Sign Here(41)

So I made her wait. I walked around her neighborhood for hours before knocking. Not because I had any other plan, but because even with the trump card in my pocket, I still felt the need to take every opportunity to keep her in the dark. Until, finally, I could no longer stand the nonstop sound of a car alarm, so I went to her door.

“What took you so long?”

“Have you ever tried to find it?” I asked as I kicked sludge from my boots. I had misjudged a puddle around the corner, but luckily it was only up to the ankle. “That car alarm that’s going off, I mean.”

Cal shut the door behind me.

“I went looking my first week here, but the alarm moves from car to car in whatever direction you’re headed.” She shrugged. “I barely notice it anymore.”

“Don’t say that too loud. We had an ice-cream truck that was like that in my neighborhood, but then some idiot had blocked it out long enough to say, ‘What ice-cream truck?’ and the next morning we got a century of Hell Week pledges on those bike-and-drink trolleys. I started humming myself to sleep with ‘The Entertainer,’ I missed that damn truck so much.”

“That’s yours,” she said, pointing to a beer on the counter. “It’s not my fault if it got warm.”

“So, care to tell me what’s going on?” I asked before I took the whole thing down in a deep and greedy gulp.

“Okay,” Cal said, exhaling. I could tell that’s what she was doing—exhaling—which meant she did it slowly enough that it could’ve been manipulative. Or she was simply breathing. “So, when I was in the Retribution Management Department on Third, designing punishment plans for individuals on the belt, I was in charge of this one case.”

“You know,” I said, and paused for another sip. “I was the person who had to actually execute those plans. You could’ve been more considerate of the well-being of your colleagues working the belt.”

I expected a sassy retort so completely, I didn’t even look at her, but after a minute of nothing, I turned. Cal’s eyes were trained on the mangy carpet.

“What?” I asked.

“It’s just rich,” she said. “Complaining to me about the conditions on the belt.”

My face burned, and I realized it had been a while since I had felt shame from the natural wellspring within instead of what they pumped into the air here.

“Sorry,” I said. “I forgot.”

“Anyway, he was a con man who got his start coaching high school football. You know how folks get about football in Texas, and there were some real promising guys on that team, already being scouted by colleges, maybe even destined for the NFL. And it was Homecoming weekend, so all these people in the town, the alums and parents—you’d just never believe how high the bets get around this kind of stuff. Something about knowing the players personally—or enough for it to feel personal—that makes people double down.”

“Does this story have a point, or are you just recapping a feel-good after-school special?” I asked. I felt warm and broad. I flexed my arms against the counter and reveled in my own strength. This is why I drink, I thought. Ninety-nine out of a hundred times it sucked, but that feeling right there was why I kept trying.

“This guy—my case—made his first real chunk of change during that Homecoming game. He pumped the team’s watercoolers full of steroids, or maybe it was their thighs? But the week of the championship, he swapped out the steroids and placed his own bets heavy against them. The team completely fell apart on the field. A couple players even got seriously injured. But it didn’t matter much; when they all tested positive, their careers were over either way.”

“I’m still waiting for the point.”

Cal rolled her eyes hard enough to hurt her neck. “Catch up, Trip! Those guys today were the team. I’m sure of it. The timing lines up, and I recognized things about them from my intel. Jason said their target stole something from all of them . . . What can be stolen that is big enough to warrant the consequences of a deal?”

I rubbed my chin. I couldn’t remember the last time I did that, but I did it then, and I did it with class.

“Oh, for Darkness’ sake, you’re not a fucking gentleman detective,” Cal said. “Sit down.”

And just like that, she sucked the booze ego out of my blood with a straw.

“Fuck you,” I mumbled as I sat.

“Their coach stole their futures, and now they want to give us the deal of a millennium. Fifteen souls at once? We’d be office legends. KQ would have to give you some pretty amazing perks if you were able to pull that off in the first couple of weeks of training me,” she added, probing my leg with her toe.

“You can’t use intel from Third on Fifth. Privacy policy. You could get in a lot of trouble if they find out.”

“That’s why they won’t find out.” Cal kicked off her shoes and turned to face me on the couch, cross-legged.

“Okay,” I conceded. “But that still doesn’t explain how we’re going to find this guy. Or what it is he has that they could possibly want. Proof, maybe?” I took another beer from the minifridge and put my hand on my neck. “Maybe we could make a beacon shoot out of him, like a beam of fire?”

Cal shook her head. “I have a better idea.”