As we settled in the retive silence, I could hear the distant opening of a door, reminding me that while this office was empty, so many others still weren’t.

  We sat and breathed; just being alive felt like winning the lottery.

  There was a sense of fate twisting to make all of it possible, and when I thought about it, the split vision had done precisely that. In any other world, I would be dead, in jail, or worse. Not that we were out of the woods, but the woods had thinned a lot.

  A few seconds after we sat down and rexed, Luanda stared far away, her face rigid. She balled up both fists, then closed her eyes, her hands shaking and mouthed “FUCK” wordlessly into the void. She breathed in deeply for several seconds, let it out slowly, and met my gaze. Her voice was steady despite the tremor in her hands. “Ok. Let’s figure out where we stand.”

  The ear buds were still on, so I asked BlueWhisper for an update.

  “It’s pretty brutal right now. They have an investigator on scene. He’s calling for helicopters, drones, and K9 units, basically anything short of bringing in the army.”

  “Nick is on his way to Harborview Medical with two cops in the ambunce and another car behind. They're giving him the royal treatment. I’d say if they decide he’s the shooter, his wounds may prove fatal, but otherwise, he’ll survive.”

  The ctter of BlueWhisper’s mechanical keyboard echoed through the office for a few minutes, with sirens still audible in the distance. Eventually, He spoke again. “Overall, the tactical situation is pretty fubar. The main good news is you are outside the hard perimeter. The bad is that every city, county, and state police officer in the region seems to think Queen Anne is the pce to be. Definitely giving you the thick blue line. I would stay hunkered.”

  Luanda broke the silence. “Hey, I wanted to thank you. There is no way we get through that gauntlet without your overwatch.”

  Whisper’s voice pitched up a bit with a hint of pride. “No worries, Luanda. Sabot is a good bloke, and his money spends, so happy to help. Honestly, though, I have no idea how you made it this far. I figured you were screwed the whole time.”

  Luanda raised an eyebrow in my direction, then closed her eyes and brought her hands to her temples. Finally, she shook her head. “Well, I’m gd I didn’t know that ten minutes ago when I was walking down the street pretending to be confident.”

  We sat in retive silence for the next few minutes. My eyes drifted over the barren walls, the new paint smell making them feel more abandoned than inviting. Difficult questions hung in the air, and both of us anticipated them. The clicking of BlueWhisper’s keyboard and the occasional detail about the ongoing search for us bnketed those questions. Luanda broke the moment by saying, “Whisper, would you mind dropping the call? I need to talk to Sabot for a while.”

  Whisper came back immediately, “Right then, I’ll keep the updates on text only.”

  After he disconnected, Luanda opened up, her tone calm and even, but her eyes focused on me, making me feel like a rabbit caught in a hawk’s gaze. “I’m grateful for you getting me out of that mess.” Her eyes softened for a moment, then hardened. “But I need to know what’s going on. Who are these people? Why did you walk into Stillpoint, and why did they kidnap me? I need some answers because I’m just swimming for my life right now with no sense of where the shore is.”

  I gave her the details: hacking Bertrand, Levin, and Hoyle, how I ended up at Stillpoint, everything except my precognition. Luanda let the words flow, not interrupting until I finished describing leaving her at Stillpoint. Then she asked the first big question, “Why didn’t you stay?”

  I decided on a partial truth. “You probably won’t believe this, but

  I get these feelings when shit’s about to happen—pain right here.” I tapped between my eyes. “When I’m really in danger, I can almost feel exactly what is going to happen.”

  Her face was a bit incredulous. “So you’re saying you're psychic? That’s a big pill to swallow.”

  “Sure, if that’s what you want to call it. It’s so strong I can’t ignore it. After you shot Dave I felt it, just as I had when Dave was about to come around the corner, and when I hid in Stillpoint in the first pce.”

  Luanda picked up the thread. “Like when you pulled me back from being seen by the Sheriff.”

  “Yes, then too.”

  She went with the other big question next. “Color me skeptical about this psychic stuff. Let’s say you believe it—fine. How’s it lead you to crash a car to save me? Why bother?“

  “When I left you, it hurt. I dumped a ton of shit on your head from the police alone. The people after me are ten times worse. When they showed up minutes after I started the hack I knew they were a real threat, with insane skills.”

  “My settup is a yered defense. Multiple VPNs anonymous public access wifi, and more. For them to pierce that and come after me so hard when I didn’t even steal that much money means I have accidentally touched on something big. They want me dead, but they want to make sure whatever it is they think I found doesn’t get out.”

  I looked her in the eye, “People like that are thorough. They won’t like that the person who shot one of their hitters just happens to be in a building in range of the wifi I used to break in, and that the same person is using an Id that’s as fake as mine.”

  I could see the dots connecting in her eyes as I outlined it. I kept going. “Whisper and another hacker pulled together the info with me and we had moment-to-moment intel on you within police custody. When the transfer order came through with a warrant and the transfer cop was a known associate of Nick and Dave, I had to try something.”

  “It was stupid. I’m no jack reacher. I don’t have a ‘particur set of skills.’ I’m just a hacker and a thief. I did it anyway and I may end up dead because of it, but I would do it again.”

  The hum of the HVAC echoed in the silence for a full two seconds.

  Her voice softened slightly, but it still had a focused edge. “You got lucky. We both did. I thought we were dead when you missed that second shot. Use two hands next time.”

  The silence held but I kept my focus on her intently and I felt like she was remembering something dark. She made a tight smirk breaking the reverie with an attempt at humor. “Next time I shoot someone. I’m booking it. Cops suck.”

  Maybe she believed me, or maybe she just wanted to focus on the immediate situation, but she shifted us back to the immediate problems. “What do we do next? I don’t think we can wait a few hours and call an Uber. How long do these searches take anyway?” I didn’t know either, so I reconnected BlueWhisper on speaker.

  BlueWhisper gave us a detailed rundown, and it wasn’t great. From what he said, there would be half a day or more of hard lockdowns, every person in the vicinity would be canvassed, and even after the hard lockdown, there would be a massively increased police presence for a day. He didn’t have any easy answers.

  After interrogating him for 10 minutes about options, Luanda decided to phone a friend. “Let me call my uncle Griss. He’s former MARSOC and has escaped from some pretty wild pces.”

  I was reluctant to bring someone new in, but her life was in as much jeopardy as mine. “Ok, but not a regur call. Let me bounce it through a PBX.”

  I ended the call with BlueWhisper and used the SIP phone I had installed. I connected it to a PBX I had hijacked from a real-estate firm in Vermont. When the setup was ready, I asked her for the phone number.

  “Sorry, but I need to talk to him directly; he’ll want to make sure I’m not being coerced and will want specific coded responses.”

  I was annoyed. I didn’t like the idea of a private or even half-private conversation after she had ripped out one of my earbuds less than an hour ago. I acceded. “Sure, give me the number so I can set up the call, then you can talk to him.”

  I set up the call, but as I did, on impulse, I decided to initiate call recording on the PBX. It started to ring, and I handed her the phone. She motioned with her head as she listened to the ringing, indicating that I needed to clear out. I navigated the repetitive gray cubicles to an empty conference room, the indentation from the missing table its only feature.

  The only words I heard as I walked away sounded small and a little scared—so different from her tone with me. Her voice cracked slightly as she implored, “Uncle Griss, I really need your help.”

  Her whispered tones didn’t reach me, so I had no idea what was said, but they talked for several minutes before she stood and gestured me over. Luanda held out the phone. “He wants to talk to you.”

  As soon as I said hello, Griss’s voice thundered with barely contained venom. “For some damn reason, my niece says not to put a bullet in you, so I won’t. But this is your clusterfuck, and you’re gonna unfuck it. Turn yourself in—step up like a man for once. Tell the cops the truth—”

  “No fucking way,” I spat back.

  “Yes fucking way—”

  “Fuck you if you think I’m doing that. It’s a crap idea—it just boils us slowly instead of all at once. Will the cops believe me? Will the killers believe I shot a cop to rescue a girl I don’t even know? If they grab me, I’ll tell them everything, but don’t think for a second they won’t try to pin Luanda with murder one for shooting Dave and accessory after the fact for Jacob, no matter what I say now.”

  At that instant, the phone started bring an alert. I could hear other phones also bring distantly down the hallway. I looked at it, and my heart sank.

  PUBLIC SAFETY ALERT - QUEEN ANNE SEATTLE: Active search for 2 suspects considered Armed & Dangerous following Officer Homicide. Female Bck approx 20s (Escaped Custody) wearing blue jail uniform/scrubs accompanied by Male White approx 20s. Fled area on foot. Call 911 if seen - Use Caution DO NOT APPROACH. SPD/WSP.

  Sometimes, life just doesn’t py fair.