Locked and Loaded Page 9

  Son of a bitch.

  “You gamble with your new recruits like this all the time? Or do you just do this for my benefit?”

  “I knew you wouldn't kill Suraya.”

  I looked at the woman I had pinned against the door. “Are you psychic as well as psycho?”

  “Pretty exotics have always made you stumble.”

  I could tell by the set of the woman's mouth that she was hearing every word of this conversation. Hearing it, and not liking it. Well, that made two of us. If he really had picked her because he knew who she'd remind me of, well, he knew me better than I'd like.

  As for the woman, she just plain didn't like me. That much was clear. But we were standing so close there was no way she could avoid listening. I got the impression that she was learning a lot about her boss today.

  I wondered how she had gotten herself under his thumb. Maybe he'd picked her up with some sweet-sounding deal. She should have known better than to deal with the devil. He never plays by his own rules. On the other hand, her hatred of the bastard could come in handy. Something to keep in mind.

  “That's a pretty big risk to take.”

  “Ah, but the biggest risks result in the biggest of payoffs, Michael. I'd have thought that you of all people would know that.”

  “I have to say that playing Russian roulette with your operatives is pretty fucking expensive for someone so wrapped up in fiduciary matters. What's the payoff in that? I don't see it being very lucrative. Lot of turnover.”

  “You've become a humanist,” he scoffed. “How far you've fallen, Michael Boutillier. How weak.”

  “I'm a realist. I see things how they are, and that's nothing to be ashamed of, sir. Have you taken a look in the mirror lately? You're a twisted fuck who can't see shit. As far as weaknesses go, that's a big one.”

  “I rather wish you hadn't been on that plane,” he mused. “I'd love the excuse to cut you down to size. You and the girl. I can see my reports were incorrect. But no matter. They will be dealt with accordingly. Be at the car in five minutes, or you will join them.”

  Suraya grabbed her purse and the phone from me, unlocked the door, and set off at a brisk clip. It took me by surprise. The surprise didn't last long. The anger, however, did.

  I was still holding that gun — in an airport — and she had just thrown open the door so that anyone might see. Bitch. Was she trying to get me arrested?

  Possibly.

  I tucked the gun back out of sight and hurried after her. It didn't take me long to catch up. The heels on her boots were an impediment to her otherwise quick steps.

  I grabbed her wrist and gave her a sharp tug that made her stumble a step or two in those ridiculous shoes. “The fuck is your hurry?”

  “You heard Mr. Callaghan. He said we have five minutes. Four, now.”

  “The bastard says a lot of shit. He's full of it, in fact. He's a goddamn delusionist, and if you let him scare you with his little riot act you play right into his hands. And trust me, that is not what a pretty little thing like you wants.”

  She slapped me. Hard. Several people nearby looked over disapprovingly. “Don't patronize me.”

  “You're making a scene,” I snarled. “That what you want? You want to get us both killed? Because if it is, you're doing an awesome job. Fighting in a fucking airport. Security's looking over.”

  Suraya turned to walk again. “We're wasting time. That delusionist has my twelve-year-old sister. What do you think will happen to her if the two of us aren't in that limo before the time runs out?”

  “So. You're a realist too.”

  “No, Mr. Boutilier” — she had decided to drop the act — “I'm a fatalist. And if we don't get to that car on time, I am going to be a fatalist with a dead sister.”

  That, I understood full too well. I said nothing, but I quickened my steps, matching her pace for pace.

  There were several limousines in the airport parking lot. Suraya gravitated towards one in the dark gray of a lead bullet and rapped on the door. It swung open to reveal Callaghan and a younger, more delicate version of the woman standing beside me.

  “Suri,” the little girl cried.

  “Jatinder! Oh, thank the merciful heavens — ”

  The two of them hugged.

  “You've seen that she's come to no harm.” Callaghan tilted his head towards Suraya, who was looking at him over her sister's shoulder. “If you don't want that to change in the next few minutes, then I suggest you drive.”

  Suraya shot him a filthy look. She said something softly to the little girl in Hindi, most likely along the lines of “don't provoke the psychotic bastard,” and then slammed the door shut. I heard another one open, and the rev of the engine.

  “Having a family is so important when it comes to productivity,” Callaghan said. “Perhaps you should consider starting one, Michael. It might improve your punctuality.”

  Christina

  “Have you seen the film Two-Thousand-and-One Space Odyssey, Ms. Parker?”

  I startled from the monitor of the laptop whose codes I was still puzzling out when I realized he was watching me. How long had he been standing there?

  The last time I looked over he was in his cubicle making phone calls. With the door open. I could hear every word of his side of the conversation, which mostly consisted of him making calls to figure out who I was and whether I actually belonged in his class or if I was the wayward delivery girl he seemed to think me to be.

  It was horribly embarrassing, but this situation wasn't so great, either. How many times had he watched me fail? And, more importantly, had he overheard me cursing at the machine in Spanish? I hoped he didn't understand any, if that were the case. I'd been saying some pretty nasty things about him, too.

  “Yes,” I said cautiously. If this was a loaded question, the trap was not immediately obvious.

  “You are like the monkey with the bone.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Using blunt-force in the hopes that the strange, foreign machine will reveal its secrets to you—but destruction yields nothing. Only devastation.”

  He turned sharp eyes on the others in the lab.

  “That goes for the rest of you.”

  Studied silence.

  “Do not attack the problem head-on.” He was back to me now. “Computers are as sentient as their creators; it is easier to change the scenery than it is to move the actor. Subtlety, Ms. Parker, is everything.”

  My temples were throbbing by the time we broke for lunch. My eyes felt itchy in their sockets and a dull ache shot through them every time I shifted my gaze. While suffused in the glow of the monitor in the darkened room, I had gotten a terrible case of eyestrain.

  I found myself walking next to one of the male students in the class on the way out and tried my hand at a bit of camaraderie at Mr. Chou's expense.

  “Is he always like that?” I asked lightly, trying not to show how much the answer meant to me. I didn't want to believe that Mr. Chou was singling me out.

  The man looked at me blankly, then quickened his pace without responding. I blinked. The rejection stung, and left me with the urge to cry.

  I did not cry. I lifted my head and went to lunch.

  No intervention from surly-faced guards was necessary this time since I vaguely remembered where the mess hall was in relation to the computer lab. So that was one small blessing.

  More people were present for this bloc, and they were a different bunch from those who had been present during my breakfast bloc. This underscored my theory that the BN, for whatever reason, didn't want us getting too chummy with one another.

  Did it serve any purpose to the powers that be to make new recruits feel as miserable as possible? Maybe there was a psychological function, and it helped them weed out the weak-links.

  Do they even have a psychiatric division here?

  The IMA had. They had put me there when Richardson hadn't been absolutely convinced that I was telling the truth about my parents an
d Michael. Richardson had been the old boss of the IMA, killed by Adrian in the confusion of the explosion we had created in order to escape from Target Island.

  I had been strapped to a lie detector that wouldn't have been out of place in a Spanish Inquisition museum. A man who looked curiously like Sigmund Freud minus the crack-pipe asked me questions about everything from school to sex.

  I'd failed the polygraph test. Which, in retrospect, I think was the intention. One of the drawbacks of a polygraph test — which I know now because I had looked it up out of a passing morbid curiosity — was that they go by physiological symptoms that are associated with anxiety.

  Most people don't lie regularly, or at least not consciously, so when they do actively tell lies, they get nervous. Either out of guilt or out of fear of being caught. The problem is that a lot of people also get nervous when they're strapped to the lie detector. Especially if they have as much at stake as I did.

  You can train yourself to pass the test even if you happen to be a pathological liar by suppressing your sympathetic nervous system through biofeedback. That's why psychopaths almost always pass. Lying doesn't make them break a sweat — literally.

  I knew more about psychopaths than I'd like because I had met one, personally. Adrian Callaghan. The IMA had sent me to him when my results came back positive, and his mode of interrogation had nearly killed me. Just thinking about what he'd done to me, and what he hadn't done but would have given the opportunity, was enough to make me feel weak.

  The BN probably did have a psychiatric division of their own. I wasn't sure how similar it would be to those of the IMA, and I hoped I wouldn't have the occasion to find out, either. Being in their charge had given me a major case of White Coat Syndrome.

  Remembering all those things had curbed my appetite. I was feeling panicky. Not full-blown panic, the way I'd been in the hallway that morning, but with a stomach-twisting anxiety that made eating unappealing. But knowing that I might not get the chance to eat later, when I actually was hungry, I made myself a sandwich with all the fixings.

  Once again, I found myself faced with the dilemma of where to sit. My encounter with the weapons specialist that morning had been sobering. It was a reminder that I wasn't here to make friends. I was here to learn how to survive.

  No more, no less.

  God, how depressing.

  I sat alone, towards the back where I would be least likely to attract attention. I ate in silence, thinking. I had no idea what I was supposed to do next or when my short recess would end, but somebody around here seemed to have an itinerary. I imagined that if I was needed, I would be fetched as if I were a recalcitrant puppy.

  Surely enough, I saw the same guard as before enter the mess hall after a while. Once again, he was scowling. It occurred to me that he might be assigned to me. That would explain why he seemed to hate me so much.

  “You're supposed to be in the library.”

  “Is there a schedule or something? A map? Because if there is — well nobody gave me one!”

  The guard reached into the pockets of his uniform and handed me a crisply folded piece of paper. “You should have picked it up this morning.”

  Oh my God. They actually had schedules.

  I looked up from the sheet of paper. “Just what am I supposed to do in the library?”

  “Work.”

  “On what?”

  Silence.

  “Seriously, it doesn't say here.”

  Again, he elected not to respond.

  “Why do I always see you whenever I get lost. Are you assigned to me personally?”

  He dragged me by my arm into the library and left before I could press him with further questions he wouldn't answer.

  The guard hadn't answered my question but maybe the receptionist might. She was in her thirties, I guessed, older but not old. As I approached she peered at me over her glasses intimidatingly.

  “Independent study?” I said, looking from her eyes to the less intimidating string of pearls around her neck. Pearls seemed to be the de facto accessory around here. Too bad Adrian had stolen my ring.

  The last time I'd seen it, it had been hanging from a leather thong around his neck. He had a cabinet of “trophies” from the enemies he had tortured and killed. I'd gotten away, but he had kept my ring among them in the hopes that he'd one day get to finish the job.

  I shivered, and the women stared at me with mounting impatience. “Did you bring documentation?”

  “What, you mean this?” I produced the itinerary. I was proud of myself. My hand only shook a little as I handed it over.

  She grabbed it, nearly tearing the paper. When I cried out she looked at me coldly.

  “Sorry,” I said, “but it's the only copy I have.”

  “Instructor?”

  “Mr. Chou.”

  The receptionist disappeared into the backroom. She was gone only for a moment. She came back with a laptop, which she handed to me. I recognized it with an inward groan.

  It was the laptop I had worked with earlier. The laptop whose password I had been unable to crack. I thought dismissal had granted me a twenty-four hour reprieve but no, here it was again. Mocking me.

  I had never seen a computer look so smug.

  “Is this everything?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can I get my schedule back?”

  She harrumphed and handed it over.

  With the laptop tucked under one arm, I surveyed the schedule. My mood darkened further. I was supposed to spend four hours in this place.

  I wanted to bang my head on the table.

  Instead, I sat down and began tinkering with various alphanumeric combinations. The faster I got through this, the faster I'd be out of here.

  Besides, it wasn't as if I had much choice.

  Chapter Nine

  Iconoclast

  Michael

  “I've been wondering about something.”

  “Candy,” I said, leaning back in the seat.

  He looked over at me. “What?”

  “Candy. That's what's in a Wonder Ball.”

  “Ah, canned humor. Humanity's way of whispering in the dark. No, Michael Boutilier. What I am wondering is, why the hell don't you ever die?”

  “I don't know, sir,” I said, “I never tried. Dying's never been high on my list of priorities.”

  We were rolling through the security checkpoint of the Washington base. An armed guard was posted there, dressed in green fatigues. He clearly recognized Callaghan, but made the perfunctory request for ID.

  Callaghan flashed his card. “I'm starting to think that you were a cockroach in another life.”

  “I'll ask the next Buddhist I see.”

  During this whole exchange the little Indian girl was sitting as quiet as a mouse. Trying to make us forget she was there, no doubt. Smart tactic.

  “What's with the kid?”

  Callaghan replaced the clearance card in his wallet. “Suraya shares your penchant for defiance.”

  “I wouldn't have guessed she had it in her.”

  “You were never good at reading people.”

  I glanced at the girl again, wondering how much English she spoke. Not much, or she wouldn't have been able to maintain that stoicism.

  Not after listening to this conversation.

  I smiled and said, “Good for her.”

  I'd never liked taking on assignments involving kids. Kids shouldn't have to take the fall for their shithead parents. Plus, they were messy and there was too much crying.

  “I'm about as fond of insubordination as I am of things that cannot be killed.”

  “Now you're trying to kill God?” I snorted. “You're a blasphemous son of a bitch.”

  “Your problem, Michael, is that you've been far too lucky so far. But one day, that luck will run out. And when it does, I'll be waiting.”

  “Here I thought it was the Irish who were supposed to have all the bloody luck.”

  He flicked out a lighter. “Ide
ally.”

  I watched him light up a cigarette. I had no idea he smoked. It suited him. “Filthy habit.”

  “Only when compared to some.”

  Smoke filled the car, and the kid began to cough.

  I jerked my head in her direction. “What about the kid, for fuck's sake?”

  Callaghan laughed quietly. “Why, Michael, don't tell me you have a soft spot for the wee ones.”

  “Not just her. I don't want to be breathing that shit, either.”

  He reached over to crank down the window. The cold breeze was a slap in the face.

  “What work does she do for you?”

  He blew smoke in my direction. “The child?”

  Fucker.

  “No goddammit. The older one. Her sister.”

  “Oh, Suraya.” Callaghan took another drag on his cancer stick. “Driver. Linguistic Specialist. You might say that she's a Jane of all trades.”

  “What happened to the Sniper? I thought he was your jackoff of all trades.”

  “He had a loose tongue. I decided to cut off the problem at the root.”

  “So he's dead.”

  In the corner of my eye, I saw the girl stiffen. So that was one word of English she understood. Great.

  Hopefully Callaghan hadn't noticed.

  If the kid was at all smart, she'd play dumb. The less he thought she knew, the better off she would be, and that included English.

  He smiled. “Not quite.”

  “He's alive?”

  “I cut out his tongue.”

  Shit.

  “That's fucking sick.”

  Not that I felt sorry for the little fuck — he'd decided to screw with me one too many times. But the two of them, him and Callaghan, had been in close cahoots. Or about as close as one could get to Adrian Callaghan without getting burned.

  This was a pretty big change of heart.

  “So what's the point?” I ran my hand along my jaw. It was itching like a mother. “What possible use could Villanueva serve for you now?”

  Callaghan stubbed out his cigarette on the door of the limo. He watched the plastic blister and bubble as it came into contact with the hot filter. A noxious, chemical odor filled the car.