Long Time Gone (Hell or High Water ) Read Free Page A

that had plagued him his entire life.
    The two weeks he’d been partnered with Prophet, they’d fought—each other and outsiders—and Tom had, of course, nearly gotten Prophet killed. Then, just to prove a point, he’d nearly gotten them both killed.
    Finally, Phil had told him to make a choice—Prophet or Cope.
    And here you are.
    Tom had texted Prophet only a few times right after he’d chosen Cope as his partner. He’d gotten a couple of short, general answers back that he’d later discovered Prophet had sent out as mass texts to get everyone off his back. And then nothing.
    Thunk .
    But when he found out that Prophet had quit—or had been forced out of EE, depending on which version you believed—his chances of seeing Prophet again shrank dramatically. What if he never saw the man again?
    And that’s when the anger had set in.
    “He could at least let me know if he’s dead or alive,” he’d muttered to Cope time and time again.
    Cope would tell him that Prophet was fine. “It’s not Prophet you have to worry about. He does the killing.” A half shrug and a smile. “Granted, sometimes Prophet does things that make you want to kill him, so maybe you should worry.”
    “Comforting, Cope,” Tom had muttered, and Cope had merely shrugged the shrug of a man used to dealing with Prophet for years.
    “I’m sure that wherever he is, he’s driving someone crazy,” Cope offered now, without stopping the throwing-the-ball-against-the-ceiling thing.
    Tom sighed, because his first goddamned response was that he wanted Prophet to be driving him crazy. He played with the leather bracelet absently, the way he had since Prophet had put it on him, his mind tumbling through the mission, the cage match, the fights, Prophet getting shot . . . “Hey, do you have Mal’s number?”
    The ball careened wildly off the wall. Tom ducked and caught it as it zinged by.
    “Mal, as in . . . Mal ?”
    Tom threw Cope the ball. “Is there more than one? Dark hair. Tattoos. Can’t speak. Kind of an asshole. Do you know him?”
    Cope snorted and started throwing the ball again. “Fucker’s crazy. Like, of all the crazy motherfuckers in the world—and Prophet holds a spot near the very top—Mal is so number one that he’s off the goddamned charts, sealed in a fucking box somewhere that’s lined with silver, encased in cement, and buried so deep in the goddamned ground, you’d hit China looking for it. That’s what I think of motherfucking, crazy-assed, don’t-let-him-on-the-same-goddamned-continent-as-me Mal.”
    Thunk .
    “So you don’t like him then?”
    Cope shrugged. “He’s all right.” Thunk .
    Tom sighed. “Can you get in touch with him?”
    Thunk . “Not with a ten-foot pole attached to C4.”
    Tom wondered if Natasha could, but he decided against letting everyone in the office know how pathetic he was. It was already pathetic enough that he’d been emailing Prophet every day, sometimes including scanned sketches like a lovesick puppy.
    Thunk .
    But writing daily to Prophet since the end of his first week in Eritrea had become the last thing Tom did every night, no matter what. The ritual calmed him and made him feel connected to the man who’d so desperately wanted to disconnect from him.
    I might’ve quit you, Proph, but you quit me first. You just didn’t come right out and say it.
    He hadn’t said that in his emails, though. Not at first. He’d kept them more focused on the job. Cope. His life in general.
    But after the first few emails, he’d let himself say whatever the fuck he wanted. Trying to woo the man with words, making promises he might not be able to keep. But what else was new? If working with Prophet had taught him anything, it was that promises were dangerous, especially if they were worthwhile.
    But now, after nearly four months without a single email back from Prophet, he knew he’d have to take things further to get in touch with the guy. If Phil ever gave him time off. It was