His date came back from the bathroom, but he couldn’t stop staring at Lou, breathing like he’d run a marathon, and I knew her: she wouldn’t be the first one to look away, either. I grabbed hold of Lou’s hand and we excused ourselves back to our table, her hot giggle breaths drifting over my shoulder, my neck. We made a good team.

The trick was in keeping an eye on the date. By the time they started to make restless movements—she’d gone to the bathroom twice now; he was sobering up for the 405 with glass after glass of water—we’d finished seven or eight margaritas. It was a challenge we’d issued to each other silently, to see how long we could last before we chickened out and left. We’d been caught only a few times before, but this was the real game, not the free drinks: which one of us could stand the heat longest.

Lou and I slipped out seconds ahead of him closing the tab, cutting it close, the reckless pounding in my chest a building volcano that spewed into guffaws as we tumbled out of the bar to the shower of expletives from behind us, the outrage at his racked-up bill following us into the street.

We put a little distance between us and him, taking the long way back to our cars. I waited to see if she would invite me to follow her, feeling a little foolish, not wanting to say goodbye. Lou stepped closer, hooking her arm in mine. I wondered if she was thinking the same thing I was, which was that it might be the last con we’d ever run together.

At her car, she turned to me and said, “Truce?”

I shook my head. “No need. Never any fight.”

She smiled back at me with her soft pink lips. “You have my lipstick on your teeth.” She leaned over and rubbed it away with her thumb. I didn’t move. Or breathe. Then she said, “I’ll think about what you said about Carrigan. I mean it. I know you have the best interests of us all at heart. I know you’d do anything for the Lady. For me.”

I thought of Ellen’s dark eyes, slick with tears, her red mouth open and trembling. Still in that pink party dress, shaking in her seat. Things I’d said to her that even I had never said to another living, breathing human before. But then I thought of the money that the Lady might already know was missing, and Lou’s big hurt eyes, roaming over the bar as she wondered where I’d been, why I was avoiding her, and knew I’d say those things all over again if I had to. I’d go to the end of the world to keep that expression from Lou’s face. If I had to.