say. “You think he ‘tutored’ all those guys too?”

Mindy licks her lips.

“If they have nothing to do with Sophnot, then someone is really good at imitating his leatherworking and binding style.”

I stiffen.

“What?”

“I can’t be sure,” she says, “everything happened so quickly, so I can’t be positive. But it sure looked the same as the others.”

Courtney draws in a long breath through his thin nose.

“Well, that’s a rather unsettling observation. But no reason to cause ourselves any additional angst by speculating.” He smiles tightly, in a way I find a little frightening.

“James keeps calling me,” Mindy says, displaying her own iPhone, flashing “James” on the screen. “Shall I tell him how badly you two performed?”

“I don’t see how this is on me,” I say. “You’re the one who said we couldn’t swap until you spent an hour with them. You said if they pulled out even one page—”

“Are you kidding me?” She drops the nub of her joint and grinds it beneath her heel. “Am I the one who threw forty-eight million dollars into a penguin pond?”

“It’s an amphibious environment.”

“If you don’t make this right,” she says, “the only person protecting you from the law is going to become your worst nightmare. And believe me, I won’t be defending you to him when—”

“Enough,” I growl. I felt queasy before, but now I’m getting truly light-headed as the implications of this afternoon sink in.

“I need to talk to James,” she mutters, half to herself. “Maybe I can save myself.”

“You can’t tell Sampson yet,” I say. “He’ll do something crazy. Just give us a chance. A little time.”

Mindy squints at me like I’m some sort of inferior life form she’s having trouble understanding.

“Even if you find them, you think those men are just going to politely return them to you?” She laughs. “Oh, terribly sorry. Here’s your forty-eight million dollars back. Perhaps now we can try swapping again?”

My vision goes red.

“Listen, you ungrateful shithead.” I shoot off the bench and stick my face so close to hers that I can smell her weed-breath and all-natural body wash. “If I hadn’t done what I’d done when I did it, we might be dead.”

“That doesn’t make this okay!” she cries. “Those books are the last seven years of my life.”

“You think I don’t want to get them back?”

I sit back down and check the GPS tracker again. Slide it into my back pocket.

“Courtney and I are gonna go see if we can get security camera footage of the aquarium parking lot, and surrounding areas. Maybe we can see them leaving and get a license plate or something.”

Courtney frowns at me like we are?

Mindy snorts.

“It’s come to that, yeah? Fine. Let me know when you give up. I’m taking the Hummer.”

“You’re not going back to Aspen are you?” I say. “Honestly, if we don’t get those bags back, and Sampson goes ape, I don’t think you’ll want to be anywhere near him. I suggest you check into a hotel.”

She frowns, and looks at Courtney for his opinion. He nods.

“I agree with Frank. Buy food, text only us where you are, and don’t open the door for anyone.”

She raises an eyebrow.

“I don’t think James would—”

“I’m not just worried about the Senator,” Courtney says. “Whether they’ve spoken to Sophnot or not, it’s a good bet those men are interested in what’s written in those books. They’ve been holding onto them for four years, and maybe have even been able to extract a little meaning from them. But they’re not linguists. You’re the expert we brought along. I’ll bet they’d like a word with you.”

She mulls this for a second.

“You’ll call me immediately if you have anything, right?” she asks Courtney.

“Of course,” he says, looking her square in the eyes. That look could sell snow to an Eskimo.

“Fine. Good luck,” she says, and walks off toward the parking garage.

Courtney turns to me.

“It’s going to be tough to get security footage, Frank. And even then, you’ve only got a prayer of being able to catch a license plate.”

“I know.” I grin and pull the GPS tracker out of my pocket. “And tedious and hopeless enough that Mindy wouldn’t feel compelled to join.” I show him the dropped pin on the screen. “The chip showed up five minutes ago. The bags aren’t moving. They’re forty-five minutes east of here.”

He blinks at me. He’s about to say something—about Mindy I’m sure—but swallows it.

“Alright,” he says. “Let’s go.”

 

We rush to hail a taxi, take it to the closest rent-a-car, and are in a Honda Accord, heading east by eight thirty. The beacon hasn’t moved. It’s in a rural area called Deer Trail.

I drive while the GPS navigates. Courtney is silent in the passenger seat, hands folded in his lap.

The phone is in the cup holder. Sampson has changed tack, and is now texting us:

Where are you!????

What’s going on???

How dare u ignore me!!

The phone is on silent, but illuminated by a string of perpetual, increasingly unhinged messages. I can’t even look at it.

I take us from the western edge of Denver to the eastern city limits in near silence, interrupted only by the robot instructions from the GPS. As night descends, my shoulders and neck tighten in anticipation.

Is this a trap?

“You shouldn’t have lied to her,” Courtney finally says.

“I don’t trust her, and I didn’t want her around,” I respond. “Don’t forget, by her own admission she wants to take the books to London.”

“So we should have discussed that with her.”

I tighten my grip on the steering wheel.

“Dude. I’m your partner. You didn’t even back me up back there about what I did in the aquarium. You’re acting like Mindy is on our side. She’s not. She doesn’t give a shit about us, and she has her own agenda. We took her with us to identify the books, and after the aquarium I’m confident enough I know what they look like. So that’s it. We’re done with her.”

“I just don’t like that kind of deception.”

“Let’s just call a spade a spade, Court. You wanted to preserve the possibility of you getting into her kidney pie, eh? Or so you figure. Well let me save you some time, champ: She’s never gonna fuck you.”

“Frank, please don’t be crude.”

“Maybe if you were fifteen years younger, and somebody completely different. But I’d say your chances of getting in her pants are like, subatomic level. Like the odds of a mouse surviving on the surface of the sun long enough to play a complete game of solitaire.”

“You’re being really abhorrent.”

“Three-card draw.”

We lapse back into a silence punctuated only the automated directions: “In 500 feet, take exit 328.”

I direct the Accord onto a two-lane rural highway. No street lights now. The roadside landscape could just be a loop of drainage ditch, green mile markers, and wood fences. I listen to Courtney’s fast breathing.

“Sorry, Court,” I say. “I’m nervous.”

“It’s alright,” he says. He’s way too sensible to let something as silly as feelings distract him for too long. “Me too.”

“You don’t think they found the chip do you?” I ask. “And are waiting for us?”

“It’s possible. But I don’t plan on just rushing in, guns blazing.”

I rub the bridge of my nose between my thumb and forefinger.

“Rico mentioned Oliver Vicks. Well, ‘Sophnot.’”

“I know,” Courtney says quietly, staring through the windshield at the King Soopers truck ahead of us, like it’s some work of art. “And I know he’s in prison. But what if he’s orchestrated all of this. Converted Sampson, trusted him with the books, and then manipulated Rico into stealing them. Then for years he keeps asking Sampson to bring the books back to him, while upping the pressure on the other side . . .”

I little shiver runs down my spine.

“That’s a pretty clever way to make forty-eight million dollars.”

I turn right off the highway, and we drive five minutes on a bumpy dirt road. Courtney’s slight form bounces up and down in the passenger seat like popcorn in the pan. 9:25.

“Stop here,” Courtney says. “Quarter mile away.”

I pull over and turn the car off.

“Hardly anything out here,” I say.

“Maybe it’s buried?” Courtney says hopefully.

“The dot hasn’t budged right?”

“Right.”

Courtney walks first, following the GPS. I’m right behind him, Magnum drawn. We walk slowly, the only light some faint stars, not daring to give ourselves away with flashlights.

The landscape here is flat, and we see the two-story house from 300 yards away. Lights are on upstairs.

“That’s it right?” I ask.

Courtney nods, and swaps the GPS out for his Magnum.

There’s a driveway leading up to the house, which we give a wide berth. Crouch as we stumble blindly over rocks and high grass.

The air is crisp and dry. Mostly just follow Courtney’s lanky silhouette, Magnum in one hand, red acrylic satchel in the other.

Courtney stops about a hundred yards from the house. We stand side by side.

“What is this place?” I whisper. The building is a dome. It’s half a sphere, like the earth started blowing a bubble. By the dim light coming through a few portholes near the top, we can see that the exterior is thousands of rusty red metal shingles. They remind me of dead red leaves, trampled and flattened. “Is this a house?” I ask.

“If I’m not mistaken,” Courtney whispers back somberly, “I saw a picture of this place when I was browsing Oliver Vicks designs.”

My insides twist into a knot.

We continue slowly toward the dome until, about twenty meters away, I halt and show Courtney my palm. There’s a guy sitting outside the front door. Big baby kind of look, wearing a leather jacket, smoking, sitting in a plastic chair, looking at his phone. Hasn’t noticed us yet. I think I hear faint music reverberating inside the dome behind him.

“That guy’s a bouncer,” I say softly.

“A bouncer?” Courtney frowns.

“Yeah. And that must be one hell of a party, to have it all the way out here.”

I point to our left: a row of parked cars. Shitty, most of them. A gold Ford Bronco, a beat--up Volvo station wagon . . . this is no cotillion. I wonder if any of them is Rico’s car . . . which would mean him and both bags are still inside. I allow myself to fantasize about bringing Sampson back the books and the money. There’s no way he wouldn’t give us a million-dollar bonus. And if we don’t get them . . . if we don’t get at least one of those bags before Sampson figures out what happened, we might as well go down a few Drano and tonics.

I had the bags in my lap . . .

Again the events of this afternoon play, projected on my mind’s eye, and each time it looks more and more like a blooper reel.

Courtney brings me back to earth.

“Let’s scope it out,” he says.

We wade through a field of burrs and brambles to approach the building on the far side, opposite the bouncer. As we near the house, I realize it’s much larger than I’d thought—equivalent of maybe four stories tall, and at least the circumference of a baseball diamond. All the windows are small and round, like portholes on a ship. Pockmarks on the otherwise smooth red face of this dome. The glass is too thick to really make anything out besides some flickering lights and muddy shapes. There’s noise though. The whole dome seems to act like a subwoofer, amplifying a booming high BPM bass line. At some point we hear something that’s the muffled wail of either a human or cat.

“What’s going on in there?” asks Courtney.

“Rave maybe?”

“What’s a rave exactly?” he asks. “Like a party with loud music right?”

I stare at him.

“Didn’t you used to work for the DEA?”

We continue around the perimeter of the house. When we’re halfway around, Courtney stops and squints through the darkness at the building, hands on his hips like a prospector.

“We could try to quietly break a window,” he says. “Though it would be a tight fit.”

“I’m not sure that’s a very strong plan,” I respond, imagining his tiny butt squirming as he tries to squeeze his lanky body through one of those portholes.

“Do you have a better idea?” Courtney asks.

I lick my lips.

“Yes, the obvious one. Go in the front door.”

Courtney frowns.

“Fine. Let’s go.”

“Well . . .” I cough. “Let’s say it is a trap . . . That they found the chip and they’re waiting for us . . .” Courtney’s face contorts into anguish as he deduces my meaning. I spell it out anyways: “Rico and those men know what I look like. But not you.”

“You want me to go in alone?”

“Just for five minutes,” I say. “Scope it out. Then I’ll join.”

Courtney’s lips writhe like little worms, pale pink under the light from the dome.

“Fine. Keep your walkie-talkie on.”

We retrace our steps, back around to the front of the house, but taking a wide angle of approach. Feet crunching over dry grass, each snap sounds like the earth crying out for water. I crouch down on my stomach about ten yards from the entrance.

“Give me your gun,” I tell him. “In case the bouncer frisks you.”

Courtney looks like he might protest, but relents and unholsters his weapon. Hands it to me.

I watch him trudge to the front door, like a man headed for the gallows. He looks over his shoulder at me, shakes his head like this is a terrible idea, then engages the bouncer. I bite my lip and flatten myself against the dirt. Maybe it is a terrible idea, but it’s really the only choice.

The bouncer is immediately on his feet, his body language saying something to the effect of who the fuck are you?

Courtney extends an awkward hand in introduction like this is a networking event.

Oh boy.

The bouncer stares at Courtney’s outstretched hand with confused disgust, like he’s just been offered a cup of rancid milk.

Courtney then puts the hand on the shoulder of the guy’s jacket, like to inspire camaraderie. The bouncer stares at the hand until Courtney removes it.

This isn’t going well.

Courtney gesticulates like can I come in? Bouncer takes out a clipboard and asks Courtney’s name.

Invitation only.

I see Courtney rubbing his scalp with anxiety. Now he’s trying to sweet talk the guy . . . maybe I can just poke my head in . . . Oh no. Courtney’s taking out his wallet, offering the guy a few flimsy bills. Bouncer laughs, and his body language pretty clearly indicates that, as far as he’s concerned, this conversation is now over. Can’t say I blame him; I wouldn’t let Courtney into my party either.

Court awkwardly tries to peek into the ajar door behind the guy’s shoulder.

The bouncer stands up and puts his hands on his hips. Shakes his head in a pretty definitive you’re not getting in here.

Courtney holds up two fingers like let me just come in for two minutes. Bouncer points back into the night, shouts something whose import doesn’t require much guesswork.

And then another guy slips out the front door, maybe he heard the disturbance. He’s wearing only a pair of red boxer shorts. Must have heard the yelling. In his right hand is what appears to be a machete.

Oh boy.

Red Boxers immediately escalates, waving his blade in Courtney’s face. He’s obviously drunk. Courtney puts his palms up like okay, you win. But Red Boxers takes another step toward him, and the bouncer doesn’t seem like he’s in any hurry to help.

I’m on my feet, and close the distance between me and the action in seconds. I lower my shoulder and blindside Red Boxers like a linebacker. We crash to the ground, and I’ve got one hand on the machete hilt, tearing it away from him, the other on the back of his head, pushing it into the dirt.

I vaguely perceive the bouncer in my periphery milliseconds before I get decked in the jaw. I fall backwards, tasting blood. The world is momentarily an assortment of blurry shapes, one of them I think is the bouncer, closing in on me. Instinctually I roll away, which lets me recover long enough to rise to one knee. The bouncer is rushing at me. I can’t dodge him, and I’m immediately in his grip, head and neck being maneuvered into a well-practiced chokehold.

Maybe he’s not an amateur.

I try reaching for my gun, but my arm is trapped behind my back. I’m powerless. He has his bicep wrapped around my neck, about to start squeezing, when I hear a smack and his grip goes slack. He falls away from me, collapses backwards onto the damp earth with a thud. Totally unconscious.

Courtney is holding the machete like it’s a baseball bat, breathing hard. The bouncer is bleeding a bit from the top of his head, where Courtney hit him. Courtney’s hands are shaking.

“Nice swing,” I say.

“Did I kill him?” Courtney asks, horrified.

I kneel besides the bouncer’s limp form. Feel his pulse, look at his head wound, open one of his eyes. He stirs slightly.

“No, you didn’t kill him.”

Red Boxers squirms on the ground, groans in anguish. I kick him again in the gut, which shuts him up.

I take the machete from Courtney’s trembling grip, toss it as hard as I can into the darkness, then hand him his pistol. Courtney’s eyes are wide and he’s breathing too fast. He’s not as solid as he was last time we worked together. He’s having a little freak-out. Can’t make him go in alone.

“Let’s go in,” I say.

I put my shoulder into the cracked front door, pistol drawn, and it opens into a narrow hallway. Both walls and the ceiling are draped in red velvet. The floor is some kind of tile that’s as black as tar. The hallway is lit with red bulbs. There’s a naked guy sitting on the floor, a few feet from the door. He has a shock of sunflower-blond hair, and doesn’t seem to notice us. Next to him is a woman with a ton of eyeshadow, wearing only lace panties.

I bend over and shove the picture of Rico in front of the blond guy’s face.

“You seen this guy? Or a bunch of dudes wearing khaki?” I ask. He seems to be taking a while to process our presence, the photo . . . struggling to fit these different pieces into a coherent narrative. I ask the woman, who looks at me like I’m speaking Mandarin. Between them is an Advil bottle filled with what I’m guessing isn’t Advil. I snatch the bottle from the dude, unscrew the cap to confirm: It’s filled with some sort of toxic looking blue pills. I shove it in my pocket; maybe just saved their lives.

“Check the GPS,” I tell Courtney.

Courtney pulls it from his pocket. “We’re like thirty feet away, but it could be above or below us.”

We continue down the hallway, pass a few more people, most wearing nothing but blank, slightly bummed-out expressions. Most look young. High school young. Some awful Marvin Gaye remix is pounding through speakers mounted on the ceiling. Despite it being the middle of the summer, there’s hot air blasting from central heating. The air tastes stale and recycled. We pass two hairless naked forms of indeterminate gender intertwined in a sophisticated knot, one of the party’s flabby buttocks rising and falling in sync with the music.

“I think this is some kind of sex party,” whispers Courtney.

“Your powers of observation are unparalleled,” I say, then prod a butt cheek with my shoe. “Hey, excuse me.”

A girl looks up at me. Her eyes are vacant, and there’s dried blood caked around her nostrils. I show her the picture of Rico. “You seen this guy?” I demand. When she doesn’t respond, I waggle my Magnum and ask again.

The girl studies the picture for way too long before saying “Yeah.” She licks her lips slowly like rediscovering their taste. “I saw him.”

“How long ago? Was he with some other men all dressed the same?” I say.

She shrugs, as her partner continues probing her torso with his mouth.

“I dunno.”

“Is there someone in charge here?” asks Courtney.

I glare at him: Does it look like someone’s in charge here?

The woman blinks at us. “Y’all cops?”

Courtney shakes his head adamantly. “No, no. Nothing like that—”

“Then fuck off.”

I could force the issue, but she doesn’t seem to have much left to offer.

The hallway doesn’t end, just curves around and around until we end up back at the entrance. We start around again, but this time we try one of the curtained doorways leading off the hallway. Courtney pulls the drapes back and I grip my gun tightly, but there’s no room behind it—just a velvet-draped ascending stairwell, the same width as the hallway. We climb the steps, which lead into another identical hallway, also smattered with orgiasts. Most are too busy to notice us, the few that do glare at us like we’re aliens. Rico is not among them.

The hallway smells of incense, vanilla, opium smoke, and a pastiche of sex-related fluids. Only furniture is an occasional velvet-upholstered ottoman. A girl of probably seventeen is unconscious, strewn awkwardly across one of the ottomans. Another man who looks nearly limp is propped up by his partner against a flannel wall, and being treated like a piece of meat. There’s a woman on the cold black floor wearing a dopey grin as she touches herself.

Courtney is way past mortified. He has his hands deep in his pockets, like to avoid contamination. His face has taken on the corpselike green of a seasick sailor, and each new sight seems to jar him like a wave ramming the hull.

We turn through countless hallways, draped entryways, all basically the same, only some contain ascending stairs, some descending. At one point the GPS says we’re right on top of the bag, but the room is empty. It isn’t long before I have no idea if we’re above ground or below, or which direction I’d go if I wanted to leave. Check my watch. Only twenty minutes have passed but it feels like we’ve been in here for hours already.

Every corridor has the heat blasting—I guess it might be comfortable in here if you’re naked, but my T-shirt is drenched in sweat and I’d kill for a glass of ice water.

We wander through hallway after hallway, getting more and more anxious that the GPS misled us, or they found the chip and buried it in one of these walls to throw us off their trail. Keep passing the same places over and over, or at least it feels like that. I have this uneasy thought that we’ll keep wandering through these halls for years without making progress. Or that we’ve already been doing this for years, but can only remember the last few minutes, like two goldfish. So we keep thinking the next bend will hold what we’re looking for, even though we’ve walked each of these corridors thousands of times already.

Finally, we encounter a change in the uniformity. A series of descending, curved stairways lead to the first true door we’ve seen here. It’s a simple wood door made of unfinished pine. Reminds me of a pauper’s coffin. At this point, I’m pretty sure we’re well below ground level.

Courtney and I exchange a look, and then, keeping the pistol aimed straight ahead, I pull on the handle with my off hand. Another fucking hallway. This one has a mattress on the ground though. Two men and two women are—surprise—naked; limbs, mouths, phalluses entangled in an arrangement that it’s hard to imagine is giving anybody pleasure. A third guy is naked and watching, and by all physiological indications, enjoying himself. Rico is not among them.

They’re either so into it, or so fucked up, that they don’t even care when we barge in.

“Hey, excuse me,” I say. One woman half glances at me, but then returns to the task at hand. “Anybody here seen a bunch of dudes wearing khaki, with a pink duffel bag?”

Nobody answers.

Courtney is still standing in the doorway, gazing at the ongoing spectacle with morbid curiosity, like it’s some horrible deformity.

“What about this guy?” I demand. I grab the shoulder of the voyeur and put the picture of Rico in front of his face. He’s more coherent than the others, but also not so keen on the interruption. But he can’t contain a flicker of recognition as I give him no choice but to absorb the image of Rico’s face.

He’s seen him.

“What did you see?” I ask. The participants on the mattress either don’t notice or care that they’re no longer being observed.

“Fuck off,” he whines. I’m hungry, thirsty, exhausted and sweaty—patience is an increasingly scarce resource on planet Frank.

I grab his shoulder and ram him against the velvet wall. “Dude, what are you doing?” he shrieks and he spits in my face. My face must betray something, because he instantly apologizes.

But the damage has been done. My vision is red and sideways, and I think I can hear my neurons holding a memorial service for whatever was left of my patience. He’s not entirely in the wrong: Some corner of my psyche is aware of that even as I switch my grip to his neck and knock the back of his head against the wall.

“I’ve had a pretty shitty evening,” I growl, squeezing the air out of him. “If you don’t tell me what you saw, I’m going to take it all out on your face.”

“Frank.” Courtney is behind me, trying to peel my hands off his neck, but I box him out. Courtney must give this guy a pretty convincing he’s out of control look, because his resolve dissolves like warm butter.

“He went in there,” he gasps, nodding to the end of this hallway, which terminates in another door.

“Did he come out?” I ask, squeezing harder.

“Don’t remember.”

“He went in alone?”

“No . . .”

“Who did he go in with?”

“A guy in a mask,” he squeaks. “Wearing white.”

I look over my shoulder at Courtney and we exchange a look.

“Did they leave?”

“The one in the mask. He left.”

“When.”

“Get off me man!”

I slam the back of his head against the wall, as if to jog his memory.

“Maybe an hour ago.”

“Thanks,” I say, releasing my grip. He drops to the floor and coughs.

I turn, and Courtney and I pass through the writhing mounds on the floor, like Moses parting a swamp of flesh, until arriving at the second door. This one is thick steel, practically a blast door.

I look at Courtney, then try knocking. Ready my pistol in case someone opens. Try again. Nothing.

“GPS says it’s in on the other side. Twenty feet straight ahead.”

Courtney sinks to his knees to inspect the lock.

“What is it?” I ask. “Can you get in?”

“It’s a very heavy lock, but no magnets,” he says. “Industrial make. Not custom. I can do it.”

While Courtney fishes his tools from his red acrylic bag, I shoo the fornicators out of the hallway, then sink to the black floor. God I’m hungry. Have I really not eaten since leaving Sampson’s this morning? That feels like another life.

Courtney is deep in concentration, working on the lock. Stethoscope chest piece on cool metal, eyes half closed.

A man in white, wearing a mask . . .

I lean back against the velvet wall. The floor is rock hard, but the walls are pretty comfy, padded like a loony bin. I shift around to get comfortable and doze off.

Courtney taps my shoulder. I was out cold despite the cocktail of adrenaline and dread swishing in my head.

“I opened it, Frank.” Courtney also looks exhausted.

I wince as I stand up, my right butt cheek adamantly informing me that it didn’t appreciate that angle.

I hold my Magnum out in front of me, and push the door in with my heel.

Before I can see anything I’m hit with a wave of scent. Some kind of incense that’s so pungent and spicy that I feel a heaviness in my lungs when I breathe it in. It’s not unpleasant—reminiscent of freshly cut wood—but the potency is overwhelming.

We both just stand there for a moment, looking into the darkness, waiting for someone to jump out of nowhere and attack us. When nobody does, I ease my way in, and some lights in the ceiling pop on automatically. Courtney steps in to join me, and the spring loaded door swings closed behind us.

The small room bears little relation to the red curtained hallways. The floor is spotless polished bronze. Beside the doorway, on the floor, is a gold-gilded basin underneath a sink—a place to wash your feet as soon as you enter. The walls are all covered in an ornate series of etched symbols, behind them inked veins of blue and red.

“Looks the same as the lines in the book,” I say.

Courtney nods.

The incense smell is coming from a smoldering pile of ash in the middle of the floor, set on a small stone.

Courtney kneels beside it, inspects the potpourri. Inhales deeply.

“Frankincense, myrrh . . .” he says.

“What?” I ask.

“I used to work in a spice shop,” Courtney says. “These are resins that are rarely used today. They were very common in the ancient Mediterranean. The Israelites burned these in their holy temple in Jerusalem. Incense offerings to God.”

“It’s still smoldering. Must be recent.”

“The guy in the hall said the guy in the mask rushed out . . .” muses Courtney.

There are two metal chains on the ground to my left, fastened to the wall. The chains end in what look like elaborate dog collars, made of leather and intricate metalwork.

“Court, come look at these,” I say.

He abandons the spices and joins me. Slips two pairs of latex gloves from his satchel and hands one to me. I know what the gloves mean.

He thinks this is a crime scene.

He picks up one of the collars and inspects it for a few moments. Tugs on the chain connected to it, first gently, then hard. It’s definitely bolted into the wall.

“Tell me these were for someone’s pet pit bulls,” I say.

“I’m afraid not,” he says, suddenly dropping the collar and approaching the wall at the point where the chain is fused in. He drops to his knees, squints at something, then turns to me looking unsettled. “There’s an indentation in the wall around the welding,” he says. “Looks like someone tried to scrape out the wall using a link from the chain itself. If I had to guess, this is at least a couple months’ worth of scraping.”

I grimace.

He returns to examine the collars, while I make my way to the far wall. I’d initially thought it was as solid as the others, but as I near I see it’s in fact a hanging curtain. I pull it back, and from the light behind me I see it’s a second room of at least equal size.

Please let the money be in here . . .

“Just like the tabernacle,” I hear Courtney say behind me. “Two rooms—the antechamber . . .”

The lights click on in the second room and I stop hearing anything Courtney’s saying.

To my right is a stone worktable, cluttered with tools. On my left is a sort of drafting table, beside which is a massive cubic filing cabinet—the kind an artist might use to store thin photos or drawing paper.

But the main event is between them, suspended from a wire clothing line. It’s Rico hanging upside down, naked, fingertips grazing the floor. I only recognize it as Rico because of the cracked, yellow hands and acne on the cheeks. But the form is loose and empty. It’s only his skin. Beneath him is a basin, like the one in the other room, filled with what must be his entrails. Around the basin radiates a gradient of freshly dried drops of blood. Nearest Rico, the floor is almost entirely dark maroon.

Courtney is at my side, breathing heavily.

“Oh my god. Is this—”

“Yes.” I swallow. “Rico.”

I tear my eyes from Rico, to the stone worktable. On a wooden shelf above it are an X-acto knife, a long butcher’s blade, a chain mail glove—the kind butchers use, rubber gloves—still wet—and a blue-handled Phillips-head screwdriver. There’s a corkboard mounted over the worktable with pins hammered into it. Hanging off the board are several collars of leather interwoven with metal—all variants on the ones in the other room.

On the table is a single object, a waxy mask the color of milk. Sunken cheeks and fat chin . . . It’s a mask of Rico’s face.

My legs feel wobbly. I’ve seen my share of crime scenes, but this is a different animal entirely.

It’s so deliberate . . .

I put my hands on the worktable to steady myself.

“Frank!” Courtney is beside me. “Put your gloves on!”

I slowly pull them on, while he takes a pack of antibacterial hand wipes from his bag and carefully rubs down the stone counter.

I stare at the stone surface and take several deep breaths. Swallow the revulsion in my chest.

“Okay, okay, okay,” Courtney is saying, mostly to himself. “We have a lot of data here Frank. Let’s be methodical. Gather data now, analyze it later. TSP. Thoughtfulness, subtlety, patience. TSP.”

He mutters this mantra to himself as he puts the tube of wipes back in his bag and removes his notepad and spy camera. While he snaps photos of Rico, of the tools, of the mask, I force myself to look around the rest of the room.

Gather data. Dispassionate. Just pretend you’re a robot.

There’s another mural on the ceiling. Blue and red stripes, symbols that look like hieroglyphics. My eyes trace the dizzying lines on the ceiling. Each square inch is unbelievably detailed: dots the size of pinpricks. I have to look away—feels like a quick-onset migraine—similar to the feeling I had earlier when I looked in the book.

Just like Oliver Vicks’s writing. Did he make this before he went to prison?

This is some kind of workshop. But to what end?

Stone worktable, drafting table, file cabinet . . .

Behind Rico’s hanging form there are more basins on the gold floor, filled with a clear fluid that smells vaguely reminiscent of the aquarium. Saltwater? Brine?

“Courtney, what is this place? What happened here?”

“I don’t know,” Courtney mumbles. “Torture?”

“Why would he torture Rico after he brought him back everything he asked for?” I do a 360 of the chamber, trying to straighten out some objective facts about this scene, pretend the flayed carcass belongs to some kind of animal.

Pray that Sophnot kills us quickly.

“Could Oliver Vicks have done this?” I mutter, feeling some pieces of this afternoon starting to slide into place. I force my brain to replay all the details of the botched exchange, now able to reframe them with more confidence that Rico was telling the truth. His fear was authentic.

I approach the drafting table on the far side of the room, behind Rico’s form. The birch tabletop has built-in straightedges, and the angle can be adjusted with a series of knobs which connect it to the base. It’s a sturdy, professional piece of equipment.

I’ll bet you find something like this in every architecture firm.

I turn to the filing cabinet. Each sliding drawer is exceedingly narrow—this is probably meant to hold photographs or documents. With a latex-gloved hand, I pull a shelf from the middle open. Inside is a folded piece of yellow-orange leather, the kind the books were bound in. I remove it from the drawer and unfold it. It’s an uneven blobby shape, about a square meter of material. A large rectangle has been cut out from the center. A piece of paper clipped to one of the corners is a passport-sized photo of a young man and a little tag with a number.

My attempt at dispassion crumbles. I feel like I’ve been kicked in the nuts. Stomach goes numb, knees quiver like a pair of yolks frying in oil.

“Oh Christ,” I whisper. “Courtney . . .”

“What?” he says, preoccupied with snapping pictures of the flaccid sac that was once Rico from every angle.

“Stop that a second.”

He obliges, lowers the camera.

“Mindy was confused today, in the aquarium,” I say, trying to keep my voice even, but I’m feeling the beginning of a dry heave. “Because the book she had was newly bound. In leather.”

Courtney cocks his head, sees the hide I’m displaying, and then the implications of it seep down his face: His high forehead crinkles first, his eyes go wide, his lips pucker into a grimace of the most profound sort of disgust. The hanging skin, the basins of fluids . . .

“This is a tannery,” he whispers in horror.

“And look,” I say, pulling the shelves open one by one. Each contains a similar sample, with a different photo and number attached. There are twenty-four shelves. All occupied except the top three. The three from the top holds only a passport-sized photo of Rico, and the square for today’s date ripped out of a calendar.

Courtney’s hands are trembling. He frowns, opens the fourth drawer down, that contains the first skin. He stares at the picture of the boy for a second. Tears are welling in his eyes.

He swallows his emotion, and gets to work. Jerks open each drawer in turn, snaps a picture of each passport-sized photo. The numbers are squares cut from a calendar. Courtney kneels to open the lower drawers. He works through them methodically until the very bottom drawer. A little hiss of air leaks from his nostrils.

“Look, Frank,” he whispers.

The picture paperclipped is of a young boy, along with a little square that says twenty-four in big letters, October in small ones. 1997. Twenty years ago.

“This is the first one,” Courtney says. “The brother of the waitress that Oliver killed. His body was never found.”

I have to look away. Take a step back and survey the whole grisly scene. Courtney closes the last drawer and turns his back on the cabinet, crouching. His skin is ashen. He looks like he’s going to be sick.

“So Oliver Vicks isn’t in prison?” I say, half to myself.

“I . . .” Courtney trails off, shakes his head helplessly. “It sure seems like he was here. But I don’t see how he would have gotten out of prison without us knowing.”

I grit my teeth.

“Say he’s not in prison,” I say. “Would he do this to Rico just because he needed number twenty-two?”

“I don’t know,” Courtney says.

I approach Rico’s hanging skin. Force myself to get close, look down at the neck and chest area. As I’d expected, there’s a ring of raw pink skin around his neck. He’d been locked up in the other room a while.

And that explains the turtleneck—

“Frank! Here’s the bag!”

I jerk up. I rush to join Courtney at the back of the room. The pink duffel is tucked between a couple closed barrels of what might be brine.

I grab the straps and my heart sinks immediately.

“Too light,” I say. “Money’s not in there.”

I open the zipper, and recognize Rico’s puffy black parka. Pull it out and set it on the ground.

Indeed, there are no bonds. Just the rest of Rico’s possessions: The blue jeans he was wearing, the turtleneck, both folded. Turn the bag upside down and shake. Wallet and keys clatter to the bronze floor and that’s it.

“Shit,” I say. “Shit, shit, shit.”

I drop my head into my hands. The room is spinning. I feel like I’m in a nightmare.

No money. No books.

Courtney stares at turtleneck and jeans and wrings his hands, as if he still can’t believe there’s no money.

“We need to get out of here,” I whisper, taking another look around. The hanging carcass, the brine, the file cabinet, the workbench, the nauseating pattern on the ceiling. “We can’t be found here. With this body . . .”

“Agreed,” he said. “Although . . .”

He picks up the pink bag, and probes through the stitching until finding the GPS chip he embedded yesterday.

“Oliver will come back for this skin,” he says. “And he’ll probably take it to wherever he has the books stashed.”

I can’t even watch as Courtney sews the tiny chip into some unspeakable part of what used to be Rico.

“Done.”

Courtney snatches one of the collars off the corkboard and follows me back through the tapestry into the first chamber.

Something doesn’t make sense. Rico brought back Oliver the books and the money, and this is his reward?

And it sounded like Rico was worried this would happen, so why didn’t he ask for help on the phone?

If that was even Rico on the phone . . .

“Where was his phone?” I ask Courtney, as he pulls open the blast door leading back into the red hallway. “His wallet and keys were there, but not his phone.”

Courtney stops.

“You’re right. And we know he had a phone, because he was texting you.”

I pull the iPhone out of my pocket. 142 missed calls from Sampson, and text messages scrolling down the locked screen forever.

I unlock the phone and go to text messages. 219 text messages from Sampson, two from the same number that texted me in the aquarium, sent at 8:02 pm. Around the time we were renting the car.

left Boks wher they belong, where Soph never goes. Ya

 

Dstry them b4 he finds them. God hlp us.

 

Courtney has been very still since we got back in the Accord. I drove for just a few minutes, then had to pull over onto the shoulder, my hands were shaking so badly. Courtney’s eyes are black and wet. He’s usually got a pretty good stomach for crime scenes and, more importantly, doesn’t dwell on them. What’s done is done—all that matters are how the details can help him figure out what happened. When he worked for the DEA, overdoses and butchered drug mules were pretty much par for the course.

But he’s obviously bothered now.

“Twenty-two people . . .” he says softly. “How could that have happened? He’s supposed to be in prison.”

I don’t respond. Outside the car, fields of grain extend forever. The air is so clean, the earth so flat, that the moon and stars really light everything up.

“How could a person do that to a kid?” Courtney says, almost pleading, like he wants me to reassure him in some way. To tell him that what we saw was some kind of mistake. “He was fourteen.”

“He’s an animal,” I say, although really that’s being a bit hard on animals; creatures of all kinds kill each other. That’s natural. But mutilation, playing with the bodies long after any rage has worn off, treating them like toys . . .

“It seems likely that somehow Oliver Vicks is slaughtering people,” Courtney says slowly, gaze hardened with a sort of rage I’m not sure I’ve ever seen on him before. “And getting away with it because everybody thinks he’s in prison.”

“If he escaped why wasn’t it in the papers?” I ask.

“It’s been twenty years . . . I guess it’s possible he got parole a few years ago and nobody cared enough to write about it.”

I pinch my nose. Trying to get my brain to think clearly is like trying to start a fire by snapping your fingers.

“God man,” I say. “I’m so drained.”

Courtney winces.

Bad choice of words.

“A boy . . .” I massage my temples. “Why is he doing this? Just for binding material?”

“I don’t know.”

“Okay, let’s just think this through,” I say, speaking softly. “Rico had been chained up there for a while. Then he was released to do the swap with us. When he saw it wasn’t going to go through, when those guys were distracted, he made a run for it, along with the books.”

Courtney cocks his head and purses his lips, grants me the slightest nod of agreement without looking in my direction.

“So . . .” I continue. “He knew if he was caught with the books he was as good as dead. So he outran them enough to hide the books somewhere, presumably to use as leverage, to barter his freedom.”

Courtney’s head rocks side to side, as he weighs my logic.

“Okay. I’m with you,” he says. “But apparently that negotiation didn’t go well.”

I scratch my cheek.

“I think Rico realized the situation was hopeless at some point. If I’m Oliver, I would chain him up until he told me where they are, then kill him. So he texted us, ditched his phone so nobody could see the text, then decided he might as well get it over with.” I exhale slowly. “If we don’t get those books for Sampson, fast . . . I mean forget about canceling my passport. The guy is a US Senator. He could make our lives really bad.”

Courtney finally turns to me. There’s a faint glow in his eyes. I know there’s a part of him that, despite the horrid things we’ve seen tonight, craves this intellectual exercise.

“So where will Sophnot never go?” he asks.

I shake my head slowly.

“We need to first see what the deal is at the prison. He’s probably still there, right? And people are just doing crazy things in a house he designed.”

“Mmmhmm,” Courtney says, a nice selection from his menu of patronizing sounds. “But it seems more likely that he got parole and Sampson didn’t know about it. And that’s why those men—his men–wanted the swap to go through, with us thinking we were just dealing with Rico. Sampson gives him back the books, and bam. Oliver Vicks steals forty-eight million dollars, and Sampson doesn’t even know he’s been robbed.”

I chew on that for a second. My stomach gurgles, but I can’t tell if it’s from hunger or nausea.

“You know,” Courtney says. “This is not the first documented case of anthropodermic bibliology.”

“Huh?”

“Anthropodermic bibliology is the medieval ‘art’ of binding books with—” Courtney coughs. “Human skin.”

“I can’t believe a term for that already exists.”

Courtney gives me a courtesy nod. He’s thinking hard, lips moving slightly like he’s mumbling incantations to himself.

“What’s he been doing, Frank?” Courtney mutters, mostly to himself. “What does Oliver Vicks want? Why did he turn himself in and go to prison? Why does he want all this money? Why did he write these books? Why does he have things like this?”

Courtney digs something out from the glove compartment with a hand still gloved in latex. It’s the collar he took. It’s like the two in the antechamber, except mounted on the front of this one is a double-pronged fork.

“What is that?” I ask.

“It’s called a heretic’s fork,” says Courtney, holding the device by the tips of his fingers like it’s radioactive. “I saw one in a museum once. It’s a medieval torture device. Two prongs point upwards to rest upon the sinner’s jugular, two against the sternum. If the victim lets his chin drop, he bleeds out in minutes. Most prisoners make it two days before succumbing to exhaustion.”

“Heretic’s fork? So they put that on nonbelievers?”

Courtney puts it back in the glove compartment.

“Yes. And I think this is handmade, Frank. Someone—perhaps Oliver Vicks–put an outrageous amount of time into making these things.”

“Because he’s crazy. And had a shitload of time on his hands in prison.”

“No, no no.” Courtney shakes his head seriously. The little fire burns stronger in his eyes. The fire of the hunt. “No, he’s not crazy at all. If this is Oliver Vicks, well. Megalomaniacal, delusional perhaps, but he’s methodical. I think he planned this all twenty years in advance. And it worked. He has just stolen forty-eight million dollars, and gotten away with yet another murder. He’s—I hate to say it—but he might be a genius.”

I start up the car. I think I’m ravenously hungry, but can’t be sure. Toward the extremes, hunger and nausea can become indistinguishable.

“What was it you said?” I say. “‘Come with me to Colorado, Frank. Got an easy job. Should only take a day or two . . .’”

Courtney’s face wilts like a flower in vinegar.

“Frank, I’m so—”

“I was kidding, sorry. Don’t feel bad about it,” I say. “It’s my own fucking fault. I should have stuck with law school.”

 

Two in the morning. Four hours and change since leaving the red house. We’re in a booth at a Wendy’s in Denver proper, been sitting here for at least an hour. Only other customers are some drunk high school kids. I really am starving—haven’t eaten anything since fruit at Sampson’s guesthouse, but have long since given up trying to force down my salad of sour iceberg lettuce and beefsteak tomato. What a cruel trick that anxiety is linked to your digestive system . . . I’d take a headache over a stomachache anyways.

Just wait. That comes later.

The iPhone is between us on the table. I texted Mindy at eleven on the dot:

Nothing. Talk in the AM.

That initially provoked a flurry of responses demanding clarification, but she seems to have finally fizzled out. Anyways, Sampson is doing more than enough to keep the phone busy. Every couple minutes it buzzes again with his number. Eighty-three more missed calls since we left the red house.

Court is zoned out. His eyes keep swiveling back and forth, like he’s mentally popping back into that grisly chamber to check if we missed anything.

I sip on my third Wendy’s coffee of the evening, which I generously infused with a bottle of Jack I bought across the street. This combo is the only thing I’ve been able to get down the gullet. Not sure what I expect it to be doing—soothing me? I’ve never been so simultaneously wired and fatigued in my life. I can feel my pulse pounding behind my eyes, and my stomach feels like it’s filled with fighting fish. Haven’t slept since three in the morning, after walking in on Sampson.

“What do we do?” I say to the tabletop. “We can’t keep ignoring Sampson.”

I look out the window. Colfax Boulevard is pretty dead this time of night. Across the street glows an empty 7-Eleven. A juvenile delinquenty-looking crew sits on a curb laughing and smoking cigarettes. Envision myself storming over to them, plucking the cigs from their mouths, stamping them out, and telling them it’s a fucking school night.

Courtney’s eyes are droopy, and his pale face looks ghostly under the harsh light. He keeps blinking in confusion at his own untouched salad, as if the limp lettuce holds the power to clarify everything we’ve seen tonight. As the shock from the chamber fades slightly, the grim reality of our current situation takes its place. No books. No money. In just two days here we’ve spiraled down and crash landed in the middle of an incomprehensible swamp of shit, and it’s not going to be easy to climb out.

“The way I see it, the job we were hired for is over,” I say.

“In a sense.” Courtney chews on his thumbnail. “Failed, but over.”

The phone buzzes again. Courtney and I lock eyes.

“Maybe I should pick up and tell Sampson the truth,” I say. “We fucked up. Forget our fee, sorry it didn’t work out, but thanks very much for the opportunity. And if there’s any way he could still give me that passport, that would be lovely.”

Courtney prods his dead salad with his plastic fork. The phone keeps insistently buzzing, like an angry bee.

“That sounds foolproof,” he says, despite his exhaustion, managing to summon enough strength for a snotty little smirk.

“What else can we do?” I say. Phone goes silent for the moment. “Huh? What’s your genius idea?”

“Call the authorities. Show them the chamber, explain everything.”

I actually laugh.

“First of all, I’m on the Interpol list. Second, you’re suggesting that we bring the cops to a murder scene and tell them that Oliver Vicks did it. Well, what if they go to prison, and somehow he’s still there, Court? You think about that? Then who’s the prime suspect? Probably the last people who ever spoke to Rico—with hundreds of aquarium goers to testify to that.”

The phone starts ringing again. Can almost hear the frustration in every desperate vibration.

“We’ll ignore it,” he says. “Until we decide what we’re going to say.”

Courtney reaches for the phone to silence it, and his eyebrows shoot to the ceiling.

“Frank,” he says, almost choking. “It’s not Sampson. It’s the number we spoke to before . . . at the guesthouse. What we thought was Rico.”

I snatch it from him. My throat tightens. There’s no mistaking that string of digits.

“Should I answer?” I ask.

“No!” squeaks Courtney. “Er. Actually. I don’t know. Wait.”

He strokes his cheeks furiously.

“Answer or not?” I demand.

“I’m thinking!”

And then the call stops. We both stare at the now silent phone. For just a moment I understand what Courtney hates about these things: the cold inhumanity, the flashing lights which only represent—but are not truly–other people.

It starts buzzing again. Same number.

“I think we gotta answer,” Courtney whispers. “It’s worse if we don’t.”

I plug my headphones into the phone, and we each stick in one earbud. I close my eyes, think a silent, wordless prayer: just an ethereal wish to keep Courtney and I alive.

“Hello?” I say, as innocuously as I can manage. But my heart is in my throat, and knees shaking frantically under the booth.

“I’d like my books.”

It’s the Darth Vader voice again. I feel like the booth just disappeared from underneath me, and I’m suddenly accelerating downward. The head of my plastic fork snaps off; apparently I’d been squeezing it for quite a while.

Before I can think, I say: “I’m sorry, you must have the wrong number.”

Courtney attempts to fit an entire fist in his mouth. The robot voice laughs.

“No, I’m quite sure this is the right number. Is this Frank Lamb? Or Courtney Lavagnino?”

Courtney looks back at me with the frozen eyes of a cow discovering for the first time what hamburgers are made of. His fingers dig into the table like he’s scared of falling off.

“Where did you get that information?” I ask.

“James told me.”

One of Courtney’s eyes shoots up, the other down, like they’re trying to escape his face in different directions. He might actually pass out.

“What—” I gasp.

“I’d like my books back.”

Courtney and I have a long conversation with our eyes which as far as I can tell is just variations on This is fucking bad. He grabs a Wendy’s napkin and scribbles a note to me: He thinks we have them.

I hold out my hands helplessly. Okay. So what?

He writes: Go with it.

Courtney clears his throat, and manages to say: “Why would we give them back to you? We had a deal. You got the money, and we got the books.”

A long pause.

“So you’ll be bringing them back to James?”

“So that he’ll bring them right to you?” I say. “And then you’ll have both? That works out nicely.”

A staticky sound that might be a modified guffaw.

“I’m not sure why you think what happens between James and me is any of your business. Bring them back to James as you promised him you would. He’s expecting them.”

“Maybe I’ll just call James and tell him you’re extorting him,” I say, trying to sound forceful. “That you’re the one who has the money, not Rico.”

A metal-coated laugh.

“You’re welcome to tell James whatever you like. I don’t think he’s going to be very receptive.”

“Listen . . . the thing is” —I’m so tired that without really thinking, I’m about to just tell the truth, mention the text from Rico, but Courtney realizes this and lunges across the table to smack me on the cheek. Shakes his head frantically. Instead I say, voice wavering: “We can bring the cops to the red house. Show them Rico, show them everything.”

A metallic clang that might be him clearing his throat.

“This must be Frank. The boneheaded one—James’s words. Frank, I suggest you defer to your wiser partner and exercise some restraint. Once you speak to James, I believe your only possible course of action will become clear. You have stumbled into something much larger than yourself. Something you cannot control. You are standing at the mouth of a cave that not even God himself dares to enter. Don’t be a fool.”

“I’m not—”

“You just invaded one of my private residences. Few things upset me more than that. So it may be prudent to ask yourselves why you’re still alive. The answer is: Because I’m a patient person. But James, decidedly, is not.”

He hangs up.

Courtney’s eyes are bulging. His face is the same pale white as the tile tabletop.

“Frank . . .” he says.

“Yeah?”

“Give me some alcohol, please.”

“Congrats,” I say and slide the liter of Jack across the table to him. “You’ve just been accepted to the prestigious Frank Lamb school of self-medication.”

He takes a little sip straight from the bottle and doubles over coughing. I doubt he’s had a drink since he last worked with me. Hands me back the bottle.

The phone starts buzzing again. This time it’s Sampson. I close my eyes, hoping when I open them everything will be different. Nope. Still sitting across the table from what looks like a scarecrow who just accidentally saw himself in the mirror and freaked out. We each still have one headphone in. I take a long pull of whiskey—half hoping one of these Wendy’s employees says something and gives me an excuse to go ballistic—and hit answer.

“Hi, Senator,” I answer softly. “Sorry about the—”

“Where the heck are you?” Sampson’s voice is throaty and raw in my ear. “How dare you ignore me! Bring them to me!”

“Senator, we—” I cling to the bottle, hoping to absorb a little more booze through osmosis. “We just experienced a little setback is all.”

“You . . .” The Senator’s voice has gone horrible. Soft, weak, cracked with pain. “What . . . ?”

“James. Listen, Rico is dead,” I say. “Oliver Vicks killed him. I know he already spoke to you, but he’s messing with you.”

“What? What?” he flips out again. “How dare you besmirch his holy name! Where is the money? Where are the books?!”

“Senator, listen carefully to me,” Courtney says, his tone pleading. “This won’t be easy to hear. But you’ve been had. It seems clear that this has been an elaborate con by Oliver Vicks to extort money from you. We can prove it to you—we can be at your house in a few hours to show you pictures. He’s not in prison. Must have been paroled or something. The authorities need to know about this. We need helicopters and German Shepherds. I’m going to call the police, and they’ll get you your money back.”

I hear the shrill crinkle of what I’m guessing is a Diet Pepsi can being manually crushed.

“Sophnot told me you’d say something like that.”

I close my eyes and see bright lights. Listen to the buzz of the air-conditioning, the ding of the cash register.

“James,” I reply, as calmly as I can. “He’s a monster. He’s manipulating you in a million different ways. Courtney and I are trying to help you.”

My heart flutters in the silence that follows. The longer it goes, the more terrible it is to imagine the man on the other end . . . His mouth open, trying to scream but unable to. Is he actually struggling to breathe? It’s impossible to tell how long the moment lasts. Time is stretched out like a man on the rack.

But when Sampson talks again, his voice is surprisingly calm, as if he didn’t hear anything I just said. His politician voice.

“You stole the books from me,” he says. “But I can forgive you if you make things right. Bring them back to me by Friday. Sophnot needs them by sundown on Friday. That’s when the holy Sabbath begins.”

“James,” I say, ignoring the seismic event unfolding in my stomach. “It’s more complex . . .” I trail off, lacking the strength or will to finish that sentence. My molars are gnashing together so forcefully I worry they’re just gonna pop out, or erode into nubs. In my earbud pounds Sampson’s frantic, impossibly fast breathing. Panting, almost. It’s like we’re listening to a man who is literally in the process of going insane.

“You think you can do this?” Sampson hisses. “You think I won’t move heaven and earth, to retrieve my teacher’s books? To punish you?” He trails off, whimpering, then starts up again, his voice again reverting to something resembling reasonable. “If you think you can simply flee with my property, you have badly underestimated the capabilities of my office. You think,” Sampson gasps, “you can hide from my wrath?!”

Courtney is breathing and blinking at hummingbird speed.

“Now let’s just back up—”

“Bring me my books. And if you dare, foolishly, to make this public, I’ll drag you down with me. I’ll clutch at your ankles and drag you down with me into hell.”

“Please, James, if we could just be reasonable—”

“I would prefer to resolve this quietly. But if I don’t get them by Friday you’ll leave me no choice. Can you imagine what happens when a United States Senator tells the FBI that he’s had very valuable property stolen from his house? You think you’d last a day with them looking for you?”

“James . . .” I lock eyes with Courtney, begging him for advice. What do I do?

I’m a fish flopping around on the sand, just looking to get back in the water even for a few moments. Have to avoid him calling in the infantry before then. Give us time to think. What’s today, Tuesday early morning? I can’t even remember.

“Okay. Friday,” I say, dread washing over my body. “We’ll bring them to your house.”

“By four,” he says. “Sophnot needs them before sundown.”

I hang up.

Courtney’s hands are trembling. Beads of sweat creeping from the creases on his forehead.

“This is . . .” He gasps, “Frank, I think I’m having a panic attack.”

“I would have had one hours ago, but I’m too tired,” I say, shooting to my feet, and retrieving a paper bag from the Wendy’s staff for Courtney to breathe into. I retake my seat.

“Why does Oliver think we have the books?” I ask.

“I don’t know,” he says. “Maybe that’s what Rico told him. But the irony is, that’s better than him and Sampson thinking we don’t have them. I guess.”

“Yeah Court, everything’s rosy,” I say. “At least the ten-inch metal rod being shoved up our asses isn’t eleven inches.”

Courtney responds with a few rapid exhalations into the paper bag.

“We need to get the fuck out of here . . .” I say. “Out of this state. This country.”

Courtney puts down the bag.

“We can’t,” he says. “Sampson will come after us.”

I blink at him.

“So . . .” I say. “I guess we better figure out where Sophnot will never go. Before Friday.”

Courtney puts down his bag, presses his palms on the table, and pushes himself up slightly out of his seat, so he’s leaning over me like some kind of perched bird of prey. The tips of his fingers are vibrating like an electric current is running through them.

“And then what?” he says. “We just leave this serial killer on the loose? We can’t, Frank. He . . .”

Courtney trails off, unable or unwilling to vocalize the atrocities we now know Oliver has been performing regularly.

I drain what’s left of my spiked coffee, pathetically hoping this final caffeine surge will suddenly render everything a difficult yet manageable challenge that I can’t wait to get to work on.

“Okay . . .” I say, trying to think out loud. “Right. Oliver. So then . . . we’ll bring back the books, then call the cops on Oliver.”

Courtney emits something between a laugh and a cry.

“No . . . making this public will bring down Sampson. And if he goes down, I guarantee you he was telling the truth about bringing us down with him.”

“Well, then what the hell do you suggest?” I snap. Feels like my brain has run out of gas and is now just lurching spastically toward the garage.

Courtney sinks back into his chair.

“Let me think,” he says, and he sits back in the booth and goes silent. I consider calling Sadie again. Trying to explain . . . what exactly?

It would be a selfish call. I just want to hear her voice. That will settle me down.

But she wouldn’t pick up. It’s two hours later on the East Coast.

I toy with the empty coffee cup.

What if Courtney had never found me in Budapest? Or if I hadn’t gone to the hotel? Or if I’d said no to him?

There’s a reasonable case for being upset at him for dragging me into this, but I don’t feel that way. Instead I feel that this case, this whole state—fucking Colorado—is some kind of black hole that dragged me back from across the globe.

Why? Why does this place want Frank Lamb and Courtney Lavagnino?

I smirk to myself at the ludicrousness of the first answer that pops into my head.

What if we’re the only ones who can fix this mess?

“Oliver is in a pretty spot . . . He’s not particularly worried,” Courtney finally says. “He’s thinking: Either we’ll deliver the books to him ourselves, via Sampson, or, worst case, Sampson will deploy the cavalry to get them back for him. And meanwhile, he already has his forty-eight million.”

I bite my lip.

“He seems to have a knack for setting up situations in which he can’t lose.”

We sit for a moment in silence.

“What if we told Oliver the truth? That we don’t have the books, but here’s Rico’s text? Maybe he would know what Rico meant, and he’d just go get the books himself.”

“No, no . . .” says Courtney. “He knows who we are. And he’s not going to just let us walk away knowing what we know. He’d either kill us or have Sampson report us.”

“So what do we do?” I ask.

We sit in silence for a moment

“Option one: If we get the books by Friday then I can get my passport, and our salary, from Sampson. Then when Sampson brings the books to Oliver we can follow, and tell the cops where he is—I’d say skinning people probably violates his probation terms.”

“And if we can’t find the books?” Courtney says.

“Then our second best option is to just track down Oliver Vicks directly. To at least protect ourselves, stop him from killing anyone else, and get Sampson’s money back.”

Courtney purses his lips and taps his fingers on the table, and for maybe the twentieth time in the last couple hours, nods.

“Okay. I’m with you. Best case, get the books. And barring that, at least try to figure out where Oliver Vicks is and—hopefully—prove that he’s on the loose killing people. So. Where will Sophnot never go?”

I scratch my head.

“Back to prison maybe? I don’t know how the hell Rico would get in there to drop the books off, but if Oliver got out on parole, I mean, back to prison is probably the last place he’d ever want to go.”

Courtney shrugs helplessly.

“Could be. Let’s go tomorrow morning and figure out what the hell happened there.”