Page 59 of The Company We Keep

“Christ. You know, my gut told me that this was what was happening with you but then I kept thinking about you on that first day, sitting in your new apartment with your new clothes and your new name and that cocky grin on your face.”

“Cocky?”

“They turned you.”

“Nobody didshitto me,” he said, bristling.

“You’re a total fucking Stockholm Syndrome case. Holy shit, Judge. What’s it been — sixmonths?”

“Nobody is holding me goddamn hostage.”

“Holy shit,” he repeated. “Listen to yourself, Charlie.”

“I thought this meeting was about me listening toyou.”

“Then listen to me now, Charlie Judge: the life you’re buying into is nasty, thankless, and extremely goddamn short. You’re lucky you’ve made it this far — but the minute A.R.Carrow and his cronies figure out what you’re hiding, it’s over. They willeraseyou.”

“You don’t know the first thing about The Company,” Dust said. He pulled into a turn lane, making a U back towards his house. He’d already had enough of this conversation “If you did, they’d have sent you in instead. But Carrow never would’ve brought you in.”

“Charlie, kid, I’m not the enemy here. I know that it’s seductive when you get in there. They money, someone to take care of you… You’re right — you know more about them than I do. But what Idoknow tells me that your future is anything but bright if you truly make the decision to be on the wrong side of the law. This isn’t you, Judge —”

“Would youstop fucking calling me that?”

The words struck him silent as if Dust had landed a slap across his face. He looked at Dust again, dazed.

“OK. I’m sorry, Dustin. I didn’t… I didn’t realize.”

Emerson was afraid of him. The gun hadn’t fazed him or the abduction, but Dust’s insistence that he call him by his name had himterrified.

“Don’t treat me like a mental case,” he snapped. “There’s more at play here than you can understand.”

“You’re right,” Emerson said. The quality of his voice had changed entirely. He just wanted to placate him — just wanted to get out of the car alive — and it was clear that he would agree to anything if it meant that Dust wasn’t going to harm him.

Christ. He reallydidthink that The Company was made up of monsters. It was awful to realize.

They drove in silence for several minutes, Dust washed in self-loathing and anger, feeling like it was a great injustice that this stranger thought that just because he was a member of The Company that he would execute Emerson here in the car in cold blood.

Finally, when Emerson spoke again, his voice was steady. They were pulling up to his block.

“What do you want me to tell them? They’re going to keep calling. Leiby is worried and there are people higher up the food chain who want answers. Just say what you want me to tell them.”

“Tell them I need more time,” Dust said. “That’s all. Buy me time.”

“Ok, Wrenshall. You got it.”

The further hegot away from the meeting, the more it felt to Dust like a dream.

When he returned to the penthouse, nothing had changed.

He hadn’t been brainwashed. These people were his family.

And in the week that followed, he wassadto see them go — watching both couples excitedly packing their bags for the week away. It would be the first time he’d been in the penthouse when every room wasn’t occupied.

It was harder to think about AIIB, about Emerson, when he was thinking so intently about what hewanted.

On Christmas morning, Carrow wasted no time in getting to the main event.

“You’re worse than a kid,” Dust said, laughing as Carrow hurried him out into the living room. “The sun’s barely up.”

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