When we are halfway down another hallway a second group of guys appears in the intersection. Charlie and I skid to a staggering stop before realizing that their backs are to us. They haven’t seen us yet. Charlie reaches for the gun but I swat her hand away and push her into a storage closet. For a minute we do nothing but breathe. After we hear their footsteps as they run by, Charlie reaches for the doorknob and again I swat her hand. She regards me quizzically but I only address Kong. I tell him that we’re stuck in a closet and that we’re not coming out until he gets that alarm off. Our only chance of getting out of here alive, I tell him, is if I can sense around corners. This time he doesn’t swear at me. His only response is the furious clacking of his keyboard. It is not an encouraging sound.

The closet is safe, but it’s not comfortable. It’s small and Charlie’s body is pressed up against mine. There’s nowhere to hide from my senses. I feel her hands clutch at my shirt, her mouth moisten my neck. It’s also quieter in the closet—the door muffles the worst of the alarm—and, unfortunately, we can now speak normally.

“I’m sorry, Otto. I’m so, so—”

“I’m not talking to you,” I remind her.

“Otto, please let me—”

“No.”

“I want to explain.”

“You stole my MacGuffins. End of story.”

“I didn’t steal them. I put them back where they belong.”

“You’re a thief for Azar.”

“Well,” she says, with a whisper of indignation, “you pulsed for the DOD.”

“So?”

“They’re a pipeline for looting in other countries.”

“I don’t give a shit about that.”

“You do, too. Your whole life is about what’s right, but, Otto—”

“You lied to me.”

“You lied to me, too.”

“You paralyzed my leg!”

“You shot me!”

The truth takes the fight out of me: I shot Charlie. I could have killed her.

“I didn’t mean to,” I say finally.

“Oh, Otto. I didn’t mean to either.”

“I thought you were having an affair.”

Charlie’s body shakes in an exhilaration of denial. Never never never, she says, clutching at me, pulling me into her body, rapturous, and for a second I almost give in. Before I get too deep under it, though, the earpiece conveys the sound of the van door slamming, and then Kong is screaming.

“Kong?” I say. “Kong? What’s going on?”

“It’s Jeet,” he says. “He’s here. And he’s got Charlie Senior. He’s O.K.”

When I tell this to Charlie she gasps and presses her body against mine. For a long minute I let her discharge tears onto my shirt. I hold her. I say some things. I stroke her head. Finally, though—and as gently as I can—I disengage.