“Then I had just as well lay it out there.”

“Do.”

“Did you arrange this dinner just so you could spend more time with her?”

“Yes! So I could spend more time with her and her husband. Who we believe to be a serial killer. Isn’t that why I’m here?”

Gif raised his hand in a peacekeeping gesture. “We just wanted to make sure that your eye was still on the target and not on…something else.”

“And now you can be sure. Go home.”

Gif tugged on his earlobe. “The wasn’t the only reason for my coming.”

“What else?”

“Not what, who.”

“Rudkowski?”

“He’s got a periscope up Mike’s ass.”

Drex cursed under his breath. “Well, that’s just fabulous. How far up it?”

“He showed up at Mike’s office yesterday morning all bluster and self-importance. Hauled Mike away from his desk and into a conference room. He grilled him about the meeting we had in the hotel. Remember the enchanting Ms. Li?”

Drex couldn’t help but chuckle. “She delivered my note to Rudkowski?”

Gif didn’t see the humor in it. “I think you’re missing the point here.”

Sighing, Drex pressed his thumb and middle finger into his eye sockets and rubbed them. He was suddenly very tired. “I get your point. Rudkowski isn’t just following up on my mysterious vacation, he’s micromanaging a pursuit.”

“Precisely.”

“I saw this coming and warned you of it. If he failed to find me, he’d come after you. I advised you to be on alert.”

“Agents are watching us, night and day. We’ve pretended not to notice. But coming to Mike’s workplace, putting him through the wringer? That takes Rudkowski’s zeal to a new level.” He studied Drex for a moment. “You left him a bread-crumb trail to follow to that hotel.”

“You and Mike urged me to contact him.”

“Through official channels, Drex. Making him the butt of a joke isn’t what we had in mind.”

Drex put up no defense. He figured he deserved this particular hand-slapping. “Rudkowski found the hotel by tracking the text sent from my old phone?”

“Isn’t that how you planned it?”

He shrugged, as good as an admission.

“Rudkowski went to the hotel in person,” Gif said. “Conversed with Ms. Li.”

“I made certain she would remember me. The birthday cake and all.”

“Likely she would have remembered you even without that.”

“She’s new on the job. Eager to accommodate.”

“Nevertheless, I doubt she would have been quite so accommodating had you not been quite so suave.” He paused. Then, “What did the note to Rudkowski say, anyway?” Drex told him, and Gif smiled in spite of himself. “I would have paid good money to see his expression when he read it. But it would have been nice for you to let Mike and me in on the joke before it was sprung.”

Drex shook his head. “This way, you can truthfully claim ignorance and innocence.”

“Makes no difference what we claim. We could take a blood oath, and Rudkowski still wouldn’t believe us.”

“Probably not. But, on the plus side, your consciences remain clear.” He shot Gif a grin, but Gif wasn’t in a jesting frame of mind.

“This is serious, Drex.”

He dropped the grin. “Yeah, I know.”

“You don’t know the worst of it.”

“There’s more?”

“Rudkowski didn’t stop with the grilling. He alleged that Mike had tampered with evidence, stolen classified documents, breached secure email accounts. He reeled off a laundry list of offenses.”

“Shit.”

“Right. On and on.”

“How did Mike respond?”

“By bending over backward to cooperate. He surrendered his work computer for Rudkowski’s flunkies to tear into.”

“There’s nothing on it relating to any of this.”

“No, but Rudkowski threatened to get a search warrant for his apartment and to seize everything it in, from roof to basement.”

Drex steepled his fingers and tapped them against his forehead. “He can’t get a warrant based on a hunch. A judge would ask for cause, and Rudkowski doesn’t have it.”

“He would cite our history. Your obsession. Our loyalty to you. The—”

“Okay, okay. It’s worrisome, but Mike will take care of it.”

“He already has. When we first heard that the sleeping giant had been awakened by that deputy down in Florida, Mike took the precaution of emptying everything off his hard drives, then destroyed them.”

“What about you?”

“Rudkowski considers me less of a problem than Mike. I’m not the computer genius. But immediately after Mike tipped me, I got out of Dodge before Rudkowski could ambush me, too. I took a week’s worth of personal days.”

“With what excuse?”

“Hemorrhoidectomy.”

“You have hemorrhoids?”

“That’s why I used it. My superiors may be skeptical, but who’s going to ask to see proof of the necessity?”

Drex chuckled again.

“It’s still no laughing matter,” Gif said. “I left my workspace and apartment clean as a whistle. They can turn them inside out and won’t find anything. But as long as you and I are off the grid, Rudkowski is going to plow on.”

“No doubt.”

Gif hesitated, then said, “You could still put in a call to him—”

“No.”

“Okay then, skip Rudkowski and alert one of his higher-ups.”

“Who would either throw it back to Rudkowski or send someone else down here to check it out, who would probably screw up, then we’d be blown, and Jasper would get away.”

“If you explained the delicacy of the situation—”

“Not doing it, Gif. Not yet.”

Gif relented. “All right. But please stop pricking with Rudkowski. Because whether we succeed or fail at getting Ford, Rudkowski isn’t going to forget your making him look foolish. He doesn’t think your pranks are funny.” He paused for effect. “What really has Mike and me worried—”

“We’re back to that?”

“We’re afraid that one of these days, one of your inside jokes is going to blow up in your face.”

Sobered by his friend’s tone, Drex thoughtfully scraped his thumb across his stubbled chin, repeating quietly, “One of these days.”

“Or has one already backfired?”

When Gif looked at someone the way he was looking at Drex now, it cut through bullshit like a cleaver. He was referring to Talia, of course. Drex answered as truthfully as he could. “I don’t know.”

“I think you do.”

Drex faced forward and laid his head against the headrest, inwardly cursing Gif and his damn uncanny ability to read people.

A long silence ensued, then Gif said, “Why her? You could go back to Lexington tonight and, with a crook of your finger, have that pretty hotel receptionist at your beck and call.”