This is what happens when you let people in. They think they know you well enough to question your motives. The trouble with Leo, though, is that he actually does. “Dao knows who she is. He can use her as leverage. The fact that we’re not close is a good thing. For her.” I try to sound upbeat but fail miserably. There’s nothing cheerful about this situation.

“Do you need help packing your things?”

“No. There’s not much.” Then I ask him something that’s been on my mind since he reluctantly opened the door to me. “Why are you living here? Why is it you’re the one getting rid of Seb’s stuff?”

He looks so miserable, I almost wish I hadn’t asked. “Seb left all his assets to his son, who’s just a kid. He had no other family. His ex was going to hire a company to pack up the house before she put it on the market. I offered to do it instead.” The last part he says while looking down at his bare feet.

I get it. This is closure for him. He’s not ready to let go.

It takes me no time at all to gather my meager possessions from the room upstairs where I lived for about a year. There’s an envelope waiting for me on the bed with my name scrawled across it. In Seb’s handwriting. Tucking the envelope in a duffel, I pile all my belongings and Whisper into my old Corolla, which still starts, and drive over to Leo’s Chinatown apartment.

We’re quiet as we take the back stairs up to Leo’s second-floor unit. Whisper and I, we’re used to being stealthy. It comes from the years we spent living in the basement of Leo’s small PI company on Hastings Street, back when both Seb and Leo worked there.

Leo’s apartment is noisy, a far cry from the sleepy Kits town house. There’s a covered balcony from which Whisper and I watch the goings-on beneath us. She’s still startled at my sudden reappearance in her life, so we go for a long midnight walk. It’s still snowing, lightly now.

I listen as the sounds of the city find me in the darkness. Feel its beating heart.

I let Whisper off-leash because I sense she’ll stay by my side tonight, and we walk until my mind clears.

It’s not that I don’t want help. It’s that I don’t want the baggage that comes along with it. The responsibility of putting other people in danger.

Brazuca had been nudging me earlier, testing me. He wanted to know my intentions with Dao. I’ve been thinking about that, too. Protecting Bonnie is number one. Making sure that it doesn’t spread any further than it already has is another.