Adelaide hadn't really expected him to try to give her advice, but before the automatic defenses came up she had to remind herself that this wasn't Boston, and these people were different. She should be glad they were different. It had just been so long, and she'd grown uncomfortable with letting people within shouting distance, never mind arm's length. She tried to shake that off and have a human conversation.
"I do realize that," she told him when he spoke of immunity. "Though in the government safehouses it's different, if you're one of them. They have their own little class of Immune honchos, and being immune there just means you don't have to have a cavalry to escort you every damn where, and they send you out in armored cars to meet up with other idiot bigwigs and talk bullshit. But like I said, when it started up I had no idea how it would really be. I only knew what I heard, and it was all just speculation. Once I went in with Cail it didn't matter how it really was, he had me stuck." She made an impatient gesture at the end of her explanation, dismissing the whole thing. "It doesn't even matter. I'm not telling you all this for sympathy or something, and I wouldn't be telling you at all if it wasn't for Jims - for my brother. I made my own stupid bed and I'll lie in it."
While she spoke, her usual tensed and chilly look eased. It was plain that though she was rather a bit more calculating than was exactly charming, her cold bitch veneer was at least halfway an act.
"And as for telling him... well the way I've been approaching so far, the only way he'll believe I want to stay with Cail is if he thinks I'm stupid, or he thinks I'm just an asshole. I've been playing it somewhere in between the two, but if I can't pretend I hate Jims - and I can't - then the bottom is always just a second away from dropping out. I'd go the way you say, except I'm skeptical that he'll just accept it without a reason why. He'll never just let it be."
She shook her red hair back from her eyes, reaching down to scratch at the dog's scruff while she frowned. "In any case, I'll deal with it. Just tell me I didn't tell you that whole foolish thing for nothing. Will you just do what you can to keep Jims in the Circle of Trust, or whatever it is? I've never seen him so furious with me."