Page 152 of Into the Fire

“I can just move up the block, you know,” she said.

Evan kept petting Dog. “I can buy that building, too.”

She let her hands slap to her sides. “You’re beyond impossible.”

Evan said, “I’m thinking that things might change soon—”

“What does that mean?”

“For the better. That my life might get … more peaceful.”

“Peaceful?” Joey said. “Who wants peaceful?”

“And I want to know you’re safe, too.”

“What are you talking about, X? What are you gonna do?”

“I’ll tell you once it’s done.”

He headed out, and she yelled after him, “Given your peaceful new life, maybe you could take the stupid dog!”

He shut the door behind him.

Outside, he hesitated and listened. Through the door panels, he heard Joey’s footsteps creak the floorboards. The crack of her knees as she knelt.

And then she spoke in a baby voice he’d never have imagined she was capable of. “Who’s a good boy?” He heard the jingle of Dog’s collar as she petted him. “Who’s the best, best, most lovey-faced puppy in the whole wide world? Yes, you are! Yes, you are!”

Grinning, he descended the stairs.

As he climbed into his truck, the RoamZone dinged with a text from Joey.

It said, I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU BOUGHT THE BUILDING. U’D BETTER CHILLAX.

Evan typed his one-word response. Before sending, he stared at the screen, a smirk curling his lips. Then he deleted the message, took off the caps lock, and typed again.

kay.

As Evan rode the 60 Freeway east into the Mojave, the sun set with blistering beauty. By the time he pulled off into the arid scrubland, the earth was lit with oranges and pinks. He drove until there was not a road or building in sight and then another twenty minutes after that.

When he finally stopped, the sun had freshly vanished, the sky backlit with an ambient glow. From the truck vault, he grabbed a three-man tent, popped it up on the dirt, and then lowered shades over the mesh windows to seal them tightly.

If there was to be a live video feed, he couldn’t afford to have anything in the background. No star positions, no distinctive geographic features in the landscape, no sourceable plant life indigenous to the region.

He went back to the truck, hauled out a Pelican case, and brought it inside the dark nylon dome. He pulled up the yagi directional antenna and then set up the SMA connector and the omni stubby antenna. Within seconds the tiny makeshift GSM base station had stealthily hooked into the network.

Teasing the RoamZone from his pocket, he turned it on and enabled the Wi-Fi hot spot, joining the LTE network. Before leaving Castle Heights, he’d slotted in a brand-new SIM card and moved the phone service from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to Istanbul.

It was full dark outside, the tent lit only by the phone. The cicadas were going at it aggressively, and he played with audio filters until he’d dampened all background noise.

He dialed the number and told the switchboard operator, “Dark Road.”

After the click he punched in the extension.

It rang a half dozen times.

And then President Victoria Donahue-Carr answered. “I’m glad you reestablished contact,” she said. “I’m going to give you another number enabled for video feed.”

Evan did not answer.