by Pema Donyo
"Jane?"
The voice that stopped me in my tracks wasn't either of them.
I froze at the sound of Adrian's footsteps approaching me, but I didn't turn back around. I put a hand on my hip and pressed my lips together.
He placed a hand on my shoulder, but I shoved it away. He swore beneath his breath. "What’s the matter? Why did you slam the door and leave?"
"What do you think?"
He threw his hands in the air. "I don't know. Why do you think I’m asking?”
"For someone with such a high IQ, you're completely dense."
"I'm trying to figure out what's wrong!"
"What’s wrong is what you did back there."
He looked so confused I almost pitied him for a second. "What did I do? Is this because I didn't sit with you at lunch? I thought you told me you wanted space sometimes."
"You were flirting with Emma.”
He laughed. For the first time, the laugh irritated me more than any other sound I'd ever heard. It was a laugh which said I was seeing things. "I wasn't flirting with Emma. We're friends. Emma and I are just friends. Hey… hey, don't turn away from me." His voice became softer, and he held my right shoulder. His other hand tilted my chin up to face him, but I kept trying to avert my eyes from his and toward one of the long portraits of past CO agents in the hallway. But the gazes from each of these century-old portraits were severe and seemed to scowl in disapproval, telling me to look back at Adrian.
I covered his hands with mine, but still didn't meet his gaze. "Then why do you let her flirt with you?"
"If you don't want me to talk to her, I won't talk to her."
I let out an exasperated sigh. "Well, I’m not necessarily saying don’t talk to her. I'm saying you shouldn't encourage her flirting."
"Okay, well I have no idea what you mean, so I'm just going to stop talking to her."
"She'll hate me even more then."
"She hates you? You're her best friend."
"Not anymore." I brought his hands down to his sides, and our fingers interlaced. As soon as we held hands, the tension in the air dispelled and I felt calm once again. "She's been ignoring me, and I think it's because of you."
"Isn't everything because of you?"
I finally stared up at him. His teasing smirk made the corners of his eyes crinkle. My look of exasperation melted away to the same look of adoration I'd seen Emma give him minutes earlier.
I ran a hand through his hair. Today it was straight and smooth, and the stubble on his chin was shaved away to reveal the golden jaw I was used to seeing. Even his skin seemed tighter, and the bags under his eyes smaller. I wanted to believe it was because I'd returned, but I decided it was because of the stress from the mission. Still. I kissed his jaw line. "Well because of you, I'm going to go crazy."
Before he could respond, someone cleared a throat. A definite female clearing. I inclined my head, dreading to see Emma... but found an executive instead. Her pressed business suit was as professional as any the executives always wore. She handed me a sheet of paper full of color-coded boxes, with a timetable and calendar.
"Your new schedule, Agent Lu. We understand you'll be with us for the next month, so we scheduled several missions in this last month. Adrian King will continue to be your partner."
Adrian stared over my shoulder at the schedule and scoffed. "This can't be right. She's scheduled for a mission tonight?"
"Correct."
"She just got back!” Adrian's nostrils flared, and I saw him clench his fists. "She has to rest."
"I'll be fine." I thanked the executive, and took the timetable and calendar from her before she walked away. Then I met Adrian’s look of disbelief. "I'm all healed. I can handle the mission."
"I'm telling the CEO about this. He'll fix it; don't worry Jane." Adrian pulled out his cell phone. He managed to dial a few numbers before I snatched it away.
I tucked his cell phone in my own pocket, away from his reach. Normally, I loved how protective he was. But I could decide for myself. "I said I can handle this, Adrian. Are you still going to be my partner, or are you Emma's now?"
"I was with her on one mission. She was filling in." Adrian draped an arm around my shoulder. "If you're serving a mission, I'm serving as your partner."
I glanced down at the busy schedule. I couldn't ruin the assassination if I was stuck back at the headquarters during one of my last chances for active duty.
"Hey, before we go back to the apartments, can we stop by the CEO's office? I need to speak with him."
I agreed, and we walked toward the CEO's executive wing. As soon as we arrived, Adrian was ushered into one of the several board rooms. I walked back toward the bathroom and repeated a safety inspection. Satisfied, I pulled out the compact again and mimicked the lipstick motion until I could hear the faint sound of Tristan's breathing from the other end of the line.
"There's going to be a mission tonight." I glimpsed at my schedule. "San Diego, California. Next to UCSD."
"Means nothing. Marge wants the first mission to be a success."
I gazed back at my confused face in the compact mirror. "Why?"
"So CO believes you're back in shape, not unable to do another mission." Tristan sighed. "It sucks, I know. Innocent people are going to die. But just keep an eye out for other missions and lemme know your other ones. Only the first mission has to go well."
"Another thing. It’s about Adrian King."
Renewed interest sparked Tristan's voice. "What about him?"
"Found out he is next in line for CEO. Training starts next month for him. Confirm it with the CIA."
"Will do." Tristan chuckled. "You're on it, aren't you? Figuring out info at this rate and you won't need to serve out the whole year. I'll be back out spying and you'll be sipping beer in Cabo before Christmas."
"Tristan..." I couldn't stop myself from asking, and the words tumbled out from pure curiosity. "What happened in Russia? Why did your espionage mission fail?"
Tristan's voice became suddenly tight. "I told a woman I was sleeping with." The candidness of his tone startled me. Of course I knew he was old enough to have sex with whoever he wanted, but the idea of Tristan sleeping with and spilling secrets to some random woman he barely knew unsettled me for some reason. "She was supposed to be my fiancé." Okay, not so random. "Someone tortured her and interrogated her, suspecting I was the spy. She spilled everything and brought evidence." I heard a quick intake of breath on the other line. "The nuclear program hired someone, an assassin. He killed her, killed my partner, and tried to kill me. I escaped, but the bastard did too. The assassin's the reason they're all dead and my career's ruined."
"What happens if you see him again?"
"Kill him on sight."
****
If Adrian squeezed his hand any tighter around mine, the barrel was going to shoot off at least two of his fingers. My grip around my gun loosened as his grip over my hand clenched.
I pulled my right hand away from his left one. "For the last time, we don't need to hold hands right now. We both shoot with our right hand."
"Stay close to me." Adrian tried to cover my body with him and his machine gun. "I've got a gun."
"And what am I holding? An oversized toy?” Adrian’s hand dropped as I lifted up the gray machine gun Marty gave me before we left for San Diego.
Adrian scowled at the weapon. I wasn’t sure how not having a gun was supposed to protect me from anything, but he was somehow under the delusion the only protection which mattered was his and not the one I could provide for myself.
Adrian finally stepped away. He lowered his barrel and his guard for a moment to turn to me. "Please, stay close to me." He flinched at the sound of a cricket starting to chirp, and I suppressed a giggle. He lifted his gun back up and continued walking forward, ears carefully trained to detect the sound of foreign footsteps.
I checked the address of the house and nodded to Adrian. He glanced around to make sure no one else was sta
nding on the street. Both of us satisfied, we crept up the porch stairs.
We hid our guns in the bags we'd brought with us as soon as we stepped onto the target’s front porch. They were soundless shooters, Adrian's favorite and the result of thousands spent on CO special weapons research. The artillery fire of the machine gun fired in such a way that the bullets barely made a popping sound. In fact, the loudest sound emerging from killing someone with a soundless shooter was the sound of blood spattering against the walls.
He took out a bobby pin and undid the lock of the door. I followed him inside and closed the door after us.
Floorboards upstairs creaked and the sound of a woman humming carried to where Adrian and I stood. The target.
"Hey, what's going on here?" A man, clearly drunk, in his mid-forties and a beer paunch belly staggered toward us from a nearby doorway.
Adrian nodded to me and pointed upstairs. I lifted my gun and ran up the stairs right as I heard Adrian's fist making contact with the man's face below me in the hall.
The woman screamed. I saw her run toward a room two doors down and the door slammed closed behind her. I didn't bother with the formality of trying to pick the lock. I aimed my shooter and fired at the door, knocking the door down. I walked through the rubble, the weapon poised as I strained to every sound.
I craned my neck. Heavy breathing from the closet. Almost too easy.
The familiar rush of adrenaline right before closing a contract flooded my system. It was like the best taste of dessert you'd ever had, or the best steak, or whatever you valued. It was better than winning the lottery. It was a rush of control and sheer force you had inside you, reminding you of the power of life in your hands.
I pressed the trigger.
Holes blew into the wooden closet, going up and down at random. I simply stood behind the artillery fire and pointed my gun, allowing the heavy rain of bullets to close the contract for me. Each bullet punctured the wood and ploughed down everything on the inside. Not a scream was heard, only the barely audible popping of soundless bullets hitting flesh.
After ten seconds of ceaseless fire, I lifted my finger off the trigger and lowered my gun. I used the barrel to open the closet door, planning to get a quick confirmation of death and then join Adrian downstairs.
My heart stopped.
"What have I done?"
The mother lay slumped against the chipped wall, her eyes squeezed shut and a baby clutched against her chest. A chord struck inside me. This could have been the mother of another operative, and Adrian and I were sent to kill parents whose only crime was trying to figure out where their estranged child had disappeared to.
The baby's eyes were wide, a scene of horror frozen in the lifeless eyes. The bullet wound gaped clear through the tiny body. I started sobbing over the stunning clarity sweeping my breath away. The woman was the target. Why had I killed the child? Even then, what had the mother done to deserve the death? How had I killed her with no emotion whatsoever? What had I done? What had I done?
A hand touched the small of my back, but I pushed it away. Tears flew down my cheeks faster than Niagara Falls hitting the body of water below the waterfall.
But the hand wouldn't take no for an answer. Adrian crouched behind me, embraced me and rocked me back and forth. I buried my face in his shoulder.
"Shhh, shhhh," he rubbed my back, his voice soothing. "It was an accident. It wasn't your fault. You did your job. It was an accident."
I shook my head into his shoulder. Somehow, through the sobs, I heaved, "They're innocent. They're innocent." I pulled my head up, trying to make sense of his features through the hazy tears. "Don't you get it? They're innocent. The baby's innocent. The mother's innocent."
Adrian wiped away my tears as fast as he could. He rubbed my back again. But the comforting touches couldn't erase the guilt eating at me. Neither did his words. "She’s not innocent. She did something so terrible someone paid for her to die. If she was innocent, then why would someone pay so much to see her dead?"
His twisted logic made me feel like a child once again. I couldn't understand it. I tried so hard to understand how he could view the targets as anything but innocent, and failed. I felt like I was reaching out for the tightrope he was on, the tightrope which accepted the murder of Covert Operatives and accepted the secrecy and lies of the organization without wondering if what he was doing was wrong. The fragile rope was beyond my grasp, though I was wobbling toward it in one last-ditch effort to remove the regret swallowing me whole.
"The baby wasn't the target."
"But the baby was in the way. It wasn't your fault. It's just a job."
"Why won't CO tell us why we have to kill them?"
"We're not involved in gathering information yet. CO knows what's best for us. They pay us for our services, and this is what we have to do to survive, Janey. You're a survivor, remember? We both are. We're going to survive this. Together."
His eyes pleaded with me. He kissed the top of my forehead and kept rocking me, whispering more words of attempted comfort in my ear to stop my hysterics.
"It's wrong. We don't know why we have to kill them. They're innocent." I didn't pull away from Adrian's arms though. Somehow, in the arms of this boy who couldn't see the evil in killing the innocent, I felt the most at peace. My upper lip curled in disgust as the realization sickened me. But I couldn't stop the warmth from flooding my system as he rocked me, treating me with the patience of a nurse holding a newborn baby. I started babbling words of guilt.
"Shhh, you're under stress. You're shocked. It's okay. I've got you. It's going to be okay, Janey. You're going to be okay." He continued to hold me as I wept over the dead bodies. Something inside me was clearly broken, and Adrian was doing his best to keep all the pieces together before they smashed on the floor. I wasn't sure how much time passed before I finally calmed down my hysterical sobbing. It felt like hours. It probably was.
Glancing up into Adrian's eyes, the warm blue orbs held nothing but compassion for me. I realized right then that if I'd been crying and in hysterics for the rest of the night, Adrian would have still sat next to me, rocking me and trying to calm me down. He would have stayed there as long as I needed him. He would have done anything as long as I'd needed it. The boy who killed innocent families without a second thought was the same boy who loved me more than anyone else in the world.
I didn't have to ask whether or not the man downstairs was dead. I knew Adrian's style of closing contracts better than he understood his own, and he hardly ever left witnesses to murder.
Adrian lifted me as soundlessly as the bullets which had entered my victims’ bodies. I leaned against him, barely able to walk straight without my knees buckling.
He squeezed my hand. "Let's go home, Janey."
Covert Operatives? The house of cold-blooded and senseless murder? The business where money was traded for spilled blood?
It would never be my home again.
CHAPTER SIX
Obituaries Section
KING, Helen
January 1st, 1967 - October 17th, 1995
Helen King, 28, passed away in a tragic car crash last Saturday in Los Angeles. She also served as a pilot for the United States Air Force and will be remembered for her tireless service to our country. She is survived by one infant son. Anyone who knows more information about Helen's remaining relatives or is willing to adopt her son should please contact Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services.
The salt spray mist filled the air, so that even standing on the beach house porch was enough to taste the ocean on my tongue.
I brought my hand up to shade my eyes from the sun while watching other CO agents splash in the water beyond the sandy shoreline. Adrian caught the Frisbee thrown to him by Ben. Lucy jumped over the incoming waves with Emma. Gwen and Jamie were tanning next to the water. The seagulls made the occasional call or two above us, and the sun beat down over our faces to remind us all of how we were in paradise.
Then why couldn't I get the image of the mother and child I'd killed a week ago out of my head?
Adrian insisted I needed rest and time away from missions to recover. Renting the beach house was Lucy's idea. Lucy invited other agents from our year, but I was surprised Emma showed up. The air between us had been tense since I'd returned from the mission. Thankfully, Adrian hadn't told anyone about my break down, because I had no doubt Emma would have never let me hear the end of it. She settled for ignoring me whenever I entered the same room as her.
I folded my knees up to my chest. My toes curled in the warm sand below me. The sand on the Charmont Beach was clean and bright, free of pollution or tiny rocks. Pure, smooth sand, looking too flawless to be real. My bikini exposed the rest of my skin, causing my already tan skin to darken further. Yikes, should have gone back in to put on sun block. I sat up, deciding there was more time between heading to the house and finally talking to the person I'd been waiting for to arrive.
"Don't leave. I'm here; I'm here." The voice from my compact belonged to a body which slid next to mine, the side of his body rustling against the sand as he sat down. "What's next, kid?"
I felt a sense of comfort whenever I was in his presence. For once, I could talk to someone without lying or hiding a secret. "The last mission was successful. Another mission is tomorrow night - the Lowell's Independent Book Store in Milwaukee, Wisconsin." I paused, raising a brow at him.
“What?”
“Shouldn’t you be in disguise?”
He waved a hand dismissively. “No one recognizes me here.”
I nearly rolled my eyes at his arrogance. CIA agents.
"What else?"
I brushed away the flying hair around my face and touched my ponytail rubber band (complete with the GPS) as I did so. "And what?"
"What other info do you have?"
I frowned. "Wasn't what I said enough?"
He lifted his hands in the air in an expression of mock defeat. "More information would be helpful, I can’t deny it. I thought you said you didn't need anyone to take care of you."
