Agent Ren Bryce Thriller Series Books 1-3: Blood Runs Cold, Time of Death, Blood Loss. Alex Barclay

       Chapter 40

      The Brockton Filly quickly emptied. She saw the creepy guy whose prints she had taken. He almost winked at her as he left. Ugh. She watched Billy make his way around the bar, closing the shutters. Every time she met him, he was wearing a black T-shirt with a graphic on the front and perfectly sized Diesel jeans.

      He looked over his shoulder at her. ‘I have three pairs of the same jeans,’ he said. ‘In case you were wondering.’

      Ren laughed. ‘Well, what else am I going to be looking at in here?’

      ‘I’m just an object to you …’

      A subject, actually. ‘Yup,’ she said.

      He kept going and every now and then he would look over and smile. It felt good. She watched him, afraid to rely on what she was feeling right now. He had to know that checking his phone numbers, checking anything out about him now could lead her colleagues directly her way. He had cut off that channel. Deliberately? He smiled at her again. If she was to be fair, she had cut off that channel too. But she wasn’t feeling fair. She was feeling suspicious. She was sitting with a man linked to a homicide investigation who had been following either her or a young woman who was linked to the homicide victim. And I am the agent in the middle.

      ‘Can I fix myself a drink?’ said Ren.

      ‘Sure – go ahead,’ said Billy. ‘I need to bring bottles in from out back.’

      By the time she got behind the bar, her heart was beating so hard, it was beginning to turn her stomach. I can’t do this, it’s so wrong. If he knew …’

      Her hand never shook on the job. She had held a gun steady on people she feared she would have to shoot. She had done terrible things in terrible situations that should have rendered every usable part of her body useless, but it never happened. She did steady better than most. Until tonight. She had crossed over. One sensible-shoed foot was rooted on the professional side. The other was in the personal zone with a trampy stiletto on the chest of a criminal.

      Jesus … and stop fucking shaking.

      She stared down at her hand. It calmed a little. She took a breath and navigated quickly through the unfamiliar menu of Billy Waites’ cellphone. Most of the texts were from her, which gave her an unwanted thrill. As she scrolled down, she realized the Inbox was filled entirely with her texts.

      I am the stalker.

      The Sent box was different; probably the same amount of texts to her, but more to numbers and names she knew she wouldn’t recognize anyway. She started opening them. They were typical men’s texts – direct and written without l8-, w8-, gr8-style abbreviations. These texts said Y or N, or had times or… Looking for coded messages seemed ridiculous. With single-letter responses, the same letters over and over, what was she going to work out? That yes meant no and no meant yes? She almost laughed. As she backed her way out of the menus she had violated, the phone vibrated in her hand with a text message. She jumped and almost fucked herself into dropping it and alerting Billy. He called out from the back room.

      ‘Shit, Ren? Is my phone out there?’

      She half-looked at it, half-tried to put it down and wholly wanted to press Yes to open the text. She wanted to find out if Billy was about to bring in a shipment of coke, arrange a hit, tell his friends what he did to her, or ask a girl called Cindy to meet him in a seedy bar. Is this the seedy bar? And what are the chances of a sinister text arriving while an FBI agent is holding his phone? Jesus.

      ‘I think it’s here somewhere,’ she shouted back. ‘I heard the buzz.’

      ‘You can leave it,’ said Billy. ‘I’ll be out in a minute.’

      With a gun to pressed to the back of my neck.

      She walked quietly around the front of the bar, leaving the phone where it was. She sat very still, then pretended to look through her bag for a pen. Her heart slowed, but there was a small tremble left in her hand. Billy came up behind her, laid a hand on her shoulder and kissed the top of her head. She reached up and rested her hand on his.

      ‘Hey,’ he said.

      ‘Hey.’

      He walked over to his phone and checked the message. Ren watched his face. There was no story in it to read.

      ‘Where’s your drink?’

      ‘I changed my mind,’ she said. ‘I need to get back to Breck.’

      ‘What?’

      She nodded.

      ‘Oh,’ said Billy. ‘I was going to fix us something to eat.’

      Whoa. Too domestic. ‘I can’t, I’ve … got to meet up with my bosses.’

      ‘Code for “I can’t possibly eat with you because that would be weird.”’

      And you know all about code … And I feel terrible for even thinking that.

      She stood up and kissed him briefly on the lips. ‘I’ll talk to you later.’

      ‘You always say “I’ll talk to you later,” and you never do.’

      She smiled back. ‘It’s just a saying. You know, like “How are you doing?” or “I love you.”’

      ‘What?’

      Ren laughed. ‘I think Homer said that.’

      ‘Really?’

      ‘Oh, not him – Homer Simpson. Gotta go.’

      When Ren finally got away from the Brockton Filly, it was three a.m. A miserable, beautiful, hopeless song played on her iPod to back up her mood. Her hand would never have shook, her heart would not have sped up if Billy Waites had been just who he was and not who he had become. She had been in situations worse than that, she had risked more, but never did she have to ask herself a similar question to the one that was running through her mind right now.

      Was I looking for reassurance that Billy Waites was bad… or reassurance that he was good?