“Both of us I should think.” He’s leaning nonchalantly against a building, looking like a cross between a young Gordon Gekko and James Dean. Only Lander can make a suit look rebellious. “You don’t have to pretend not to know me anymore, so that should make things easier for you. As for me? Well, now you can tell Travis that you’re in the position to get the inside scoop on me. My brother doesn’t trust me? Let’s give him some cooked-up dirt and see where it takes us.”

I am no longer in the middle of one of Sartre’s plays. I’m in the middle of The Twilight Zone.

“I . . . I haven’t agreed to that,” I stammer.

“And what have you agreed to, Bell?” he asks. “What bargains have you made with your demons? Because I suspect you’ve made a few.”

“I think,” I say slowly, “that I could ask you the same question.”

Again he smiles. An elderly couple walks past us, hand in hand, while a thirtysomething woman wearing a tightly fitted dress passes them with a longing glance. The world is moving at the pace it’s supposed to move . . . except for Lander and me. We’re in this holding pattern as we try to parse each other’s moods and secrets.

Lander has his own plans, plans that I know nothing about despite all my research. I should never have made him a target. Targets should be simple, like Jessica, who is the equivalent of a red bull’s-eye; to take her down all I need to do is keep a steady hand and a focused eye. Or like Travis, who is a hawk: difficult to shoot, but easy to spot and identify.

Trying to make a target out of Lander is like trying to shoot an entire colony of killer bees. Destroying him, even containing him, may be nearly impossible, and yet I suspect that he has a unique ability to destroy.

Travis is in trouble.

“Will you help me feed Travis some false information, Bell?” Lander asks. “Will you help me put some wheels in motion?”

He’s asking me to do what I’m already doing. I wish I could tell him that. I wish we could laugh about it and work like a true team, the way bees are meant to work.

But I can’t do that. I lift my face up to the sun and close my eyes. “I will, on one condition.”

“What’s that?”

“I want to know what the deal is with this waitress. We’ve been together almost every night this week and you still haven’t offered to take me anywhere.”