She left the Borderlands forum, got out of the dark web, and shut her computer system down for the night. “You’ve been running nonstop for a while, Glen. Take a rest. Maybe after I bash in some ugly thug faces, I’ll get a good night’s sleep too.”
Amped up at the chance to unleash her drow side for a good cause, the halfling left her desk and headed toward the kitchen to look for anything remotely edible. The cabinets were empty except for a can of baked beans all the way in the back. She scowled at them and turned the can from side to side. I don’t even remember buying these.
The loud, obnoxiously digital ringtone made her freeze.
She rolled her eyes, gritted her teeth, and abandoned her cabinets to walk around the kitchen counter until she stood glaring down at her backpack on the floor. The front pocket flashed with a muted light as the FRoE burner phone Sir had given her kept ringing.
Ember was right. I’ll end up regretting it if I don’t answer. This is gonna suck.
Jerking open the front pocket of her backpack, Cheyenne pulled out the clunky old flip phone and gave it the middle finger before flicking open the top. Then she stuck the phone to her ear and hissed, “This better be good.”
Chapter Seventy-Five
“Honestly, halfling, I was pretty sure you weren’t gonna answer this call.” Sir’s dull, humorless voice came over the line with perfect clarity.
“Yeah, well, you guys wouldn’t be able to get anything done without me, would you?” Cheyenne sat on the floor by her backpack and leaned back against the half-wall of the kitchen counter.
“Fair enough. You might be entitled to rub it in. I take it you’re open for another assignment.”
“Is that what you’re calling it?” The halfling snorted. “Sounds like you’re about to beg me to finish something your guys can’t.”
“Everyone has an opinion, kid. Whatever you wanna call it, I’d like you on another operation tomorrow. Figured the least we owe you is a little advance notice.”
“As long as it’s after two o’clock tomorrow,” she said. “If it can’t wait ‘til then, you’ll have to find someone else.”
“That’s right. Because you’re just swamped with work for your graduate studies, aren’t you?”
Of course, Sir knew about her not-so-regular life outside of being the FRoE’s new half-drow asset. Now that they’d figured out who she was, he was bound to make some kinda jab about it.
“Something like that,” she muttered.
“Right. Like you even need to go to school, with all the skills you already have.”
“Cut the crap. I know you didn’t call me to talk about my dreams and aspirations.”
Sir let out a dry chuckle. “That would be way too boring. Don’t worry about the time, halfling. We won’t need you ‘til tomorrow night. I’ll call you then with more information. Got it?”
“Yep.” A long silence followed, and Cheyenne rolled her eyes. “Is that it?”
“That depends. Anything else you wanna tell me?”
Yeah, eat shit. “Nope.”
Without waiting for a reply, Cheyenne ended the call and closed the phone, then tossed the burner back into her open backpack. Sir had nothing to hold over her head now, beyond the fact that he’d said he could tell her about her dad if she kept tagging along on FRoE operations. Knowing she was Bianca Summerlin’s daughter didn’t give him any extra leverage, either. Not after the way Cheyenne’s mom had crushed him during their tensely civilized debate yesterday.
As soon as the guy gives me what I wanna know about Inmate 4872, I’m out.
The call had definitely dampened her enthusiasm for going out on her own tonight to crack magical-criminal skulls together. Her eyes were suddenly way too heavy, and her head dipped toward her chest. Just before she decided to turn in for the night, her stomach growled. Cheyenne looked down, then rolled her eyes. “Fine.”
* * *
Her trip to the gas station down the street went just how she liked them—short, boring, efficient, and without anything feeling even remotely off. The asshole clerk who’d taken over Katie’s shift after the attempted and failed robbery the other night was as much of a jerk as ever, but Cheyenne managed to ignore him. The thought of zapping his cocky mouth with purple sparks got her through the chore of listening to him drone on about some sports team, then she brought her dinner back up to her apartment—bag of chips, jar of salsa, a frozen linguini dinner, and a bottle of vitamin water.
She brought the steaming tray of linguini with her to her desk in the living room and turned Glen back on again to finish one more task. At the very least, and probably a lot more, she owed Ember this much.
Hacking into VCU Medical Center’s server to access the billing department and all their records wasn’t any harder than slipping into the patient files. She pulled up the existing bills for Ember Gaderow and sucked in a breath through her teeth. The whole thing would have put Ember under more than two master’s worth of student loans.
And that was why the drow halfling knew she could help. After several more minutes of looking through Ember’s patient files and the recommendations for rehab and therapy Dr. Andrews had given her, Cheyenne had selected all the best options plus adding several more days in the hospital.
Wiring the chunk of money from her savings account, which had been opened and fully stocked with the inheritance Bianca Summerlin’s parents had left their grandchild just before they died, took a little longer. But then everything was paid in advance, all at once. “Guess we’re all lucky I turned twenty-one before any of this happened. Thanks, Elaine and Clive. I’m pretty sure we wouldn’t have liked each other very much, but you helped my best friend get her life back. That counts for something.”
Ember would probably freak out when the hospital
