Page 14 of A Friend in the Glass

“So… if this Brady Bunch Bitch was waiting for you, does that mean Lew saw you?”

“I don’t know.” Sam pinched the bridge of his nose, and his eyes shuttered for another heart-stopping moment. “No. I don’t think so.”

“Ok.” Rufus hunched his shoulders a little before nodding to himself. “Ok,” he repeated. “What do you want to do?”

A taxi was slowing down on the street as it approached them, and Sam fixed it with more than his usual level of hatred. He caught Rufus’s arm and pulled him into a walk. The taxi rolled behind them, and Sam threw another look over his shoulder before walking faster.

“Fuck me,” he muttered. In a louder voice, he said, “It doesn’t seem like a coincidence that Shareed contacts me out of the blue, offering to sell me information about Stonefish, information that she says Lew Frazer was interested in, and then Shareed ends up dead after calling a convention where Lew just happens to be offering corporate blowjobs to the same dumbfuck company that was behind Stonefish in the first place.”

“I admit,” Rufus ventured after a pause. “The probabilities of it all being chance seem slim.”

“So, the next step is to fill in the blanks. What did Shareed have? Why did Lew kill her? And how?”

“Well, if she had something tangible, it wasn’t left behind in that hotel room. Give me your hand.”

Sam held out his hand.

Rufus took it, sliding his cold fingers between Sam’s own warm ones. He thought about Edmund Burn, PhD, the third edition ofWhat to Do When Anxiety Strikes. You were supposed to utilize the five senses to regain control of your body and mind, but Sam was intent on moving, was probably too agitated to stop and humor Rufus’s request that he see, touch, hear, smell, and taste. So Rufus improvised and hoped that his touch would be as comforting as Sam’s was when he was working himself up. “I wanted to hold your hand,” Rufus lied while shrugging. “But someone back there probably would’ve strung me up to the flagpole by my wiener.”

“Do you want to tell Erik about Lew and what we think might be going on?”

“If youwantme to involve Erik, I will. You might have to rub burn ointment on my ass, though, because he’s going to be feisty.”

“Erik wouldn’t be able to do anything,” Sam said, more to himself than to Rufus. “I don’t even know if he’d believe me. Not without something concrete.”

“Then I guess we should ask more questions about Shareed,” Rufus concluded. “Like, for one, why do you think Lew murdered her? I mean,Lewspecifically. Because setting up an elaborate display meant to look like an OD…. I don’t know the guy, but that seems sort of overdramatic, you know?”

“It seems like a good way to keep anyone from thinking she was murdered.”

“But that wasn’t my only question, Sam.” Rufus looked at him. “Why do you think Lew is a murderer?”

“Because she said his name, Rufus. She said he wanted the information she had. This is Benning all over again, do you get that? Went killed himself because they pinned it on him, and nobody would look twice at Lew Frazer because they thought he’d hung the moon, even though I knew he was hiding something. Now he killed this woman, and I can’t even get you to believe me. Why the fuck would I expect Erik to?”

Rufus pulled Sam to a stop. “Don’t make it sound like that. I’m asking because—because I don’t know who any of these people are. I don’t know what happened firsthand at Benning. I barely fucking understood those stupid keywords the panelists were flinging at the audience. Shareed said Lew’s name, ok I get that. Said he wanted information on Stonefish, as well. Fine. But she said your name too, and you want information too, and you surely didn’t fucking kill her.” Rufus worked his jaw for a minute before swallowing the softball lodged in his throat. “I don’t want you having tunnel vision.”

“Right.” His voice was tight. “Thanks.”

“Sam,” Rufus protested. “I’m on your side. I’malwayson your side.”

“No, you’re right. I’m obsessing. But I don’t think I’m wrong about Shareed. Someone killed her.”

“Then we need to prove it without a forensics or medical degree,” Rufus said, offering a hesitant smile.

“Fuck, we don’t even know who she is, not really.”

“We can start there, then.”

“Fine,” Sam said as he started walking again.

Chapter Nine

They walked back to Forty-Fourth and Tenth, the wind slapping Sam in the face hard enough to bring tears to his eyes. The ache in his leg had gotten steadily worse once the adrenaline from the fight with Brady had worn off, but he barely felt it now as the cold dug into him. The day’s long shadows had thickened almost into night; the sun had dropped completely out of sight, and streetlights were popping on.

Cyber 44 didn’t look much better in the gloom. The neon sign shed a pink glow under the scaffolding, barely enough to make out the drooping Pride flag. A hobbitish man scurried out of the cybercafé, the shopkeeper’s bell jingling as the door swung shut on its closer. Sam kept his pace steady and hoped that Rufus hadn’t figured out yet where they were going.

“Oh, come the fuck on,” Rufus groaned as if on cue. “She almost beat me black-and-blue this morning. Let’s go somewhere else.”

Sam ignored him and, just to be safe, walked faster.

---