She was waiting there and watching television when Eddie returned that afternoon.  He had already successfully dodged a barrage of questions from the San Jose PD, and his mood was guarded.  He was happy to see that Nikki had come back, but he didn't know how the job had gone, other than Ethan's being assaulted.  Nikki looked up at him and her eyes followed him into the bedroom.  "So," he called, tossing his now-useless BMW satchel on the dresser and loosening his tie, "are we successes or are we going to try again?"

Nikki turned off the TV and came into the bedroom.  She tossed the optical drive onto the bed.  "I'm hungry," she said, sitting next to it.

Eddie allowed himself a sigh of relief and gave Nikki a congratulating smile.  "I owe you dinner, then.  Prodigy went ballistic, as I'm sure you could imagine.  Did you hit their kid?"

She looked at the floor.  "He grabbed me.  I'm not happy about it," she added.

"Well, you busted his nose and cheekbone, Killer," Eddie said in a congratulatory voice as he put the drive on the table next to his laptop.  His tone irritated Nikki, and she was on the verge of snapping that she could have done a lot worse to the kid.  To his mother, too.

Eddie said, "You're clear anyway.  Mom thought you were a man."

For some reason, that made her feel worse.  "What?" she gasped.

"You heard me.  She even described you with a mustache.  The kid couldn't give a statement yet, but when he does it'll confuse things even more, regardless of what he thinks you were."

How was that possible?  Just because she was thin?  Because she'd hurt this woman's son?  Nikki's brow wrinkled, deeply upset.  It wasn't fair.  She doubted that Taiisha had ever been mistaken for a man.  Not that Taiisha would have cared one way or the other.  But it hurt.  Nikki wished she knew why.

When Nikki didn't say anything, Eddie took that as his cue to continue.  "Don't sweat it.  It's embarrassing, but it's a good end to a spoiled caper.  I'm glad you remembered not to come back," he said.  "Good thinking on your feet.  Now, for our next trick, I have a prospective job from an old friend in Michigan.  Unless of course something comes up between here and there."

"I hate Michigan," she said, without a lot of conviction.  She didn't want Eddie to think she wouldn't go with him, not that it mattered.  She wondered if she should kill him tonight after he fell asleep, or in the morning  He'd struggle a lot, and she was too worn out to do it now.  A bath and dinner sounded like better plans.  She didn't want to think about it at all; injuring the kid had left her feeling unsettled and ashamed.  She couldn't blame Taiisha for forcing her to do that, and the guilt was beginning to gnaw.  She could have blamed the boy himself, but what was he supposed to do upon catching a burglar?  She didn't want to think about it any more.  "I hate it," she said again, bringing herself back to the present.  "That's why I left."

Eddie sat on the bed and pulled his shoes off.  He hated dress shoes.  Nikki moved away from him, putting space between them--a move born purely out of habit, he could tell.  "Absence makes the heart grow fonder," Eddie said.  He put his hands to his heart and made a sappy face.

"Not after a five-hour plane ride."

"Well, I'm glad you brought that up, because we're not flying.  We're driving."

Nikki frowned, confused.  She asked him why with her eyes.

He was getting used to her nonverbal questions.  "I bought a car.  Couldn't pass up the deal."  Murray had put Eddie onto a silver Lincoln Town Car at a local dealer three days ago.  It was a demo car with two thousand miles on it.  Eddie had always wanted to own a Lincoln, so he had bought it.  Judging by Nikki's demeanor, Eddie guessed that she felt badly about hurting Prodigy's kid--"hurting" being something of an understatement.  When the paramedics brought him out, he looked like he'd been brained with a small appliance.  Nikki seemed to be pissed at herself for doing all that though, and maybe about the job not going right, either.  It reminded him of...himself, actually.

Nikki muttered, "Takes half my life to get here and then I leave after a fucking week."

"Pardon?"

"Nothing.  Nothing." She started folding her afghan.  "Are we leaving in the morning?"

"Bright and early.  Hope you're as good at quick travel as you are at picking pockets."

"Eat shit and die."  Yeah, she could kill him.  In the morning.  Right now she had to eat.

As if he had read her mind, Eddie put two twenties on the bed.  "Go get yourself some dinner," he said, standing up again.

Nikki looked at the money.  "You're not eating?"

"Naah.  I want to download that stuff," he motioned to the optical drive, "and have a look at it.  Call me nosy."

She couldn't go.  If she went out without Eddie, Taiisha might think she was running away...

"What's wrong?" Eddie asked.  "You shivered."

"No, I didn't."

"Yes you did, I saw you.  And your breath trembled, too."  He met her midnight blue eyes.  "You afraid to go out for some reason?"

She didn't deny it again.  Eddie was looking at her with that almost concerned look in his eyes.  It made her think of the way he'd cleaned her up after Taiisha's attack, and a completely incongruous desire to ask him to bathe her rose up suddenly.  Just to have caring fingers on her skin, not touching to hurt but to comfort.  Just maybe.  She couldn't ask, of course, that was stupid.

"Was it something else?" Eddie asked again, his grin widening.  "Just a hot flash?  Let me guess, it was that film guy Jason, right?  He's got that grunge thing you girls go for."

Nikki sprang abruptly off the bed, snatched the money, and stalked into the other room.  He heard her on the phone a moment later, ordering room service, and smiled to himself.  He couldn't help himself; it was just fun to tease her.

He looked in on her a while later, to see what she was up to.  Nikki was sitting on the floor with a logjam of colored pencils by her side, hunched over her sketchbook.  Her hand moved in short, violent strokes.  She didn't look up.  Eddie heard the lead snap with a faint, brittle click, and Nikki dropped the pencil, picked up another one of the same color from the pile, and continued without pause.  He was tempted to say something, but decided to let her be.

Eddie disappeared the next morning, leaving instructions for Nikki to call an answering service and take messages off of it.  There weren't many; a call from someone named Dell, who wanted to see if Eddie could arrange a hotel conference and a bogus delivery van to intercept a package, a call from his friend in Michigan, whose name was Ian, a familiar, how's-it-going call from someone named Cathy--Nikki guessed it was a relative or close friend, not a girlfriend--and finally a call from a toady-sounding man named Tony who said that he'd had a lot of requests for Eddie's services lately and suggested a quick phone call.  Nikki wrote them all down.

Eddie returned half an hour later, without the optical drive, and checked them out of the hotel.  Before lunch, they picked up his new Lincoln and left for Michigan.