Bailey nods, like she is relieved to have her correct drink. Except we both know the flight attendant delivered us the correct drinks in the first place. And only now—only since Bailey’s gesture, her attempt to relieve the tension—are the drinks mixed up.

If this is Bailey’s way of reaching toward me, I’m going to meet her there.

I take a sip of the Coke. “Thank you,” I say. “I thought mine tasted weird.”

“No worries…” she says. Then she returns to looking out the window. “No big deal.”

We get into an Uber at the airport and I scroll through the news reports on my phone.

Stories about The Shop plaster CNN’s home page, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal. Many of the recent headlines focus on a press conference held by the head of the SEC, offering up such clickbait as THE SHOP IS CLOSED FOR GOOD.

I click on the most recent article in the New York Times, which covers the SEC announcement that they’re filing civil fraud charges against Avett Thompson. And which quotes a source in the FBI about how senior staff and top executives will most certainly be named as people of interest.

Owen isn’t mentioned by name. At least not yet.

The Uber pulls onto Presidential Boulevard and heads toward the hotel, which is on Lady Bird Lake near the Congress Avenue Bridge. It’s away from the hubbub of the busiest part of the city, across the bridge from the heart of downtown Austin.

I reach into my bag and pull out a printout of our hotel reservation, sweeping over the details. Jules’s full name, Julia Alexandra Nichols, stares back at me. Jules suggested reserving the room on her credit card as a safety measure. I have her credit card and her ID in my wallet, further safety measures, in case anyone is tracking us.

Of course, there is a record of our flight to Austin. Jules put the flights on her credit card, but our real names are on the plane tickets. There’s a clear way to track us here, if anyone is inclined to do so. But even if they track that we’re in Austin, they don’t need to know exactly where in Austin. I’m not helping the next Grady or Naomi to show up at my door, unannounced.

The driver—a young guy in a bandanna—looks at Bailey in the rearview mirror. He isn’t much older than she is and he keeps trying to make eye contact with her. He keeps trying to get her attention.

“Is this your first time in Austin?” he asks her.

“Yep,” she says.

“What do you think so far?” he says.

“Based on the fourteen minutes since we left the airport?” she says.

He laughs, as though she is joking with him, as though she is inviting him to keep talking.