The Athena Factor

by W. Michael Gear

  Copperhead was nowhere in sight. Sheela walked through the archway that separated the powder room from the toilets. Christal was two seconds behind her. Passing into the toilets, she found her quarry.

  To her surprise, a short line waited: two women, Copperhead, then Sheela, and finally her. Bending at the waist, Christal assured herself that feet filled every stall.

  “God,” the first woman in line muttered. “This is taking forever.”

  “Nice reception, don’t you think?” Copperhead turned to Sheela.

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Sheela Marks, right?”

  “Right. And you are?”

  “Cindy Denton. I work with MCA, rights department.” She hesitated. “I liked Blood Rage. Saw it last week.”

  Copperhead was giving Christal a thorough scrutiny. Christal didn’t make eye contact, but fumbled with her purse for a distraction.

  “Thanks, it was a fun film to make.”

  “Congratulations on the Oscar.”

  The toilet flushed, and a harried woman stepped out, pulling her skirt straight as she headed for the sinks.

  “I wasn’t expecting it,” Sheela answered. “You always hope, but when it came, I just couldn’t even think straight.”

  One by one, the line moved up. Copperhead stepped into the stall. Sheela glanced at Christal just as the woman in the adjoining stall flushed and stepped out. She was a mousy thing. Thin, dark-haired; the glance she gave Sheela was curious, evaluative.

  Christal watched Sheela step in and close the door. She could hear fabric slough, a purse snapping, urine, then a flush. Another flush. Then another.

  Finally, Sheela stepped out, pulled her dress straight, and shrugged as she walked past. Christal glanced into the stall. A tampon floated in reddened urine.

  Copperhead stepped out unexpectedly, saying, “Excuse me. Please use that one.” She pointed at the stall she’d just vacated as she pushed into Sheela’s and flipped the door closed.

  Christal stopped short. What the hell?

  Sheela was at one of the sinks, bent to wash her hands as she checked herself in the mirror. The sounds from the stall made no sense whatsoever: the lid clunking as it was lifted … Then what? Christal couldn’t place the noise as she pushed on the locked door. Was that plastic crackling and dripping water?

  Moment’s later, Copperhead opened the door, surprised when she found Christal still standing there. Their eyes locked, and Christal started forward, saying, “One moment, please.”

  Copperhead crouched, lowering her shoulder. She caught Christal off guard, driving her body back, off balance. Christal clawed for balance as Copperhead slammed her into the wall, then followed up with a hard blow to the solar plexus. Then another. And another.

  Christal windmilled against the tiles as she tried to catch her balance. Her body jerked against the blows. She was gasping for breath, and then Copperhead was off, leaving at a run.

  “Stop her!” Christal croaked, coughing as she pushed herself upright. Her guts were on fire. A glance showed her that the toilet bowl was white, the water clear.

  Sheela and the other women had turned around to stare in disbelief as Copperhead ran past. The purse in the woman’s hand was larger, and gripped as if it contained diamonds rather than a used tampon and urine.

  Christal coughed again. Her lungs burned as she drew a breath and stumbled toward the door. She straight-armed a surprised woman who stepped into her way, pounded past the alarmed gazes of the women in the powder room, and smashed the door open. Salvatore was walking toward her, concern on his face.

  “The woman!” Christal croaked, still out of breath. Then she saw her, that streaked-auburn head making straight through the crowd for the fire exit. “Stop her!”

  Salavatore lifted his arm and spoke into the mike, a frown on his face. Christal forced herself forward, weaving through the surprised crowd. Across the packed room a fire door swung open. An alarm blared flatly.

  Christal could hear Salvatore’s feet thudding behind her as she dodged, weaved, and shoved people out of her way. The fire door clicked closed just as she bowled past the last of the gawking spectators and hammered her body against the crash bar. She might have hit a wall. Even the impact of Salvatore’s thick body didn’t budge it. For a long moment they hung there, thrusting, both of them, while the alarm blared its obnoxious wail.

  Lieutenant Harris, of the Los Angeles Police Department, studied the rubber wedge inside the plastic Ziploc he held. It was a door stop, one of nearly thirty scattered around the hotel. They’d pried this one out of the fire door. “Who knows, maybe we’ll get a print off it. Maybe it will even be from someone who doesn’t work at the hotel.”

  “Don’t get your hopes up.” Christal had her butt propped on one of the wood-veneer tables as she looked around the small conference room. The walls were finished in beige and illuminated by overhead fluorescent panels. A podium stood in one corner; an easel with marketing diagrams had been left behind by some of the room’s previous occupants. Outside, the press of media could be heard as two cops held them at bay in the hotel hallway.

  Lymon stood with his arms crossed. The lieutenant and another detective sat at the table with the baggie. Sheela looked shocked and humiliated as she twisted her hands in her lap. The expensive Narciso Rodriguez dress seemed to shimmer in the light. Salvatore had a chastened look, as if he’d just come up impotent on his wedding night. For her part, Christal hugged her sore stomach and fumed.

  “Why’s that?” the lieutenant asked.

  “It was too well planned. Right down to the fake legs in the stalls.” Christal pointed her chin at the plastic trash bags full of shoe-covered mannequin legs. “Copperhead was wearing gloves. You’re not going to lift anything from the women’s room stalls or the fake legs, either.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “Did you get anything at Julia Roberts’?” Lymon asked, picking up the threads. “How about at Bullock’s in Wyoming? Ono’s in New York?”

  “You’re saying this is related?” Harris looked from one to the other.

  “Yeah.” Christal took in the shocked expression on Sheela’s face. She looked as if she’d just been raped. Maybe without the physical brutality, but the sense of psychological violation and humiliation reflected there made Christal’s heart ache. “They didn’t get their sample in New York. They had to come back.”

  “What? What sample?”

  “Their piece of Sheela,” Christal added.

  Harris and Lymon both turned frowns toward Christal; the former asked, “What piece are we talking about?”

  “A piece of her, a bit of Sheela.”

  “For what purpose?”

  “We don’t know,” Lymon muttered.

  A cop opened the door and leaned in accompanied by the sounds of melee in the hallway. “Lieutenant, there’s no Cindy Denton at MCA. Not in the rights department, not anywhere.”

  “Thanks.”

  Christal could see a crush of reporters held back from the door behind the small knot of police personnel. They were calling questions as the cop pulled the door closed behind him.

  Harris stared at the plastic trash bags on the floor. “Look, even if we figure this out, we’re not going to be able to do much.” He met their eyes sympathetically. “What’s the crime? Theft of a tampon and urine?”

  “Second-degree assault,” Christal replied. “She hammered me three times after she shoved me against the wall.”

  He studied her thoughtfully. “We’ll file it that way if you’re willing to press charges, but if it ever comes to court …”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know. There’s a hundred ways a good attorney could get an acquittal.” She made a helpless gesture. “But what else have we got?”

  For a moment, no one spoke.

  Harris made a decision. “Ms. Anaya, we’ll be sending a detective by tomorrow with a forensic artist and an old-fashioned mug book. It’s obvious that the mousy woman and Copperhead, as you call he
r, were working together on this. If these things keep happening—”

  “They will.”

  “—then at least we’re doing something that might be proactive.”

  “How’s the situation out there?” Sheela asked, looking sick to her stomach.

  Lymon replied gently, “This has a bad smell, so the press has come in a swarm.”

  She closed her eyes, color draining from her cheeks. Christal stepped forward instinctively and reached out. At her touch, Sheela looked up and gave a brief shake of her head, raising an arm to stop her. “It’s okay, Christal. I’m tougher than I look.”

  “Yeah,” she answered. “I know.”

  Pain lay bright in her blue eyes. “If you hadn’t been there, we’d never have known.” A pause. “I wonder, would it have been better that way?”

  The cell phone in Hank’s pocket rang twice before he could stumble from the Marriott’s bed to the chair where he’d flung his coat the night before. The hotel room had a brownish look in the dim light. Much nicer than the Best Western, and without any connection to Marsha. He glanced at the bedside clock: 8:23. Morning, he assumed, and wished he’d been easier on the bourbon last night.

  “Yeah?”

  “Abrams? That you?”

  He recognized the voice. “Hey, Larry. What’s happening in New York these days?”

  “Just the usual. We’ve got half the Muslim population under surveillance. Kidnapping is up; drugs are down. I’m up to my ass in paperwork, and I’ve got a hot date with a grand jury on Friday. Which is why I’m in the office today. I got your voice mail.”

  “And?”

  “Sure, we know about Verele Security. We work with them a lot. They’re on the up-and-up. It’s an international executive security firm. Big time. They specialize in high-profile personages. They had someone in our office last week. Some Saudi prince was in town for a bunch of medical procedures. Hush, hush, very sensitive. Maybe the guy had VD and didn’t want the local mullahs back home to know. You get the picture?”

  “Anything suspicious about them? You hear any rumors?”

  “Nope. Why, you got something I should know for a heads-up?”

  “Nah, it’s just that, well, they’ve offered me a job. Sort of. If I pass the test.”

  “All I can tell you is that from our end, our dealings with them have been professional all the way. Especially with the ebbing and flowing of the terrorist threat. Like I say, they do a lot of Arab leaders, rich Asian businessmen, and that sort of thing. Mostly they try to keep their clients, and their clients’ security, from rubbing with the public. Sometimes it’s tied up with diplomatic stuff at the UN, and sometimes it’s exiled leaders here for different reasons. If you got right down to it, I’m sure you’d find that some of their clientele are scum, but that just comes with the territory.” A pause. “You going to do this?”

  “I don’t know. Larry, I’ll level. I got my balls busted. Demotion and transfer to El Paso. Political, if you get my drift. The assistant director himself recommended Verele Security.”

  “Shit happens,” Larry said neutrally. “They’ve got an office in the city. Flatiron Building, I think.”

  “Yeah.” Hank looked down at his knees; his bare feet were kneading the carpet. “Listen, if they schedule an interview, how’d you like to do lunch? Or would you be seen in public with a pariah like me?”

  “Call when you get here.”

  How many years had it been since Lymon had had butterflies like this in his stomach? Five at least since that last mission into Iran. It had been his final HELO—high-elevation, low-opening parachute drop—into a hostile environment. Naval intelligence needed positive identification of a chemical plant since the Iranians had built it in the middle of a residential area—and next door to an orphanage for good measure.

  Lymon and his team had used a handheld laser targeting device to ensure that the navy jets hammered exactly the right building from exactly the right direction. They even had to dope the wind so that it carried the fumes away from the kids.

  He felt the butterflies again as he walked down the hall, past the Southwestern art, and stopped at Sheela’s door. He tapped lightly at the carved wood.

  “Come,” came the tired response.

  Lymon opened the door, entered the parlor, and found Sheela curled on one of the chaise longues. Across from her, the giant TV displayed Russell Crowe in Gladiator. He was enthusiastically slicing, dicing, and lopping off limbs. Since the sound was off, it looked curiously surreal. Sheela, however, might have been oblivious as she stared vacantly into the corner. A half-empty cup of tea perched on a silver platter on the low table to her right.

  “You asked for me?” He walked over and sat in the overstuffed couch across from her.

  “Rex just left.”

  “I know. He sent me up.”

  “He thinks I should can you.”

  “If you would be more comfortable that way, I understand.”

  She looked up with distaste. “Lymon, shut up!”

  He lifted an eyebrow at the tone in her voice.

  A faint smile appeared, then died at the corners of her mouth. “I need you too much right now.”

  “We haven’t been doing such a hot job. First New York, then last night.”

  “That’s not why I need you.” A pause. “Well, yes, there’s that too.”

  “Christal reamed me pretty good. She was wondering just why, exactly, I only had male security guys to keep track of a female principal.” He paused. “She did a good job last night, didn’t she?”

  Sheela raised her eyes. “How’s she feeling?”

  “Sore. She showed me the bruises. Whatever Copperhead hit her with, I’m surprised she could go running in pursuit.”

  “Just a fist.” Sheela shook her head. “I saw it. Saw her expression as that woman slugged her in the gut. It had to hurt. Is she still blaming herself?”

  “Yeah. Like me, she seems to take these things personally.”

  Sheela seemed to fade. “You don’t know what personal is. It’s all over the papers.”

  “I know. Dot slammed an assortment of today’s editions on the conference table. The slug lines were creative, to say the least.”

  Sheela’s lips trembled. “Do you know how creepy it is? They maneuvered me right into that stall, lined it with plastic, and stole my … my …” Her eyes were imploring. “Who’d steal a woman’s tampon, for God’s sake? How sick can you get?”

  “Well, do you want me to think about it for a while? I’ve got a wild and very creative imagination.”

  The attempt at humor succeeded in getting another quiver of her lips.

  She took a deep breath, sighed, and slapped her hands onto her knees. “Hell, I should know better. It’s just the price you pay in this business.”

  “It must feel like being raped.”

  She fixed him with a steady stare. “Believe me, it’s very different.” She saw through his stoic expression. “Why, Lymon, I’ve taken you by surprise! A woman who takes risks—like I always have—gets slapped down by life on occasion.”

  “On occasion?”

  “The first time was in Saskatoon that time I ran away. One night, under a bridge.” She looked away, as if evaluating her past. “A great many things happened as a result of that forbidden motorcycle, didn’t they?”

  “I’m sorry. I’d change it for you if I could.”

  She waved it away. “I wouldn’t let you. I wouldn’t be who I am today, but for those events.” She turned her eyes to his, watching for some sign. “Does it bother you? Knowing that I’ve been raped?”

  He leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his knees. “Sure it does. You’re important to me. I’d be a dirty liar if I said no and shrugged it off. But the past is the past. You are who you are, and that’s who I’ve come to regard and respect.”

  “Regard and respect?” she asked dryly. “My, I couldn’t have stated it any more sterilely with rubbing alcohol.” She paused. “What would you say
if I asked you to stay with me tonight?”

  He could see the desperation in her eyes. “Sure. I’ll set up camp out here. You’ve got a great library.”

  “What if I wanted you in there?” She indicated the closed double doors that led to her bedroom.

  “I’d have to decline unless I could bring someone, maybe Christal, with me.”

  Her chuckle was humorless. “Ah, Lymon, always professional. It’s okay. I won’t ask you. Won’t compromise your professional ethics.”

  “Look, Sheela, you’re upset, off balance, and desperate to find some kind of stability. You don’t want me. I’m not the man you think I am. Trust me on this, huh?”

  She reached out for her tea. “Did you know there are people who make a hobby of memorizing the names of actors who have committed suicide and overdosed? Is that macabre, or what?”

  “Why bring that up?”

  “Because I finally understand way down in my bones why they do it. Not the counters, but the suicides.” She sipped her tea, looking down into the brown liquid. “It caught me right out of left field, the biggest surprise of all.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I never anticipated the incredible loneliness that comes with success. They’re all standing in line, thousands of them, all wanting something from Sheela Marks. Since the Oscar, they’ve been hammering down Rex’s door. It seems like the entire world wants me to give, but I, on the other hand, can’t even share my only friend’s company for a night.”

  “I’m not your only friend.”

  Amusement filled her. “Aren’t you? Who else will give me a motorcycle ride? Do you have any idea how precious that day was to me? Damn, Lymon, for those few marvelous hours we were free, you and me. I was just a woman and you were just a man, and we were having fun.”

  “It was fun.”

  “When I’m harried, frustrated, scared, or angry, I take that memory out and play it from start to finish. From the moment you walked out by the pool, to the expression on your face when I came out with that helmet, to the gleam in your eyes when we stopped for soda.” She paused. “The miracle is that there are people out there who can do that every day if they want.”