Chapter 9: Brennan street

I arrived at the café ten minutes early.

Old habit. Richard had always been late on purpose, making me sit and wait and wonder, so I had learned to arrive first, to choose the seat, to have something in my hands before the conversation started. Small ways of holding ground.

I took the table by the window where I could see the street in both directions. I ordered a coffee I didn't want and watched the door.

Mara walked in at three minutes past eleven.

She looked the same as always. Dark coat, hair pulled back, the quick confident walk of someone who moved through the world without apology. She spotted me immediately and crossed the room with a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes.

She sat down, set her bag on the table, and looked at me for a moment before speaking.

"You look tired," she said.

"I haven't been sleeping well."

"The apartment?"

"Among other things."

The waiter came and she ordered without looking at the menu. Earl grey, no milk. She had been ordering the same thing since we were twenty-two. I used to find it comforting, that kind of consistency in a person.

Now I wasn't sure what I found it.

"How are things with the roommate situation?" she asked.

"Still unresolved."

"Phoebe." She said my name with a particular weight, the way she did when she thought I was being evasive. "You can talk to me."

"I know."

"Do you?"

I looked at her across the table. She looked back at me, open and concerned, exactly the way she always had. Nothing in her face suggested anything other than a woman worried about her friend.

But she had told me to come alone.

And she had replied too fast.

"How did you find the apartment listing?" I asked.

She blinked. "What?"

"The link you sent me three weeks ago. You said you found it in a local group online. Which one?"

Mara picked up her tea when it arrived and wrapped both hands around the cup. "I don't remember exactly. One of those neighborhood pages. Why?"

"I'm just curious."

"You don't sound curious. You sound like you're interviewing me."

"Sorry." I softened my voice deliberately. "Everything has just been strange lately. I'm trying to understand how I ended up in that apartment."

She relaxed slightly. "You ended up there because you needed somewhere affordable and fast and I found you something that fit. That's all it was."

"Right."

She studied me. "Has something happened? Beyond the roommate thing?"

"Richard came by," I said.

Her expression shifted. "When?"

"The first night."

"Phoebe." She set the cup down. "Why didn't you call me?"

"It was late. Bruno handled it."

The name landed and she went very still for just a moment, half a second, barely visible. Then her expression reset into concern.

"Bruno," she repeated. "That's his name?"

"Yes."

"And he just handled it."

"He was there. Richard left."

Mara looked down at her cup. "I don't like the idea of you relying on a stranger."

"He's not really a stranger anymore."

"You've known him four days."

"I've known Richard for twelve years," I said. "Knowing someone a long time doesn't make them safe."

She looked up at that. Her eyes were careful in a way I hadn't noticed before, or maybe had always noticed without knowing what I was seeing.

"What did you want to talk to me about?" I asked. "Your message said you needed to tell me something."

Mara turned her cup slowly in her hands.

"I've been worried about you," she said. "Living alone, Richard showing up. I wanted to check in."

"You asked me to come alone for a check-in."

"I just wanted it to be private."

"Mara." I kept my voice even. "You knew I wasn't alone before you sent that message."

The café hummed quietly around us. Someone laughed at the counter. A chair scraped against the floor. Ordinary sounds that had nothing to do with the silence sitting between us.

Mara didn't answer immediately.

"Richard called me," she said finally.

I had expected it. I had been sitting across from her for twenty minutes expecting it. But hearing it said out loud still did something to my chest.

"When?" I asked.

"Two days ago." She met my eyes. "He told me about the man staying with you. He was worried."

"Richard doesn't worry. He monitors."

"Phoebe"

"What did he ask you to do?"

She looked down again. That small downward look that I recognized. Mara only looked away when she already knew she was wrong.

"He asked me to find out who Bruno is," she said quietly. "Where he came from. What he wants."

"And you agreed."

"I was trying to protect you."

"By reporting back to my abusive husband."

"That's not what this is."

"Then tell me what it is." I kept my voice low and steady because the alternative was standing up and walking out and I wasn't ready to do that yet. "Tell me exactly what you told him."

Mara pressed her lips together.

"I told him Bruno seemed connected to someone important," she said. "Someone Richard had history with."

"Cassano."

Her eyes came up fast.

She hadn't expected me to know that name.

And in that single unguarded second, I saw everything I needed to see.

Mara knew exactly who Cassano was.

Which meant Richard hadn't just asked her to gather information.

He had been using her for far longer than two days.

I picked up my bag from the back of the chair and stood.

"Phoebe, wait—"

"Don't." I said it quietly, without anger, which felt worse than if I had shouted. "Just don't."

I walked out of the café and onto Brennan Street without looking back.

The morning air hit my face and I kept walking, phone already in my hand, already dialing.

Bruno picked up on the second ring.

"Mara is working with Richard," I said. "She knows about Cassano. She's been feeding him information."

"How long?" he asked.

"I don't know. Long enough that she didn't flinch at his name until I said it first."

Another pause, longer this time.

"Phoebe," Bruno said. "Go straight back to the apartment. Don't stop anywhere."

"Why?"

"Because I just got a message from Cassano's number."

I stopped walking.

"What did it say?" I asked.

Bruno's voice was very quiet when he answered.

"He says Richard has already moved the documents."