What Have We Done (10)

It could also have a tracker—she’ll deal with that after. But she needs to warn him.

The burner’s screen is blank. She tries to power it on, but nothing happens. It’s dead. Or they loaded some self-destruct code on the device. It would be just like Sabine and her Corporation operatives to pull this kind of Mission Impossible bullshit.

Back on the main floor, Jenna glances out the window before heading outside. She can’t take an Uber without her phone. Maybe she can get a cab. A cabbie won’t need money up front and might let her borrow a phone for a quick call. Then she spies a bus pulling to the corner of K and Seventh. She runs over, waits for two elderly women to get on. The driver is already moving before the old ladies have found and swiped their fare cards. Jenna steps past them and the driver says, “You forgot to pay, ma’am.”

“Sorry,” Jenna says. “I must have left my wallet at my exercise class. I can get off now or at the next stop.”

The driver sighs, shakes his head, but plows ahead. Jenna sits on the edge of the seat near the back door. She tucks the jacket with the tracker under the seat, the cell phone and wig stuffed inside.

One problem solved. Let that woman follow the bus around for a while.

The bus tugs to a stop, and Jenna jumps out at Ninth and I, near the collection of high-end stores at City Center.

She looks for a cab but doesn’t see any, which isn’t surprising since Uber and Lyft turned everyone into amateur taxi drivers. She spots a guy in a suit riding one of those motorized scooters that are such a nuisance. He has a hipster beard and is gabbing on his phone, zipping along the

sidewalk and around pedestrians too fast.

Jenna decides to do it. As the scooter approaches, she trips forward, knocking into the man. The guy yelps, and they both topple onto the grassy strip separating the sidewalk from the street.

The hipster’s eyes are wide as he looks at Jenna, who has jumped to her feet and is brushing herself off. “Oh my gosh, are you okay?” she asks.

A few people walking by watch, then continue on once they see that no one’s hurt.

He looks up at her, slightly dazed. His suit pants have a hole in the knee, but he’s all right. His head snaps back and forth as if he’s making sure no one caught the scene on their phone—the ever-present risk of going viral for one of life’s embarrassing moments.

The guy says, “You need to watch where you’re—” He stops, apparently computing what’s happening as Jenna scoops up his phone and holds it up to his face, unlocking the device.

“What are you—”

Jenna doesn’t answer as she darts to the scooter, pulls it from the pavement, and rides away.

He yells after her, but his voice grows distant as she races along Ninth and cuts a sharp right on Mount Vernon Place and past the historic Carnegie Library building that’s tragically been converted into an Apple store.

She manages to dial Simon’s number as she steers the scooter. It goes to voicemail. Of course …

a call from an unfamiliar line. When she’s a safe distance away, she skids to a stop and furiously thumbs a text.

It says only two words, but Simon will understand:





Alas Babylon.



CHAPTER NINE

DONNIE

Donnie adjusts the angle of the hospital bed upward, laces his hands behind his head with his elbows sticking out. He got lucky: The fishermen were 1990s boys and fans of Tracer’s Bullet. They gave him some whiskey and a blanket to get his body temperature up, bandaged the gash on his head, and brought him ashore.

Now he has a half circle of fans around his bed at the University of Miami Hospital. TMZ got wind that Donnie Danger survived a fall from a cruise ship and it didn’t take long before his room was filled with flowers and women with big hair. Tracer’s Bullet had been one of the only hair bands to emerge—and thrive—during the grunge era, a novelty act that scratched the itch of early Gen Xers not swept away by Kurt Cobain, Pearl Jam, STP, and the rest.

“Could you sign my CD?” a lady asks. She’s in her forties with an orange hue to her skin and prominent lines around the eyes from too many years in the sun. With her, a girl in her teens whose eyes are glued to a phone.

“Sure, sweetheart,” he says, taking the Sharpie someone gave him. He’s in the gown, his skinny white legs tucked under the sheets. “What’s your name?”

“Crystal,” she says. Like always, he writes: “To beautiful Crystal, stay close to Danger. DD.”

She examines the CD cover and cups it to her chest like a treasure.

“And who’s this?” He looks at the girl.

“My niece.” The girl barely looks up from her phone. “She was at my house when I heard. I’m so glad you’re okay.”

“You and me both, darlin’.”

“How did it happen? I mean, your fall…” She says it uncomfortably like she shouldn’t ask.

“That is the million-dollar question,” Donnie says as he signs a poster for a man with sleeved tattoos. And it is. The last thing he remembers is Tom firing him. And Donnie retrieving his emergency bottle of Jack from his cabin.

The nurse arrives, a look of distaste on her face. “Mr. Danger, you have a visitor.”

“The more the merrier,” Donnie tells her. He’s in full rock-star persona, the only time he feels comfortable in his own skin. The only way to mask the anxiety baked into his bones.