“I’d have no choice.”

But he would. If his client was Stephen Leibman, he of the swinging knife, or Sack Man Calvin Whitmer, he’d have that choice to say no, that men like them don’t deserve defending.

Yet I know deep down Jeff wouldn’t make that choice. He’d choose to be on their side. To defend them. To help them.

Even Him.

“There’s always a choice,” I say.

Jeff says nothing. He simply stares at the ceiling until his eyes grow heavy and eventually close. Minutes later, he’s asleep.

For me, sleep is an impossibility. I’m still too angry. So I thrash under the covers in search of a comfortable position. If I’m being completely honest, there’s a part of me that’s just doing it to wake up Jeff. To make him as sleepless as I am. But he doesn’t wake as the clock moves from eleven to midnight, then midnight to one.

At quarter past the hour, I crawl out of bed, slip on some dirty clothes and tiptoe into the hallway. Light still peeks from under Sam’s door, so I knock.

“Come on in, Quinn,” she says.

I find her sitting cross-legged on the bed, reading an Asimov paperback bent at the spine. She’s changed her clothes, returning to the black jeans and Sex Pistols T-shirt of yesterday. When she looks up at me, I assume she can sense my anger. She certainly knows why I’m there.

Sam wordlessly leaves the bed and roots through her knapsack, removing a purse, of all things. It’s a Pleather monstrosity with short handles that can only be slipped to the elbows. Next out of the knapsack is a pile of paperback books, which Sam stuffs into the purse.

“Here,” she says, snapping it at me like a football.

I catch it, surprised by its heft. “What’s it for?”

“Bait.”

I say nothing. I simply follow Sam out of the room, the purse’s handles gripped in my sweaty palm as we slip out into the night.

CHAPTER 18

Outside, unseasonable warmth clings to the clear air, raw and oppressive. The heat of the day seeping into night. By the time we reach the park, I’ve broken into a sweat, my face slick and shining. On the verge of radiance.

Inside the park, it’s so hot that most of the men we see have discarded their hoodies, content to prowl the park in sticky-tight T-shirts. We nod to some of them when we pass, as if we’re one of them, cruising the night for supple flesh.

In a way, we are.

There’s no mist in the park this time. The night is almost brittle in its clarity. Blades of grass catch the moonlight, glowing white, looking like sharpened teeth. In the trees, leaves droop from their branches like recently hanged men.

We choose a bench not far from the one we sat on last night. I can see it just across the way, a triangle of streetlight thrown over its seat. I picture me sitting there twenty-four hours earlier, nervously wanting nothing more than to go home. Now I scan the night-shrouded corners of the park. Every shadow seems to tremble with untold danger. I’m ready for it. Eager.

“See anything?” I say.

“Nope,” Sam says.

She pulls the pack of cigarettes from her pocket and taps one out. I hold out my hand.

“Give me one.”

“Seriously?”

“I used to smoke,” I say, when in truth it was only once and only after being goaded into it by Janelle. One puff made me cough so violently that she had to take it from me, fearful of inflicting more damage. Tonight, I do better, taking two tiny half-puffs before the first cough erupts.

“Amateur,” Sam says, inhaling deep and blowing smoke rings.

“Show off,” I say.

I merely hold my cigarette while she smokes the remainder of hers, always on the lookout, our eyes never leaving the dark horizon of the park.

“How are you feeling?” Sam asks. “About Lisa.”

“Mad.”

“Good.”

“What happened to her is so wrong. I think it was easier—”

I can’t say the rest of what I’m thinking. That it was easier to deal with when we thought Lisa had killed herself. It’s not something you want to articulate, even if it’s true.

“Do you really think someone’s out to get us?” Sam says.

“It’s a possibility,” I say. “We’re famous, in our way.”

Rather, we’re infamous. Notable for going through unthinkable situations with our lives intact. And some people—like the sicko who drove to Quincy, Illinois, to send me that letter—might see it as a challenge. To finish off what others couldn’t complete.

Sam sucks in the last dregs of smoke from her cigarette. She then puffs it out, talking as she does it. “Were you ever going to tell me about that email from Lisa?”

“I don’t know,” I say. “I wanted to.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“Because I didn’t know what it meant.”

“Now it means we might be in danger,” Sam says.

Yet here we are, sitting in Central Park at an ungodly hour, just asking for trouble. Hoping for it, in fact. But I see nothing in the clear night. Only our streetlamp-enabled shadows stretching across the path in front of us, dotted with the smoldering butts of our two cigarettes.

“What happens if we don’t see anyone?” I say.