It didn’t matter that Karl had probably never passed a sleepless night after a heist. He knew me. As much as I hated to admit it, the proof lay here before me, not just in the eyedrops and caffeine, but in everything. The coffee, double cream, no sugar. Inside the bakery box, a blueberry bran muffin. The paper: USA Today. Even the eyedrops were my brand, and the “sensitive eye” formulation I used. There were married couples who didn’t know each other as well as we did.

It was a quiet meal. Not like us at all. Usually, even while reading our different papers, we’d exchange a steady volley of comments and quips about the articles. Newspaper reading as a joint activity, like so many other things we did together—each doing our own thing, maintaining our independence and yet finding a way to share it.

That morning there was no anger in the silence, though. It felt almost…cautious, as if fearing that opening our mouths would lead to a fight, and this joint meal—albeit a silent one—was as close to comfortable as we could manage.

After breakfast, I called Benicio for my daily check-in. I said nothing about the heist or about Karl, but did mention that I might learn something later and, if I did, could I call him? He said he’d be at the office all morning.

We left at eight thirty.

THE FIRST HALF of the trip was as silent as breakfast. Then Karl mentioned he’d checked in at Stonehaven after coming back from Europe, and I asked after Elena and Clayton and their eighteen-month-old twins. And there we found the perfect neutral topic: babies.

I asked how the little ones were doing and how they were growing and what milestones they’d reached since I last saw them. As adorable as children were, neither of us had the slightest interest in them, but it was a subject we could discuss without fear of it devolving into a fight. So we stuck with it for the rest of the trip.

WE WALKED IN the front doors of the building that Jaz had pointed out the other night: Cortez Cabal headquarters. I’d wanted to keep our entrance low key, but should have realized things were never low key when Karl was around.

Every female eye turned his way as we entered the lobby. Karl is rarely the best-looking man in a room, but when he walks in, you can be forgiven for thinking he is. He has that proprietary confidence usually only seen in men like Benicio Cortez. In Karl, though, it tipped over into an “I know you’re watching me” arrogance that made it even harder to look away.