“Midnight,” Zoe mused as she drove towards home. The meeting with Luciano had gone longer than she expected, even if it had flown by. Zoe teared up as she received a message from someone claiming to be Jimmy. “This isn’t funny.”

Zoe’s first instinct was to delete the message, but something stopped her. Instead, she pulled over and parked while her Allegro scanned the message. Her ICE showed the message was clean, but Zoe ran another scan just to be sure. After the scan finished, Zoe played the message.

“Hey Zoe,” Jimmy’s voice greeted her. “If you’ve listening to this message, it means it’s been two weeks since I last reset the timer to keep this message from reaching you and that I’m dead.”

Zoe paused the recording and wiped her eyes after taking off her helmet. After a moment she took a few deep breaths and looked around. The people walking around weren’t paying her any attention.

“Keep it together Zoe. You’re not at home,” Zoe muttered to herself. She resumed playing the message.

“I’m going to keep this short and sweet. Zoe, you need to abandon the boathouse as soon as possible and go into hiding. Tommy has sold your location to the Purity Church.”

“He what?” Zoe nearly shouted. Two women walking past laughed at Zoe’s outburst. Zoe gave them a sheepish smile and the women kept going.

“The short version is that Nucky had told us that all the families and other major gangs had received offers from them for information on you. At first, the church just wanted to know if you were in the city, and then after several sizable credit amounts were stolen from the leadership, they wanted any information on you they could get but especially where you were staying,” Jimmy’s message said. “We kept this from you because Nucky had other plans for you.”

“What?” Zoe asked the message much more quietly and replayed that part again. “So much for getting away with those credits cleanly.”

“When I found out what Nucky’s plans for you were is when I decided to side with Tommy since he promised me that we wouldn’t go through Nucky’s bank heist plans. That’s right. Nucky was going to use you to rob his own bank,” the message stated. “Then you did something nobody thought you could do and paid off the debt with interest. That really upset the Nucky’s apple cart and left me in a bit of a predicament too.”

“I bet,” Zoe said with a smile on her face.

“Anyway, that’s water under the bridge. I’ve put that 10 grand you gave me back into an account for you. It should be enough for you to hide out for a while until the church gets tired of looking for you, which hopefully won’t take long. I suggest hiding in Jersey or someplace in upstate New York if you want to keep working in the city. If not, there’s lots of other cities full of opportunities out there.”

“Yeah,” Zoe muttered.

“Good luck and take care of yourself,” Jimmy’s message said. “Oh yeah. Don’t worry about mom. I’ve made sure she’ll be well taken care of financially. As for me, I’ll miss smacking your ass on occasion.”

“Asshole,” Zoe said wiping at her eyes. She decided to heed Jimmy’s advice and go into hiding. “But first I need to get a change of clothes and make a call.”

*

“Aunt Anne, are you safe?” Zoe asked just as soon as Anne answered the call. Zoe’s trace started tracking the call.

“Yes. I’m staying with a friend,” Anne replied. “Did Jimmy send you a message too?”

“Yes.”

“Are you home or someplace safe?” Anne asked. She was still in Brooklyn, but at a city owned apartment building. Zoe raised an eyebrow in question and started slicing into the building’s security system.

“I’m sitting on the side of a street at the moment,” Zoe admitted. “I was on my way home when Jimmy’s message arrived.”

“I don’t think the church would hurt you, but if you have stolen from them…”

“I don’t view it as stealing so much as recovering income that should have been mine for work performed,” Zoe replied as she accessed the building’s security system and camera network.

“Oh Zoe…”

“I know. But what’s done is done,” Zoe said flicking from one camera to another until she saw her aunt and another older woman sitting on a couch. Zoe was glad her houseboat didn’t have such a “security system” in place. Spying on one’s residents was low, but not unexpected. “Who are you staying with?”

“My friend Hannah. Why?”

“Just wondering,” Zoe answered while checking the building for anything out of the ordinary. The only thing she saw was some gang activity, which she assumed was normal since the gangers were just hanging out on stairwells.

“What are you going to do?” Anne asked as Zoe flicked through the rest of the building’s public feeds.

“Setup some false profiles and hide for a few days,” Zoe answered.

“Anything else like going to the police?” Anne asked hopefully.

“And admit I sliced the church and its leaders?” Zoe countered squashing that hope.

“Good point,” Anne replied.

“I’m going to ask a friend of sorts for protection,” Zoe said after the thought hit her. “His family has some connections.”

“A friend of sorts?” Anne asked.

“An acquaintance or associate would probably be better terms,” Zoe answered.

“Just be careful,” Anne said.

“I will. You be careful too,” Zoe replied.

“I will. I’ll be leaving the city sooner than I originally planned,” Anne said.

“How soon?” Zoe asked suddenly, worried for her aunt more than she had been a moment before.

“Tomorrow. I’ll be taking the clothes and few important things I have with me, but leaving the rest behind,” Anne answered.

“I…ok. I love you Aunt Anne,” Zoe said.

“I love you too,” Anne replied. “Message me when you’re safe and I’ll message you in the morning before I leave and every other day until I arrive in Arizona.”

“Ok,” Zoe replied. The call ended soon after.