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shifted the subject.
    “What about Agent Blue Eyes?” A.A. asked. “How’s he treating you?”
    “Like an employee,” I said. “Nothing’s going to happen there. My littlecrush is too much of a cliché to be taken seriously.”
    “Why do I think that means exactly the opposite?” she said.
    It was a fair question. But the truth was, I had no idea if my feelings for Billy were real or just another part of playing the game. Like maybe winning over Agent Keats was more about winning than it was about Agent Keats, for me.
    None of which seemed worth untangling right now.I felt beyond useless out there on the street while everything that really mattered was happening back at the office. What I needed was to get back to work.
    “I guess I just wanted to say hi,” I said. Already, I’d done a U-turn and started walking fast, back through Quincy Market. “But I’ve got to go.”
    “Don’t you even want to
ask
about Darren?” A.A. said then.
    That got my attention. I hatedeven hearing his name, almost as much as I hated what this probably meant.
    “
Please
don’t tell me you slept with him,” I said as I waited for a crosswalk sign to change.
    “Oh, God, no,” she said.
    “Good.”
    “I told him he had to prove himself capable of adult behavior first, and I meant it,” she said. “If I’m satisfied by Friday, we’ll get a beer. That’s how I left it with him.”
    A.A.’s no pushover.If she said she meant it, then she did. She’d probably give that jerk a little hell in the meantime, I thought, and maybe even enjoy doing it.
    But still, why was she bothering? Darren Wendt was the definition of a futile pursuit. Thinking he was going to change was like waiting for a pig to clean up its own pen. And it wasn’t like she’d ever raved about the sex, either. Honestly, I had no ideawhat kept that doofus on A.A.’s radar.
    “Don’t be mad,” she said.
    “I’m not,” I told her, going for something like sincerity. “This is the new me. The one who doesn’t take things so personally anymore.”
    “When did you ever take this personally?”
    “Apparently, I take everything personally,” I said.
    “Oh, please,” A.A. said. “Did you get that from Eve?”
    “I love that you know that,” I said. “Butlisten, I really do have to go.” The light had changed now, and the closer I got to the office, the less I could think about anything else. It was time to get back to work. Past time.
    “Text me later,” she said. “I don’t think I can take the new you all at once. I’m going to need you to yell at me at least a little bit about Darren.”
    “That I can do,” I said.
    “And Angela?” she said. “Be careful,okay? Don’t do anything stupid I wouldn’t do.”
    “No promises,” I said just before I hung up and headed back into the belly of the beast.

CHAPTER 21
    WHEN I GOT to my desk again, Zack Ciomek asked me to compile a full report of everything I’d done with the app so far. Record keeping is important, and it all funnels into the intelligence reports that are disseminated to the various key players in any given case. I knew that.
    But it was still paperwork. Basically, being asked to compile a report is the FBI’s version of “Go cleanyour room.”
    “Welcome to the suck,” Ciomek said. “Shouldn’t take you more than a couple days to finish.”
    I wasn’t off the case, but so many new people were involved now that my role had gotten watered down. Way down.
    The good news was, my hands are like lightning on the keyboard, and if I’m being honest, my brain fires faster than most. By lunch the next day, I’d posted my report and was sittingthere in the CART without nearly enough to do. Nobody was around, or if they were, nobody was pulling me into any meetings.
    So I turned my attention to something else.
    One thing I hadn’t been able to get out of my head was thisphotographer I’d heard about from Gwen’s friends. I had no idea if anyone had taken that tip and run with