I put the sim card back into the phone Consuela gave me and turn it on. She answers before the first ring can finish.
“Sydney, thank god.” The relief in her voice sounds genuine. “Why haven’t you been answering your phone?”
“I’m from the text generation, Consuela, same as you. You know phone calls make us nervous.”
There is sound behind her, and I hear Consuela’s hand cover the receiver and mumbled words. Then she’s back. “Launching an attack on a transport—actually, never mind.” She lets out a sigh and then takes in a breath. I scrunch the rumpled sheets in my hand.
“There was a warrant issued for your arrest but I was able to get it rescinded.” I roll off the bed and cross to the windows. The shower stops. Mulberry will be out here in a few minutes, and James will wake up soon.
“Okay…what’s the catch?”
“I’m not giving up on this case.” Her voice is hard, cold. She sounds off. “I registered you as an informant.” My stomach lurches, vulnerability crashing over me. If Richard Chiles wanted me dead when I was just a loose end… “Of course, your information is confidential.”
A harsh laugh escapes me. “You know that’s a bunch of bullshit. You just put a target on my back.”
“The target was there—what I did was get you some coverage. At least the arrest warrant is gone—and going after a federal informant is a hell of a lot riskier than going after a woman believed to be dead or an infamous vigilante.” Her voice is tight. She’s frustrated.
She also has a point.
My gaze rakes over the back yard. There’s a pool surrounded by flagstones in the same earth red as the hills beyond. The curated cactuses are closer together here, more varied—short little round fellows clump around red long-leafed agaves. Near the hot tub stands a saguaro cactus with its fat trunk and friendly arms. The thing looks like a cartoon character frozen in place with both arms raised; maybe it’s getting mugged…or arrested. “Is there still a case?” I ask.
Consuela’s pause is too long. “Yes.”
“It’s harder without Jackson.” I assume.
“Yes.” Consuela’s voice is low, like she doesn’t want it to be true.
“What about Dan?” I ask, my fingers reaching up to touch the cool glass. The sun beats on the other side and I can feel the echoes of its warmth through the double panes. But the AC spills cold air into the room.
“I’m seeing what I can do.”
“Wait,” I say, as it occurs to me that Consuela is no longer a Homeland Security officer. “How could you register me as a confidential informant? You’re senatorial staff now. They don’t have CIs, do they?”
“Legally, no. I asked a colleague.”
“A colleague?” I say, my voice raising. “So whose informant am I?”
“Declan Doyle.”
The sound of the bathroom door opening turns me from the window. Mulberry, a towel wrapped around his waist, walks into the room, a billow of steam coming with him. Sunlight hits the burn scars, lighting their edges and smooth valleys. My heart beats harder, the pain of them somehow lingering inside me.
“Declan Doyle?” I parrot back to her.
Spotting me on the phone, Mulberry cocks his head, his brow furrowing. Who are you talking to?
I hold up a finger. Just a minute.
Mulberry starts to cross toward me, his confusion twisting into playful delight—as if he just discovered an opening to mess with me and is going to take full advantage.
Consuela’s pause stretches the length of time it takes Mulberry to reach me. “Yes,” she finally answers.
“So he’s not trying to arrest me anymore?” I say as Mulberry’s arm comes around my waist. “I’m now his informant.”
Mulberry cocks his head. I hold up my finger again, I’ll explain it all once I’m done.
“Yes,” Consuela says.
“But he actually wants to arrest me?”
“He was following orders.” Consuela’s answer is faster this time—that’s a good reason in her mind.
But don’t we all know about the dangers of blindly following orders at this point in history? How many atrocities has that act led to…Mulberry fuzzes my brain when he tugs my body against his and gets his second arm around me. I tilt my face away when Mulberry goes for my lips, needing them to finish this conversation. So he nibbles on my jaw. “I’m not good at understanding politics, Consuela. Is he a good guy or a bad guy?”
“If only the world was so simple.”
Indeed. “Does he wanna bring down Richard Chiles?” I ask, focusing on the indisputable evil in this conversation.
“Declan is still constrained by the system.”
“But you told him what happened with your niece?”
“Yes, I did. That’s how I got him to agree to register you as his CI.” So Consuela trusts him enough to tell him that dangerous secret.
“He offered me protection,” I say. My mind goes back to that windswept field when I chose to get on Robert’s helicopter instead of take up Declan’s offer. It was only a few days ago but time has stretched itself in that strange way that it does sometimes. I’m the same woman but also so fucking different. That was before Petergate. Before Robert’s wounding. Before…so much.
“Offering protection to someone he also likes hunting sounds like Declan Doyle.” Consuela’s voice sounds tired. Like Declan is exhausting.
“He likes to see himself as a white knight.” Mulberry’s teeth tease my earlobe, and I have to bite my lip to keep from making any sounds inappropriate for a serious conversation about good and evil, laws and injustice…all the super important stuff.
“He also likes approval from above.” Consuela’s tone isn’t outright bitter, but it’s got an edge to it.
I wriggle and Mulberry loosens his hold, releasing my ear, but not letting me go. “Do you trust him?” I ask. I don’t, but I want to hear what Consuela has to say. I’m guessing she feels the same, but I’m really curious if she’ll admit it to me. How much does she trust me may be the real question I’m asking here.
She doesn’t answer for so long that Mulberry gets bored and starts to kiss my bare shoulder. “Right now, Sydney, I don’t trust anyone. And you shouldn’t either.”
Good advice I struggle to follow every damn time.
“I’m headed back to DC with Senator Jackson’s body.” Her voice doesn’t crack, but there is pain in it.
“I’m sorry,” I say, the weight of the woman’s death hitting me again. “She…I could see you two were close. And I could see why.”
“Thank you,” Consuela says, her voice low. Mulberry stills next to me. “I’m not giving up.”
“I understand.” And I really do. Consuela and I both care deeply about justice, we just go about it differently. “Has the shooter in custody said anything or is he still just pleading the Fifth?”
“I need to go,” she says, not answering my question. “Keep this phone. I’ll be in touch. I have some ideas of how to move forward but need to take Senator Jackson home first.”
“Okay. And Consuela?”
“Yeah?”
“Take care of yourself.”
“You too, Sydney.”
We hang up, and I stare at the phone for a moment.
Mulberry straightens so that he can meet my gaze. “Consuela sounds…”
“What?”
“Not scared.”
I shake my head.
“Not even nervous.”
“No,” I agree.
“But dire nonetheless.”
“Almost resigned?” I ask, not really liking that word either. Because she didn’t sound like she was giving up on anything but trust in others. Which, sure, that’s a bummer—I’ve been there—but it’s not the same as resigned.
“Determined,” Mulberry says, then nods. “She sounded like she wasn’t giving up even though she knows she should.”
“Yeah, that’s it,” I agree, smiling.
“You’re awful cute when you think I’m right.”
I huff a sound of outrage, and Mulberry laughs. He tilts his head back, laughing, oh so fucking proud of himself. I smack his bare chest. “God really must be fucking with me,” Mulberry says, wiping a tear from his eye as he looks back down at me, affection written in every line of his face.
“Yes, I’d say the big man upstairs thinks both of us are hysterical. You’d think He’d have better things to do than mess with us, considering He’s an all-knowing, all-powerful being…but, the mysteries of the world can’t fully be explained.”
“Is that what you plan to tell James?” Mulberry asks, his smile still that sweet loving one that I’ve only gotten to see on the rare occasions our intimacy didn’t immediately lead to something rotten. Like me freaking out and running from him. Or him trying to corral me into more than I can give…
“I don’t know.” I lean my face into Mulberry’s chest, the scars right under my lips. “I guess we will figure that out together.”
Mulberry’s lips brush the top of my head. “Yeah,” he says. “I guess we will.”
I close my eyes and lean into him, letting him support me. Letting him do the whole I’m a big strong man and can hold you up shtick—and I don’t mind it for one minute. Not even a second.
You can have everything you desire if you’ll let yourself. Robert’s words come back to me, so close that it’s as if he’s in the room and just whispered them into my ear. I squeeze Mulberry tighter, refusing to let that man ruin this intimacy.
But my mind won’t leave him just lying in that hospital room, deep in a coma, where he belongs. Oh, no, my brain moves him onto the surgery table, cuts his skull open and shows me the vivid red blood on the surgeon’s gown. Fear trills up my spine. And I’m not sure if it’s because I’m afraid he’ll die or afraid he won’t.