The Mysterious Stranger (The Confidence Game Book 3)

by Ainslie Paton

  “You think I’ve got time to train you? You think I’ve got time for injuries and accidents and food spoilage. I don’t. This whole place runs on the food that comes out of this kitchen. I’ve got no time for people who can’t contribute.”

  “Can you get me transferred? I’ll do anything else.”

  Macy slapped her hands to her thighs. “Can I get you transferred? That’s not how things work around here. You think we get a choice? Everything is done for a specific reason and you can’t just go altering things to suit one person because she looks like a fashion model.”

  “I can’t help how I look. Same as the next person.” Nothing Rory wore was special, the barest lick of lip gloss, her hair pulled back in a tail. This had to be the first time in her life her looks were a disadvantage. Oh, she’d used them to disadvantage others, but this was a novelty. “I don’t want to cause trouble.”

  “You are.”

  Had to admire a woman who knew how to roadblock so effectively. “It’s my first day here. How can I make this work?”

  “Tell me you were lying about having no skills.”

  No skills that made sense here. “Why would I lie about that? I really will do anything else. I’ll wipe goo from people’s faces if that’s what you need.” She couldn’t help herself and gestured vaguely at Macy’s cheek.

  Macy took a swipe at the smear and missed. “Crap, girl, I don’t know what to do with you, but if Orrin wants you here, that’s where you’ll stay. Doesn’t mean I have to like it.” She pointed. “You stand in that corner by the window and watch. Don’t move from there until the cleaning crew arrive. Then at five bells you be standing right there again, watching and then at five bells in the morning, same thing. Got it?”

  “That’s all?”

  Macy’s back was already turned when she said, “That’s all I’ve got time for.”

  Rory went to the corner by the window, conscious of all the eyes on her. So much for blending in. This was either a mistake or a lesson. Either way it was uncomfortable. What were they doing to Zeke? She stared out the window at a row of buildings housing the bakery, the general store, the laundry, the clinic and other town square structures and tried to recall what he’d checked on his work skills form and how that might make him the vegetarian working in a slaughterhouse.

  She stood there while the noise level in the dining room grew as people started arriving for the first seating, as the action in the kitchen shifted from preparation to serving meals in a canteen assembly line. Her stomach growled. She’d not had breakfast and the food smelled good. No one spoke to her and after a while they stopped looking her way.

  Was Zeke out there, was his voice part of the laughter, the deep rumble of male conversation? Her hand went to her back pocket again. That habit was going to die hard.

  She stood by the window while the volume from the dining room turned down and the action in the kitchen shifted again. There was more cooking, more preparation, not at the level of before but to keep the meal choices topped up, to serve the right amount of food for everyone. Macy was right, this was the nerve center of the settlement. Good food made waiting for doomsday palatable.

  Her feet were protesting by the time the delivery crew arrived. They carried hot and cold packs, a little army of people loaded up with meals to take out to work sites. They were the Uber Eats of Abundance without the choice of restaurants or tips.

  Meanwhile her stomach hollowed out and kissed her spine, and she considered marching out to the dining room, grabbing a plate and getting in line. Except maybe she’d score more points with Macy if she asked permission first. Trouble is she couldn’t see Macy anywhere. This was a torture for newbie survivalists.

  If she had to design a torture for Zeke, something to unsettle him, to break down a man less aware of what was going on than he was, she’d find a way to make him irrelevant. Starve him of company and activity and purpose. He’d be a growly bear in a couple of days and since she was feeling pretty growly herself, that would only be fair.

  She’d put him somewhere he’d be bored rigid, where he had to wait long hours with nothing to do for something inconsequential to happen that never did. That would test his patience. He wasn’t good at sitting still, Mr. Perpetual Motion. He was always neck-deep in a project, making plans for the next one, or being extravagant with his leisure time, trekking, or skydiving, or spelunking. He could surf and skate and ski. He had friends all over the world to go adventuring with, and he was never short of company.

  He’d hiked the Inca Trail and cycled through Vietnam, climbed Kilimanjaro, went dogsledding to see polar bears in Canada. He once went off the grid for a month to live in a tree house in Brazil or Argentina or wherever. He was the ultimate variety junkie and every time he went on vacation, he came home with a new save-the-world project for the bank of Sherwood to finance.

  You could see that in his long cons as well. They were elaborate ruses where he played character roles and there was always a risk he’d be discovered and exposed. An art appraiser, a paleontologist, a wine merchant. He did it so that he could extract the maximum amount of money from wealthy douches to fund his environmental crusades.

  He had nerves of steel and the heart of a lion. The memory of an elephant too. He could remember names, faces, bank account numbers and passwords glanced over a shoulder, and recall long-forgotten pranks and embarrassments in excruciating detail, a skill he deployed as a weapon in sibling wars, and since Rory had been an honorary Sherwood sibling, she’d felt the sting.

  She loved the stuffing out of him. The electric crackle she felt when he was around. He’d always been in her corner, no matter what, ready to give her whatever she needed, never assuming he knew what that was. Best big brother a girl could have.

  She never got lunch and never saw Macy again, but when she went to leave the kitchen as the clean-up crew arrived, there was her new bestie, Cadence.

  “Shouldn’t you be at work?” she snapped. It was undeserved, but might as well show the destabilization was working, speed things along.

  “I’m on a break, thought I’d check on you.”

  Like a good spy, because Cadence looked like she’d rather check on a rattlesnake. “Is there anywhere I can get something to eat?”

  “To eat?” Cadence smiled for the first time and it transformed her face. She was beautiful when she wasn’t tense and scowling. “Macy didn’t let you eat?”

  “Not exactly.” Macy didn’t want incompetence in her kitchen, that didn’t mean she wanted Rory to starve. “I didn’t want to bother her,” she mumbled.

  “You could try the bakery, but at this time, they’re mostly sold out. I’ll walk you over.”

  “It’s just out there,” Rory pointed out the open doorway. “I don’t need a travel guide.”

  Cadence simply ignored the sarcasm and led the way. Absolutely, definitely following orders.

  The bakery was empty except for a sleepy, apologetic baker. The general store next door had clothing and footwear basics and simple tools, an Abundance organic toiletry range, homemade candles, condiment and spreads and herbal teas in jars with handwritten labels, and five different types of rope, but nothing Rory could actually eat unless she went with a jar of preserved onions.

  She was almost that hungry.

  “We have fruit in season in the mornings,” Cadence said, stepping back behind a counter, on top of which was a large pile of nails, and the smaller piles they were being sorted by size. “Sometimes we have milk and yoghurt or cookies, if someone makes enough to share. We don’t believe in waste.”

  “But otherwise I need to eat during mealtimes.” Who’d have figured her cult experience would start with self-inflicted hunger pains. “Guess I’ll just take a walk around and then go finish unpacking.”

  It must’ve been an approved activity because Cadence went on with the nail sorting and let her leave with a, “See you at home.”

  She got to the door and turned back. “Hey, you never told me how come you
came here?” She had to bond with her new roomie. She needed information and for that she needed friends.

  “Same way you did.” Cadence kept her eyes down on the nails.

  “You mean you believe the world is falling apart fast and this is the only safe place?”

  “Of course I do. But I was an addict too. If I wasn’t here, I’d be dead already.”

  Ah, that confirmed the spy assumption. Cadence had been briefed, but it would play false if Rory appeared happy about that. “Who told you I was an addict? Are you supposed to watch me in case I’ve smuggled drugs in? They’ve already searched my bags, you know, and I’m clean.”

  Finally, Cadence looked up. “I didn’t volunteer for this. I’m supposed to make sure you don’t starve to death in your first week.” She shook her head. “So far I’m not winning.”

  Rory grimaced on her way to a laugh. “I’m sorry. I don’t know where Zack is, and I can’t call him. Everything is...” She dropped her gaze to the floorboards and waited for Cadence to fill the blank with empathy.

  “Strange. I know. Zack will show up soon and you’ll get used to being here. In a few months, you’ll wonder how you ever put up with the bullshit of the decay.”

  “How did you score me as a housemate if you didn’t volunteer?”

  “My cabin had a spare bedroom. They matched us up when they couldn’t find a cabin for you and your brother to share. I live alone because my roommate went into a bond.”

  “A what?”

  “She bonded. It’s like being married in the decay, but either party can quit any time they want. They agree to live together as partners, support each other, have children, all the regular stuff, it’s just we don’t call it marriage and it doesn’t have to be for life. It’s also no big deal. You sign a piece of paper together at HQ and if you split you go and tear it up. No fault, no blame.”

  “What if you’re gay?”

  Cadence risked eye contact. “Are you?”

  She’d considered it for her cover. It would make it easier to avoid men, but, it was men who were in charge. Avoiding them wasn’t going to get answers quickly. “No. Are you?”

  Cadence’s eyes went back to her hands. “Dabbled in the decay, trying to work things out. Mostly I don’t find anyone attractive in that way. I’m different I guess. Sex isn’t important to me. But you can have sex with whoever you like. We don’t judge.”

  Oh yeah, they did. They’d judged Cadence a good investment.

  And no way it was all as easy as it sounded. “How does dating work?”

  Cadence groaned. “Same as always. Just as awkward from what I can see.”

  Rory laughed. She could get to like Cadence. “And sex without bonding?”

  “So many questions.” Cadence waved a nail at her. “I have to sort these, and you should go unpack. If you look in the kitchen cupboard at home there might be some dried fruit, raisins maybe.”

  Raisins were better than pickled onions. It didn’t matter if the Continuers enjoyed bi-sexual orgies on every flat surface, they were all being taken for a ride.

  She left the general store and stepped out into the sunshine to take her first walk about the town square. They’d done aerial surveillance of the settlement, and from photographs she knew the basic layout of the place, but seeing it up close was more revealing.

  The first thing to notice was that there was no one hanging about. Almost like it was siesta time, the streets were empty. That suited her purposes. Her casual stroll became a methodical survey of the places most likely to contain a cell jammer. She’d already discounted the kitchen. Too much traffic to the area, too many people around who could trip over a piece of equipment. The general store and the bakery she discounted for the same reason, but she was going to need a bandage, or a headache fix to explore inside the clinic during daylight, and a whole different set of excuses to get inside the nursery and the school.

  That left headquarters, which was a sprawling low-slung building with a second story. It was the obvious place, which made it equally obvious the jammer was someplace else where fewer people might be tempted to turn it off and log on. It also left a host of buildings a five-minute walk away; the assembly hall and what looked like a sports equipment block, which sat at the edge of a playing field.

  Beyond that was a series of outbuildings and the mystery barns where they hoped to uncover something reportable to shut this place down. For all she knew, Zeke had already made it that far and found the cell jammer.

  Her hand went to her back pocket.

  Shit.

  She really wanted to talk to him, tell him about the kitchen catastrophe. He knew she was a girl who like to dine out and be cooked for. He’d get a laugh out of her predicament.

  She went back to the cabin with the blue flowerpot and checked the cupboard. Two plates, two dishes, four glasses and some assorted silverware, candles, matches, fire starters, mousetraps, a lopsided pottery vase and homemade bug spray.

  No raisins.

  There wasn’t much of anything else either. The cabin was sparsely furnished, everything sturdy and practical, made for basic living rather than wallowing in comfort. She was going to miss comfort and her e-reader and Netflix and order-in and restaurants and alcohol and—

  Stop.

  Unpacking took all of ten minutes, so she went for a walk around the rows of cabins, maybe Zeke had thought to leave a sign. She’d do that when she got back. Turn a T-shirt he’d recognize into a flag. There were lots of unique markers but none of them looked like they’d been placed there recently or belonged to Zeke.

  At five bells she went to the kitchen and took up her position in the corner. Nobody came near, spoke to her or made eye contact. If Macy wanted her to feel like she was being punished, it was working. When the noise in the dining room reached a crescendo, she went looking for Zeke. Short of standing on a chair and shouting his name, she was left with weaving her way around the room. He’d see her that way, just like everyone else who stared as she went by.

  And how they stared. Whole tables of Continuers falling silent and gluing their eyes to her body. It took a real effort not to put a little swing in her step, give them something to look at.

  Zeke was like raisins. Imagined.

  She ate a plate of stew which might’ve been made from sawdust. She was so hungry and light-headed she’d have eaten anything, and the food made it easier not to care she sat alone and was entertainment for the locals, even though she wasn’t doing anything but forking carrot and potato into her mouth too quickly to be polite.

  Meal complete, she went back to her place in the corner, like the useless recruit hoping for a reprieve she was, and when the next hour came around, she went looking for Zeke again. He’d be looking for her too, so this should be easy, especially given the silences and the head turning she attracted.

  And no Zeke. She did the back-pocket pat and then cursed.

  He could look after himself, but this was annoying, more so because it was deliberate.

  There was one last stint of standing in her corner with the satisfaction of having Macy grunt at her as she came past, and then back at the cabin, she hung her Nasty Woman T-shirt in a front window so Zeke would know where she was. She spent her second night at Abundance under a pretty handmade quilt, in a single bed, in a tiny bedroom of a cabin she shared with a woman who said she was an addict and may well have been saved by coming here.

  But then, sixteen-million Americans thought chocolate milk came from brown cows.

  The bed was narrow and it was difficult to get comfortable. They were teaching her a lesson by separating her from Zeke. The ill-fitting job was another way of undermining her confidence. The stares and silences played their part as well. She was supposed to feel isolated and afraid, so that when the love-bombing started and she felt acceptance, she’d fall in line to avoid the pain of being rejected again. Knowing that’s how it worked was strength and comfort.

  Still, it took her hours to fall asleep, running through e
very scenario for what came next, even the remote one where she never saw Zeke again.

  There was no strength in that, and no comfort.

  Chapter Five

  Zeke woke, squinted at his naked wrist and then fumbled for his phone to check the time, groaning when his vision filled with nothing but blue sky. Yeah, that’s right, so much for missing his bed. He was in a sleeping bag on the hard ground, in the middle of thousands of acres of pristine wilderness, he ached all over, was desperate for a soak in a tub, and he was digitally detoxing.

  And Rory likely had no idea he’d been drafted onto a construction crew where he’d live on-site for a week at a time.

  A red-tailed hawk flew overhead, wild and free. What was Rory doing? Snug in bed still after taking names and kicking ass, hopefully. They’d been separated in the town square and he’d had no way of knowing he wouldn’t be back. It was a bitch not to be able to call her, send her a snap of that hawk, to make sure she knew he hadn’t been buried in a shallow grave out here with only a cactus as a marker.

  It had to be five, maybe earlier. The air was crisp and the shadows still long. The rest of the crew was asleep, spread out around last night’s campfire. He unzipped the sleeping bag and rolled to his feet, shoved on his filthy jeans and snagged his T-shirt. With a full water bottle, and socks and boots in hand, he left the campsite. If anyone stopped him it was just a call of nature, if the drone drop site was further than he’d calculated, he’d say he got lost. The ten-man work crew had already had their jollies at the expense of his city slickerness, so it was an easy stereotype to play into.

  He’d been walking twenty, thirty minutes when he hit the stand of trees where he knew the phone would be. It was sheer luck the work site was so close to it. He took a sip of water and checked his bearings, and a noise behind him, the drag of feet over earth, made him pause before he took another step.

  “What kind of trees are these?” he said without turning.

  “Mountain spruce.”