Accident?

Hardly.

Everything about that day was coordinated by Nick. All the surveillance footage show a confident and purposeful Harper making her way through two international airports, changing identities, accessing a cab in LA, a city she had never been to before. Then navigating her way around UCLA campus like she’s been a student there for years. In fact, she had a UCLA ID, she was wearing it around her neck just before she entered the library. There was no footage of her coming out.

After that she was back on the record. New cab procured, ride out to Huntington Beach, dropped off at the Main Street Pier. Paid with cash. She got out, walked north one block, turned up Fifth, and from what we can tell by the street cams in that area, she went straight to the apartment. There’s a gap in the footage at that point. Obviously she took the apartment, she technically still lives there for another few weeks. But I didn’t find her right away. And I was not given orders. I learned all this way after the fact. My original explanation about why I was watching her was true. I’m obsessed. I want her. She’s mine.

My information comes to me in different ways. Like the Sasha thing. The Admiral says he sent me to get her.

OK. I had not expected that, to be honest. The receptionist thing Merc and I share is not a secret. I’ve had the same arrangement with lots of different operatives over the years. So it does not surprise me that the Admiral figured it out… it’s just… Why would he care about this one little girl? That part makes no sense.

I check for Sasha in the rear view and find her watching me. I smile at her. “We’re gonna stop soon. There’s a restaurant up here, I’m sure of it.”

I look back over to Harper, but she’s got her cheek pressed up against the window, her back angled towards me.

She’s avoiding something.

Maybe it’s the files. Maybe it’s me. But either way, this day is starting to feel… off.

And when I get that off feeling things are building up to something. Something big. I’ve been in this business long enough to understand intuition is your best friend. Right now my intuition is screaming at me to be careful because this is the endgame. Or at the very least, the beginning of the end. The Admiral got in touch last night. And that can only mean one thing.

Nick is about to pop back up.

I searched her apartment almost every day back in Huntington. The Admiral might’ve said I was on leave, but once I found her, I knew that was not the case. I was there for Harper. Keep an eye on her—or f**k her. Same thing.

I allow myself a small smile as I think about that.

Her father will flip when he finds out. And there’s no way that will stay secret for long, but he’s the one who came to me twelve years ago and made that promise. I’m simply taking what’s already mine.

Back in the OC I searched her apartment thoroughly. There are no secret panels in the walls, or loose floorboards, or special compartments in the box spring. I checked. There are no special knickknacks that look like useless crap, but have a screw-top lid hidden into the design so you can hide stuff in plain sight.

Nothing.

I checked that little mechanical room she used to stash her money and key too. That wall did have a loose brick, so it was easy to find. But there was only one.

“Let’s stop here!” Sasha says, leaning between the front seats to point out the window. “Look!” She laughs and suddenly I can imagine the little kid in her again. She flip-flops between killer assassin and hormonal teenager, but right now I can see her the way her father might’ve. A little girl who just wants to be a kid. “Dinosaurs!” she says.

Sure enough, we are in Cabazon. Home of two massive roadside dinosaurs.

I pat Harper in her leg. “Want to go see the dinosaurs, Harper?”

“I do!” Sasha says excitedly from the back. “Look, they have a restaurant there too. We can stop and eat and then go look at them. Can we look at them, James?”

“Harper?” I ask again. She turns towards me with a smile, but something is definitely off with her too. “You in for food and a tourist trap?”

“Sure, I’m starving and that looks fun.”

I try and ignore all the warnings going off in my head and just pay attention to the moment as I get off the freeway and head over to the giant T-Rex. I park in front of a restaurant with the sign Eat in front. I switch the engine off. The lack of air-conditioning affects us immediately. If you don’t have a constant stream of cool air blowing on you, the desert heat moves in. All three of us open our doors to get out at the same time. You can’t fight the sun. Even three hardened killers know this.

Sasha takes a long look at the gigantic dinosaurs and then notices me watching her and blushes in embarrassment. “I was obsessed with dinosaurs when I was a kid.”

“You’re still a kid, Smurf,” I tell her as I open the door of the restaurant for them. Inside it’s cool again.

“Did you ever see Jurassic Park, James?”

I laugh. “I think everyone’s seen Jurassic Park, Sasha.”

“I haven’t,” Harper says.

“See!” Sasha exclaims. She’s very excited about the dinosaurs and this makes me smile. “Harper grew up on a boat, she probably never even had TV. I grew up with TV, and we went to the movies, but not a lot. I saw Jurassic Park on TV once when I was like six and that’s when I decided I’d like to be a paleontologist. Did you know that Thermopolis, Wyoming has real dinosaur tracks and bones in the same place, James? That’s not very common. You almost never see them both in the same place.”

I shake my head as I hold up three fingers for the waitress. She smiles at Sasha, who has directed her impromptu dinosaur lesson towards Harper now, and winks at me. “They are fun at that age, aren’t they?”

“Who?” I ask, following behind her as she leads us to a table.

She sets the menu down and smiles again. “Daughters. I have three.” And then Harper and Sasha arrive and sit together in the booth. The waitress walks off before I can correct her and for a moment I just stand there.

Daughters?

I slide into the booth across from the girls, but I’m sorta stunned. “I’m only twenty-eight,” I say. But she’s long gone, already chatting with another group of people on the other side of the restaurant.

“Twenty-eight is old, James.” Sasha quips. “You’re definitely old enough to be my father.”