NaNo Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty
I was a diamond-tiara kind of girl in a dusty cowboy bar

I felt completely overdressed as I walked into the pub. Sure, the dress was flattering and it fit me beautifully, but it was overkill for the low-key get-together assembled at the bar. No one was in jeans, but no one was in formal dress, either. I shot Jenny, in her not-quite-as-evening dress, a look. It was a look I reserved for extreme situations, and it promised retribution. Granted, I never look that threatening, so she probably thought I was plotting to snarl her yarn or bend a knitting needle. I really needed to work on my evil looks.

“Relax, you look great.” She smiled at me. I frowned at her.

“But I’m a tad over-dressed, wouldn’t you say?” I fiddled with the pearl necklace around my neck. It felt both out of place and completely comfortable.

“Ummm, no?” She batted her eyelashes at me innocently. “I think you look lovely.”

“I didn’t ask if I looked okay, I asked if I was over-dressed,” I said sourly.

“Really, you need to relax and stop being so paranoid.” She shot me a look I couldn’t quite read.

“Oh, don’t start that with me. You did this to me on purpose. Now I stick out like a sore thumb.” I glared at her, but it was a weak glare. Jenny was impossible to stay mad at.

“Not like a sore thumb at all! Like a diamond nestled amid…” She trailed off. There was no way she could compare this group to anything too shabby, because she was too polite for that. She struggled to come up with an analogy while I simmered. “Like a diamond in a pile of blue topaz,” she said with a grin.

“Ah, and I stand out so much against the semi-precious stones, eh?” In spite of my anger, I had to laugh. Only someone like her would place so much weight on the difference between precious and semi-precious jewels.

“But of course!” She didn’t really see the humor, but I couldn’t hold it against her. It was just the way she was raised. I, for one, would be perfectly happy to settle down with a nice blue topaz. Even a cubic zirconium would work for me. As long as it admitted it was a cubic zirconium, and didn’t try to put on airs and pass itself off as something else. I shook my head. Obviously, I had needed this night out. I was going batty.

I did a quick sweep of the pub and only one figure, a man down at the end of the bar, didn’t look familiar. At least everyone here knew all about Jenny and her match-making schemes. Most of them had been on the receiving end of her attention at least once, so I would get more sympathetic looks than anything else. I settled into a booth and watched Jenny flit from table to table.

“She never gives up, does she?” a deep voice said at my elbow. I jumped and looked up at the smiling face of Jamie. I grinned at him.

“Can’t you catch her already and get her to settle down?”

“I wish,” he said sadly, shaking his head. “I swear, I can’t understand that girl. Sometimes she seems interested, and the other half of the time she’s trying to set me up with another girl.”

“I know this may seem obvious, but have you ever actually asked her out?”

He looked confused. “We go out places all the time together.”

“No, not like that. Not asked her to join the group, but asked her out on a proper date?” Men could be dense sometimes.

“I… I… I…” He frowned. “I’m not sure I have, honestly. You think that might change things?”

It took all I had to hold back the biting sarcastic ‘you think?!’ that was on the tip of my tongue. Instead I opted for diplomacy. “It might make a difference if she knew how you felt,” I said gently.

“I suppose.” He chewed on his lip nervously. “Do you think she’d say yes, though?”

What was this, sixth grade? “Would you like me to talk to her and see what she’d say before you ask?” All we needed now was a slip of paper with check boxes.

His face brightened. “That would be great! Thanks, you’re wonderful, you know that? Can I do anything for you?”

“How about getting me a drink?” I scanned the pub, but didn’t see Jenny anywhere. I wondered, briefly, what she was up to now.

“Coming right up!” He hustled over to the bar to get me a drink, and I got up and wandered over to a group of people I knew pretty well. At least I could feel out some people on the idea of a combination yarn shop/café. It was starting to sound like a better idea the more I thought about it.

Jamie came up and joined us, handing me a drink. I took a sip and nearly choked.

“What is this thing?” I gasped.

“My new concoction. I call it a Prickly Hedgehog. What do you think?”

“I think I’m wondering if I’ll ever breath properly again!” I coughed and groped for a nearby chair. Slumping down, I laid my head on the table.

“I’ll… just go get you a glass of water,” Jamie said. I nodded weakly.

“There you are!” Jenny’s voice cut through the din of the pub. “There’s someone I want you to meet.”

I could see she was towing someone through the crowd of people, but as they neared a rowdy group blocked their path. I set my head back down on the table.

A few minutes later, a low, male voice said, “Hello.”

I looked up at him and recognition hit me. Hard. My heart stopped.

“Elizabeth, this is Alex. He just moved to town, and he’s looking for a job. He just finished culinary school,” she said, giving me a meaningful nudge.

“Is that so?” I squeaked. I cleared my throat.

“And Elizabeth here is thinking of expanding her yarn shop to include a small café. Granted, it would just be cookies and cakes and whatnot, not the seven-course meals you’d be making at a restaurant or as a private chef, but there’d be plenty of freedom, and… well, why don’t I just let you two talk about it?” She winked at me, and was gone.

Alex reached out and touched the pearl necklace softly. “Why, hello, Elizabeth, it’s very nice to… meet you.”

The End.

NaNo Chapter Twenty-Nine

Part Three: Elizabeth’s Story

Chapter Twenty Nine
Knit… Purl… check on the cookies

I remember the day I saw the news story about what happened. I cried, despite myself. Not that I’d really harbored much hope for the happy ending, but it had always been there in the back of my head. It was possible. It had been possible. Not anymore, and I needed to move on with my new life.

I’d set up shop in a small, sleepy town, mostly living off of the money I’d squirreled away when I was working for the agency. It wasn’t as if that job gave me time for a social life, so living frugally had been easy. Now, though, I was glad my little yarn shop was taking off, because I was spending evenings out with my new friends, spending more in a week than I used to in a month. They knew me as a girl from the Midwest, who’d headed to the big city to try to make it big, and found she couldn’t deal. So I’d pulled up stakes and settled here, content to live a sleepy, small-town life. Privately, they all wondered why I thought I could have handled city living and the fast pace of a city job, because I was so suited to a slower way of life. Each took some responsibility for how much happier I’d become since I first showed up with everything I owned in a truck, and a sad, defeated expression on my face.

They all also knew there was more to the story than I told, probably having something to do with a man. Perceptive, these small-town folks. I was finding it harder and harder to hide my depression over the news from them, because why I would be so upset about some spies being caught in a shoot-out and corruption in a super-secret government agency was something I couldn’t explain. But I found myself sitting in my little apartment over the shop at night, staring at the necklace in my hand. I hadn’t put it back on, but I handled it every day. Every day I tried to put it on, but I just couldn’t. I had it in my mind that they day I did would be the day I’d be able to move on with my life.

The little bell over the shop door jingled, and Jenny walked in. She was an unashamed gossip and my best friend, even if she tried to hook me up with every man in the town. I think she thought that all I needed was a good roll in the hay to clear my head. But she meant well, and she was fun to hang out with, so I put up with her incessant match-making.

“Watch the place for me, would you?” I set down my knitting and picked up the little timer sitting next to me. “I need to grab the cookies out of the oven.” Not that I needed to have anyone watch the store, this was one of those obnoxiously picturesque towns where there was vanishingly little crime. I ran up the stairs as the timer started going off, and rescued the racks of cookies from the oven. I set them on coking racks and headed back downstairs. Two warm cookies in my hand. Jenny was fingering some lace-weight mohair I’d just gotten in.

“Lovely, isn’t it?” I held out a still-warm cookie for her.

“I was thinking it’d be perfect for that shawl I was going to make Nana.” She took the cookie and nibbled on it. “These are amazing! What’s in it?”

I winked at her. “It’s a secret.” I’d recently taken up dabbling in baking, and while I still had more failures than successes, I was getting better. I think Jenny encouraged it so much because she thought it would help me land a man. Everything came back around to men in her mind. I was pretty sure I wasn’t the one who needed a good roll in the hay.

“Have you given any thought to expanding your shop to include a café? The place next door would be perfect for it.”

“Are you kidding? If I added cookies and tea to the yarn, half the women in the town would never leave!” It was tempting, though. I could use the extra income, and I was really enjoyed making up new cookie recipes.

“Especially if you had, I don’t know, a handsome man working as a cook?” she said slyly. I shot her a sideways glance. She had that look like she was up to something.

“Which one of the Mathews boys fancies himself a baker now?” She’d been trying to get me to go out on a date with Jamie since the day I showed up. I think it was mostly so he’d stop chasing her, and I don’t believe he was any more interested in me than I was in him. We both humored her for different reasons.

“It’s a secret,” she winked back at me. “Come out with me tonight and we’ll talk about it.”

“Fine, where are we going?” I picked my knitting back up and started in on the sock once again. I only had a few more hours of work on it. It was my first pair, and I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to wear them. Maybe I’d just frame them. Then I promised myself I’d tackle the dozen or so projects I’d brought with me from my previous life. I’m sure there was some psychological mumbo-jumbo to explain it, about embracing the new but not forsaking the old, but I just wanted to get some things done. Maybe it was about clearing the clutter, not only in my closet, but in my mind.

“It would be nice to expand my apartment,” I mused. Jenny smiled.

“You could turn the entire place above the bakery into a master suit with a gorgeous bathroom suite.”

“You’re just looking for a place to practice your interior design skills, aren’t you? You want me to be your guinea pig.” Though, in truth, I wouldn’t mind. I was comfortable enough in my shabby apartment, but Jenny had a way with interior design. She didn’t just throw together the latest trends and make a place look like a show room, cold and sterile. She took into account your personality and really made it into what you would have done, if you’d had the time and energy. The only problem is that I would insist on paying her, and she would refuse, and I’d feel guilty. She didn’t do it to make money, she told me. She had a trust fund for that. It was because she loved it.

“Perhaps. I was watching one of those design shows on TV last night, and this one designer glued hay to the walls. I’d have never thought of it, but maybe it’s worth a try…” She winked slyly at me.

“You’d never!”

“I might.”

I threw a skein of yarn at her, which she caught and started to pet. “Oooh, this is nice. Is it new? I don’t think I’ve seen it before.”

“Yeah, part of that new shipment. I’m not completely sold on it, I think it might shed too much. Plus, I tried a swatch with it, and I don’t like the way it’s working up.” I held out the small knitted swatch to her.

“Hm, I see what you mean. Still, it’s lovely and gorgeous all wound up in a ball. And goodness knows at the rate I’m getting my projects done, it’ll be like that for a good, long time.”

“Isn’t that the truth? You and me both. So, what do you have planned for tonight?”

“Well, there’s that get-together and the Sampson’s, but I know you’re not fond of them.” She held up a hand to forestall my objections. “No one is. They’re boring and snotty, but they do have the best chef in three counties, so everyone goes to their parties just to eat. Trust me, you’re not alone in your opinion. Though I do think they are harsher towards you than anyone else, since you don’t descend for a noble bloodline.” She said the last in Iona Sampson’s nasal voice.

I laughed. “I would rather not deal with them tonight,” I admitted. “Usually I can deal with her, but I’m not feeling up to it right now. Besides, I’m more in the mood for something… exciting.”

“And exciting has never been used to describe any of the Sampson’s parties, unless you count the time the giant ice swan tipped over and pinned Iona to the ground between its wings. And even that was more a relief than exciting, because it gave everyone an excuse to leave early.” Jenny smiled at the memory. “Now, mind you, it’s not that anyone wanted to see her hurt, but as she wasn’t, well…”

“I completely understand. What else is going on?”

“There’s a bunch of us getting together at the pub, just and informal gathering. But it should be more fun than a stuffy party, even if the food is a bit more… plebian.”

She was up to something, but I wasn’t going to argue. It did sound like more fun than sitting at home, knitting by myself. And I needed to get out. A few days doesn’t a hermit make, but if I didn’t break out of my melancholy, I was bound to draw more attention than I wanted. And Jenny was too observant to throw off the scent.

“Fine, but dah-link, I have nothing to wear!” I drawled.

“I think we can work on that,” she said. “The party starts at eight, I’ll meet you here at five when you close up. There’s a dress over at Maddie’s that would look divine on you.” She sailed out the door with a backwards wave before I could object.

I groaned. A dress from Maddie’s would cost me an arm and a leg, and even though I know Jenny would insist on buying it for me, I wouldn’t let her. I’d better make tonight worth the cost of the dress, I decided, and went upstairs to pull out the pearl necklace.

NaNo Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty Eight
They may not have come in on horses, but they were still a calvary to me.

Daniel burst into the room, oblivious to the guns that swung in his direction. It took me a moment to register why he was so unconcerned, but when I saw the ring of swat team members filing in after him, I understood. Nate, George, and Mike were outnumbered. That didn’t mean they wouldn’t do anything stupid, or that Daniel was safe, but then, spies rarely worried about how safe something was before dashing in. At least he’d brought back-up, and that made him a lot smarter than I was.

“You okay?” he shouted at me.

Well, other than being tired to a chair, dehydrated, sleep deprived, starved, and with a lump growing on my head the size of Cincinnati, yeah, I was great. But I didn’t even have the energy to be a smart ass, and all I could manage was a little head wiggle.

“I’m going to go with that meant ‘as well as could be expected, under the circumstances’,” he said. I gave another head wiggle. “Don’t worry, old man, I’ll get to you as soon as I can.” He grinned at me, and turned to address Nate, who was still somewhat between the two of us, if off to one side.

Nate still had his gun pointed at me, and Mike and George kept their guns trained on Daniel. It was a very tense stalemate, and I knew better than to speak up. Daniel was a much better negotiator than I was, and we could all see where my fast talking had landed me. On the wrong end of the gun barrel.

“Nate, you might as well give yourself up. We have all the proof we need. Proof of your dealing with Edward Gaust and his crime syndicate, how you filtered everything through George and used Mike as your errand boy. You weren’t careful enough, Nate, there are witnesses.” Daniel spoke in a low, controlled voice. I was glad one of us had stayed awake during the negotiating classes.

“What, the word of a criminal trying to avoid a harsher sentence? I’m sure that carries a lot of weight,” Nate scoffed. “They would jump at the chance to put any of us behind bars, and everyone knows that.”

“Perhaps not if their word was all we had, Nate, but there’s a lot of evidence. The kind of evidence that doesn’t lie.”

“Faked evidence,” Nate said.

“How, exactly, do you explain this, then?” Daniel gestured to me, still bound in the chair. I was hoping one of the SWAT guys would slide over and untie me, but so far they were holding their positions, all weapons aimed at Nate, George, and Mike.

“I’m sorry to tell you, Daniel, that Jake here is the traitor. We uncovered evidence that he was working with Robin when she killed Jason and Robert. They must be the ones who’d been working with Edward.” Nate said. He was a good liar.

“I’m sorry to tell you, Nate, that I think that’s a load of horse shit,” Daniel said pleasantly. “And what about Sandra? Can you explain how her blood ended up smeared on the floor in your house?”

That stunned everyone. Nate gaped, looking like a drowning fish, his lips moving silently. Finally he rallied. “I was set up, then. I don’t know anything about the Sandra case.”

“But you do know something about the Jason and Robert cases, don’t you, Nate? You know you were the one who ordered them killed. Jason, because he was getting too close to clearing his name after you’d tried to frame him, and Robert… that one I can’t understand, Nate. Why did you have Robin kill Robert?”

“She did that all on her own, I had nothing to do with it!” Nate yelled.

We were all silent for a moment as the words sunk in. They weren’t a confession, but they were damning.

“Nate, just give yourself up,” Daniel said.

“How many times do I have to tell you that it’s Jake you’re after? Jake is the one who betrayed the agency. Jake is the one who had Sandra and Jason and Robert killed. Hell, he probably killed Sandra himself. Isn’t it always the boyfriend?” He sneered at me. “And then he tried to frame me!”

Daniel glanced at me, and I could see the worry in his eyes. I understood. Nate was no longer stable. He couldn’t be reasoned with. He was an animal, backed into a corner, fighting for his life. Prison was a bad place for people who had put a lot of the criminals away, and he knew he had a better than average change of ending up in a traitor’s prison, and having a horrible accident befall him in the laundry room.

“Nate, why don’t you and I step out of here and talk it over. Leave George and Mike to look after Jake, okay? You can show me the proof you have.” Daniel was trying to separate them, figuring that if Nate wasn’t there, George and Mike would give themselves up. He was right, too, I could see George’s hand was already starting to shake, and it was only with a fair amount of effort he kept the gun up and pointed in the general direction of Daniel. Mike just looked confused.

“Don’t you come near me, I see it now, you’re working with him, aren’t you? You’re all against me. You’re all traitors!” Nate was plunging head-first into crazy now.

And then I did something stupid. I know, surprise, surprise.

“What the hell could I possibly have to do with your business dealing with Gaust? We have evidence that there was money that went directly from his companies into your pocket. The funny thing is, it isn’t even about your job. No matters of national security, no super-secret spy business. It’s because your wife is a council person and gets to vote on new developments. You were selling her vote. It was all just garden-variety greed and dirty political dealings.” I shook my head sadly.

“Shut up,” Nate growled. Normally I wouldn’t be cowed, but he was waving a gun at me.

“Yes, shut up, Jake,” Daniel hissed at me. He shot me a look that clearly said ‘I am trying to save your worthless hide, you pain in the ass, so please don’t try to help or I will shoot you myself’. Or something very similar.

“I’m just saying, maybe Nate needs to take a deep breath and consider his options carefully. If he is being set up.” I shot Daniel a look. “If he’s being set up, then he’ll need us to help clear his name. We are the best investigators.”

“That is true,” Daniel said. “And really, Nate, Jake has no reason to set you up. It had to be someone else. We can find that out. Obviously, they’ve been trying to deflect suspicion all over the place. You, Jake, George…”

Nate seemed to consider it. “How do I know you’ll actually look for the person who did this? How do I know you won’t just hang me out to dry on the Sandra killing? That blood in my house is probably enough evidence for half the agency, they’ve always been out to get me.”

I saw a flicker in Daniel’s eye. It was brief, and I doubt many people would pick up on it, but I noticed. And I knew what it meant. Daniel could bluff when it came to most people, but I knew him too well. He’d lied about the blood. But it had worked. Nate was rattled. I couldn’t help it, I started to laugh. I blame the stress of the last few days. Nate was having a psychotic break, I should be allowed a little hysterical laughter.

“What’s so funny?” Nate demanded.

I couldn’t answer, I was laughing so hard I couldn’t catch my breath.

“Shut up!” Nate yelled. And Daniel and I saw the look in his eyes at the same moment.

“No, don’t be an idiot,” Daniel said, his hand going to the butt of his gun.

But Nate didn’t listen. He fired, hitting me square in the chest. My last thought as I sank to the ground in a haze of pain was that at least I got to see his body riddled with bullet holes. Between Daniel and the various member of the SWAT team, they must have punched him full of a dozen holes. I only had one, though it was a doozy, and I counted that a win.

NaNo Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty Seven
Cake, or Death? And by the way, we’re out of cake.

Mike had the brawn and lack of queasiness you need to torture someone, but he lacked the imagination. George was such a pathetic little runt he couldn’t even give the order to have someone properly tortured. And Nate was too caught up in accountable deniability that he didn’t want to get involved. What it resulted in, then, was a lot of shouted questions and a few punches to the face. Which weren’t comfortable, but they also weren’t anything I couldn’t handle. I’d gotten far worse working undercover in some rough-and-tumble bars. But I tried to look cowed and scared, all while blubbering that I didn’t have whatever it was they were looking for.

Which was true. By now, all the proof should be in the hands of whoever would be able to bring Nate and his cronies down. Hopefully whoever that was was acting on it right this minute, getting all the paperwork in order and assembling a tactical team to secure my release. And hopefully we were someplace that Daniel could get a signal and find me. And then he would show up with the calvary, and the good guys would triumph and we would ride off into the sunset. Or, rather, sunrise, by this time. I’d lost track of how long I’d been here. I had managed to catch some sleep between the bouts of questions, and I was actually feeling a little better. Which I’m pretty sure is not the objective to a session of torture.

“Look, I know you tracked down that damnable evidence. I don’t know how you did, but if you don’t tell me where you’ve hidden it, you won’t be the only one to pay,” George growled as menacingly as he could manage.

“Yeah, that’s right,” Mike chimed in, sounding about six years old. I tried not to laugh. For one, I’m pretty sure it just wasn’t what you did while being tortured, especially when you were trying to convince them that you were being tortured. No reason to make them think they had to ramp it up a notch. For another, grinning would split my lip open again, and that really did hurt.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said. “You have access to all of my notes, the file, everything. It’s all in the office, in the computer database. That’s everything I know!” My protests almost sounded sincere.

“I know you’ve been up to more than that. You’ve hardly been in the office, and you haven’t filed a report in ages,” George said.

“Did it occur to you.” I stopped and took a deep breath, and I didn’t have to fake the pain in my voice as I pulled a muscle in my back. I cursed Robin again for the shoveling. “Did it ever occur to you that I’m a little upset about the death of my ex-girlfriend? I still had feelings for her, you know. Maybe I just needed some time to myself.”

George considered that. It was clear that have never crossed his mind, and I wasn’t surprised. I would have been surprised if someone told me George had a shred of humanity and had every shown a genuine human emotion. “Is that all it was?”

“Yes, that’s all it was. Ask Nate if you don’t believe me. I did some free lance computer work. I was thinking of retiring and making that my career.” I wished my arms weren’t tied behind my back. Not because I had any grandiose dreams of jumping up and beating them both to a pulp before they could shoot me, as pleasant as that thought was, but because I desperately wanted to know what time it was. How long was it going to take Daniel to get everything together and come after me? Eventually Nate would grow tired of his underling’s pathetic attempts to get information from me, and then the torture would begin in earnest. Either at Nate’s hands, or by someone else he hired for the job.

They huddled together and talked it over. My guess is their consensus was that they had no idea, and they needed to call Nate. This didn’t make any of us happy. George and Mike were unhappy because it meant they had failed, and they knew they would pay for it. Nate would be unhappy that they had failed and dragged him into it. And I was unhappy because I knew my life was about to get a whole lot worse.

George wandered further away to make the call, and I couldn’t hear what he said. But it was obvious from his hand gestures that things were not going well. I thought about taunting Mike a little, but resisted the urge. No need to inflict more pain on myself before it was necessary. George gestured for Mike to join him, and they left the room. I tried pulling at the ropes that held me in place, but it was no use. Mike was an idiot, but he must also have been a boy scout. I could try to hop the chair across the room, but it would make a lot of noise and ultimately I still wouldn’t be able to get the heavy steel door open. So I did the only thing I could think of. I fell asleep.

I was woken by the sounds of arguing, loud and vicious enough to be heard through the heavy door. I hadn’t been asleep long, which meant Nate had been close. Which meant Daniel might also be close. I held on to that hope as the door opened, and George, Nate, and Mike walked in. There was a moment of relief that no one else, say, a massive thuggish killer-for-hire, had joined them, but that was quickly quashed by the look on Nate’s face.

“Where is it?” he asked.

“Where is what?” I feigned innocence. Really, he could have been talking about anything. I did not know, for instance, where that sock I lost in the laundry last week had gotten off to.

“The records. The proof. It was supposed to be in Edward’s office, but someone stole it. And I think that someone is you.” Nate loomed over me, his face turning red.

“Edward? Edward Gaust? The one Jason was supposedly in cahoots with? No one ever said they knew of proof of that relationship.” Misdirection, that was the key. And it threw Nate for a moment. He didn’t know whether to believe me. I tried another tack. “You think I stole it, tried to cover it up? You think I’m a traitor?”

Oh, now I saw confusion in his face. I’d given him an out, if he believed me. He could say it was all about mistrusting me, and if I was telling the truth, and that paperwork never surfaced, I’d be the one tossed out of the service.

“Did you?” he asked.

“No. If I’d known such paperwork existed, we’d have been down there in a flash, and this case would be closed.” Again, an element of the truth.

“You would say that, though, even if you’d taken it, wouldn’t you? Anything to save your skin.” Check and mate. He’d turned it around on me. He still had a perfect excuse to beat the crap out of me, and if he killed me, no one would be the wiser. At least no one as far as he knew. I wasn’t about to clue him in on the fact that if anything happened to me, Daniel would connect the dots and he’d be up for murder.

“You do have a point there,” I admitted. “But it’s also what I’d say if I were telling the truth.”

We stared each other down for a little while. He had the upper hand in the immediate situation, and he knew it. The only was I was going to get out of it was by talking my way out of it, or if Daniel came in and saved the day. So pretty much Daniel was my only hope.

“Look, we can stare at each other all day long, but I’m tired and hungry. Make up your mind what you’re going to do and get on with it, okay?” It sounded pretty brave to my ears, if a bit stupid.

“Where did you go when you left the office?” he asked abruptly.

“What?” I was completely caught off guard.

“You said you were going to meet a woman.”

“Ah, yes, so I did. She wasn’t home, so I went back to my place. Where your fine lads caught up with me.”

“And yet you left your car there. Why would you have done that?”

Dammit, he had me there. I’d acted like a man being followed because I’d known I was a man being followed. I’d been cocky and stupid, and instead of keeping them busy I’d felt the need to slip their surveillance and somehow ‘win’ the game. Instead, I should have acted completely oblivious. Hindsight, what can you say?

“It… broke down?” I offered.

“Try again.”

“I felt like walking?” I asked.

“Fifteen miles? I don’t think so. Would you like to try again?” He looked amused.

“I was suddenly stuck by the immediate need to become Amish, and it required me to eschew all motorized transportation. So I procured a horse and buggy and drove it home.” Like I said, Daniel really was my only hope.

“Creative, but not very plausible,” he said. “But a very nice try.”

“Thanks, I thought so. I’m not much of one for thinking on my feet, you know.” No reason to hide it now. Brazen and stupid to the end.

“Mike, it’s time to put an end to this,” Nate called out.

“Oh, so you’re too much of a coward to do anything yourself,” I sneered. Probably not my best move.

“You think you’re such a wise guy, eh?” Nate shouted at me. “If you’re no good to us alive, then…”

He pulled out his gun and pointed it at me. It seems he was finally ready to get his hands dirty, after all.

NaNo Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty Six
I love ewe, too.

I jumped out of the shower and scrambled to get into my clothes. Was it my imagination, or had there been something off about the velvet pouch in my top drawer? I was only a few steps away from the bedroom door when my phone rang. I’d left it sitting on the dining room table, and, cursing, I backtracked and grabbed it.

The caller ID said it was from an unknown number. I hesitated, then answered. “This is Jake.”

“Jake, I just wanted to update you on the status of the project,” a familiar voice said. It was Daniel, wisely calling from a phone other than his personal cell or home.

“Go ahead,” I said. I started back towards the bedroom, though not with as much urgency as before.

“Pickup went fine, the delivery is in progress. I think it’s a good… product. You shouldn’t have any problems.” There was a deep rumble in the background. It sounded like he was calling from a pay phone near the highway.

“No problems with anyone trying to get their hands on it?” I was aware that my phone could be monitored, so I added, “It’s something I’ve worked a long time on, you know, and it’s proprietary software.”

He understood, and played along. “None that I could see, and I kept my eyes open. I’ll try you back in a few hours. Oh, and Jake? I think the sale would go through even better if you wore your old college watch. The head investor is an alumni.”

“Will do, thanks,” I said, and hung up the phone. So that’s what Daniel had planted my tracking device in, I thought. No one trusted anyone these days. I tried to dredge up some anger, but it would have been hypocritical. He had the same motivation for tagging me as I had for tagging Sandra. And right now I was very glad. As long as it was still in working order, if Nate and his boys did kill me and dump my body, at least Daniel’d be able to find it to prosecute them and give me a decent burial. Not a charming thought, but in my line of work you take what comfort you can.

The only question was, where had I put that watch? Last I saw it was in the living room, where I’d taken it off after Sandra gave me the watch I wore now. I think it was her way of trying to nudge me into growing up, giving up the college gear. And the watch she picked out was a lot nicer, so I couldn’t complain. I pulled it off and started digging around the house, looking for it. Too bad the tracking devices weren’t pinpoint accurate, or I would’ve asked Daniel for the frequency and I’d have been able to find it quickly. As it was, I tore apart half the living room before I found it, wedged down between the cushions in the recliner. It looked a little battered, but it was still ticking. And it even had the right time. I strapped it on and went back into the bedroom.

I reached into the drawer and touched the velvet bag, again struck by the feeling that something was a little off. I picked the bag up, and knew something was wrong. The bag was alarmingly light, and when I reached into it I pulled out not a necklace, but a little slip of paper. I unfolded it and read the three words written there: “Naked Came Ewe”. I smiled at the play on the book by Bloom County’s Opus, and realized it was what she’d planned on naming that yarn store she always wanted to buy, but never thought she would. At least I had an easy way to find her when this was all over, and the reassurance that she wanted to be found. I was still smiling, distracted by my fantasy of a cozy, happy life, when my brain finally registered the fact that there were two people standing behind me. I closed my hand over the little slip of paper. I had to make sure they never saw it. At least I could protect Sandra.

“Hey guys, what the hell are you doing?” I tried to grin jauntily, but it felt forced. I was armed, but so were they. And there were two of them, and just one of me. Sometimes the best thing to do is back down and hope you live to fight another day.

“Jake, Jake, Jake,” George clucked. He was trying to be sinister and mob-like, but it looked and sounded weird coming out of a little weasel like him. Like the scrawny little kid playing tough. “Why couldn’t you just stay out of our business? Everything was going so well until you started meddling.”

“Because that’s my job?” I could never resist being the smart ass, even as I swore at myself. They must have come in while I was in the shower. Why didn’t I make a circuit of the apartment when I got out? Would it have done any good, anyway? There still would have been two of them and only one of me.

“Hands up, wise ass. If you hadn’t noticed, or couldn’t handle the complex math, there are two of us and only one of you.” He smirked at me, and it took all I had not to punch him square in the middle of that ferrety little face. He’d always irritated me. But to do so would probably gain my nothing but additional, completely unnecessary, and indeed detrimental, holes in my body. So I resisted the urge.

“Mike, take his gun. Jake, no sudden moves, or you’ll be full of holes, you understand?” It was like the guy could read my mind. I put my hands up, hiding the slip of paper between my fingers. Mike relieved me of my gun.

“Now, then, that we can talk like civilized gentlemen,” George said. “Why don’t you tell me where it is?”

“I didn’t realize civilized gentlemen were in the habit of speaking to people while waving guns at them,” I said. “And tell you where what is? I’m afraid Mike never had a brain, so it’s not as if I’ve hidden it.”

That comment got me a smack upside the head from Mike. It wouldn’t have been so bad, but he used the butt of the gun. I felt a dull headache begin.

“Just tell us where it is, and we can all get out of this happy and in one piece,” George said. He tried to sound gentle and cajoling, but it reminded me of a used car salesman trying to unload a lemon. He was lying, and he knew I knew it.

“You’re a lying sack of shit, you know that? Even if I did know what you wanted, or where to find it, I wouldn’t tell you.” Keep the lie going, I thought. It was my best, and only, defense right now. “Besides, you didn’t say the magic word.”

“Give it to me now,” George said, stuffing the gun in my face. It was a stupid move. If there were just the two of us, I could probably wrestle the gun away from him and get the upper hand. But Mike was there, keeping guard, well out of arm’s reach. Maybe I had misjudged who was the brains of the operation.

“Or… you’ll shoot me sooner? It won’t really help you recover what it is you want. Especially if I do know, and am the only one who does.” I winced as I saw him grin. “Unless this is something you never want found, in which case, I would have been stupid not to leave it someplace with explicit ‘open if you don’t hear from me’ instructions, right? Presumably, if I do have this thing you want, and I know what it is, I’d be smart enough to know which course of action would be best to ensure my survival, right? Unless you think I’m a complete moron.” I held up my hand. “No, no, don’t answer that. I’ll just say that, if I knew what you were talking about,” I put a lot of emphasis on the word ‘if’. “If I knew what you were talking about, I can guarantee you I’d know what I should have done with it, you know?”

George and Mike exchanged a look. They were clearly out of their depth here. I’d been wrong. Neither of them had half the brains to run even this little part of the operation. I sighed. I never thought I’d even be suggesting that anyone kidnap me, but here it went. It would buy Daniel time, because sooner or later they’d get around to asking about him, and he’d find me in time. I hoped.

“Guys, guys, you clearly are at a loss for what to do here. Would you like to know what I would do?”

“Yeah,” Mike said, before George could stop him.

George tried to recover. “Not particularly, but I’m guessing you’re going to tell us anyway?”

“Yes, well, I would take me to your base of operations, to better be able to work me over and get the information you need. Think about it, it’s probably safe and secluded, and you have all the things you need there. If you do anything here my neighbors will hear. They’re notoriously picky about noise, you know. Call the cops at the drop of a hat. I can barely watch my TV without one of them banking on the wall for me to turn it down.” This was a bald-faced lie, as I had no neighbors at the moment, but they didn’t know that.

“Funny, that’s just what we were going to do. Great minds think alike, eh, Jake?” George grinned at me. I gave him a lopsided grin back.

In truth, that was the last thing I would do. It was classic stupid criminal, taking your enemy back to your base. But if it made evidence gathering – and therefore prosecution – easier, I was all for being kidnapped.

George nodded and Mike prodded me in the back towards the door. I went along docilely. Once we were outside, I let the little piece of paper slip from my hand, and it fluttered away in the breeze. At least that was one secret that was safe. They wouldn’t even think to ask me about it, either. Despite my dire predicament, and perhaps because I was running on next to no food and even less sleep, I felt damn near giddy. I didn’t protest as they shoved me in the car and drove me god knows where.

NaNo Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty Five
I don’t care what Daniel said, that rock was definitely out of bounds.

One more trip back to the airport, this time clean and pressed, and in my own car. It was busier in the early morning hours, and I doubted, if there were the same security guys on duty, they would have recognized me. Still it was a slight chance, but one I had to take. It seemed the most logical place to hide the box. Robin had that right. Open at all hours, easily accessible, and now all I had to do was hide a key. I slipped the box into a locker just a few down from the one Robin had used, put two quarters in the slot, locked it, and took the key. I was constantly on the lookout for George, or someone Nate might have sent to tail me, and saw no one. Either my skills were slipping, I was too tired, or they were that inept. I preferred to believe it was the last of those, though I also feared it was something else. They were up to something I knew nothing about, or perhaps they were on to Daniel.

My next stop was the old alley where Daniel and I used to play racquetball. It was a block off the agency’s campus, and because it was in a commercial part of town, we could sneak down there at night and play for hours. That was during that time when the agency thought we could do with a little discipline, and had imposed a curfew. Oh, the days of youth and high jinks. I smiled at the memory. It was good to have someone you know would cover your back, no matter what. And despite all the subterfuge and backstabbing going on, I was sure I could count on Daniel. I was, in fact, betting my life on it.

At the end of the alley was the wall we used to hit balls off of. We never could agree what the marked the back of the court. I suppose we could have brought down a tape measure, and measured out an official court, but that would have taken all the fun out of the bickering. And sometimes I think that’s what kept us going through most of those years.

I had a moment of panic when I thought the large rock that marked my idea of out of bounds had moved, but it was still there, just a little more to the side. It was placed there originally to keep the dumpsters from rolling, but over the years the dumpsters had moved further and further down the alley. The rock had been shoved up against the wall, but it was still recognizable as the same rock we had fought about all those years ago. I slipped the key under it, and slid back into the shadows to watch. If anyone had followed me, I might see them try to make a move. Tiredness pressed down on me, but I kept watch for a solid hour. Nothing. No suspicious noises, no one walking by the alley. If someone had followed me, they were good, and far more patient than I was. If they stole the documentation, the only thing I had was the copies I’d scanned and uploaded to my server, and they wouldn’t stand up nearly as well as evidence. Hopefully I was right, and for whatever reason, they hadn’t followed me.

Which actually presented a bit of a problem. Now that they evidence was safely delivered, I had hoped to occupy Nate and George’s time, to give Daniel a chance to do the work he needed to. He should be by that afternoon to pick it up, and since I’d laid all the evidence out it wouldn’t take him long to convince the higher-ups that action needed to be taken, and quickly. But keeping Nate busy was going to be difficult if I couldn’t find him. I yawned, stretched, and decided to head for the one place I was sure Nate wouldn’t be – the office.

Turns out I was dead wrong on that account. Nate was ensconced behind his desk, barking orders and generally driving everyone mad. I nearly smiled with relief. The secretary told me Daniel had called in, something about a sick relative. In true, reckless character, I popped my head in to see if Nate needed me for anything.

“Where the hell have you been?” He looked at me with beady, suspicious eyes. “You look like hell.”

“Sorry, boss, I was out on a security job. It kinda fell into my lap, and I didn’t think it’d take that long. I’ll put in for some vacation time.” I tried to suppress a yawn, but failed.

“Seems like you might need to put in for another day for today. You’re useless to me in that condition,” he said. Oddly enough, he looked happy about it. But if I went home, they’d know right where to find me. I needed to figure out a way to get them chasing their tails.

“Well, if you think so, I did meet a very charming young lady last evening…” I let the sentence hang in the air, and tried for a wolfish grin.

He grunted, and waved a hand at me. “I shouldn’t let you go, not with Daniel out. And not if you’re not going to get some sleep. I don’t know how you young people do it.”

Neither did I. I couldn’t even imagine a romantic encounter right now. I’m pretty sure my body would laugh at me if I even suggested it. But there was no reason to let him know that. “Thanks a million, boss. I’ll see you bright and early tomorrow, then.”

He didn’t say anything, and I wandered back out to my car. This time I was aware of Mike shadowing me down the hallway and coincidentally getting into his car at the same time. Subtle as a brick to the head, Mike. That was okay with me, and I led him on a merry chase down to the heart of the city. I parked my car under a large apartment building and got in the elevator. I could almost imagine what was going on in Mike’s head then, wondering if he should watch the elevator and try to determine what floor I got out on, or take the stairs and try to catch me getting out of the elevator, or maybe just sit on my car. He probably called Nate to try to figure out what to do. Any of those three options were fine with me. I rode the car up to the twelfth floor, then back down to the lobby, and walked out into the street. I hopped the nearest subway and was asleep as soon as the car started moving.

When I woke up, I wasn’t sure how many times I’d ridden the circuit, but I was alone in the car. I cursed myself for my stupidity. My watch told me it was early evening, and my body told me I hadn’t gotten nearly enough sleep. I wanted to call Daniel to make sure he’d retrieved the package, but I stopped myself. I trusted him to do it, and any contact could tip off Nate. I briefly wondered if Mike was still back at the apartment complex. I wondered if it was safe to go home. I really wanted to go home, take a shower, and crawl into bed.

The desire for comfort won out over my sanity, and I got off the subway and trudged the few blocks to my apartment building, stopping at a small local grocery store along the way. I was going to eat before I fell into bed, and it wasn’t going to be horrid fast food. My mouth watered at the thought of the juicy steak and a mound of mashed potatoes. It would be worth putting off going to bed for that. And at least I’d fall asleep with a full stomach.

I got back to the apartment and started marinating the steak. I stuck it in the fridge while I took a shower, mindful of the fact that there was every possibility I would fall asleep in there. The brief, unsatisfactory naps I’d been taking made me feel even more run down, and the buzz from the caffeine and sugar had completely worn off. I took my gun and clean clothes into the bathroom with me, conscious of the fact that I wasn’t even safe in my own place. I locked the bathroom door and stood under the hot steam of the shower until the water started to run cold. My mind had started to drift, in that weird state halfway between sleep and wakefulness, and my brain registered something that I’d seen that hadn’t quite looked right. It wasn’t something as out of place as the first aid kit, but something…

Suddenly my eyes popped open. What kind of person would break in to someone’s house and only disturb a first aid kit? Someone who was hurt. Someone who had needed a bit of fresh blood to sell their own death, and had to cut themselves to get it. Someone who then had to suture up the wound. And someone who might just be interested in something in my top dresser drawer.

NaNo Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty Four
I always hated jigsaw puzzles. Probably stems from when I was younger and my older brother would swap out half of the pieces with a different puzzle, leaving me completely frustrated.

I approached the lockers, telling myself I would dig up Robin and kill her again if this wasn’t the end of this wild goose chase. She’d led me through enough to reasonably distance herself from the evidence. I stuck the key in the locker and opened the door, braced for anything from an explosion to an empty locker. I didn’t realize I had closed my eyes and braced myself for a blast until a moment later, when nothing happened and everything was black. I cracked an eye open, steeling myself for disappointment. But I was rewarded by the sight of a large metal box. It was unlocked, and when I flipped it open I saw that it contained a mixture of jump drives, pictures, and paper documents. I sighed in relief, closed the box, and high-tailed it out of the airport. Getting the car started was easier a second time, but I was tired and nervous and my hands were fumbling. People who saw me walking up to an expensive Mercedes, covered in dirt and carrying a suspicious looking box, gave me curious looks. But in today’s society, everyone minds their own business, and these people were in too much of a hurry to bother with me so long as I didn’t seem an immediate threat to them. For once I was happy for the apathy and anonymity of a big city, and as the car roared to life and I left the parking lot, I wondered if I would be happy in a small town.

I put thoughts of the future out of my head and tried to concentrate on the case. Now that I had all the pieces, all that remained was assembling them into a semblance of a case against Nate. As long as I took him down, everything else would work itself out. I could retire, and others could take over the internal investigations. My mind wandered back to thinking about my future. I was bone-weary of this job and ready to hang it up. I was sure they’d offer me a nice cushy office job somewhere up the chain, or maybe a teaching position, but I wanted out. Even if Sandra wouldn’t take me back, I would set up shop somewhere and run a little computer business and be happy. Maybe not a small town, but not a big city, either. Someplace nice. No more lies, not more paranoia. Right after I solved this last case and hung that bastard Nate out to dry.

I drove back to the apartment, my arms and back screaming in agony. I desperately wanted a decent night’s sleep, but I didn’t have time. A hot shower and a pot of coffee would have to suffice. I parked the car a few blocks from the apartment, wiped down everything I’d touched, and left it unlocked. I probably left a few hairs behind, but there wasn’t anything I could do about that now. I was too tired and in too much of a hurry. I could always claim I’d once been in the car with Robin, if it came down to that. Hopefully it never would, and some crack head would steal the car and take it to a chop shop, or wreck it. If my luck would just hold a few more days.

I hopped into the shower and let the hot water sooth my aching muscles. The soap burned all the scrapes on my arms and hands, but it felt wonderful to be clean once again. After I finished washing, I turned the knob to cold and gritted my teeth as the icy water washed over me. It was cruel, but it had the effect I wanted. I felt marginally more awake as I stepped out and toweled myself off.

I reached under the sink to pull out my first aid kit, and was frozen by what I saw. Things weren’t exactly as I had left them. I reached into my pile of dirty clothes and grabbed my gun. Wearing nothing but a towel, I made a quick circuit around the apartment, but nothing else seemed out of place. Maybe I was too tired. Because who would break into a person’s apartment just to riffle through their first aid kit? Just to be on the safe side, though, I decided to forgo the ointment and band aids, just in case they had been tampered with. There are plenty of drugs that are transferred through the skin, and the scrapes weren’t that serious. Still, it left me wondering, and that thought stayed on the edges of my brain as I went though assembling the case against Nate.

I brewed a pot of extra-strong coffee and poured myself a cup, then grabbed a box of snack cakes from the cupboard. I crammed two of them in my mouth and had already refilled my coffee cup once before I’d gotten the table set up with my computer, the files from my safe, and the box I’d dug up at the construction site. I started on the last of these first, since I needed the most awake brain to deal with the newest information, and I didn’t think I had much time left before I crashed.

The box contained dozens of snapshots, all of which I carefully scanned in, labeled, and tagged. I put them in a folder and sealed it, signing my name across the seal and adding the time, date, and case information. The one thing they never tell you in all the spy movies and TV shows is the sheer amount of paperwork involved. It gets tiring, but I was going to be sure to dot every T and cross every I this time. Or whatever. I poured myself another cup of coffee and snarfed another snack cake. The caffeine and sugar would have to be enough to keep me going.

Next I tackled the jump drives, which contained audio recordings of a lot conversations the participants can’t have wanted saved for posterity. I recognized Robin’s voice, as well as Nate’s and George’s, and there were two men I didn’t recognize. They were careful to never use names, but from the conversations, I gathered that one of the men was Edward Gaust. And it sounded like the other was someone who worked closely with him. I painstakingly transcribed the conversations, cursing my lack of typing skills. It took a few hours, but at the end I printed those out, added tags, labels, and my signature, and sealed them in an envelope with the original jump drives.

I fixed another pot of coffee and drank half of it before I tackled the last part of the box, the documents. They were a mix of financial records, bills of sale, and a few memos. I arranged them on the table carefully, and was able to follow a very thin trail of money from Gaust’s sham businesses all the way to Nate’s pocket. It was flimsy in and of itself, but combined with the audio, the pictures, and the info I had gathered on George it was enough for the agency to condemn him. He may not ever be tried in a civilian court, but he’d be punished. And that would be enough for me.

I fell asleep with my head pillowed in my arms, drooling on the table. My dreams were strange and troubled, with quirky undertones. I was on a construction site, being chased by Nate and George. Except everything, including us, was made of Lego blocks. And there was a pygmy hedgehog. But I didn’t know what he was doing there. Then I was on a boat, but the whole ocean was full of bubble bath bubbles. It was actually rather relaxing, and I settled in to enjoy the ride. The ocean grew rough, and I started to get sea sick. I woke myself up heaving and panting, and I narrowly avoided throwing up all over the evidence. I forced my stomach to settle down and took deep breaths. I still felt unsteady, and my head swam from too much coffee, too much sugar, and not enough sleep. I looked at my watch and swore. Though I’d only been asleep a little over an hour, I had to get moving if I was going to get the evidence in a safe place in time. And then I still needed to lead Nate and his boys on a merry chase in order to give Daniel the time to do what he needed to.

I dragged myself upright, and instead of another cup of coffee I drank a large glass of water. Then I took a minute to fix myself a sandwich, though I didn’t have anything in the apartment other than peanut butter. I fixed myself a fluffer nutter on slightly old, crusty bread. It sat heavily in my stomach, but at least it wasn’t rumbling anymore. I drank another glass of water and sat back down at the table to write up my report.

I strung together all of the evidence in a continuous narrative, adding my own personal observations and the evidence we’d gathered as a team. It was a long report, but comprehensive. It was more than enough for a formal criminal investigation, though not yet enough for a conviction. I had no doubt, though, if given free rein, we could dig up more information. And if we could work with the police, I had no doubt we could both get what we wanted – Nate behind bars and Gaust’s empire dismantled.

I finished the report, printed it out, and added it to the pile of evidence. All of it went into the metal box, and I tucked it under my arm and went to hide it in a place that hopefully only I and Daniel would think to look.

NaNo Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty Three
Sure, I could play that role, as long as they changed the name of the movie to “Gone in 600 seconds”.

I decided on public transport to get across town to the Weston. Mostly because, as short as the ride would be, I could catch a few moments of sleep. And a good spy always took advantage of any sleep they could get. You never knew when your next opportunity would come. I set my watch alarm for twenty minutes, and settled down in the subway seat to catch a few minutes of rest. I wouldn’t be a good sleep, but it was something. And I would need my wits about me in order to play Robin’s game.

Even asleep, I tried to stay alert, as idiotic as that sounds. I knew George was out there, and he’d be looking for me. At my best, he’d be no match for me, but I was no where near my best. I slept fitfully, my mind still trying to make sense of everything that had happened, trying to fit everything together. But there were still too many pieces missing. I could only hope Robin was leading me to a place with all the answers, and not a trap.

It had occurred to me that, as her final act, instead of redeeming herself, Robin would set a trap for me. There wasn’t any reason for it, other than my natural paranoia, but I resolved to stay on guard and not do my usual, stupid, rushing into things. And that’s why, after getting off the subway and walking the few blocks to the Weston’s garage, I scouted the area thoroughly before going up to the blue Mercedes on the fifth level. I looked over the car carefully, checking under it with a small flashlight, looking for any wires that seemed out of place, any explosives, any transmitting devices. I ran my bug scanner over it and came up with nothing. As far as I could tell, the car was clean. That didn’t mean the door wasn’t packed with C4 and the moment I opened it I’d be shrapnel. But it was a risk I was going to have to take.

After a deep breath, I punched the four-digit code into the door and the locks clicked open. Nothing else happened. I grabbed the door handle and yanked the door open. I was still there, still in one piece. I lowered myself into the car and looked for the GPS unit. It was tucked into the compartment between the seats, and it was fully charged. The little line that appeared on the screen showed the car’s last trip, starting in a section of town I wasn’t very familiar with and ending at this parking garage.

Unfortunately, Robin’s generosity did not extend to leaving the keys anywhere in the car. And Mercedes were notoriously hard to hot-wire. I suppose I could take solace in the fact that she must have had faith in my skills, but it was a hollow victory. Ten minutes, a lot of swearing, and one shock later I finally got the car running. Only to find that it was nearly out of gas.

Calling Robin every vile name I could think of, then feeling guilty because she was dead, I headed to the nearest gas station and put ten buck’s worth of gas in the car. I kept the baseball hat pulled down low and used one of the agency’s dummy credit cards, hoping that if anyone every looked into the security tapes they wouldn’t be able to tell it was me. I wouldn’t pass for Robin, but I might be mistaken for Mike.

I followed the GPS’s commands on a return route, and found myself entering the outskirts of town. Not a lot of people out and about, the construction sites having closed for the day. The GPS led me to a particular site surrounded by a chain-link fence and razor wire. It had obviously been shut down for quite some time, and as I read the placards posted on the fence it jogged my memory. Something about a corrupt land-development agent, some shady deals, and bad permits. The city had come in and shut the site down a few weeks ago. I almost laughed as I remembered one of the restaurants that was going into this particular strip mall. Red Robin. She’d kept it going to the very end.

I searched my fuzzy memory banks for the plan I’d once seen of the development, showing the proposed shop locations. If I recalled correctly, and I wasn’t sure I did, the Red Robin was slated to anchor one end of the strip mall. The North end. I slipped through an opening in the fence and walked across the uneven ground to the place I thought the restaurant should go. Litter covered the ground, and I scrutinized each piece until I found what I was looking for. Half buried in the dirt, and anchored securely with a large rock, was a Red Robin menu. I looked around for a shovel, but the construction site had long been stripped of anything useful. I swore again and made my way back over to the car. I’d left it idling, not wanting to have to deal with getting it started again, and I was gratified to find it still there. Luckily the local hoodlums had moved on after they’d picked this particular construction site clean of anything valuable.

I reached in and popped the trunk, not hoping for much, but maybe, just maybe, Robin had been kind. And in this once instance, she had. There was a shovel, still dusty from use, laying in the trunk. I thanked her and trudged back to the menu to start digging. I didn’t know how far down I’d have to go, but I was pretty sure it wouldn’t be too close to the surface. She wouldn’t have risked anyone accidentally stumbling on it.

By the time I’d made a hole a good seven feet in diameter and four feet deep, I was ready to give up. I’d run out off unkind things to call Robin, and marveled at her strength and endurance. Of course, she probably hadn’t been doing it while sleep deprived and starving, I reassured myself. And maybe the hole had already been here, and she’d simply filled it in. Or maybe she’d been more of a man than I was. I didn’t care at this point, I just wanted to find whatever it was she’d buried. Then the thought occurred to me. I didn’t know what it was she’d buried. I didn’t know how big it was. I scrambled up and out of the hole, scraping up my arms on the various sharp, pointy rocks. I gritted my teeth and ignored the pain, searching for the glint of metal I’d seen early in my digging. I hadn’t thought anything of it, believing I was digging for a large box or file.

I sifted through the dirt pile, and a few minutes later, I found it. “Son of a bitch!” I swore out loud. It was a locker key, on I recognized as being from the airport. It had been a foot or so directly under the menu, a mere one or two shovels full of dirt. I slumped against the pile of dirt, angry at myself and bone-weary. At least, I thought wryly, I’d gotten in a good workout. You just had to look at the bright side and laugh at yourself sometimes, or you’d go mad.

I took the key and went back to the car, heading out to the airport. It was a short drive, but I had to park in one of the outlying lots and that meant turning the car off. I sighed as I realized it meant another laborious task of re-starting the car, this time in a busy parking lot. Even at night, the airport was a hive of activity, and I couldn’t count on being unobserved for very long.

I took a shuttle into the terminal, getting a lot of not-so-subtle glares because of the dirt I was shedding everywhere. I probably didn’t smell as fresh as a morning daisy, either, but I ignored the looks and tried to act casual. It was easier to ignore the stares of the other passengers, but the looks of the security guards were more troubling. I looked suspicious, and they had every right to question me. I just did not have the time for it, and if they decided to pull me in I might not make it in time to gather all the evidence and bring down Nate before he took a page from George’s book and fled. I snuck a quick look at the arrivals board and saw a delayed flight. I breezed past the board and up to the nearest security officer.

“Excuse me, is there any way to know when the flight from Atlanta is going to be in? The board says delayed. My wife sent me here in hysterics, telling me I was late picking up her sister.” I gestured to my clothing. “Didn’t even give me time to change from my work clothes. If there’s enough time, I’m going to head home.”

The man relaxed at my explanation. I certainly looked like a construction worker. He inquired about the status of the flight using his walkie-talkie, and grimaced as he relayed the information to me. “Sorry, buddy, it’s due in about fifteen minutes.”

“Okay, then, any place I can wash up a bit and get a bite to eat?” I settled my face into a hang-dog expression. My stomach decided to help me out and chimed in with a loud rumble.

He gave me a sympathetic look and gestured me towards the far end of the concourse, where there were several restrooms, restaurants, and the lockers. With any luck, I could get into the locker and retrieve what was in it before the flight came in, and slip away unnoticed. For now, I was explained away as the harried, hard-working husband sent to pick up his wife’s sister.

NaNo Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Two
And then she realized, when he was saying ‘I’ll always have your back,’ he really meant, ‘you’re on your own’.

Robin was not going to give me anything easily. The disc did not contain a series of scanned documents or video files or anything so helpful. She was careful, putting a lot of distance between herself and the evidence. I might be able to link her to it if I tried, but it would be a hard sell. It would require people to know, or believe when I explained to them, a series of inside jokes and specialized references. And they’d have to believe I was telling them the truth, and this is where I got the information. Which, if I were them, I wouldn’t believe. It’s always easy to say you got something from a dead person, because no one can go back and hurt them. You don’t lose a source. It’s the oldest trick in the book. Not even Nate would believe Robin had given him up, because he was too egotistical to believe that anyone would turn on him. No, I was best off leaving Robin out of it and making them believe I’d stumbled upon whatever she had left for my strictly by chance. And, oddly enough, given my career and sting of luck, they’d probably buy it.

First thing, though, I had to decipher the mystery Robin had left on the DVD. It was a series of movie clips, seemingly random. There was no commentary, no hidden data that I could find. It seemed to be leading me somewhere. If I wrote out the scenes in the movies and the landmarks they showed, and translated them into landmarks in our city, like substituting the taco stand we frequented for the one in the show, it formed a neat trail from the office down to the docks. It took me a few times watching through, and I had to guess on some of the clips based on the path I’d drawn on the map, but I think I had it. It wasn’t the most direct route, it wound through a few odd places, but it was definitely a trail of breadcrumbs. By the time I finished, it was morning, and I hadn’t slept a wink. My eyes were gritty from lack of sleep, but I was wired with adrenaline. I dismissed the idea of trying to get a few hours of shut-eye, and instead decided to start following the trail before some little birdies came and ate the breadcrumbs.

I copied the audio file to a jump drive, then stashed the bug and the disk in my hidden safe next to the papers I’d hoped Sandra would never see. Sure, it was cleverly hidden and had a near-tamper-proof lock, but I would never underestimate that girl’s abilities. By now I was pretty sure she hadn’t been involved in her boss’s dealings with Edward Gaust, nor in his attempt to muddle the issue by involving Jason, and I was worried that wherever she was, she was planning on… not revenge, really, but clearing her name and bringing down the bad guys. That might be why Jason had picked her, of all of her team, to try to prove his innocence. She was by far the smartest, and the least trusting of the rat-faced George. I’d never liked him, but of course hadn’t been able to say that to Sandra. Because when would a graphic design artist have met an agent of his standing? And why would I know so much about his background? The lies still weighed heavily on me, and I made a pack that if I ever saw her again, I would tell her everything. She’d probably guess a lot of it when we put George and whoever he was working with behind bars. I was pretty sure Nate was pulling the strings, but I needed proof. If I could take down Nate and George, the rest of the rotten operation would come tumbling down. I had no idea how far the rot ran, but I could be pretty sure the rest of the underlings would roll as soon as we took out the leaders.

I tidied everything up, making sure I hadn’t left any notes that showed the real direction of my research, and headed out the door to follow Robin’s trail. The sun had just risen and it was a beautiful day, but all I felt was cranky and sleep-deprived. I promised my body and entire week in bed if it would just carry me through the next few days. The pep talk, or the bribe, seemed to work, and I managed to pick up the pace and make reasonable time along the path I’d traced out on my map.

When I got to the first location, a small, quaint stone bridge in the park, I was stumped. I walked around it a few times, searching for whatever it was that Robin would have left as a clue. There had to be something, somewhere. I was sure each of the locations would hold a piece of the final puzzle, and only by gathering it all up would I be able to get whatever it was she had stashed. She was being careful, and I just had to be clever enough to decipher all the clues.

It was on my third trip around the bridge that I saw it. Etched into a stone low on the bridge was the crude figure of a robin. I hopped down and, sure enough, the small stone wiggled free. Behind it was a small slip of paper with a single word written on it. I stashed it in my pocket, and headed for the next destination, my eyes on the lookout for small, red-breasted birds.

Robin had been very clever. There were places I found slips of paper, other places I found that there was a store nearby with a sign that boasted a robin. Sometimes the robin she’d drawn contained a letter or a number, and in one impressive piece of graffiti, the only think I could come up with was the number five, since it was a stylized picture of five robins. At the end of the trip I had a pile of clues that amounted to the following choppy sentence:

“Weston Crown 4 7 Park Level 5 Blue Benz 5 1 1 2 G P S”

I was exhausted from walking and searching for robins all day, and hadn’t eaten a thing. The Weston on 47th was a long was away, and my apartment was on the way. As much as it pained me to rest for even a short time, I knew if I didn’t get any sleep I’d be useless. I was on my way to catch a few winks when Daniel called me. I almost didn’t answer the phone, but curiosity got the better of me.

“What?” I yawned.

“Find anything good today?” he asked cautiously. “We haven’t heard from you in awhile.”

“Not yet, though I have some solid leads,” I told him. “Why do you ask?”

“I was hoping you’d be in a good mood,” he said. “And you wouldn’t get too pissed.”

“About what?” I was too tired and hungry to muster up enough anger to sound threatening. If anything, it came out sounding decidedly apathetic. I shook my head and tried to temporarily wake myself up.

“We finally got the evidence to nail George,” he said.

“That’s… good news.” I was confused. I didn’t think I was that tired. “There must be something else.”

“He’s gone. Slipped the net. We’re watching all possible escape routes, so he’s still in the city. But he knows we have him, so he should be considered very, very dangerous.”

I was suddenly a lot more alert. I made a quick scan of the area, and didn’t see anything suspicious. “I understand.” I checked my watch. It was three in the afternoon. If I gave myself a few hours, I might be able to recover whatever it was Robin had left for me. But I needed a place to stash it if George was on the run. It wouldn’t be long before he had Nate after me. And I didn’t have time to be as clever as Robin had. “Hey, Dan, do you fancy a game of racquetball? You know, like back when we were at the academy? I could blow off some steam.”

“Now?” He sounded surprised, and I could almost hear him thinking.

“No, not now. I need to catch some shut-eye. What about, say, tomorrow afternoon? I bet I can still kick your ass.”

“I doubt it. Unless you want to invoke those absurd out-of-bounds rules again.” He understood what I was saying. I felt relief wash over me.

“It’s like Calvinball. We make it up as we go along.” I chuckled.

“You, maybe. Okay, then, tomorrow, and I’ll show you I still have it, old man.”

“Who are you calling old man?” I retorted in mock-anger.

He chuckled and hung up the phone. I pulled myself together and tried to shake off the lingering cobwebs of exhaustion. A quick trip into a small coffee shop got me caffeine and sugar. Hopefully that would be enough to keep me going as I tried to unravel the mystery Robin had left for me. I could only hope the next step ended in something easy, unmistakable, and dead simple. Like a giant red X.

NaNo Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-One
I do not think that word means what you think it means.

Daniel and I left Robin’s house, him dejected, me buzzing with excitement. I was sure the DVD I had stashed in my shirt, now transferred to my computer case while Daniel wasn’t looking, would provide all the answers I needed. Robin had been an odd duck, and as mad and disappointed as I was in her choice of allies, if, in the end, she helped me out I was willing to forgive. Sure, she was a murderess, but when it came right down to it, a lot of spies were. Sanctioned murder, yes, but perhaps not justifiable. There are always unknowns, and you always have it in the back of your head that who you think is the bad guy might not be. I was willing to give Robin the benefit of the doubt that at the time, she was operating under the widely-held belief that Jason was a traitor. I didn’t know her reasons for killing Robert, if it had been an order or of her own volition, but I couldn’t feel bad about that. Not after what that weasel had said about Sandra.

I dropped Daniel off at his car, telling him I’d meet him at the bar in a few hours. The team was going out for a mini-celebration for having the Jason and Robert murders cleared. Daniel hastened to ensure me that it didn’t mean they were backing off Sandra’s killing, and I assured him that I understood. In this business, you needed to let off steam occasionally. Even if, to outsiders, it might seem inappropriate. I also knew there would be fond and not-so-fond stories of Robin told. Even though she died a traitor, she’d still been one of us. And she’d still done a lot of good work. Not to mention the ground rules for divvying up her office supplies would have to be set. I told you it might seem inappropriate, but it’s the way we did things.

The office was quiet and deserted, but the cleaning crew hadn’t been in yet. I stationed myself at a terminal not too far outside of Nate’s office. In a place this sensitive, even the cleaners had high clearance, and I had to keep in mind that they, too, were trained professionals. Most of them were training to be field agents, and often the instructors would try to trip them up during their cleaning duties. It was going to be a tricky job, or so I thought. Until I saw that evening’s cleaner.

She was hot, even in the baggy cleaning crew uniform. I couldn’t get a good look at her face, but she was curvy in all the right places and had the most luscious, er, flowing hair. I saw the perfect opportunity to play up the stereotypical male and get what I needed, all without her being the wiser. Sure, she’d think I was an uncouth lout, but as that wasn’t far from the truth I could live with it. I ducked back into the cube when she unlocked Nate’s door. It was important she didn’t know I’d seen her before. Surprise was the key element to my plan.

As she came out of Nate’s office and re-locked it, I picked up a hefty file and started reading it. When I saw, out of the corner of my eye, that she had started working her way down the row of cubicles, I stood up and, still holding the file, started to walk down the aisle while reading it. When I got to her cart I looked up, prepared to act surprised at seeing such a beautiful woman and ‘accidentally’ trip over the garbage can. It was genius. Except for the part where I was actually surprised and I did actually trip over the garbage can. I ended up on my ass, looking up into a gorgeous, and utterly familiar, face.

“Jake,” she giggled, surprised. “Fancy running in to you here!”

It was my youngest sister’s friend from elementary school. I used to baby-sit the two of them. My stomach heaved as I remembered the lusty thoughts that had just been running through my head. “Patty! I didn’t know you were training with the agency.” I reached out to lever myself up, and my hand closed around the crumpled chip package with the bug inside. It seemed my improbable luck in the spy business was still going strong. I hopped up, slipping the package into my pocket in the same motion. She never batted an eye.

“Just started a few weeks ago,” she admitted. “I was sorry to hear about Sandra.”

“Yeah. Hey, I’m sorry, let me help you clean that up,” I said, reaching for the toppled garbage can.

“No!” She threw out a hand to stop me. “I mean, no thank you. It’s my trash, and I’m responsible for it. I can get it.”

I grinned at her. “It wasn’t a test, but good for you. I am sorry, though, I didn’t mean it. I was so caught up in the file, and seeing you was a big surprise. Last time I saw you, you weren’t so…” I floundered for a non-offensive term.

“Tall?” she asked with a wink.

“Yes, that’s it.” I grinned back at her. “Well, I should leave you to it, I’m really sorry again! Good luck with your training, let me know if I can ever help.”

“Thanks,” she said, and bent to pick up the mess I’d created. I tried not to stare at her perfect bottom as I backed away. I finally got myself turned around and going in the right direction, giving myself a stern talking-to. What can I say, I’m a guy. We appreciate a fine feminine form.

I gathered up the rest of the case file I’d left on my desk and left the building. These were things best sorted through at home, where I could be relatively sure no one was watching me. I couldn’t be as sure no one was listening, which is why spies are never the type to talk to themselves. Or rather, good spies aren’t. You can never be sure you’re the only one listening. It was going to be a long night, going through all of the evidence. And even if I found anything, the ability to nail Nate on anything concrete might be difficult.

I stopped by a burger joint on the way home and grabbed dinner. It was shameful how little I’d managed to eat lately, and I could feel the lack of good food wearing me down. And I’d even done a stint in culinary school on a job, about five years ago. Another handy skill I liked to keep up on, when possible. But I was too eager to get to work on the case to even spend the time to whip up a simple dish, so burger and fries it was. Maybe when all this was done, if I came out of it in one piece, I’d look for a new career. Spying on spies is a tough business, and those of us who do it usually have a pretty short career. Not only is it dangerous, but the burn-out rate is extraordinarily high. At ten years in the business, I was considered a very old-timer indeed. Maybe I could make a switch to a regular spy. It would be less stressful, but still with the occasional surge of adrenaline. Though if the others would accept me, after having spent so long as our version of Internal Affairs, I did not know. Maybe I could just concentrate on my computer business. Boring, but I could make a decent living, and Sandra and I could settle down to a nice, normal life somewhere.

I got home and spread the papers out on the dining room table, propping the computer and the Princess Bride DVD up next to it. I attacked the bug first. Once I plugged it into the computer, it automatically downloaded the file. It hadn’t been left there long enough to run out of storage space, so it undoubtedly got my fast-food order and my conversation with Patty. I flushed at that, but at least I could edit that out before anyone else heard it. The files had a feature where it would show any tampering, and it would show that I had cut off the end, but I’d just tell them it was hours of silence, and that would be close enough to the truth. No one likes to sit and listen through nothing, and if I turned the entire sound file in, they would be forced to do just that. I’d simply make a note of what I cut out, time-wise, and tell them it was just the noises of me retrieving the device and driving home. I plugged a pair of headphones into the computer and got listening.

As I suspected, the first ten minutes were all that mattered. You heard me crunching down the hallway, eating the bag of chips. Then I knocked, and you heard me tell Nate what I was going to do. There was silence for a moment, then the sound of someone moving around the room and a door closing. The next noise could have been anything, but I’m guessing it was Nate picking up and dialing the phone, because his next conversation was one-sided.

“Hey, it’s me. I know, I know, but it’s an emergency. Blast that, I don’t have time for it. I’m the boss, no one taps my phone. Yes, I’m sorry, you’re going to have to destroy this one as… is that a toilet? Oh, I see. Yes, I’m sorry I had to call, but you needed to know they’re on their way. Jake knows something. You’ve been under… oh, I see. So you can’t… That’s a shame. I’m sorry, I can’t help you. You’re on your own. No, I’m not going to guarantee that, either. If you become a liability… Yes, that is harsh. Yes, I am that. Look, I just need to know where you put the… Robin? Robin? ROBIN? God damn it.”

The sound of a phone being slammed down, then picked up and dialed again. “Yes, I need to add time to a cell phone, please. The number is 555-6794. Pin is 5462. Twenty dollar’s worth. Yes, the card that is on file. I can confirm that, yes. 1142. Thank you!”

Hanging up and dialing again. Grumbling. Then the phone being slammed down again. “Don’t tell me no longer in service!” Then the footsteps, a door opening, and nothing else until Patty came in to empty the trash. Interesting. Nate had evidently run out of the office on his way to look for something, to get to Robin before she did what he knew she would. Too bad I hadn’t been able to tail him, as well, though I don’t think he’d be able to lead us to anything. How had Robin arranged that so well? Was it luck, or had she timed it so that he wouldn’t have time to ask her about whatever it was that was hidden?

Now she was off the hook, she hadn’t betrayed him. He wouldn’t go after her family, but he wouldn’t get what he wanted, either. Clever, clever girl, I thought. And suddenly I was very sad she was gone. She would have made a brilliant instructor at the academy.

I clipped the audio file down to the relevant part and added a note explaining what I did. I also tagged the date, time, and location of the recording. Then I turned my attention to the DVD. I opened the cover, and saw the standard disc staring up at me. For a moment my heart sank. But then I saw, behind the official disk, another CD had been stuffed into the case.

NaNo Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty
It’s a thin line between helping and hindering. Only the most talented can look like they’re doing the former while actually doing the latter.

I was on my way back to the lab to see if they’d found anything new when Daniel interrupted me. He came jogging down the hallway and grabbed me by the arm, dragging me into an empty conference room. Even in the semi-privacy of the conference room, he didn’t say enough to let anyone uniformed know what we were talking about. Walls in this place typically have both eyes and ears.

“That thing you had me do? It was… productive. We need to go now,” he whispered furiously.

I nodded in understanding. “I’ll meet you at the car in five. There’s one thing I need to do first.”

I hurried back to my office and pulled a small device from my desk drawer. It larger than most bugs, but that was because it was self-contained. It didn’t transmit a signal, making it almost impossible to detect. But that also meant that you had to retrieve it, making it much more dangerous to use. But in a place filled with suspicious, techno-savy people, it was the only way I might be able to get the information I need. It was another case where the risk would hopefully be worth it.

A quick stop by the vending machine for a bag of chips and I was on my way bag to Nate’s office, stuffing my face with chips as I went. I hadn’t realized how hungry I was, and couldn’t even remember the last time I’d eaten. When the bag was almost empty, I activated the bug and dropped it into the bag. I knocked and stuck my head around the corner of his office door. He motioned for me to come in. I popped another chip in my mouth, then crumpled the bag.

“Hey boss, just want to let you know Daniel and I are off to go over the crime scenes again, and check up on Robin. I feel awful about her being caught up in all this, and I haven’t even talked to her since.” I dropped the bag into his trash can. He barely noticed, paying more attention to what I was saying and less to what I was doing. A mistake a lot of complacent, office-bound agents make. Always watch for the misdirection.

He hesitated, unable to think of a tactful, reasonable way to tell me not to do something I should be doing. Instead, he nodded. “Good, let me know if you find anything.”

“Will do,” I said, and went off to meet with Daniel. I suspected anything of interest the bug would pick up would be in the next ten minutes, but I’d have to wait until evening to hear it. Patience is a virtue, I told myself. I could wait. It almost worked, but I was still jittery with anticipation.

I joined Daniel out in the parking lot, and we high-tailed it to Robin’s place, making one quick stop through a drive through to pick up a burger. Initially he objected, repeating the need for speed, but the look I gave him must have changed his mind. He settled back and filled me in on what they’d heard.

“She hasn’t done anything remarkable. She went home and has stayed there, not making contact with anyone along the way. The only reason we got the info was because we managed to get a wired mike in through the oven vent, and luckily she hasn’t done any cooking. And I know she’s swept the place for bugs at least twice. Once we saw her do it, and the second time she was on the phone, and she told the person she was talking to that she was actively searching for any. Even so, I’m surprised she said as much as she did. We have her on tape for the murder of Jason and Robert. Obviously, she can’t be the one responsible for Sandra’s murder, because as good as she is, she can’t be in two places at once. But you want to hear the best news?”

“We know who she was talking to?” I asked. That took the wind out of Daniel’s sails for a moment, but he rallied.

“Well, no. She was talking on a throw-away cell, and we don’t know the number so we can’t trace it. And the boys saw her thoroughly destroy it when she was done talking. She smashed it to bits and flushed the pieces, so that’s a dead end. But she did happen to mention that she still had the gun. She hadn’t had a chance to get rid of it. The bad news is that she knows she was followed, so that was a screw-up on our part. That’s why she hasn’t chucked it yet. Even though, if she tossed it off a bridge we’d probably never recover it, the act alone would land her in a lot of hot water. You know the agency doesn’t actually have to prove you guilty of anything to punish you.”

I nodded. “So if we get there fast enough, we might be able to track down the gun, and at least that’s something. I doubt we’ll get anything out of her, though. She’s too tough to crack.”

“I rather doubt questioning will lead to anything, either, but we have to give it a shot. You never know, maybe the lure of a lessened sentence will make her turn on her boss,” Daniel said, but there wasn’t much hope in his voice. We both knew how unlikely that was.

As it turns out, it was even more unlikely than either of us guessed. When we got to her house, there was already an ambulance parked out front. One of the surveillance crew came jogging up to the car.

“We tried to stop her, but we got there too late. We didn’t realize what was happening until it was too late. I’m sorry, boss. Really.” He took a deep breath. “And I’m sorry she knew she was being followed. We tried really hard to stay unnoticed, we did, and I honestly don’t know where we screwed up…” he trailed off miserably.

“She was a good agent,” Daniel said. “It wasn’t so much that you were incompetent as it was that she was very, very good. Learn from this. Go over it with your team. I want a full report and alternatives as to what you could have done better. I-”

“What happened?” I interrupted, though I knew the answer.

“She killed herself,” he replied. “She wrote out a note, which is when we should have seen it coming and done something, I know, and then she just shot herself. It happened so fast.”

“There’s nothing you could have done,” I reassured him. “Robin was a professional. She knew what she was doing. She knew she was being watched. Hindsight tells you that you should have known, but at the time, she might well have been writing out a shopping list. Don’t worry about it.”

He nodded glumly and went back to the surveillance van. I knew he would worry, there were no words that could stop that. But it was a learning experience, and he was young. In the long run it might help, though there was a thin line between a healthy amount of second-guessing yourself and thinking so much you lose your chance at action. I tended to lack enough second-guessing, and was admonished often for being too brash. Maybe if I’d screwed up a few times early in my career, instead of being the luckiest bastard in the agency, I wouldn’t have that problem. And maybe I’d have thought enough ahead to have planned for this eventuality.

“Well, shall we go see what Robin thought was important enough to tell us in her last words?” Daniel asked.

We trudged up to the house, where we were handed a blood-splattered paper in a plastic bag by an officer. “I suspect this was meant for you guys, makes no sense to us. Just be sure to hand it back to one of the CSIs when you’re done with it.” We nodded, and he wandered off.

The note was written in Robin’s distinctive swirling hand, and it was short and to the point. There was no greeting, and no signature.

You’ve come to me for information, but you’re too late. I’m too old and tired to hold up to questioning, and, frankly, those I’ve allied myself with would just as soon see me dead. It’s the coward’s way out, but I’d rather leave on my terms than to spend my last days cornered and afraid. The gun I used on myself is the same one that was used on Jason and Robert, and, yes, I admit I was the one who pulled the trigger. I’m not going to pretend I was a saint or try to pin my sins on anyone else. I’m sorry, Jake, that I had to let you down. It wasn’t personal. And I truly am sorry about Sandra. If I knew who killed her, please believe me that I would tell you. I have nothing left to lose, anyway.

And even though I have nothing left to lose, I regret to inform you that I cannot tell you who my boss is. There are other lives at stake, others I love who would be put in danger. And I cannot risk their lives. I do hope you understand this, and do not hate me too much for it. But as you wish, Jake, as you wish.

“Well, that was… weird.” Daniel said. “And fairly unhelpful.”

I nodded, and handed the note to a nearby CSI. “Any chance we can look around?” I asked.

“Just don’t touch anything,” she said curtly, and went back to her work.

“What are we looking for?” Daniel asked.

“Nothing,” I lied. “Just looking around. In case we missed anything, though I doubt we did. I just don’t want to look back later and think that we should have done something, you know?”

He nodded, and we wandered through the house looking at everything and anything. On my second circuit of the living room, I had a brief moment when no one else was there, and with no one watching, I quickly slipped one of the DVD cases off the shelf and into my shirt.

NaNo Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Nineteen
Your first instinct in usually right. Except, of course, those times when it isn’t.

I know she could have put the necklace on as she was driving home, or when she was walking up to her apartment. It was completely possible. But I didn’t think she would have. Not knowing what is was. Oh, I believed she’d keep it on her, so I’d be able to find her if I needed to, but I didn’t believe she’d ever wear it again. And I didn’t blame her, considering all it represented. I’m sure the lies and mistrust would be a lot to put aside, though hopefully some day she’d forgive me. But if it hadn’t been around her neck, why had it been broken? The only reason I could think of was to make it look like even more of a hit, the tracking device left behind.

Which would make sense if, as she believed, it was official. Then everyone at the crime scene would see it as an inside job, someone who knew what that meant and knew to leave it behind. But no one else knew. It was something I’d done to ease my conscience after breaking up with her. A way to keep an eye on her, and as a means to possibly be able to clear her name if anything ever came down. It wouldn’t be much evidence, but perhaps enough to cast doubt. I thought the risk had been worth it, though I honestly never thought she’d find out. And, I admit, if she hadn’t, and I’d been able to get back together with her, I never would have told her.

And it had been worth that risk, and even the consequence, since Sandra had been able to evade those following her so many times. We’d lost track of her a lot the last few days, leading others in the department to believe she was involved in whatever shady dealings were going down. But I knew where she’d been, and it didn’t add up. I went back to my office and sat at my desk, running through all the places I know she’d been. The one that kept popping up with a little red flag was the vamp club. She’d been there the night it burned down, the night Robert and John had been sent in to retrieve the blood. The night they screwed up, getting John, the superior, busted back down to background-check duty. The night they brought back the wrong blood. Blood. The dreams, the blood and the freezer. My subconscious hadn’t even been subtle in trying to tell me something.

With a groan my head hit the desk. It couldn’t be that simple. She couldn’t have. I refused to get my hopes up. I looked back through the evidence, shuffling the bits of the file and combining it with the things in my head that only I knew. The places she’d been when they’d lost track of her. And there was that brief stop on the way back to her apartment the other night…

I grabbed my coat and headed out the door, yelling a quick, “I need decent coffee, I’ll be back,” as I went. No one batted an eyelash at that, as the sludge they served in the break room had more in common with used motor oil than with coffee. You only drank that if you were desperate, or it was late at night and nothing else was available. Late. That was the key. She’d driven home very late at night. There couldn’t have been many places to stop. I retraced the route, keeping my eyes open. The tracking device wasn’t exact, but it gave me a fairly good idea within a block’s radius where she’d momentarily stopped. And there, smack-dab in the middle of that block, was an all-night big-box store. A place you could buy any number of things in a single trip. Including men’s clothing and rubber gloves.

I pulled into the parking lot, not sure how to approach this. I couldn’t leave a trail, because if anyone at the agency found it, all her hard work would be for nothing. But I had to know. Suddenly, I had an idea. Not a good idea, probably, but maybe just good enough to work. I whipped out my laptop and quickly hacked into the store’s credit card processing computer. Because of the need to approve the cards, a lot of information was flying around and available if you knew how to use it. This store’s security was particularly lax, and I was even able to hook into their live video feed. I couldn’t get any older information, though, so I had to take it to the next step. I poked around the digital info until I found the name of their computer security company. I slid into a logo-ed button-down shirt and went in to talk to the manager.

He wasn’t happy to see the list of credit card numbers I’d pulled off of his under-secured network, and he quickly agreed to my offer of giving his store security an overhaul. The company they were using had been recently highlighted in a new story about identity theft, and while the manager had meant to upgrade the security, he’d never gotten around to it. I gave him my schpeal about being a small, one-man operation, flourished my credentials (all those jobs and training courses finally paid off), and named a decent price, and he was more than willing to hire me.

To be fair, I did get him a very good system upgrade. Very few people would be able to hack into the system I installed. And I made a pretty penny on the side. But most importantly, I got unfettered and untraceable access to the records. I narrowed down the video tapes to the hours or so she would have been there, and saw her checking out. I brought up the register she checked out through and found what I believed to be her purchase. If it hadn’t been clear enough on the video, there it was in black and white. Men’s sneakers, jeans, flannel shirt, trash bags and rubber gloves. It was then I allowed myself to hope. She’d managed to fake her own death better than we had. Well enough that, as far as everyone working for the agency, she was dead. Even without a body.

It was the lack of the body that sold it, though it seems counter-intuitive. It had been brilliant. And if I hadn’t known about her visit to the vamp club, or her stop on the way home, there’s no way I would have been able to put the pieces together. I headed back to the office, happier than I’d been in a long time and trying not to show it. I had two objectives now: find out who was behind it, and make sure Sandra stayed dead. I had the power to confuse any investigation, and the more I put forth the belief that she was still alive, the harder they would try to prove to me that she was dead. And in the end, they’d build a cast-iron case for it and they’d believe it, regardless of their initial doubts.

I swung by my boss’s office on the way in. He knew about my computer side-business, and that I’d kept it up since the assignment three years ago. I wouldn’t go so far as to say he approved, but it kept me busy in my spare time and the extra income kept me from pushing too hard for a raise, so he tolerated it. As long as it didn’t interfere with my official duties.

“Yo, Nate, just wanted to let you know I worked a computer job this afternoon.” I took a deep breath. “It just… helped to clear my head, and take my mind off…” I trailed off convincingly.

He nodded, looking as sympathetic as I’d ever seen him look. That wasn’t saying much, since he had the empathy of a rock, but it was touching. “I completely understand. If you want to take time off, or get re-assigned, I’d understand.”

That threw me. We’d all swear Nate would make you work a case if your own grandmother had been killed, and here he was, willing to excuse his best (I’m not being vain, it was simply true) investigator because the victim was an ex-girlfriend? That seemed out of character.

“No, I feel like… I feel like I owe it to Sandra to find her killer. If, in fact, she’s actually dead.”

Nate gave me a pitying look. “She is, and while I have no doubt you’d manage to do a fine job, if you need off, Mike is more than ready to step in.”

I nearly choked. Mike? Nate’s pet lackey, Mike had the intelligence of a turnip. He was good at following orders, but not much else. Anything Mike was in charge of, Nate was directing. And that set off alarm bells in my head. If the problem was at the top, it would make it a lot harder to stop, and almost impossible to prove. I’d like to say I’d always suspected Nate of being up to something, but the truth is, up to that point, it’d never crossed my mind.

Nate was dry, humorless, and an asshole, but he never came across as corrupt. Good criminals usually have a smidgeon of creativity to help wiggle out of tough situations. Even the most meticulous plan goes awry now and then, and if you can’t roll with the punches, you’ll sink. And it was universally joked that if it wasn’t written down as standard operating procedure in some manual, Nate didn’t do it.

“No, no, I’m good. I intend to get to the bottom of this. If she’s dead,” I emphasized the word ‘if’. “If she’s dead, I’ll catch the bastard that did it.”

It might have been my imagination, but I fancied I saw a glimmer of fear in Nate’s eyes.