Jordan turned to Heather. “He has to say that. Twitter is blowing up.”

Heather kept looking at Chris/Curt. She wondered if he was even single. Maybe that had been a lie, too. Her gaze went to his left hand, but she couldn’t see if he had a wedding ring. Maybe he kept it at home, with his wife. And seven children. Also a dog and a cat.

Jordan listened as the spokesman continued, but Heather kept her eye on Chris/Curt, trying to read his mind. He was probably thinking that he was a hero, that he did his job even if it meant telling a whopper. He may have served the greater good, but still, she didn’t like being lied to. The lesser good still mattered, and she and Jordan were the lesser good. She wondered if she’d ever hear from Chris/Curt again, then if she wanted to hear from him again.

Suddenly she realized that the odor of salmon was permeating the apartment, and the fish was burning.

“Dammit!” Heather said, jumping up and running into the kitchen.

Chapter Sixty-two

It wasn’t until midnight that Curt got home to his spare, one-bedroom apartment on the second floor of a row home in the Italian Market, a city neighborhood of open-air stalls selling fruit, produce, and fish, packed cheek-by-jowl with old-school Italian restaurants. The air always smelled like fresh basil and rotting food, but the neighborhood suited him. He could pick up prepared foods anywhere, and it was easy for him to blend in, since the Market bustled with employees, shoppers, and tourists.

He’d come home tonight completely unnoticed, the shops closed, tarps drawn over the stalls, and the few tourists inside the restaurants. He’d kept his ball cap on just in case, after having spent the day feeling like a celebrity poseur, being clapped on the back, congratulated, and even hugged by a pretty lawyer in the U.S. Attorney’s office, who reminded him of Heather.

Curt flopped on his bed, which was made by the cleaning lady who came in every other week, whether he was home or not. There was nothing on the white walls of his bedroom because he’d never had time to decorate, nor had he truly cared to, but tonight it looked lame, beyond bachelorhood into psycho hermit. Oddly, he missed his apartment in Central Valley, and by now, other ATF agents would be routinely fingerprinting, taking photographs, collecting his laptop and going through his videotapes and audiotapes for the government’s case against Evan. None of the possessions in that apartment belonged to him, except the clothes, but he would leave them behind, shedding the Chris Brennan identity like a snake does its skin. It had never been a problem before, but now, he felt vaguely like a real snake.

He picked up the remote, turned on a news channel, and watched the coverage of the operation on mute. There was one talking head after another, then the screen played the video of him flying upside down, with Evan hanging on.

Curt felt odd. He had never seen himself on television before. The camera focused on the sheer terror in Evan’s battered face, and Curt’s heart went out to the boy. He thought of the text that Evan’s mother Mindy had sent him earlier today, thanking him. It made him feel good inside, but still he worried about Evan, and of course, Jordan and Heather.

The TV screen changed to a replay of the press conference, and Curt watched himself on the dais, knowing that he had been thinking about Heather the whole time. He wondered if she had been watching and what she must be thinking of him. He thought about calling her, then glanced at his watch. It was 2:15 A.M. He’d lost track of time with so much going on.

A wave of exhaustion swept over him, and Curt let his eyes close, thinking about her. He wanted to apologize to her, and to Jordan, and to all of them—for the first time ever, he felt guilty after an operation was over, even though by any objective measure, it had been successful. But he didn’t feel successful, he felt like a jerk. He had gotten justice for the murders of Abe and Courtney’s husband, Doug, but justice never was an eye for an eye, not for him. All that was left was death and destruction, leaving him feeling more alone than ever.

Curt drifted to sleep, knowing that it would never be any other way—unless he changed something. And so three nights later, after the hoopla was subsiding and he was returning to a normal schedule, with his new position as yet unspecified, Curt found himself lying on his bed again, looking up Heather’s phone number online in the Boosters’ directory, pressing in the numbers, and waiting while the call rang.

“Hello?” Heather answered, her tone vague, probably because she didn’t recognize the number of his new phone, since he’d turned in his old one as evidence. Still, hearing her voice brought him back to Central Valley, and knowing she was on the other end of the line made him feel different, too. Better, the way he had felt back then.

“Heather, it’s Chris, I mean, Curt.” Curt thought he had gotten used to using his true name again, but evidently not.

“Oh, hi.” Heather’s voice sounded cold, which he had expected.

“I waited a few days but I wanted to call you to say, well, I’m sorry. I’m sorry that I lied to you about who I was. I hope you understand—”

“I get it.”

“It’s my job. It was my job anyway.”

“I said, I get it.” Heather paused. “Jordan gets it, too. Team player, greater good, seventeen inches. Got it.”

Curt didn’t, but let it go. She sounded unhappy talking to him. “I wanted to apologize to Jordan too, but I didn’t want to contact him without asking your permission first.”

“Fine with me, if you call him.”

“Good, thanks.”

“You should. You lied to him, too.”

Curt felt a pang, hearing the sting in her words. “I’m sorry. I know it must’ve been really strange for you, both of you, to find out I was undercover.”

“It was.”

“Is there anything you want to ask me? I mean, you’re entitled to know the truth.”

Heather didn’t answer except to chuckle, not in a good way.

“I mean I never contacted anybody after an operation before, but this is different.”

Heather didn’t say anything.

Curt felt he should explain further, especially because she was saying so little. “I usually work undercover with drug dealers and thugs, but this time, I was infiltrating good people, like you and Jordan.”

“So?”

“So—” Curt hesitated, unsure what to say next. “So it’s unusual for me, and I know it must be for you too, finding out that I’m not a coach or a teacher.”