Page 73 of Borrowed Pain
"Rowan." I kept my voice low, for me more than him. "Did they follow you?"
"I don't think so. They were there for her. Not me."
FBI on Patricia made sense. She was the one running an internal case under a public job title; if anyone in that building tripped a sensor, it would be her.
"Even if they were on her," I said, "you were a person of interest by default if they scraped her meeting records. Today only compounded that."
"I know." It was a ragged admission. "She handed me a drive before they put their hands on her. And—"
He stopped.
"And?"
"She smiled when they led her out," he said. "Not at me. Past me. Like she'd finally arrived at a destination only she could see."
My mouth went dry. "What's on the drive?"
"Three years of everything. Financials, compliance reports, and patient files. Notes in her own hand." He spit out the next point in a lower tone. "David isn't her nephew. He's her son."
"Fuck. I didn't see that coming. And Rook? Any more about him?" I asked.
"She's been in love with him for two years," Rowan said. "Protecting him while building a case against the same people who destroyed her kid."
He'd delivered the key points of the meeting, and I focused on him.
"Are you safe?" The question scraped my throat raw. If they'd arrested Patricia for helping us, what stopped them from deciding Rowan was worth eliminating?
"I'm coming to you." His voice softened on those four words, and I heard what he couldn't say: that coming to me meant more than tactical regrouping.
"Please tell them before I get there. I can't walk into that room and watch them decide I'm too dangerous to keep around."
That's what this was really about—not only Patricia's arrest, but the growing certainty that everyone who helped him became a target, including me.
"Okay. Drive safe."
"Always," he said. The connection ended.
I looked down and realized I was gripping a tuft of Charlie's fur. He shifted, leaned heavier, and made an approving grunt as if I'd finally done something right.
"Rowan?" Matthew asked without looking away from the dough.
"Twenty-five minutes," I said. "Patricia is in custody. Picked her up in the diner. He thinks they were there for her, not him, but anyone with access to her records could tag him—us. He has a drive."
Dorian scanned his feeds. "We'll assume her systems were compromised."
Matthew exhaled, gathered the dough, and flipped it into a new shape. Flour dust floated and settled on the cutting board in a pale drift. He wiped his palms on a towel he'd already ruined and shook his head once, hard.
"Tell me the part that made you go quiet," he said.
"David is her son. Rook is… not just an asset."
Dorian typed something I couldn't see, and something else in the room hummed to life, a fan maybe, barely audible.
"They'll want that evidence back," Dorian said. "If the drive holds anything real, it's a liability on top of being a lifeline."
"I know." I scratched between Charlie's ears. "He asked me to tell you before he walks in. He doesn't want to watch it land."
Charlie got up, stretched, and thumped his tail against my shin twice. I stood, the chair feet scraping against the floor.
