Page 100 of The Boss

“Persona Kit.”

“Shit.”

“Fuck!”

More curses fill the line and I can’t tell who says what.

“Brilliant,” Allie is practically swooning.

“Oh, no, uh, not that,” Gailo says, clearly having forgotten some of his training.

“It contains dye, wigs, prosthetics, glasses, makeup, not just physical disguises, but ID, credit cards, additional props for a fake identity.” Robbie reads off the contents to help Gialo out. “It’ll take me a minute to track down the exact list of individual items and which persona. I’ll start checking pings on our credit cards.”

I slump, discouraged as I point out, “She’s too smart to use them.”

“Did she take her dog?” O asks.

“Yes,” I say. The word is like acid on my tongue.

“Stop everything else and start looking for where she ditched the bike. We find it, maybe we catch a glimpse of her right now with dyed hair or—”

“She has black hair she can’t dye that. Hoodie, I bet,” Allie says.

I go to the closet. “Yes. She did take a hoodie and,” I look back at the armory wall. I gulp, “She took a Kevlar vest too.”

More curses ring out on the line. If she was coming back, she would have left the dog. She’s taken everything she needs to sneak, or blast, into enemy territory. Or enough to start her journey home and shoot any one of us who gets in her way. Every second that passes cements the reality for all of us. The weight of it settles deep in my gut. I swallow down bile.

My wife is going to betray me.

CHAPTER 44

Luna

My hands tremble as I pull on the door handle.

I am so tired of shaking.

And vomiting.

And crying.

But I’m still alive and I have options. A lot of them. The fact that I even made it to this door is…extraordinary. I never use that word. But it fits.

Maybe someday I’ll feel proud of myself. Happy that my plan worked. Maybe someday I’ll feel something other than terror, anger, sadness. And smug that I outsmarted what has to be the most powerful shadow organization that’s existed in a couple hundred years.

I mean, damn.

The intel Quinn had on that computer…my father…

Quinn…no, Van. Of course none of this was real. It was an arranged marriage, for shit’s sake. He was just using me to get to Papa…Papa…Mama…

Not now Luna! You can have a grade-A level-one nuclear mental breakdown later!

I square my shoulders, act like it’s totally normal to walk into a high-end spa wearing a hoodie and sunglasses with a backpackthat has a tiny dog’s head sticking out of it. I just look down my nose at the front desk girl when her brow raises. I act like I’m normal and everyone else is weird. Like a real New Yorker.

I whisper and lower my voice as low as I can at the same time when I command, “Tell your boss I’m here to see Vix.”

Man, I hope the rumors are true about this place. If not, that one sentence could be enough to flag voice recognition software.