“My father-in-law,” Carrigan clarified, “told me he couldn’t support my campaign because he had something grander in mind for me than public service. Said I was the son he’d never had, that he’d turn the business over to me someday. All bullshit. He won’t retire before he dies. Unless someone forces him to do it. I’d like to speed his timeline up, a little.”

“You could just ride it out. Law office no longer fulfilling?” I was doodling on my notepad, not taking notes the way Lou had trained me to. Instead, I’d doodled a constellation of stars—or freckles—and I was working my way between them, connecting everything together.

Carrigan cleared his throat on the other end of the phone. “No one has come right out and said it to my face, but I know they’re happy I lost the election. You know my firm never even bothered to put up a poster? Not one single poster,” he said, and there was an edge to his voice. “That’s reason enough for me.”

“I see,” I said.

“Could we grab a drink sometime?” Carrigan asked. “Go over the particulars?”

I thought about it. I thought about his wife and his big house and his even bigger bank account, and I thought about fucking him with Jackal’s eyes on me in his apartment, the way he’d shivered as I cried. I thought about the red blinking light on my answering machine that morning. When I’d clicked it, the voicemail button squishing under my fingernail like a ladybug, an unfamiliar voice had filled my office.

“Hi, um, hello? We met—well, no, we didn’t exactly meet, I guess, you left your card for me a few weeks ago at the, um, at the St. Leo. The hotel. I was there with a man, and he was, well, ha, you know. I spilled a beer into his lap. Jesus, Laura, shut up, you’re rambling! Anyway. You left your card for me. That’s all. You left your card for me and told me to call you if I wanted, um, a free drink? And, well.” A breathy little laugh. “Here I am. Calling.”

At the time, I’d rewound the tape, played it again. Wrote down the number she’d left me on my notepad and stared at it for a long time, wondering what to do about it. On the phone with Carrigan, I thought about that pretty young girl at the St. Leo, a million years ago, and what she might be able to do to the career of an old money man like Carrigan Sr. I thought about how I wouldn’t have to split the money with the Lady Upstairs, and about how grateful a man like Mitch Carrigan would be for my help. I thought about the power I had now over this girl’s life, if I called her back.