Chapter 78: Before She Does

Lucas stood at the blind with his phone still against his ear and watched the corner where the sedan had turned.

"Reed," he said. "It just left. It turned toward the river. Toward her building."

"Toward Victoria’s."

"Yes."

"Stay inside. Do not call her. Do not text her a warning that names anyone." Reed’s voice had gone flat, the way it did when he was already writing something in his head. "I’m calling her detail through the channel the GC set up under the litigation hold. They can move without you freelancing a reason."

"How long?"

"Minutes. Stay put. Leave the front light off. If anyone knocks, you do not open the door. You call me."

"Understood."

"And Lucas. Do not reply to that text. Screenshot is enough. You’ve already forwarded it. That is the whole of your job for the next half hour."

Reed hung up.

Lucas locked the deadbolt again, even though it was already locked, and sat on the floor with his back against the wall under the window so that anyone looking up from the street would see an empty apartment. The refrigerator hummed. Through the wall the neighbor’s television was on again, a commercial with a jingle about car insurance that he had heard three times that week.

He did not turn on a light. He sat in the dark and watched the unknown number sit at the top of his messages, unanswered, and tried not to invent what "before she does" was supposed to mean. Richard had asked for ten minutes too. Richard had used doors that were never just doors. Danner had written it like an older man being reasonable, which still sat wrong in Lucas’s chest.

He thought about Victoria’s apartment, the one with the river view and the detail in the lobby, and about a dark sedan signaling politely at his corner as if courtesy made the rest of it fine. He thought about Elena saying sixteen days and six prints, and about a director who had asked for detail logs eleven days ago in language that sounded like governance.

He checked the street again through the edge of the blind. Empty curb. Empty corner. A cyclist went past with a delivery bag and did not look up. Lucas let the blind fall and went back to the floor. His jacket was still on. He took it off and folded it beside him because the dark made small orderly gestures feel useful.

[Priority Quest Active.]

[Objective: Do not meet or reply to Philip Danner. Report the contact to counsel immediately and preserve the message.]

[Status: Reported. Message preserved. Reply withheld.]

[Reward pending completion confirmation: 400 AP.]

He let the overlay fade. His hands were steady. He was surprised by that. Two months ago he would have been halfway to the door with a bad plan. Tonight he stayed on the floor and counted the seconds between the television jingles and waited for Reed to do the job Lucas was not allowed to do himself.

Victoria texted at five thirty-eight.

A car sat outside my building for about four minutes and left when the detail walked toward it. They flagged it. I’m fine. Irritated. Do you know something about this.

A second message, almost immediately.

I’m asking you a question that is not about testimony. I’m asking you if I should be looking over my shoulder for a reason that involves you.

He read both of them twice. He thought about what Reed had said. He thought about Miller telling a room not to say a name. He thought about Victoria noticing the GC holding his breath that morning and putting it on her own list, the way she put everything on a list eventually.

He typed carefully. Deleted a longer sentence. Typed again.

Call Reed. Stay with your detail. Please.

Three dots appeared. Stopped. Appeared again.

That’s not an answer.

It’s the answer I can give. Call Reed.

She did not reply for almost a minute. He watched the screen and hated how familiar that silence had become between them, the kind that meant she was choosing which version of herself to send next.

I’m calling him. Then I’m going to decide whether I’m angry at you or at the paper you’re standing behind. Don’t leave your apartment.

He put the phone face down on the floor beside him and waited. The neighbor changed channels. Someone laughed on a sitcom. Lucas stared at the underside of the windowsill and practiced saying nothing until it felt like a skill instead of a failure.

He wanted to write her a longer message. He wanted to tell her the sedan had been outside his building first, and that the man who wanted ten minutes had used her name like a lever, and that the reason he could not say any of that was sitting in an annex room under Miller’s rules. He did not write it. He put his phone farther away, out of arm’s reach, and listened for sirens that did not come.

Reed called back at five fifty-one.

"She’s fine," Reed said. "Her detail saw the car. Dark sedan, no plates they could read from the angle, private service look. They approached. It pulled away before they got close enough to knock on a window. They followed it three blocks and lost it at a light. They’re pulling what they can from cameras."

"Was it the same one?"

"I don’t know yet. Color and shape match what you described. That’s not an identification." Reed paused. "I told her the contact you received tonight is with counsel and that she is not to discuss it with you. I also told her I asked you not to warn her yourself, because a warning from you would put information on the wrong paper. She understood the sentence. She did not like it."

"I know."

"She’s allowed not to like it. You’re allowed to keep doing it anyway." Another pause, shorter. "The car was booked through a private car service under a shell company. Morgan is already on it. They lost the vehicle. We’re not chasing it ourselves. Miller’s office has the description."

"Shell company," Lucas repeated.

"Don’t start building a theory on a phone call. Morgan builds theories. You stay home." Reed exhaled. "You do not answer that number if it rings. You do not open the door. And you can stop holding your breath about the quest, if your little screen still cares about that. You didn’t meet him. You didn’t reply. You reported it. You preserved it. That’s the list."

[Quest Completed!]

[Objective Met: Contact reported and preserved. No reply. No meeting.]

[Reward: 400 AP.]

[Current AP Balance: 5750.]

Fifty-seven fifty. Lucas looked at the number in the dark and found it did not make him feel safer. It made him feel like a man who had passed a test while someone else was still driving a route that passed her lobby.

"There’s something else," Reed said. "Danner’s personal lawyer just emailed me. Offering a voluntary interview with his client on Monday. Not with Miller. With me. He framed it as a courtesy between counsel."

"What did you say?"

"I said I’d get back to him after I speak with Miller. Which is true, and also a way of saying no without saying no until Monday morning." Reed’s voice softened a fraction. "You’re done for tonight. Eat something. Sleep if you can. Call me if anything else moves."

"Reed."

"What."

"She asked if she should be looking over her shoulder because of me."

"And you told her to call me. That was correct." A beat. "I’ll handle her. You handle staying inside. And Lucas — if she shows up at your door, which she might, you still do not tell her a name. Separate paper does not get thinner because someone drove past a building."

"I know."

"Say it like you mean it."

"I won’t tell her a name."

"Good. Eat."

Camilla texted at six ten.

Home. Own kitchen. Sister put the baseball bat in the closet and cried about it. I’m going to sleep for eleven hours. Don’t text me unless someone is in handcuffs again.

He typed back.

Glad you’re home.

You sound like a man sitting in the dark. Go turn a light on.

He almost smiled. He got up, turned on the kitchen light, and left the front room dark. He heated leftover rice in a pan with an egg because it was what he had, and ate it standing at the counter while the street outside stayed empty. The egg stuck a little. He scraped it off with the spatula and ate it anyway.

At six twenty-two Reed forwarded him a one-line note from Morgan, no commentary: shell entity incorporated eight months ago, registered agent a mail drop in Wilmington, car service invoice paid by wire from an account that was not Vertex’s. Lucas read it once, put it away, and did not try to finish the sentence for her.

He washed the pan a second time because there was still egg on the rim. He wiped the counter. He opened the fridge, looked at a half lemon and a bottle of wine he had bought for no reason and still not opened, and closed it again. The apartment looked the way it always looked when he was trying not to pace: too clean in the wrong places, and quiet in a way that made the clock in the kitchen sound louder than it was.

At six forty his phone buzzed again. Victoria.

Reed hung up on me after twelve minutes of being careful. My detail says the car was a private service and they lost it. I’m fine. I’m also not sleeping in this apartment tonight while somebody’s driver knows the address.

He waited. The three dots came back.

I’m coming to yours. Not to ask you questions. I already know you won’t answer them. I’m coming because I told you next time I was staying, and because I would rather be angry in your kitchen than alone in mine. I’ll be there in forty minutes. Tell me now if that’s a problem.

He looked at the deadbolt. He looked at the dark front room. He thought about Reed saying stay put, and about a sedan that had already been past his curb once tonight, and about Thursday night when she had stood in his doorway and said next time without making it a joke.

It’s not a problem. Use the back stair if you want. Chain will be on until I see you through the peephole.

Romantic.

Practical.

Same thing, tonight. A pause. Then: I’m bringing a change of clothes and I’m not pretending this is casual. See you in forty.

[Target: Victoria Sterling.]

[Relationship Status: Intimate Partner (Probationary).]

[Target State: Unsettled. Choosing proximity over distance after a security scare she cannot fully explain. Still keeping her list.]

Lucas put the chain on. He washed the pan. He turned on the lamp in the bedroom and left the living room half-dark, the way she had liked it the last time. He checked the peephole twice for no reason. He put a clean glass by the sink and filled it and left it there, because the last time she had come through his door the first thing she had needed was water.

He sat on the arm of the couch where she had sat on Thursday night and waited for the knock that would mean she had decided the wall between them was something she could sleep next to, if not climb.

Outside, the street was empty. Somewhere down toward the river a car door closed, too far away to be hers yet. He checked the unknown number one more time. Still unanswered. Still preserved. Still a sentence he was not allowed to finish out loud.

At seven twelve a car slowed outside. He went to the peephole before it had fully stopped. Not her. A rideshare dropping someone two doors down. He went back to the couch and sat again and told himself that forty minutes was forty minutes and that Reed would have called if the detail had lost her between buildings.

He put the phone face down on the cushion beside him and did not pick it up again until he heard footsteps on the stairs, measured and familiar, and then the short pause of someone who had reached his landing and was deciding whether to knock like a guest or like a woman who already knew where the chain was.

She knocked twice. Short. Not polite.

Lucas stood, checked the peephole, saw her face in the warped glass with a bag over one shoulder and her detail’s gray Suburban idling at the curb behind her, and took the chain off.