Page 17 of Joker

Grinder clears his throat. “Raven.”

Her chin lifts a fraction.

“This is Joker.”

Her eyes come back to mine fully this time. No handshake. No fake smile. Just a long enough look to say she’s taking inventory.

Fair enough.

“She and her little girl are heading north with you,” Grinder says.

The woman’s mouth tightens like she doesn’t love hearing herself summarized like cargo any more than I love being sent for her without warning.

I don’t blame her.

I shift my weight and look back at Grinder. “You planning to give me anything useful, or am I supposed to freestyle a witness protection run blind?”

That earns the barest flicker of something from Raven, maybe surprise that I said it out loud. Grinder, on the otherhand, just folds his arms over his chest and stares me down like he’s deciding how much to say.

“Bare minimum,” he says.

“Of course.”

“She’s in danger.”

No shit.

I keep my mouth shut and let him continue.

“The ex is connected. More connected than he should be. The fewer names, places, and details floating around, the better.”

That’s not enough information to make me happy, but it’s enough to tell me this is not some run-of-the-mill asshole ex with a bruised ego and too much time on his hands.

Connected means money, law, politics, family, or some ugly combination of all four. Connected means the kind of man who can make problems without getting his own hands dirty. Connected means the reason they’re moving her like this is because conventional options have already become liabilities.

I glance at Raven again. Her face doesn’t change much, but her jaw tightens on the word ex.

That tells me enough.

Grinder keeps going. “He’s got eyes in places he shouldn’t. She disappears too obvious and he’ll sniff in the right direction eventually. That’s why you’re taking her at night.”

That fits better.

Night gives you fewer eyes, fewer cameras catching clear images, fewer random people remembering a woman and a child climbing into the wrong truck. Darkness makes everybody less distinct. Less memorable. If somebody is looking, you want them chasing shadows, not details.

I nod once.

“Get her to Bartsville without incident,” Grinder says. “That’s the job.”

Simple.

Except nothing about this is simple.

I lean one shoulder against the doorframe and look at him harder. “And when I get her there?”

“Logan takes it from there.”

That’s not what I mean, and he knows it.