NOT EDITED

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Thursday: January 16, 2020

4:20 AM; CLINSTONE, BO AUSTEN’S HOUSE, BEDROOM

Bo opened his eyes as Acamas attempted to shove her nose up his. Gently, he swatted her away. “Why the hell do you do that, huh, baby?” he asked. Acamas let out a purr, kneading her paws against the fabric of his shirt. “You’ve got issues, Acky, serious issues.” He lifted her off his chest and got out of bed. There was no way he’d be getting any more sleep anyway. The second go-round at the nightmare of the horses from the Thanatos case stomping him to death while Kathy laughed had been good enough for him.

He flipped on the bedside lamp and headed for the bathroom. He turned on the light and kicked the door shut. As he turned on the water in the sink, he heard one of Acamas’s toys slide across the tiled bathroom floor. Acamas, who enjoyed hard plastic toys meant for human toddlers rather than cats, also enjoyed launching them under doors at Bo’s feet. Chuckling, he kicked the toy back under the door.

Bo leaned down and washed his face with cold water. The toy hit his heel. After shutting off the water, Bo kicked the toy back in Acamas’s direction. She shoved a paw under the door, curling it around the toy and pulling it back toward herself. Bo pulled the hand towel from its hook and lightly patted his face dry. He heard his phone ding in his bedroom.

He opened the door, stepping over Acamas as he walked into his room. He swiped his phone from the nightstand and smiled to himself. The program on his laptop had found a match. He walked out of his bedroom, Acamas following at his heels. In the kitchen, he leaned over the table and opened the lid of his laptop. He quickly typed in his password. As soon as the screen unlocked, he scanned the information on his laptop.

“Holy shit,” he breathed. He fucking had it.

7:00 AM; CLINSTONE POLICE DEPARTMENT, LAB

Bo didn’t lift his gaze from his laptop as the door to the lab opened. “Detective Lehmann,” he greeted.

“You know it’s me without even looking?” Carter asked.

“You put more weight on one foot than you do the other. The sound’s incredibly distinguishable when compared to Jake, and he’s about the only other person who would come down to visit,” Bo said. Finally, he looked up at Carter. “What can I do for you, Detective?”

Carter cleared his throat as he crossed the room. “I, uh, brought you coffee.” He set the cup down in front of Bo. “It’s the same thing Jake orders for you. It’s a, umm, peace treaty, I guess you could call it. I’d like to start over. I’ve been a royal dick, and I’m sorry. You didn’t deserve that. It’s just…” Carter sighed. “When I met Jake, he was helping Alice get this guy out of prison, and nearly every case we worked during that time dealt with this other man, our previous Lieutenant, Connor Anderson. I spent my whole time believing that Jake didn’t know what he was talking about, that Connor was innocent, that he wasn’t a bad man. I was wrong, and I didn’t want to make that mistake again with you, but if you were guilty of something, you definitely would’ve killed me or Gwen already for what we did. So I’m sorry.”

Bo nodded once and held out a hand. “I’m Bo Austen, forensic analyst. You are?”

Carter smiled faintly as he grabbed Bo’s hand. “Detective Carter Lehmann, Jake’s partner.”

“Well, it’s great to meet you, Detective,” Bo said softly, dropping his hand back to the table. “Thank you for the coffee.”

“You’re welcome, and… thank you for ‘starting over’,” Carter said.

Bo nodded once. “My pleasure, Detective.” He offered a faint smile. “I’m not the bad guy, here. I try to be as level-headed as I possibly can. No true grudges, no out of place anger. I may not be like you, but it doesn’t mean that I don’t understand you.” He shrugged. “I would’ve been suspicious of me too. I’m a little odd, in case you haven’t noticed, and it’s something I’m well-aware of. It takes a while to look past that and realize that I’m intelligent for reasons other than being a mastermind killer,”

“Lehmann, what’re you doing in here?” Jacob asked as he walked into the lab.

“It’s okay. He’s apologizing,” Bo said.

“Do you actually mean it this time?” Jacob asked.

Carter nodded as his partner moved to stand beside him. “I do. I promise, Jake, I’m done with the bullshit.”

“Awesome. Looks like you can be back on the case,” Jacob said. “You know, now that we all can be friends like mature adults.”

“I’m glad we’re all being mature,” Bo said. “But with that out of the way, my program got a hit this morning.”

“Oh, sweet.” Jacob rounded the table to stand beside Bo. “What is it?”

Clearing his throat, Bo brought up a news article. “I’ll save you the boring task of actually reading through the whole thing. Lauren Bates, mother of two, was driving late at night. She rounded a curb at about ninety miles an hour and rolled the car. She and her daughter, who was in the passenger seat, died. It was labeled as a suicide. Lauren had been depressed for nearly a year and had attempted suicide before the fatal incident.

“This was in 2017. The daughter, Brooke, was thirteen. Lauren was forty-two. The husband and son, Andrew and Gordon Bates, were left grief-stricken, obviously. Lauren and Brooke had a funeral and a burial, and Andrew and Gordon were out of work for almost two weeks.

“Brooke Bates was born on February fifteenth, 2004. Natalie Lambert was born on February eleventh, 2004. Lauren Bates was born on November seventh, 1975. Cleo Marshall was born on November 2, 1975. Andrew Bates is chief of surgery at Walker-Bates Memorial Hospital here in town. He has a scar on his thumb from a rogue patient who attacked him. Gordon Bates is a veterinarian at the place here in town, as well. You want two prime suspects without flaw? I’ve got them for you, and my system’s already voice ID’d them both to the nine-one-one calls. They killed, they called in, and they got themselves caught because they were stupid enough to call the cops to make sure the victims were found.”

“Bo Austen, take a fucking bow. Jesus Christ, you are amazing,” Jacob said. One corner of Bo’s mouth lifted. “I’m gonna talk to Leu and put in for a warrant. Austen, you’re amazing, honest to God. Thank you, you little genius. Thank you. You’re amazing.”

“Thank you, Jake,” Bo said quietly. With a wide smile, Jacob offered a two-finger salute to Bo before walking out of the lab.

“Can I ask you something?” Carter questioned.

“Yes.”

“Why do you hate taking credit for your accomplishments?” Carter said. “What you just did? That’s amazing, and you’re acting like it’s nothing special.”

Bo lifted his shoulders. “When it came to solving the biggest case in my entire career, I couldn’t do it. Everything I’ve done since then has been… mediocre, at best,” he said softly. “I don’t take credit for mediocre.”

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NOT EDITED

Chapter Twenty-Six

12:45 PM; CLINSTONE, THE JOHNSON HOUSEHOLD, LIVING ROOM

“Whatcha thinking?” Jacob asked, tilting his head to the side.

“That the younger guy killed one girl this morning, and the older guy killed two people an hour ago,” he said. “Besides that, I’m still working out how this went.”

“We don’t have to know exactly how it happened. We never really do unless there’s footage, you know? I just have to know how they died and when they died.”

“I know that. But… I have to know how it happened. It’ll drive me insane otherwise,” Bo said. “Okay, Surgeon peeks in through the living room window, sees that Marion and Mike are asleep in their chairs, an old movie playing on TV. He comes in through the patio door, sneaks up behind Mike, Hypodermic to the neck. Mike wakes up and shoves Surgeon back before he can press the plunger down.”

“So… Mike wasn’t injected with etorphine on the first try?” Jacob asked.

Bo shook his head. “No, there’s more than one puncture mark on his neck,” he said, touching all three marks on Mike’s neck with his gloved fingers. “Mike stands up with enough force to knock his chair over,” Bo said, nudging the arm chair with the toe of his shoe. “The commotion wakes Marion up, and she runs out of the room. Mike and Surgeon fight and Surgeon goes through the glass coffee table. Mike doesn’t have the wounds to have been the one to go through it. Just like his fingerprint, his blood’s not in the system. Mike’s winded, so Surgeon gets him in the neck again. Mike fights him off and runs into the kitchen to retrieve a knife.

“Surgeon follows him—he’s bleeding, as you can see,” Bo said, tracing an invisible line over the blood drops on the carpeted floor. “Mike has a knife by the time Surgeon gets in here,” he said, stepping into the kitchen. Jacob followed, gaze focused on the blood trail as he stepped over it. “Mike gets one good swipe in on Surgeon before the etorphine is successfully injected into his neck. Adrenaline keeps him from going down right away. Surgeon grabs the knife and drives it into Mike’s abdomen. Mike hits the ground, back against the counter, and bleeds out in three or four minutes.

“Surgeon walks down the hall and finds Marion in the closet.” Bo stepped into the bedroom, peered into the closet. By all the clothes and hangers she’s pulled down in here, she grabbed ahold of everything and anything she could to try and keep him from pulling her out. He chloroforms Marion near the closet and carries her back to the bed. He draws her blood, inner arm. I’ll find out how many pints back in the morgue. He injects her with etorphine and removes a two inch square above her lip and onto her cheek.”

He tossed an open wallet to Jacob. “It’s a beauty mark. That’s what he removed. Natalie Lambert, whoever Surgeon wants her to be, is supposed to have a beauty mark.”

“Your ability to walk through a scene like that amazes me every single time,” Jacob said.

“It’s not me. It’s the blood. You just… You have to let the blood talk to you, and if you do that, you can piece together anything,” he said softly.

2:05 PM; CLINSTONE POLICE DEPARTMENT, MORGUE

“Mike Johnson. Seventh found victim. Time of death, around eleven o’clock this morning. Drugged with etorphine, killed by blood loss. Abdominal wound caused by a fully serrated, four and three-quarter inch full tang point steak knife,” Bo said. “Marion Johnson. Eighth found victim. Time of death, roughly eleven-forty AM. Chloroformed, two pints of O-negative blood taken, drugged with etorphine. Beauty mark above lip removed with a number ten scalpel.”

Jacob nodded. “Breasts, brows, beauty mark…” With the items ticked off on his first three fingers, he raised an eyebrow in Bo’s direction. “What’s left?”

Bo leaned back against the counter, crossing his arms over his chest. “Lips, ears, nose,” he said. “Unless Natalie’s nose needed to be substantiously larger than it is, I imagine he surgically ‘fixed’ her nose. If it needed to be smaller or straighter or more angular, it would’ve been easier to do by chiseling and carving rather than… slicing and dicing and implanting,” he said quietly. “Cleo Marshall, however, has a very dainty nose, and I guarantee you that in the next few days, someone is going to lose a nose to replace Cleo’s current one.”

“Ah… lovely,” Jacob said quietly.

“Right.” Bo cleared his throat. “Do you think you could get me the nine-one-one call for the Johnson scene?”

“You betcha. Can I ask why?” Jacob asked.

“I checked the Johnson’s home phone for prints, just to see, and… I found nothing. It had been wiped clean. Your average person isn’t going to wipe down their phone, especially the part that doesn’t touch their face.” The corner of Bo’s mouth scrunched up. “I think the Surgeon called it in, and if I can just hear his voice…”

“You want to memorize it,” Jacob said.

“Yes.”

“Yeah, kid, I’ll get it for you.”

Bo had given up on reminding Jacob he was not the young college student he appeared to be. Instead, he took the compliment. He didn’t get many that weren’t about his brain, anyway. “Thank you.”

“No problem.” Jacob cleared his throat. “You want a coffee refill?”

Bo shook his head. “I don’t drink coffee after noon.”

“All righty. I’ll go talk to dispatch. Be back in a few.”

2:57 PM; CLINSTONE, ROSE ANDERSON’S APARTMENT, BEDROOM

“Rose Anderson, twenty-one years old,” Bo said quietly, snapping a picture of the side of Rose’s head. “Ears removed, couple extra centimeters of skin removed around the base of each ear.” Pressing a knee to the side of the mattress, he leaned across Rose’s body to get a picture of the other side of her head.

“So… the next victim will be missing her lips?” Jacob asked.

“That would be my assumption.” Bo dropped his foot back the ground, wrapping a hand around the lens of his camera as he looked around the room. “He was able to sneak up on her without any troubles. There are no signs of struggle.”

“And ‘he’ would be the younger one in this case?” Jacob asked.

“Correct.” Bo picked up the cell phone on the nightstand, dropping his hand from his camera. It thudded dully against his chest before settling in its place. He pressed the home button and tilted it down until the light in the room reflected on the screen.

“Whatcha doing?”

“Cracking her passcode. One. Four. Six. Zero,” he said quietly. He tilted the phone back toward himself, using his thumb to try the first combination. One-zero-four-six. The screen unlocked and took him to the home screen, a picture of Rose and a boy, presumably her boyfriend.

“One try?” Jacob asked. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

Bo snorted. “Practice, Jake. Lots of practice.” And a hell of a lot of luck, but for theatrics, Bo chose to keep that one to himself. He opened up her phone application and scrolled over to the recent calls section. “Nine-one-one was the last number she called, and I guarantee you that she wasn’t the one that called it in.”

“Which means we might just have both of their voices on record,” Jacob said.

Bo cracked an extremely faint smile. “Bingo.”

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NOT EDITED

Chapter Twenty-Four

Tuesday: January 14, 2020

7:00 AM; CLINSTONE POLICE DEPARTMENT, MORGUE

“Hey,” Jacob greeted as he stepped into the morgue.

“Hi.” Bo raised an eyebrow. “Have you brought breakfast into my morgue?”

Jacob smiled. “You eat breakfast all alone down here every single day at seven.” He crossed the room and slid into the chair beside Bo. “Thought I’d join you.”

Bo chuckled. “Thanks, Jake. You don’t have to be here, though. I’m okay.”

“Oh, I know I don’t have to be. But I want to be. ‘Cause we’re friends, and friends like to eat breakfast together.”

Bo smiled faintly. “Again… thank you.”

“You betcha.”

“This doesn’t change the fact that I’m going back home after this case is over,” Bo said.

“Hey, that’s fine. You do what you have to do, Bo. I’m not a dictator.”

“I know.” Bo cleared his throat, wrapping a hand around his coffee mug. “So, uh… I took your advice of standing with my hands in my pockets.” He shook his head. “That feels unnatural.”

“Anything you’re not used to doing is unnatural,” Jacob said. “For what it’s worth, you shouldn’t have to change yourself in the first place. I only told you that because you asked me to be completely truthful, and I didn’t want you to be mad at me for telling you not to change who you are or how you are.”

“I know. That’s why I asked you. Because you’d tell me what I wanted to hear, regardless of how you felt about the situation.”

Jacob shook his head. “One of these days, Bo, I hope someone knocks some sense into you and tells you that no one can be normal.”

“I would say… good luck with that.”

“I know, unfortunately.” Jacob cleared his throat. “So, umm, once you go back to California… If anything bad happens, will you call me again?” Jacob asked.

“Do you want me to?”

“I’d prefer it, truthfully.”

“I will… do my best to call you if something goes south.”

Jacob breathed an audible sigh of relief. “Thanks, Bo.”

“You betcha,” Bo whispered.

12:00 PM; MINNESOTA, THE SURGEON’S HOUSE, OFFICE

“Did you take her food down?” he asked.

Gordon nodded. “Yeah, Dad, and I made sure she ate it.”

“Good. She needs her strength.” He cleared his throat. “She’ll eat again at six tonight, and her surgery will begin tomorrow morning at six, if that works for your schedule.”

Gordon glanced up at the ceiling for a moment. He looked back at his father, nodding. “As far as I know, that fits. If something comes up, I’ll tell you.”

“Good.” He shifted in his chair. “You’re going to want to go out for at least one or two before the surgery. There are four that need to be retrieved tomorrow.”

“Which ones?” Gordon asked.

“Paula, Rose, Marion, and Hannah. I’ll grab Marion in the evening, but the other three are younger than I am comfortable with.”

Gordon nodded. “Sure, Dad. Do you need any more etorphine?”

“Not today. I still have a dose or two here. I’ll let you know.”

Again, Gordon nodded. “All right. Well, I gotta get home. The kids are getting out of school soon due to snow, so I have to pick them up. I’ll be back tonight.”

He smiled softly. “Sure, Gordon. Tell them Grandpa loves them.”

Gordon chuckled, offered a smile of his own. “You could come by, tell them yourself.”

“Oh, I can’t. Not until your mom and sister are back. And then… then we’ll all be together again, and then I’ll come by. Okay?”

“Yeah. Sure, Dad.”

11:40 PM; CLINSTONE, BO AUSTEN’S HOUSE, BEDROOM

The usual jolt that awoke Bo from his nightmares was softened by the gentle tickle of Acamas’s whiskers on his cheek. “What’re you doing, Acky?” he asked roughly, cracking open one blue eye to look at his cat. She stood on his chest, her nose pressed against the end of his own, her eye locked on his. She purred, arching her back in a stretch. She lay down on his chest, stretching her paws out against Bo’s throat. Bo chuckled, lifting a hand to scratch the cat’s head.

He closed his eyes and shifted to run his hand over the cat’s spine instead. Bo may have had a less than ‘excellent’ life, more or less, but in more ways than one, Acamas was like a bright light at the end of the tunnel. And even though this house wasn’t home, Acamas was, and that made Clinstone, Minnesota just a little more tolerable.

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NOT EDITED

Chapter Twenty-Three

Monday: January 13, 2020

8:00 AM; CLINSTONE POLICE DEPARTMENT, MAIN FLOOR

“Hey, Bo?” Jacob asked, standing up from his desk as Bo walked into his sight. Bo turned slightly, gaze focusing on Jacob. “Come here. Please?” Bo crossed the room, stopping a foot in front of Jacob’s desk, hands locked behind his back. “How are you doing?”

“I’m…” Bo trailed off, his mind searching for a word that wouldn’t make the detective worried. He wasn’t sure there was an excellent choice. “Recovering. I’m recovering, Jake. Thank you. H–how are you?”

Jacob smiled softly. “I’m good. Thanks. Did you sleep last night?”

“For a little while.”

“Do you have nightmares?” Jacob asked. “I don’t mean to pry or anything, but you startled yourself awake a few times the other night.”

“If you’d like to call them that,” Bo said softly.

“They’re about Kathy, aren’t they?” Jacob asked, his voice quiet. “About her and Dallas?”

Bo’s smile was faint. “Yes, mostly. But I’m good. Stable. I’ll be fine.”

“I’ll take your word for it,” Jacob said. Bo nodded once, clearing his throat. “Oh, you, umm… You’re dismissed.”

“Thank you. I’ll be in the morgue for the start of the day. Filling out some paperwork.”

“For what?” Jacob asked.

Bo lifted his shoulders. “Just something nice I want to do, that’s all.”

Jacob smiled. “All right, Austen. Don’t have too much fun.”

“I’ll do my best, Jake.”

5:00 PM; CLINSTONE POLICE DEPARTMENT, LAB

“What do you think it means? That there was nothing today,” Jacob said, arms crossed over his chest. 

“I’m… not sure,” Bo said as he shrugged on his coat. “Let’s say he’s performed surgery on both victims: Natalie Lambert and Cleo Marshall. He doesn’t want them in too much pain, so he’s giving them time to rest. In general terms, after a mastectomy—double breast removal, typically because of cancer—the patient is in ICU and the hospital for three to four days, I do believe. He’s probably giving them three to four days to rest between surgeries. 

“If he’s reconstructing their faces too, he’ll do that before we see any more victims killed for spare parts,” Bo said. “Natalie’s second surgical endeavor was probably two nights ago, maybe last night. I’m leaning more toward Sunday night. Four days of healing, less pain by that point, and he does not want to hurt them. I’d say Cleo Marshall’s second surgery will happen sometime around this Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday. After that, we’ll probably see another O-negative blood type victim missing something around Wednesday or Thursday morning.”

“You know, it’s totally going to blow my mind if you got any of those days correct,” Jacob said.

Bo smiled faintly as he lifted his satchel over his head, tugging on the strap to get it to rest evenly over his shoulder. “It’s all about patterns, Jake. Once you find one, you kind of just have to… roll with it. I try not to assume they’ll be absolutely and completely correct or adhered to, but the chances that they’ll follow somewhere along the line are pretty high.” He tilted his head to the side. “May I ask you something?”

“You betcha.”

“Let’s say I want to pretend I’m normal. Let’s say my abnormalities around Kathy and Dallas are the center of many of my nightmares. I can’t shut off my brain. There’s no changing that. Outwardly, though, I can change. Tips?” Bo asked.

“That’s… not what I was expecting,” Jacob said.

“I only ask in the assumption we’re friends. And I want you to be as honest as you can. You don’t have to worry about hurting my feelings, I assure you.”

Jacob cleared his throat. “You know how you stand with your hands behind your back?”

“Yes?”

“It comes off as… unnatural,” Jacob said. “Tuck them into your pockets when you’re standing. Like, the pockets on your pants. That, or cross your arms over your chest. That’s how a lot of people stand.”

Noted. Thank you, Jake. The advice is appreciated.”

“No problem,” Jacob said quietly.

“Well, I’ll be heading to my house, now,” Bo said. It wasn’t lost on Jacob that Bo refused to refer to it as ‘home’. “Enjoy your family tonight, Jake. You have a beautiful setup in that home of yours.”

Jacob grinned. “Thanks, Bo.”

Bo nodded. “See you tomorrow morning, Jake.”

“You betcha. Goodnight,” Jacob said as Bo walked past him.

Without turning around, Bo lifted a hand in departure. “Night, Jake.”

7:00 PM; BO AUSTEN’S HOUSE, DINING ROOM

Bo set a bowl of food on the floor for Acamas, a little smile tugging at either corner of his mouth as he scritched the top of her head. She purred and loved up against his shin before settling in for her supper. Bo headed back into the kitchen for his own supper, stilling when his phone rang on the counter. He leaned over to look at the screen, heart skipping a beat. Dallas. Bo couldn’t remember the last time Dallas had tried to call him. A month or two after the trial? Jamal had told Bo that a stipulation of getting his job back at the station was discontinuing his visits and phone calls to Dallas. Eventually, Dallas had apparently gotten the message and stopped calling.

Until now.

Well, he didn’t work at the LAPD anymore, and Jamal didn’t have control over his job at the CPD. So… surely he could accept the call. It was likely about Kathy anyway, but it would still be nice to hear Dallas’s voice, even if it was just to talk about Kathy.

Bo pulled his phone off the charger, accepted the call, and pressed his phone to his ear. “Hello?”

“Hey, shorty. I wasn’t sure you were going to answer.”

“I… needed to weigh my options first.”

“Of course,” Dallas said, his voice soft and understanding, like Bo always remembered it to be. “You won’t believe this, but Jamal was sitting in my cell when I got off work today. Just sitting there.”

“What did he want?”

“He wanted me to call you. He said he came by to tell you about Regina and Kathy. I, uh, also heard you’re out in Minnesota now?”

“I am,” Bo said after a moment. “He asked you call me?”

“Told me to, actually. Ordered.” Dallas chuckled, but it didn’t quite sound like Dallas. “He says you’re not doing well, Bo. How are you doing?”

“I’m fine. You don’t need to worry about me, Dallas.”

“That’s definitely not what Jamal said. The man wouldn’t come to prison to visit me if it weren’t serious, Bo. He fuckin’ hates my guts. For him to worry about you and talk to me? Bo, he’s gotta think you’re half a step over the edge.”

Bo leaned back against the counter, crossing his free arm over his chest. “Jamal doesn’t know me as well as he thinks he does. I’m fine.”

“It’s me, Bo. Behind bars or not, I’m still me. I care about you, and I’m always gonna worry about you. Just tell me what’s going on.”

Bo closed his eyes. “You’re allowed fifteen-minute phone calls. Fifteen minutes is not nearly enough time to dive into the depths of my depression, Dallas, even if I wanted to. But truly, I’m… safe. I’m working a case, and I have a commitment to the victims of it.”

“Can you make a commitment to me too? That… that after this case is over, you come back to Los Angeles and visit me here at the prison for a face-to-face talk?”

“Yes,” Bo said after a long silence. “I can… I’ll commit to that.”

“Good. I’m holding you to that, Bo. I’ll see you after the case is over. Okay?”

“Okay.”

A little over a thousand, three hundred miles away in Los Angeles, Dallas put the phone back on the hook and turned in his chair to face Jamal. He was leaned back against the wall, arms crossed over his chest. “He’s not well,” Dallas said after a moment.

“No shit.”

Dallas ran both hands over his short hair, fingers locked together. “You need to leave him alone, Jamal. You aren’t helping him.”

“Do you really think I flew all the way to Clinstone because I thought my presence would drastically increase the value he sees in his own life?”

“God, Jamal, I wish like hell I knew what you thought about anything.” Dallas dropped his hands back to his lap. “He’s… okay until the end of this case. He follows through on commitments and promises, and he has a commitment to this case and to visiting me afterward. He won’t put a stop to either of those things.”

“And afterward, then what? I hire someone to kill someone in Clinstone to give him another damn case to investigate? I can do a lot of things, but supplying Clinstone with a consistent stream of homicides to keep him too occupied to end his life isn’t one of them.”

“First of all, it is one of them. You aren’t exactly above murder. Or torture.”

Jamal rolled his eyes, but he didn’t respond.

“Second of all, I… I don’t know, Jamal. I wish I knew what the right answer was, but I don’t.”

Jamal let out a slow breath, and for the briefest of moments, the hard mask he wore over his face fell. He looked like hell. Tired and worn down and worried. But the mask was back up so quickly that Dallas may have imagined it just to see the humanity buried so deeply inside the man he had once seen as a father. “I considered putting one of my men on him. A bodyguard in the shadows type of thing. But I… I don’t know. It’s like hiring a spy, and I don’t assign spies to people I…” He ran his tongue over his top row of teeth. “To people like Bo. People that aren’t marks or targets or rats. Civilians. I don’t assign spies to civilians.”

Dallas pushed himself to his feet. “For what it’s worth, it’s not spying if the spy doesn’t tell you everything Bo does and says. Then it’s just a… guardian angel that works on cash instead of prayers. Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Jamal whispered. Once Dallas had made it to the doorway, Jamal cleared his throat. “Thank you, Silver.”

“Yeah.” Dallas tapped his hand on the doorframe. “If I’m ever a free man again, I want Bo to be the one who picks me up the day I’m released. So your spy that’s not a spy? Benefits everyone.”

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