LITMIR.BIZ

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only going to end up head-first down the crapper without her so much as smelling them first.” Ben flicked a nod toward Chandler’s door. “Nobody likes that one, either. She pops up everywhere and won’t breathe unless Allen signs off on it first.”

      I leaned back in my chair. “Knows all, sees all?”

      He sighed. “And keeps her trap shut.” He looked over at me. “What’re you doing?”

      I folded my hands across my stomach, closed my eyes. “Sitting.”

      “Now you’re sitting?”

      I grinned. “Yep, my body’s out here watching out for the body . . .”

      He interrupted me mid-snark. “Can it, wiseass.”

      * * *

      At five, Allen’s office emptied out faster than a brothel during a vice raid. Everyone hit the door at top speed, desperate, it seemed, finally to breathe air Vonda Allen didn’t own. However, Allen, true to her word, stuck it out till six; only then was she ready to be escorted home like the monarch she thought she was.

      Her shiny black limo idled out front as the three of us hit the lobby. The driver was dressed as you’d expect in black pants and jacket, neatly pressed, a starched white shirt, and a driver’s cap. His name was Elliott, and he was all business. He held the door for Allen, waited until she got comfortable, and then eased in behind the wheel, never looking back.

      Ben sat up front with him; I sat in the back with Allen, in the seat across from hers, so that we were face-to-face. She ignored me, of course, though I didn’t have that luxury. I kept my eyes on her intermittently while also watching the streets as we went along. That was my job. Luckily, Allen didn’t live far, only a few blocks away, in a penthouse condo on North Lake Shore Drive, an area where even the pigeons knew better than to relieve themselves on the sidewalk.

      Elliott pulled up into the building’s circular drive and dropped us off. Ben took point, Allen was in the middle, and I held the back position as the three of us breezed past the security desk and stood waiting for the private elevator to take us up to the residences. We didn’t have to wait long. The polished brass doors whooshed open after a few seconds to reveal a sweet-smelling car outfitted in sheeny cherrywood and a thick Oriental carpet. Ben stepped aside to let Allen walk on, and I stepped in after her.

      “You see her up,” Ben said. “I’ll hit the garage. Get the car. Meet you down there.”

      I nodded; Allen didn’t. The doors closed, and the car rose slowly without a single auditory clue that we were moving at all. No squeaks or groans, no Muzak, no nothing, just the sound of the two of us inhaling and exhaling as we rode up to Allen’s apartment.

      “Kaye told me you questioned the staff today.” She didn’t bother looking at me. Her eyes were fixed on the shiny doors. “Contrary to my instructions.”

      I watched Allen’s reflection in the sheen. Though it was slightly distorted, I could see her lips pressed tightly, her lifted chin, the hard eyes. “That’s right.”

      “I forbid—”

      I stopped her right there. “Forbid?”

      “I call that insubordination.”

      “I call it doing my job.”

      We rode up a few more floors in chilly silence before Allen spoke again.

      “I assume you have a gun?”

      I let a moment go by. “Uh-huh.”

      “And that you know how to use it?” Her voice was so low, it came out almost as a whisper, as though she were afraid someone else might hear, as though saying even those few words opened a window into her deepest, darkest fears.

      I turned to face her, really took her in, though she still would not look at me. For all her perceptiveness, tough talk, and high-mindedness, I could see clearly now that she was uncharacteristically vulnerable but too proud to admit it—even to herself. Who had done this to her? I wondered. What or who was she frightened of? I faced forward again, watched her in the doors, the stiff set of the shoulders, her defiance, even now, as she fought not to exhibit the slightest hint of emotion.

      “I know how to use it. I’m hoping I won’t have to.”

      I could almost feel her struggle with herself over whether to say more. Expectant seconds passed before it became clear to me that she wouldn’t. It was yet another missed opportunity.

      “Maybe tomorrow you’ll tell me why you needed to know that,” I said.

      There was a sudden intake of breath, and then the doors slid open, and she all but bolted into the cocooned safety of her penthouse suite. Only then did she appear to breathe again.

      I stood there, my mouth hanging open. If I thought her office was big enough to host a joint session of Congress, it had nothing on this place. The panoramic view of glitz and abundance was so striking that the glare of it nearly knocked me back a step. And the view. Outside Allen’s floor-to-ceiling windows stood the skyscrapers of Chicago in all their steel-girded magnificence, and beyond them, close enough to almost reach out and touch, was the blue-green, undulating sparkle of Lake Michigan, pleasure boats bobbing on the water. Sheesh. All I saw from my front windows were the apartment buildings across the street, and they were nowhere close to being this opulent.

      A short, wide Hispanic woman materialized from somewhere and planted herself front and center to await her mistress’s desires. Dressed in a severely starched maid’s uniform of gray under a crisp white apron, her hands clasped in front of her, she nodded at me, smiled, and waited.

      “This is Isabella,” Allen said without enthusiasm, handing the woman her briefcase, as she likely did every evening about this time. “Isabella, this is Ms. Raines. She’s assisting me for a few days.” Turning back to me, she said, “You’ll accompany me to the gym tomorrow. Be here at six thirty sharp.” Judgmental eyes swept over me. “Bring workout clothes, if you want.”

      I raised an eyebrow, marveling at Old Girl’s recovery rate. As quickly as it had taken her to exit the elevator and relieve herself of her briefcase, she’d managed to get ahold of every hint of vulnerability she’d shown and ram it back behind an iron veil of self-absorbed bitchiness. She then turned on imported heels and clicked away from me without a backward glance.

      The elevator doors closed on her exit, and I rode down to the garage in silence, this time watching my own reflection. I looked tired, harassed, like a woman who knew there was trouble waiting around the corner. Something was looming, something dangerous, and I hadn’t the first clue what it was. I assume you have a gun? And that you know how to use it? I scrubbed my hands across my face just as I hit the lower level and the doors whooshed open.

      Chapter 5

      I slid into the passenger seat of Ben’s old Camaro, clicked the seat belt across my chest, then turned in the seat. “Have you seen this woman’s apartment?”

      He grinned. “Can you technically call that an apartment?”

      “Whatever you call it, it’s embarrassing.”

      “If you had her money, you wouldn’t think so.”

      I jabbed a thumb toward the side window. “There are homeless people sleeping in boxes two blocks from here.”

      Ben snorted, slid me a look. “She can’t see them from way up there.”

      We pulled out into late rush-hour traffic, the street clogged bumper to bumper with cabs, Ubers, daredevils on Divvy bikes and electric scooters, tourist trolleys, and overly trusting pedestrians weaving in and out of it all, their eyes on their iPhones, their heads up their behinds, everybody on the street jockeying to get just ten seconds up on the next fella. One honk of a car horn led inevitably to a chain of frustrated copycats.

      “She wants me to follow her around the gym tomorrow,” I said.

      “We

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