I wake up to gentle morning light filtering in through the window and something warm lying against me, an unfamiliar arm across my chest, an extra heartbeat slowly counting the seconds. I open my eyes - and immediately freeze.

Pie is lying entangled in my arms, our legs sprawled together. Pie’s eyes are closed, her face open and vulnerable. For a whole moment I lie as still as I can, wondering what to do. Part of me knows I should pull away, but another part of me wants to savor the feeling of Pie in my arms for as long as possible.

Wait –

I pull back, almost falling out of the bed in my haste, and Pie jerks awake.

‘What’s happening?’ she asks, stifling a yawn. ‘What time is it?’

‘Sorry, I was getting out of bed and I woke you. Sorry.’

‘It’s alright.’ She rolls around, pressing her face into the pillow, and pulls out her phone. ‘Almost eight. Ah!’ Her phone buzzes in her hand and I pause on my way to the bathroom.

‘Aunt In?’

‘Yeah…’ Pie stares at the screen, frowning. ‘She wants us to back to Mike’s house.’

‘Why? What’d they find?’

‘She just says go back, and soon. Should I call them?’

‘Maybe. See what it is specifically we need to look for.’

‘Ok. I’ll do that while you’re in the shower.’

I nod and open the bathroom door, while in the bedroom Pie is dialing Aunt In’s number. By the time I’ve finished and am standing on the cool bathroom floor, toweling off my hair, Pie knocks on the door.

‘What did she say?’ I ask, slinging the towel over the rack and opening the door. Pie looks up at me, her gaze flicks down and back up before she answers.

‘She said Mike’s brother keeps talking about some – delivery. Something he has to have prepared by a certain date, but she doesn’t know what it is, or when it is he’s talking about.’

‘Oh, I must have forgotten to tell you – it isn’t Mike’s brother. It’s him. He might not even have a twin brother.’

‘Why would he lie about that?’

‘Probably so he doesn’t get invited to anymore dinners, but if Jane or Puey and Top see him out and about they don’t get suspicious.’

‘That makes sense,’ Pie nods. ‘Maybe he really does have a brother, and he just gets sent on trips every now and again to that his cover story is fully intact.’

‘Maybe.’ I rub my left wrist with my right hand and watch Pie. She’s speaking normally but she’s shifting from foot to foot, not looking me in the eye. ‘Are you alright? About going back, I mean.’

‘Yeah, of course. I’d just – hoped it wouldn’t be for a while.’ She smiles a little sardonically, and I nod.

‘Me too. At least know we know he’s there we can be more prepared to deal with him.’

‘That’s true.’ Pie glances up at me, and for a moment I feel as though she’s teetering on the edge of saying something else. But then she looks away and moves to the bathroom. ‘I’m going to get ready. We can make a plan over breakfast.’

+

‘So, nighttime is definitely a-go. And bulletproof gear this time.’ I shake my head. ‘Honestly, deciding not to wear that was –’

‘Crazy,’ Pie agrees. ‘And dumb. Should we go about the same time, midnight?’

‘Aunt In said activity dies around ten-thirty so midnight should be fine. But the specifics of this – I’m still kinda confused. We need to go in, see if we can find out when and what this delivery is, right?’

‘Yeah.’ Pie sips her tea thoughtfully. ‘I’m assuming most of what we need will be in the room you found, so we should work out some kind of… watch system. Someone can go in; the other person stands guard.’

‘Maybe we should take tranquilizers. Then if one of us see him coming, we can shoot him and he’ll be knocked out so we can escape. But if that happens, we shouldn’t forget to remove the dart so that when he wakes up he won’t know someone shot at him.’

‘That’s a good idea.’ Pie leans back against her chair and sighs. ‘I hate waiting for these things. We have the whole day, I’m just going to get more and more anxious. I wish we could get it over and done with.’

‘Me too.’ I lie my fork down on the table. ‘We could get everything ready now and then try to keep ourselves busy until this evening, so we don’t have to think about it?’

‘Yes!’ Pie points at me with her spoon. ‘Good plan.’

‘Alright.’

It takes barely half an hour for me to gather together the darts and load them into the guns. When I’m done, I head upstairs to see if Pie has finished putting together the gear and find her lying on the bed.

‘What’s up with you?’ I say, lying down beside her. Pie glances over at me.

‘This is the strangest assignment I’ve ever been sent on,’ she says, and I grin.

‘I know how you feel. You must miss your fiancé, huh.’

Pie shifts to face to me, smiling. ‘What do you mean? You’re right here. Anyway, we’re married.’

‘No,’ I laugh, ‘I mean Van. Your real fiancé.’

‘Oh.’ Pie falls silent for a moment. I wonder if maybe she doesn’t want to think about Van while she has to pretend to be my wife. It could make things… complicated? I’m not sure.

‘Pie? Should I not have –’

‘Kim?’ She isn’t listening. Pie stares at the ceiling, and I stare at her in turn. ‘Have you ever been in love?’

I sit up, heart beating. Am I really so obvious? ‘Why?’

She shrugs. ‘Just wondering.’

‘I’m not sure. Maybe.’

Pie raises herself on her elbow, twisting around to meet my gaze. ‘You don’t know?’

‘Well… I don’t know if… what I have felt is love.’

‘Ah.’ Pie falls back onto the bed.

‘You must be in love,’ I say, thinking of Van. Something inside my stomach stretches, painfully taut, ready to snap.

‘Yes,’ says Pie. Her voice is faint. She almost doesn’t seem to realize she’s speaking aloud. Then she smiles. ‘Unfortunately, I am.’

‘Unfortunately?’ Pie is still smiling but there’s something wrong with it. The corner of is twisting, puckering. ‘Pie? Is –’

She gets to her feet. ‘Excuse me.’ I watch as she crosses to the bathroom and slides the door closed.

‘Pie?’

‘Yes?’ her voice on the other side of the door is muffled; I can hear a faint sniff. My stomach twists tighter. Lacking the right words to say I press my hand to the translucent glass door, hoping she’ll see it and understand. I can still hear her sniffing.

‘Pie, I’m – I’m coming in.’ When she doesn’t reply, I carefully pull the bathroom door open. Pie is crouched in the corner, her arms around her legs, rocking back and forth. For a moment I stare, not knowing quite what to do. Then I hear a muffled whimper and before I can think about it, I’m striding over to her. I lean over and take her wrists in my hand. ‘I’m going to pull you up,’ I say. She nods, still with her face pressed against her knees so I can’t see her face. I hold a little tighter and draw her up, Pie following with her body. She stumbles a little bit. Her cheeks are red, her eyes closed and tears dribble down her cheeks. It’s instinct almost, putting my arms around her and drawing her closer to me. Instinct, her hair. Instinct, pressing a kiss to her temple. Her skin is hot; I can feel her body being wracked with sobs that only faintly register out loud. They seem to go deeper than she can articulate, reaching down somewhere voiceless and anguished. I can feel my own eyes burning, I wrap my arms tighter around her in a futile attempt to shield her from – whatever it is that’s causing this pain. ‘Pie,’ I murmur. Her ragged, wet breaths are loud in my ear. ‘Is there anything I can do?’

‘Just…’ her voice is thick with crying, her words softened and round. ‘Stay with me for a moment.’

As if I could leave you.

+

I try once before we set off, tapping Pie on the shoulder. She turns, half-way through clipping on her bullet-proof vest.

‘Are you sure you want to come?’ I ask, trying to sound concerned and caring instead of like I’m making a comment on her abilities. ‘Just because – ah –’

‘I’m coming,’ she interrupts, looking down. She clips the vest together and takes two dart-guns from the table. ‘Come on.’

‘Alright.’

We get in much the same as we did last time, up the wall, onto the balcony, through the glass sliding doors. Down the stairs, I pause at the door and press my ear against it. No sounds come from the room below. ‘Ok.’

I push the door open and move out, gun first, but the kitchen is deserted. A quick glance to the counter shows that the blue vial has been removed, as well as the firearm. Down the corridor, light is shining thinly through the cracks between the door and the wall. I point at it, and Pie nods. We’d worked out a back-up plan at home in case Mike was still awake and working in his… lab or whatever it was. Similar to the original plan of one standing guard while the other investigated, this version involved someone standing just outside the door so that when he opened it to leave he could be shot quickly with a tranquilizer. They were instant, and lasted from two to four hours, depending on the weight of the person in question. Taking into account Mike’s lean physique, we were looking at at least three hours before he woke up after originally being shot.

And we always had our extra darts.

Pie positions herself outside the door, holding her gun up to eyelevel. I crouch across from her, ready to move. Somehow, with all the gear and weapons, I feel more anxious this time than I did last time. Already my hands are growing warm. Having nothing better to do, I focus on Pie. Her stance is perfect, not a tremble in her poised arms. For a moment I let my mind run from the dim hallway, wondering briefly why Pie had been employed for so many strictly observational assignments when she clearly has more than the necessary skills for field-work. Then the door handle turns and I have to pull myself back to the present. Pie’s finger moves quietly to the trigger, the door swings open –

Mike falls forward, a look of vague surprise on his unshaven face. Pie straightens, and nods at me. I step over the body, behind me Pie bends over to pull the dart out of Mike’s neck. In the laboratory the light flickers like it did the night before, throwing the equipment into sharp relief. Similarly, to the last time I was there, the blue liquid takes up most of the table and some of the floor, filling various containers. Now, however, most of it is in the vials and seems to be packed away in large Styrofoam cartons.

Stuck to the wall on the other side of the door, parallel to where I had been hiding, is a large calendar. Days are crossed off in red pen, including the day Mike was supposed to have left for his trip to Paris, and the day his ‘twin brother’ was said to be arriving. There’s a large clear space with nothing written on it, and then, marked in thick letters is the word ‘DELIVERY’ across the coming Friday.

'68,’ I whisper. Pie steps over Mike to join me, holding the used dart in her hand. Her gaze flickers over the calendar, Pie pulls her phone out of her pocket and takes a photo of the date. She turns and takes several photos of the cartons stacked on the floor, making sure to angle it to show the contents of the boxes. ‘I have an idea,’ I say, watching as Pie slips her phone back out of sight.

‘Mm?’

‘Let’s put him back on the chair. So when he wakes up it’s like he just fell asleep.’

Pie nods. We move over to where Mike lies, slumped in the corridor and I thread my arm under one of his. Pie takes the other side.

‘One,’ she says, ‘two, three, go.’

We heave together. Mike’s deadweight is heavy, we slide him across the floor to where his chair is. Then I take him by the arms and Pie takes his legs and we lift. He ends up lopsided on the desk, I push him until he slumps over the surface. Pie arranges his arms like a pillow under his head and then steps back. I check my watch. Only about half an hour of our time had elapsed, but still. Better to be safe than sorry. I jerk my head towards the door and Pie nods, following me out into the hallway. I close the door behind me.

This time, our descent down Mike’s wall and the subsequent walk back to our house is much calmer. But with the silence comes more time to think. And I can’t stop wondering – what is the liquid in the vials? Is it dangerous? What will G.O.L.F. do if they get their hands on it?