Page 83 of Devil's Bargain

“Over here!” Pansy whispered, and gestured her urgently on. “Get down!”

“There’s no reason to keep your voice down, they’re not stalking the halls with Uzis,” Jazz said in a normal tone, and straightened up. “Also, there’s no way they can see in here from any of the windows. We’re fine.”

“Thanks, we’ll just—stay here,” Pansy said. “I called nine-one-one.”

“Good idea.” Jazz realized her heart was still pounding, and she was breathing too fast, and reached up to run her hand through her hair. Something bit in a sharp hot line on her finger, and she bent over and shook her head. A rain of glass fragments came out and bounced on the carpet. “You both okay? No holes in you?”

“Fine,” Pansy said. Manny wasn’t speaking, evidently. “Jazz? I’m thinking I might, you know, take a personal day.”

Jazz nodded calmly, ejected the clip from the Sig Sauer and checked it before slamming it back in and ratcheting the slide to put one in the chamber. “You know,” she said, “I personally think that sounds like an excellent idea. But wait for the police.”

“Don’t worry,” Manny said. Like Jazz, he sounded extremely calm. Unnaturally calm. “I’m not moving until there’s three-hundred-sixty degrees of Kevlar.”

She had no doubt that was true. She expected the next time she saw Manny, he’d look like the Michelin Man, only in black body armor. “Pansy. You didn’t see Borden when you came in this morning?”

“No, was he here?”

“Yes.” No need to go into details. “I’m going to check the rest of the offices.”

“Um …” Pansy made a vague gesture toward Jazz’s legs. “You might want to put on some shoes first.”

She’d forgotten, but it came back to her in a weirdly warn rush of feeling, Borden sliding her shoes off her feet and dropping them to the floor … they must have landed next to the couch. She turned back to the office but met Lucia at the door coming out. Lucia had bolstered her gun and was holding Jazz’s shoes in her left hand. She thrust them out without a word and slammed the door behind her.

“Off-limits,” she said flatly. “You said Borden was here somewhere?” As Jazz bent to slide on the shoes, she turned her attention to Manny and Pansy. “Wait there. I don’t care what you hear, don’t come running, all right?”

Two nods. Jazz straightened up, and Lucia performed that magic trick again, the one where she started empty-handed and ended up with that gleaming little gun in her hand. Only this one, Jazz noticed, wasn’t so little. It was at least a .38. Still elegant looking, though.

“Do you match your guns to your outfits?” she asked. Lucia threw her an exasperated look. “Kidding.”

“Go left,” Lucia sighed. “No heroics.”

Borden was nowhere in their offices. Nowhere, as it turned out, in the building. Police arrived within five minutes and turned the entire place inside out, coming up empty. They also turned up nothing on the sniper. Jazz wasn’t shocked. As she and Lucia finished giving statements, she felt her cell phone buzz against her hip, and stepped away to answer.

“Borden?” she asked. It was his number lighting up on the panel. “Where the hell are you?”

It wasn’t his voice that answered. “Go to your secretary’s desk. Right now.”

She froze for a second, mind racing. She didn’t know the voice, had never heard it before, but it had a ring of authority. She turned away from the cops and Lucia, trying to look casual about it, plugged a finger in her left ear and tried to make it look as if she was seeking a quiet place. Pansy and Manny were still behind the desk, watching the cops move around. Jazz stopped at the low counter on the other side of the barrier from them.

“I’m here,” she said. “Where’s Borden?”

“Shut up and listen. Look through the mail. There will be a FedEx envelope.”

There were three, in fact. Jazz spread them out quickly on the counter, looking at addresses.

One was from Gabriel, Pike & Laskins.

“Open it,” the voice said.

She picked up the GPL envelope, jammed the phone between her shoulder and ear, and ripped the tab. When she turned the stiff cardboard upside down, a familiar red envelope fell out.

“You have the envelope?” said the voice.

“I’m holding it,” she said. “Want me to open it?”

“If you break the seal on it, your lawyer friend dies. I want you to turn and walk with it to the stairs. Proceed down to the lobby, go outside and turn right. Walk exactly two blocks, then turn left and go one block. No cops.”

She tapped the red envelope oil the counter, staring at Pansy’s frown, Manny’s worried expression.

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