Page 25 of Mess With Me

“If a client needs protecting outside our borders, we’ll connect them with our foreign partners.”

“For domestic operations, we could easily miss something if we’re not covering all the bases.” Ford leans back in his chair, clearly worried.

I know I should be, too. And he’s right. But I can’t quite put my finger on what feels off.

We’ve never had to worry about our bottom line. The whistleblowers we’ve protected have all given us information that ended up on front pages around the world. Lionel had the presence of mind early on to set up a literary and film agency to ensure the resulting tell-all books and blockbuster film deals are brokered by this arms-length corporation. Not to mention reward money for turning up missing and wanted individuals all over the world. There hasn’t been a single client we’ve worked for since Lionel founded the company that I’d consider unsuccessful.

“Now, I know I shouldn’t have said anything,” Lionel says, “but I wanted you two to know that if I’m telling you to back down on certain people of interest, it’s because I’m tightening our belts, nothing more. Some operations have bled us dry recently, so we’re going to be conscientious moving forward. Maintaining the reputation of McCrae & Associates to those who know about it is imperative—our credibility is the cornerstone of our success, and we will not be sullying it with anything that’s not our best work. The only way to do our best work now is to pull back and focus on a few key clients so we can do the best job we can for them stateside. I’ll need the cooperation of my best people during these difficult times. That’s you two.”

Ford and I look at each other, and I’m pretty sure a sense of dread is sitting cold in his belly like it is mine. Not because the company’s in danger, but because I know Lionel McCrae is lying through his teeth.

* * *

“The fuck I’m stepping away,” I say, folding my arms and leaning back in the booth of our favorite diner in New York. We headed straight here to debrief after that shit show of a meeting.

Ford dumps what I swear is a fifth little container of cream in his coffee while we wait for our sandwiches. “I’m just saying—it’s what you always tell me when things get personal.”

“Things are not personal.”

Ford raises an eyebrow. “You telling me you would have come up with that fireman shit if the woman had been someone else?”

“Of course I would have.”

Ford smirks and takes a sip of his coffee. He makes a face and adds another creamer.

“That shit’s going to be butter if you keep that up.”

He ignores me. “So what do you think about the money thing?”

“I think it’s bullshit.”

“Could be real.”

“Maybe, but he didn’t seem to care when I volunteered to cover it. Something’s still up. I can feel it.”

He sighs. “I know. But I didn’t exactly let that idea about you paying for it sit long enough for him to consider it. Maybe itisthe money and he’s leaking it somewhere he doesn’t want us to know about.”

“I like that better than the alternative.”

“Which is?”

“That something bigger’s at play.” I take a sip of my coffee, shoe-polish black. “Whatever it is, he’s not telling us the whole truth.”

“Agreed. We need to figure out what it is. I won’t work for an organization where there’s shit going on that compromises my values, and I know you won’t either.”

“It’s why I hired you.”

“Worst mistake you ever made, huh?”

“Not by a long shot. But”—I down the last of my coffee—“it’s got me thinking about that other idea.”

Ford sits back and folds his arms. “You really think we can make it on our own, without Lionel’s resources?”

“We might have to.”

Ford and I have joked over the years about what we’d do if we started our own protection agency. It’s appealing in a lot of ways. But not, too. “Seeing my sister run the Rolling Hills and growing up with my mom doing the same—there’s a shit ton of bureaucratic work that goes into running a business. Less time for doing the work.”

“So we hire someone to run that shit.”

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