Rachel Caine: Devil's Bargain

“Um…” Pansy made a vague gesture toward Jazz’s legs. “You might want to put on some shoes first.”

She’d forgotten, but it came back to her in a weirdly warm rush of feeling, Borden sliding her shoes off her feet and dropping them to the floor…they must have landed next to the couch. She turned back to the office but met Lucia at the door coming out. Lucia had holstered her gun and was holding Jazz’s shoes in her left hand. She thrust them out without a word and slammed the door behind her.

“Off-limits,” she said flatly. “You said Borden was here somewhere?” As Jazz bent to slide on the shoes, she turned her attention to Manny and Pansy. “Wait there. I don’t care what you hear, don’t come running, all right?”

Two nods. Jazz straightened up, and Lucia performed that magic trick again, the one where she started empty-handed and ended up with that gleaming little gun in her hand. Only this one, Jazz noticed, wasn’t so little. It was at least a.38. Still elegant looking, though.

“Do you match your guns to your outfits?” she asked. Lucia threw her an exasperated look. “Kidding.”

“Go left,” Lucia sighed. “No heroics.”

Borden was nowhere in their offices. Nowhere, as it turned out, in the building. Police arrived within five minutes and turned the entire place inside out, coming up empty. They also turned up nothing on the sniper. Jazz wasn’t shocked. As she and Lucia finished giving statements, she felt her cell phone buzz against her hip, and stepped away to answer.

“Borden?” she asked. It was his number lighting up on the panel. “Where the hell are you?”

It wasn’t his voice that answered. “Go to your secretary’s desk. Right now.”

She froze for a second, mind racing. She didn’t know the voice, had never heard it before, but it had a ring of authority. She turned away from the cops and Lucia, trying to look casual about it, plugged a finger in her left ear and tried to make it look as if she was seeking a quiet place. Pansy and Manny were still behind the desk, watching the cops move around. Jazz stopped at the low counter on the other side of the barrier from them.

“I’m here,” she said. “Where’s Borden?”

“Shut up and listen. Look through the mail. There will be a FedEx envelope.”

There were three, in fact. Jazz spread them out quickly on the counter, looking at addresses.

One was from Gabriel, Pike & Laskins.

“Open it,” the voice said.

She picked up the GPL envelope, jammed the phone between her shoulder and ear, and ripped the tab. When she turned the stiff cardboard upside down, a familiar red envelope fell out.

“You have the envelope?” said the voice.

“I’m holding it,” she said. “Want me to open it?”

“If you break the seal on it, your lawyer friend dies. I want you to turn and walk with it to the stairs. Proceed down to the lobby, go outside and turn right. Walk exactly two blocks, then turn left and go one block. No cops.”

She tapped the red envelope on the counter, staring at Pansy’s frown, Manny’s worried expression.

“Any particular reason I need to take this stroll? Other than for my health?”

A shockingly loud scream burst out of the phone, wild and full of agony, a full-throated bellow. She flinched, nearly lost the phone and slowly straightened up. She felt the blood drain from her face.

“You know what I call a half-dead lawyer?” the voice asked. “A good start. Move your ass, bitch, or he gets something else cut off. Maybe something that he can’t live without.”

The phone went dead in her hand. She closed her eyes for a second, felt a hot bead of sweat trickle down her back. She turned slowly, keeping the phone to her ear as an excuse to stay where she was, and looked at the cops and Lucia.

Lucia, who was talking, glanced over at her, away, back again to stare. She paused for a breath, smiled at the cop and murmured something that sounded like a graceful apology. Then she walked over to where Jazz stood, red envelope in hand.

“What?” she asked softly.

“Borden,” Jazz replied. “They have him. They want this.” She moved the envelope slightly, drawing Lucia’s attention to it. “They sound real serious.”

Lucia nodded. Something sparked bright in her eyes, and her expression smoothed into an unmoving mask. “You want to get real serious?”

“I do.” She was still vibrating from the force of the scream. Maybe that wasn’t him, she thought, but she knew that was a stupid wishful lie. She’d felt that scream go deep. She’d known it. “I want to get real fucking serious, right now.”

“We have visitors.” Lucia crossed her arms and tilted her head toward the cops.

“I go first. You back me up.” Jazz fixed a hard stare on her. “I need you on this.”

“I know. I’ll be there.”

Jazz nodded once, took the envelope and shoved it into her coat pocket, then walked, in no great hurry, around the corner.

“Where’s she going?” one of the cops asked behind her.

“Bathroom,” Lucia said. “Do you think we should get away from the windows? In case he’s not really gone?” She suddenly sounded vulnerable and scared.

“Sure. No problem.”

Jazz heard them moving away, and grinned without humor. She was just moving for the stairs when someone hurried around the corner and almost collided with her. She jumped away, ready to punch, and Pansy staggered back to catch herself against the wall, hand flat against her chest and an expression of shock all over her face. She straightened her glasses and fanned herself.

“What?” Jazz demanded.

“Here!” Pansy pressed something into her hands. “Manny gave it to me. Give me this one. Go!”

She hurried off, back the way she’d come. Jazz, mystified, looked down at what she was holding in her hands, and felt a sudden surge of wild, strange glee.

She shoved it into her pocket and hit the stairwell door at as much of a run as she dared to keep noise to a minimum. Rocketing downstairs on tiptoe was a trick, but she managed, checking her momentum with an outstretched hand raking the walls at the turns. At the lobby door she paused and risked a look outside. More cops down there, but they were all on the street by the patrol cars. She eased open the stairwell door, hurried across the lobby and made it to the service entrance.

Loading dock. Deserted. She left at a flat-out run, breathing deep, feeling a burn in her knee where bruises hadn’t begun to heal from her fight the day before. It was easy enough to dodge the cops on the street, and then she kept running, moving as fast as she dared to cover the two blocks. As she waited for the light to cross to the left-hand side, she looked behind her. No sign of Lucia. No sign of cops looking for her, either. She supposed that was a wash.

She pelted across the street the instant traffic paused, bounded over the curb and jogged another block, past the blank side of a long windowless building. Cars were parked at meters on the side. She passed a beat-up Ford, two trucks, a panel van…

The sliding door on the van slapped open when she was even with it, and she darted backward, hands up, as the muzzle of a gun slid out in her direction.

“Against the wall,” a voice barked. She couldn’t see into the van. Too dark. Sun glinted on window glass, blinding her. No markings on the van, dammit, she needed to see something, describe something…. “Do it. Now.”

She backed up until her heels and shoulders pressed against brick, hands still high.

“Where’s the envelope?” The voice sounded different in person than on the phone, but she was still sure she’d never heard it before. “You have two seconds or I start shooting.”