It's seven the next evening before he finds any time away. His pounding head begs him to travel to back to his favorite spot, but he digs his fingers into the too-hot steering wheel and steers the car back home. The torrent of information is only beginning to resolve itself; he still feels as if he were watching the last eighteen hours on a video camera rather than through his own eyes. He knows this sensation – the way each of the puzzle pieces comes together, each bit of intelligence fitting just where it should, only to form the picture of someone's life falling apart. He has seen this before – he remembers the way they added up the clues, bit by bit, to form the picture of a woman named Irina Derevko, a woman he'd never met. Each piece of that jigsaw puzzle had been drawn in his daughter's tears and painted in his own blood. He never forgets this. He can still see the scars.
Today, it was another jigsaw puzzle – the picture slowly coming together, a picture of a woman none of them had ever met, yet somehow all of them knew – he knows this sensation, too. Those pieces are also drawn in the tears of his daughter, and painted with the blood of Francie Calfo. He saw Tippin, too, the image of a life deconstructed, red-rimmed eyes staring at the floor of his cell, one hand raking through his hair until it all stood on end, and raking through it again. He brings these images home with him tonight; he wonders if they will follow him into his dreams.
At the thought of dreams, his fingers clench more tightly on the steering wheel, hot vinyl searing his skin. She. She is responsible. He can trace it all back, every mistake, every defeat, every time he's downed scotch in a dingy bar or slept alone on his couch or driven with his fingers itching to snap the steering wheel – it all traces back to her.
The voice of reason might tell him differently, remind him of his own faults, as well, remind him that anyone – even his daughter – can make a mistake. But this changes nothing. It all, somehow, stems from her.
He doesn't listen to reason much, anyway.
The car finally finds its way back into his driveway, a small marvel he made it this far, and after sliding sweaty hands from a too-hot steering wheel, he's out of the car and in the door, without even bothering to take off his jacket. He's barely inside before reaching for the transmitter he keeps concealed in the handle of a steak knife. He taps out the message in morse code, only once, not certain whether he truly wants this message to be heard. His head tells him to run, to get as far away from this woman as humanly possible. But he's listening to something deeper, the pain in his gut, the anger that wants so badly to lash out. He completes the transmission and walks to his room to change clothes, taking his time, giving her the chance to arrive first. He then reaches for his wallet and keys. Time to create cover.
When he pulls off of his street, he hears the rumble of another engine starting. The nondescript white 4-door pulls into traffic behind him. It stays far back, never getting too close, sometimes lagging minutes behind him, sometimes taking alternate routes, then ending up on the same road. But it stays behind.
He pulls into the gas station. Past time he filled his tank. The white 4-door pauses at a video store down the block. He stops at the liquor store. He told himself the bottle of scotch on the coffee table would be his last, but the way this week is shaping up that's looking less and less likely. The 4-door passes and pulls into a church parking lot. He stops at the dry cleaners and drops off two suits, while the 4-door idles in an alley a half-block down. He goes in for groceries. He asks a clerk for the bathroom and, predictably, is pointed to a rather shady back room with a tiny unisex stall in a closet-size space behind a door that barely locks. Waiting for the stockboys to clear the area, he crouches behind two boxes, then slowly creeps out through the loading dock. A small delivery truck is parked just to one side, rear doors opened a few inches. With one last glance around, he walks over to the truck and slowly pushes the rear doors open, rewarded by the screech of steel that plays on the edge of every nerve. He is greeted, predictably, by a gun barrel. She lowers it slowly as he climbs inside, forcing the door shut behind him, again greeted with screeching steel, only slightly better than fingernails across a chalkboard, or sirens when his daughter is on a mission.
"I had to take some rather disturbing risks in order to meet you here so quickly."
His face is taut, lips pale and pressed tightly together. "And what makes you suppose I would care about those risks?"
Her tone remains even, but her eyes flash. "Only that it means a risk for you, as well. Discovery would not be terribly helpful to your future at the CIA."
"I'm glad to hear you're so concerned." He makes no effort to hide the venom in his tone.
"Jack, had you complied—"
"Had I complied? Had I complied? What could possibly persuade you that I would commit a felony, much less trust a woman who has proven she cares about nothing but herself? Do you really think I'm foolish? You give me so little credit?"
"Are you finished, or do you think there's someone on this block who hasn't heard you?"
He sucks in his breath, sharply, between his teeth, and continues. His voice is low, clear, deadly. His tone matches hers, and hates himself for even this small resemblance.
"Irina, despite everything I have seen you do, every betrayal you have made, I believed that at least you cared for Sydney. But this – this was beneath even you." He spits the last two words; the glint in her eyes and clench of her fist show that she recognizes those words for just what they are – the worst insult he can think of.
"Jack, if you are bent on not even listening to me—"
"I have nothing more to say to you. To think that I would stoop to even speak to a woman who betrayed her daughter, betrayed her family, and never gave it a second thought –"
She closes her eyes, tired, as if this is an argument they have had many times before. "Jack—"
"I want nothing to do with you. Nothing. And if you so much as dare to speak to my daughter—"
"She's our daughter, Jack."
"Not in her mind. And not in mine." The shot hits home; he can see it. Her body sags, ever so slightly, against the metal of the truck wall. Her jaw clenches tightly, like his, and he can see the color draining from her clenched fists. But this is all she gives him.
She stands up and strides toward him, past him. "The reason you will never catch Sloane is that you can't distance yourself from your emotions. I tried to help, but you can't listen to a simple sentence. I'm no longer working with Arvin, and I'm no longer meeting with you. Goodbye, Jack."
She says this as she reaches for the metal door, raising her voice only enough to be heard over its screeching as it slides open. She steps outside, off to one side of the truck, and he does not even bother to see which way she goes.
He gives himself only a moment, slowing his breathing, unclenching his fists, finger by finger, like prying open the hands of a stubborn child. He has the presence of mind to look both ways before he steps out of the truck, and to brush off the stockers as he makes his way into the store. He places seven items in a basket without even looking at them, explaining the time spent here. He's out the doors and down two blocks before he sees the white 4-door pull out behind him.