"I have no idea what you're talking about," Faye declares, though she folds his jacket over her arm and slides into the booth, her own little piece of collateral to keep him around until she finally spits out what she's been waiting to tell him. Waving over the server, she orders two fingers of their best whiskey — splurging a little, and only at the beginning, when both of them are sober enough to enjoy it.

"I found myself a bit of an undercover job," she murmurs, once the server's gone too far away to hear. "Thought you might want to know, in the event that I go incommunicado for a while."