Page 57 of The Last Flight

A whistle sounded, signaling a time out, and loud music blared over the sound system.

Her voice grew louder again. “What ended up happening to that friend of yours, the one who referred Brittany?”

Dex stared at the cheerleaders dancing on the court below them and said, “He’s been dealt with. Wasn’t my call, but I can’t say I’m sorry about it.”

“Do you know for sure he was a part of the investigation?”

Dex shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.”

“Seems kind of dangerous,” she said, “to get rid of the guy who was Brittany’s contact. Won’t that draw the attention of the police again?”

Dex gave a tight smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “They’ll never find him.”

Eva felt a hollowness directly beneath her ribs and waited for him to continue.

“Fish has a warehouse in Oakland. Some kind of import/export bullshit. There’s an incinerator in the basement.”

She swallowed hard, fighting to keep her gaze steady on his, and nodded, hoping her recorder was picking this up and not just the jumped-up music of Daft Punk. Below them, the cheerleaders twirled and spun, their hair flying out, arms and legs pumping faster and faster as the music accelerated.

Claustrophobia began to overwhelm her, the heat of the arena, the people crammed into narrow seats that spiked upward toward the roof, giving her the sense that they were all pressing in on her. Eva checked the time on the scoreboard. “Let’s get a head start,” she said. “Beat the crowds. I’m starting to get a headache, and I think I want to go home.”

“You don’t have to ask me twice.” Dex pushed himself out of his seat and slid past the people in their row, Eva following behind him.

* * *

They were first in line at the bathroom, and the drop took less than thirty seconds. “See you next week?” Dex asked, pulling his coat tight around him.

Eva looked out the window of the clubhouse, down to the baseball diamond below them, thinking ahead a few months to spring when the players would be down there, running bases and spitting sunflower seeds into the grass. Hopefully, she’d be gone by then, one way or another.

She looked at him, taking in the profile that had become as familiar as her own. This was a hard life, and he’d done his best to teach her everything he knew. And she’d learned well. For a long time, she’d been happy enough. But those days felt far behind her, like faded snapshots of a person she used to know. “Sure,” she said. “Stay safe.”

“Always,” he said, giving her a wink.

Back on the crowded concourse, she glanced at the time. She had five more minutes to get across the arena and meet Jeremy. She wasn’t lying about the headache, which was creeping around her temples, and she knew it would be a full-blown migraine by the end of the night. She pulled her phone out of her pocket and texted Jeremy again.

Meet me at the entrance to section two instead.

She pushed through the doors of the clubhouse and maneuvered her way back into the crowd.

People squeezed past her on their way back to their seats, and she searched for a small corner to claim while she waited. She looked across the court, to section ten, trying to see if Jeremy was over there waiting for her, when someone caught her eye.

At first, she saw just the back of him—short brown hair. A sport coat large enough to conceal a holster. As if in slow motion, she watched him glance at his phone, read something, and push off the wall, heading in her direction.

She glanced at her own phone, as if seeing it for the first time, realization creeping over her, blurring her vision around the edges. She thought back to every text she’d sent over the past few weeks. To Dex. And to Jeremy, telling him exactly where to meet her, and when. And there was Castro, where Jeremy was supposed to be.

In a flash, she saw it all again. A piece of white paper being handed through an open car window.Brittany. Who had her number and was able to pass it on. The Whispr app was useless if someone was reading her texts at the same time she was.

She pushed through the crowd, a lone figure against the tide of people making their way back to their seats, keeping her head down. Afraid to look anyone in the eye, certain Castro’s hand would grab her any moment, yanking her backward, asking her to empty her pockets. Explain why she was still selling drugs. Telling her their deal was off.

She burst out of a side exit and into the cold night air, sprinting down the stairs, her compromised phone still gripped in her hand. As she passed an overflowing trash can, she fought the urge to bury it under old food wrappers and empty cups. To get rid of it as soon as possible. But she held on to it, knowing that she had to keep using it, that Castro needed to believe nothing had changed.

She walked briskly toward Sproul Plaza, pulling up her last text to Jeremy and hitting Reply.

By the way, I ran into your mom today. She looks great!

That was the code she set up with all her clients, the one that let them know it wasn’t safe to meet. Hopefully, Jeremy would go back to his spot in the student section and forget about her.

Eva walked up Bancroft and dropped the plain envelope containing Jeremy’s pills into a trash can outside the student union, and turned toward home.

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