Page 79 of Antihero

The pack of drunken men was within touching distance of Joey. One of the guys pawed at the woman he’d been dancing with and she let his fat hand slide across her belly.

Evan’s heartbeat had quickened, the pulse tangible at the side of his neck. If he didn’t want to draw in a close-quarters space crowded with no-shoots, he had his Strider, the table knife, fork, the jagged peg of a torn-off chair leg. A clean strike at the bread plate could break it into shards, a double-wrap of the cloth napkin protecting his palm on the grip. Joey’s coupe glass could be ground into an eye socket, extra points for the blinding sting of alcohol.

If he eliminated them all now there would no longer be a threat to Joey.

But there wasn’t.

There wasn’t a threat to Joey.

“I have to go,” he said. “I’m not safe to be around right now.”

Joey wilted.

He threw cash on the table and sliced through the throng, adhering strictly to the third of his five pre-charted routes to the front exit.

Driving through Midtown toward the Bronx, Evan was completely locked in. High visual alertness, a mental map of surrounding blocks continuously unfolding around him as he forged north, heart rate resting around 60 bpm.

And yet.

He could not let go of the way Joey had wilted when he left, hidden beneath her hair and an oversize coat.

Guilt wrestled with righteous annoyance.

The delta between the training he’d undergone and the operations he’d conducted and Joey’s abbreviated time in the Orphan Program was substantial. It was also worrisome. He didn’t know if she’d been stress-tested sufficiently to be field-operational. He couldn’t even be sure if she could handle a basic waterboarding.

He avoided the FDR, driving through interior city streets to maximize alternative routes. A light rain fell, making the asphalt shimmer. Coasting up First Avenue, he found himself dialing Aragón.

“Hola, amigo.”

Evan said, “I think I screwed up.”

“Screwed up how?”

Three greens in a row, street signs for Sixty-Third, Sixty-Fourth, Sixty-Fifth whipping by overhead. Evan cleared his throat. “Handling a situation with Joey.”

“Explain to me.”

Evan did.

Aragón said, “Zoom me.”

“Why?”

“So I can see you.”

“Why?”

“To understand better, yes? To see.”

“I don’t Zoom.”

“So call with whatever pinche encrypted shit you use.”

The median strip hemmed Evan in on the left, giving him two decently flowing northbound lanes to work with. Parked cars clogged the third. Skyscrapers towered on either side. Even in the fancy Mercedes, it felt claustrophobic, like burrowing through a maze.

“I’m driving.”

“Then pull over.”