Page 46 of Boardroom Mask

“Figures. What else do you have?”

“I’ve been going through the corporate filings. Lazarev Global has at least fourteen shell companies registered across three states and two offshore jurisdictions. The layering is intentional. Nobody builds a structure like that to sell real estate.”

“That’s interesting,” he says judiciously. “It’s not, however, a story.” He puts the pen down. “Jillian, I went to bat for you on this. In return, what you’re handing me is a missing source and some Delaware LLCs that every billionaire and their mother probably has. Here’s what I’ve got for you: End of the year.”

I blink. “What?”

“End of the year,” he repeats. “It’s almost December now, so that gives you about a month and change. You bring me something I can take upstairs, something that at leastsuggestsit leads somewhere real, and we keep going. If you don’t have it by then, I’m pulling you off and giving it to Bartlett.”

“Doug, you can’t?—”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” he says sarcastically, “are you the editor now? Should we switch chairs?” Harrumphing, he leans back and scowls at me. “I can and I will. Bartlett been sniffing around organized crime for two years. He’d kill for this assignment.”

“Bartlett couldn’t investigate a parking ticket,” I snap unfairly.

Doug is unbothered. He shrugs, picks up his bagel, and takes a messy chomp out of it. “Then beat him to it. End of the year, Pierce. Clock’s ticking.”

I stand up. “I’ll get it,” I say.

“I know you will,” he says, attention firmly fixed on his bagel. “That’s why I’m not pulling you now. Just don’t let me down.”

I get home a little after seven. The walk from the subway is cold and I keep my keys between my fingers and my eyes on every shadow. The lobby is empty. The stairs are empty. The hallway is empty.

My apartment is not.

He’s sitting at my kitchen table, pale eyes watching calmly. I stand in the doorway with my bag on my shoulder and my keys still in my hand like talons.

“I couldn’t stay away,” he explains.

I close the door behind me and drop my bag on the floor.

17

JILLIAN

“Oh, the less I know the better”

— “The Less I Know the Better” by Tame Impala

“You need to leave,” I say.

The Masked Man doesn’t move. His hands remain on the table, fingers laced, as he watches me like he’s got nowhere else on earth to be.

“I mean it,” I insist. You can’t just—you can’t keep showing up here.”

Nothing. Not a word. Not a shift in his posture. Those gray eyes remain blank and still through the holes in the black mask.

I drop my keys on the counter with a loud clatter. I cross my arms, then uncross them, then don’t know what to do with my hands so I shove them in my coat pockets.

“Why did you come back?” I start to get angry when he still doesn’t answer. “Seriously. Why? What is this? What are you doing? Because last night was—” I stop and try again in a morelevel voice. “Last night can’t happen again. You understand that, right? It was a mistake. A huge, massive, colossal mistake that I made because I was scared and exhausted and not thinking clearly, and you—you’re?—”

I’m pacing now. Back and forth between the counter and the fridge, talking at the floor, at the ceiling, at anything that isn’t him.

“Do you need reminders, huh? Do you have the memory of a goldfish? Okay, fine. Happy to oblige.” I start to rattle things off on my fingers. “You broke into my apartment. Multiple times. You beat my neighbor unconscious. You wrote on my wall in his blood. You told me you were sent tokillme. And I—what, I just—on the kitchen floor—” I press my palm over my eyes. “That’s not okay. This isn’t some fucked-up fairy tale where the girl falls for the—the—whatever you are. This is real life.Myreal life. And in my real life, I don’t do this a second time.”

I stop pacing. I’m standing maybe six feet from the table. He still hasn’t spoken or moved an inch.

“Say something!” I demand.