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toes sticking out the end of the car. We had to force their legs and push them into unnatural positions to make them fit.
    Once they were settled, we lifted the carpet, and were just trying to figure out the best way to fit it in as we heard the sirens of the fire engines around front. We only had seconds before firemen would be in here checking the building, and we both panicked a little, losing our grip on the carpet and letting it fall to the ground between us. It unraveled a little as it fell, and I realized this had worked in our favor—it flattened out from a roll to a messy pile of carpet. We folded it over and forced it into the back of the car, on top of the bodies, and slammed the trunk shut.
    I peered in through the car windows. Bits of flesh were on show, but only if you knew what you were looking for. All a casual eye could see was a pile of carpet, and it was too dark for any stains to be visible. I closed the fire escape door behind us and walked round to the driver’s side, taking the keys off Laura and getting into the car.
    Laura was just about to slide into the passenger seat beside me when we were bathed in the flashing lights of a police car. Two uniformed officers pulled up in front of us in a marked car, blocking our exit.

I fixed my eyes on the blue lights as they strobed across the hood of my car and avoided looking up at the cops blocking our path. I held to the same logic as a child ignoring the monster under the bed.
    Ignore it, it’ll go away.
    Ignore them , they’ll go away.
    I heard one of them step out of the patrol car and start toward us, and I swore under my breath to a god I’d stopped believing in a long time ago. Before Laura could finish cursing, she was out of the car and walking around it to greet the uniform. I cranked my window down a few inches as quietly as I could to listen in.
    “M’am.” The uniform clearly recognized her.
    “What’s up, boys?”
    “Attending the fire. We were driving past when we heard the fire engine and saw all the people out front. Then, as we were pulling off the road, we saw movement round the back here and thought—”
    “Good instincts. Well done. But everything’s okay.”
    I felt both officers fix their eyes on me, then at the load in the car behind me. If they recognized me then they would know my connections and we’d be done.
    Laura must have felt she was losing them too, because she stepped in close and whispered something I couldn’t hear. The young uniform straightened up, nodded, and turned back to his car. He had a terse conference with his partner. Then the two of them belted up and the car engine started. They reversed away as Laura slid into the passenger seat beside me. They offered us a quick nod before pulling around to the front of the building.
    “Fuck you.” Laura repeated her new favorite greeting. She was staring at the dashboard, keeping her eyes away from me for the time being. “My name’s all over this now.”
    “What did you say to them?”
    “I said this was an operation. You’re a police informant, and we were meeting here when we got made. The fire alarm is to cover us as we get you out.”
    “Wow, you thought that up on the spot?”
    “Fuck you.”
    “That’s a huge lie, I mean even by your—” I thought better of the cheap dig. “I mean, you know, couldn’t you just say you were meeting your ex-husband for a bit of rough, and it’s a secret, so when the alarm went off we snuck out the back?”
    She looked up now and shook her head. “Really? I have to put up with enough innuendo as it is, with guys trying to turn everything I do into some kind of sexual rumor, and you want me to give them something like that to talk about?”
    “They bought it?”
    “They’re young cops. Young guys . They all want to be the star of the movie. They’ll hold on to that like it makes them Serpico. Plus, I told them they could check with the super if they didn’t believe me.”
    “But what if they talk to