Page 365 of Top Dog

“I get your point. Sorry. I’ll try not to fuck up Bend this time.”

“You gotta settle somewhere, Graham. Every time you kick up a storm and move, it leaves a bigger paper trail,” he said.

“I’m working on it.”

“You’re not keeping a very low profile.”

“I’m keeping an incredibly low one. Keeping myself afloat on bullshit jobs that don’t require official paperwork, not getting involved in business that isn’t mine. Not my fault people are curious about some asshole walking around town.”

“Have you tried not being an asshole?” he asked with a grin.

I looked at him, straight-faced for a moment.

“Graham, come on. Loosen up a bit. Bend might be the place you’re looking for,” he said.

“No place is the place I’m looking for anymore,” I said.

“Have you been back?”

“No,” I said. “I have a job to finish.”

“You have a life to assimilate. But that doesn’t mean you can’t go visit their graves.”

“They’re buried in DC, Turner. The fuck do you expect me to do?”

“What you always did with the CIA. Go in undercover and give yourself some closure.”

“You don’t think that’s what I’m doing? Getting closure?” I asked.

“Not the way you should,” he said.

“Sorry you don’t like my plans.”

“If you’re serious about Bend, you need to remember your CIA training. It’s i

mperative that you blend in. And right now, you’re doing a shit job of it. People are already staring at us.”

“Because I’m new.”

“No. Probably because you pissed someone off,” he said.

“Not my fault people wanna talk and I don’t.”

“That’s the thing. You have to talk. If they want you to talk, then talk. If you don’t wanna talk, then get yourself an off-grid house and live alone.”

“You know I can’t do that until the job’s finished.”

“I hear you loud and clear. But you’ll be moving in another month if you don’t clean your act up,” he said.

“What the hell do you expect me to do?” I asked.

“Get a part-time job. Trim up that beard. You look homeless.”

“I am homeless.”

“You’re renting a house.

“Not what I meant,” I said flatly.

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