by Gini Koch
THIS WAS SO TYPICAL FOR MY LUCK that I didn’t even comment on it. “I have no freaking idea. Who the hell are you? And why the elaborate ruse to get me down here?”
Her eyes narrowed. “It’s not a ruse. Why did the Dingo put you as his next of kin?”
“The Dingo?” I’d heard some amazing nicknames by now, but this one was in the running for World’s Worst for sure.
She shrugged. “It’s his name in the business.”
“What business, the assassin business? You guys have a union or something?”
“Yes, the assassin business, and I’m not in it.”
“Right. That’s why you have the big gun pointed at me.”
“I don’t like taking chances.”
“So, you moonlight in nursing and kill people at the same time? That’s convenient.”
“I haven’t killed anybody. Today,” she added, apparently for truthfulness.
“Great. I haven’t either. I’m willing to start with you, though, if you don’t get that gun out of my face.” This was bluster on my part. Hyperspeed did nothing for you if the bullet caught you, and she was close enough that I wasn’t sure I could get out of the way in time.
“Why did the Dingo put you as next of kin?”
“Again, I have no freaking idea. I don’t make up these plans. I just get caught up in them and have to figure them out before everyone I care about gets killed. Why do you know him as the Dingo and who the hell are you?”
She studied me. “I’m with a…secret organization.”
“Wow, me too. What’s the freaking name of your secret organization?”
“What’s the name of yours?”
“Oh, for God’s sake.” I had to figure Jeff had picked up what was going on by now. “My husband’s going to break down that door in a moment, and then you’re going to have a lot more to worry about than secret handshakes and tricky passwords.”
I looked at the stuff in the tray. None of it looked familiar. None of it looked waterlogged, either. “How the hell did Peter or the Dingo or whoever the hell he was give you all that stuff, and, more importantly, how is it that none of it looks like it took a swim in the Potomac earlier?”
“These things were with him when we checked him in. He didn’t say they weren’t his. And he was quite specific that he only had one living relative in town. So why are you listed as his next of kin?”
“I’m assuming because we saved his life.”
“Why? You’re working with him?”
“No. You know, my husband asked me that, too, why I wanted to save his life. So did everyone else. I can’t tell you why, I just didn’t think it was right to let him and the other dude who spent all day trying to kill me drown. Not, I have to mention, that I have a problem killing the big bad fuglies, at least under most circumstances.”
“What other ‘dude’?”
“The other guy who came in with Peter the Dingo Dog Man. There were two of them, both admitted. I saw them get strapped onto the gurneys myself.”
“Shit.”
“Excuse me?”
“There was only one admitted. That means they took the other one.”
“Who is ‘they’?”
“Our enemies.”
“When you say ‘our,’ do you mean enemies of yours and your secret organization’s, enemies of mine, or enemies of both of us?”
“Yes.”
“I’m really considering the benefits of just hating your guts right now.”
Nurse Carter cracked a smile. “I can understand that.”
I decided to just go for it. “Look, is this about the assassination attempt that’s going to happen at the President’s Ball?”
She stared at me. “What? What are you talking about?” She seemed genuinely confused. It so figured.
“Oh, great. So, since you seem unaware of that, let’s just identify what the hell plan you’re working on, for, or against, shall we? Just so I can sort of keep it straight.”
She blinked. “What are you talking about?”
“That’s exactly what I’m asking you. Let me speak slower—what the hell is going on, and why are you still pointing a gun at me?”
Nurse Carter seemed to reach a decision. “I’m with the Paraguay Secret Police. I’m investigating dangerous alien activity in our country. We’ve traced the ones in charge back to people in your government.”
“When you say ‘my’ government, which one do you mean?”
“How many governments do you work for?”
“Technically? Um, I’m honestly not sure. The lines get blurred and all that.”
She stared at me. “You are Angela Katt’s daughter, aren’t you?”
“I might be.”
“Are you insinuating that your mother works for more than one government?” Her eyes narrowed again. “Is she still Mossad?”
“Not to my knowledge, but I think it’s once in, you always get to go to the alumni dinners sort of thing. But, no, my mother works for the President of the United States.”
“But you don’t?”
“No. I mean, I’m not against the President, or the U.S. Or anything like that.” She relaxed a tiny bit. I decided to go for it. “I work for American Centaurion. I mean, that’s why I’m one of their head diplomats.”
“You’re what?”
Why was this a surprise? We weren’t exactly flying under the radar these past few months. “Are you the worst informed member of covert ops in history? Why are you asking me this?”
“You’re listed as a senator’s aide.”
“Well, I have no idea where or how, but I’ve never assisted any senator with much of anything.” Oh, sure, Jeff and I had eliminated Leventhal Reid at the end of Operation Drug Addict, but he’d been a member of the House of Representatives.
Nurse Carter reached into a pocket and pulled out a picture. She looked at it. “This isn’t you,” she said, somewhat accusingly.
“No idea whose mug shot you’re looking at, but I’m not going to apologize for it not being me.”
The guys chose this moment to finally breach the door. “Don’t come any closer or I’ll shoot her,” Nurse Carter shouted, as Jeff used the super hyperspeed and got the gun away from her, while the human guys raced up and surrounded me.
“Geez, what took you guys so long?”
“We had to knock out the security guard and it took Reynolds a while to crack their vault.”
“I didn’t have any decent equipment on me,” Chuckie said by way of apology.
“Whatever. I have no idea what’s going on, and good luck to all of you in getting a straight answer out of Nurse Carter here.”
“Take her picture,” Chuckie said to Oliver, who complied.
“My government will not pay for me to be returned,” she said.
“We’re not planning to ransom you, but a little cooperation in the form of you explaining what the hell you think is going on wouldn’t go amiss.”
Nurse Carter looked around. “Not here.”
“Well, if not here, then why the hell did you ask me questions here in the first place?” My phone chose this time to ring. I grabbed it. “Hello?”
“Kit-Kat! You tied up, sis?”
“Hey, Caro Syrup! How’s my girl?”
Caroline sighed. “I’m stranded at the stupid airport. We got rerouted three times, my ride bailed on me, I can’t raise anyone at his Embassy, and everyone else has left already. There are no cabs or limos around, God alone knows why. The Metro is having issues, something to do with street construction screwing it up, but no trains have been able to come in or out for hours. We just got back from South America, I’m wiped out, and I was hoping you could maybe do your sister a solid and come pick me up?”
I got a funny feeling and grabbed the picture out of Nurse Carter’s hand. Sure enough, while the girl in it wasn’t me, I knew her really well. In fact, I was talking to her. She wasn’t my real sister, of course. But considering how garbled Nurse Carter’s intel seemed to
be, perhaps the confusion was understandable.
“Caro, did you just, in fact, get back from Paraguay?”
“You know I’m not supposed to confirm or deny, Kit-Kat.”
“Work with me on this one.”
“Yes. Can you come get me?”
“Yeah, we’ll be there soon. Really soon. And, Caro—do me a huge favor?”
“Sure, what?”
“Don’t let anyone get you other than me, and if someone other than me tries to even talk to you, call me immediately while you run screaming toward the most security people you can find.”
CHAPTER 34
“UH, WHAT’S GOING ON?” CAROLINE SOUNDED only slightly freaked. She’d been working in Washington for well over a year now, after all.
“Highest level security breaches. You’re in danger. You need to trust me.”
“Always have, always do.”
“Chuckie and I will be coming for you. Stay around security, stay around a lot of people, call me if anyone comes near you. Which airport are you at?”
“National.”
“This means nothing to me.”
She managed a laugh. “The Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. In Arlington.”
“That means something, thanks. Be there in a flash.” I hung up. “We need to move, fast. Bring Nurse Carter and all of Peter the Dingo Dog’s stuff along. I think we have yet another kidnap-murder combo to foil.”
Len and Kyle took everything from the tray. “Is there anything else?” Len asked.
I looked at Nurse Carter. “Is there?”
“No.”
“Jeff?”
“She’s not lying, at least as far as I can tell.”
Chuckie produced handcuffs from somewhere about his person and cuffed her. “Let’s go. Why do you think Caroline’s in danger?”
Since Caroline was not only my sorority roommate but also my closest girlfriend from college, it meant, of course, that Chuckie knew her well. He’d recommended her for the job with Senator McMillan. As a matter of fact, so had my mother.
“Nurse Carter, why did you think the girl in this picture was Angela Katt’s daughter?”
“She recommended her for the position, recommended very highly.”
“My mother’s never recommended me for anything,” I mentioned to Jeff as we raced along. “Neither have you,” I added to Chuckie.
“You didn’t need it,” he said as we got the elevator.
“Right.” I looked back at Nurse Carter. “That’s it? My mom recommends someone and that makes her me?”
“No. She’s the sister of the wife of the American Centaurion Ambassador. That would make her Angela Katt’s daughter.”
“No, not really. That would make her Angela Katt’s daughter’s sorority sister. Jeff, we need to get to the National airport in Arlington like five minutes ago. We’ll need a car there, too, but I don’t think we have time to drive there.”
Jeff pulled his phone and made a call—to Reader, as far as I could tell. I was busy examining the photo. It showed Caroline and a large group of people, all grouped around a tent. I wasn’t certain, but the scenery looked like what I remembered seeing of the Chaco, when I’d watched a twelve-superbeing formation try to take on a lot of A-Cs.
Memory shared that the C.I.A. had been on the scene and had tried to keep us from destroying the superbeings. I handed the photo to Chuckie. “I think some of your brothers and sisters are making a play.” Like me, Chuckie was an only child.
He, of course, knew what I meant. “This was taken in Paraguay.” He shook Nurse Carter. “Why are you people spying on American politicians?”
“We’re trying to determine who’s in charge of the project,” she said angrily.
“What project?” Chuckie’s voice was hard.
She snorted. “The one that hires our poorest people and then, when they never come home, claims they’ve never heard of them. The one that turns people into inhuman monsters.”
Jeff hung up as we reached the elevator banks. “Alpha Team’s going to meet us at National. We have a floater gate marking on our limo.”
“Jeff, remember, right before Operation Drug Addict, there was a big superbeing cluster in the Chaco?”
Jeff winced. “I hate your nicknames for operations. Especially that one.”
“Whatever. Do you remember?”
“Yes. The C.I.A. was on the scene; they wanted our people to let those superbeings survive. Argentina sent in stinger missiles at my request and blew them up.” He sighed. “The cluster was just like the one we had in Paris a few months ago. Just like the one in the Chaco, again, this morning. Only we didn’t blow the cluster up either of those times, they self-destructed. So, yes, I know where you’re going with this, baby.”
“Right. I don’t think that project’s been stopped.” I looked up at Chuckie. “My take on Senator McMillan is that he’s a good man. What’s your take?”
“He is a good man. He’s also unafraid to speak out against things he thinks are wrong.” Chuckie’s eyes narrowed. “The man behind Caroline—is he familiar to you?”
I took the photo back and gave the man Chuckie pointed out a closer inspection. He was wearing sunglasses and had what looked like a couple of weeks’ worth of facial hair. But he was very familiar. So was the man standing behind him. “That’s my ‘Uncle’ Peter, and the guy with him is the other guy we fished out of the Potomac.”
Jeff cursed quietly. “I knew we should have let them drown.”
“No, I think Peter had a change of heart somehow. That’s why he listed me as his family.” And why he’d slipped me the memory card, though I didn’t think I wanted to mention that around Nurse Carter. “Per our ‘nurse’ here, the other guy never got checked into the hospital, so whoever’s running this had him picked up.”
“How would that be?” Chuckie asked. “There were supposed to be Centaurion teams assigned to the prisoners.”
“There weren’t any operatives around other than Airborne when we reached the Medical Center. Peter and his crony got handed off to local law enforcement, of which there was a tonnage. Assume some or all of them were undercover bad guys.”
“Makes sense.” Jeff sent a text. “But why not grab both of them?”
“I’m concerned about what happened to the teams that were supposed to be covering this,” Chuckie said.
Jeff’s phone beeped and he sighed. “Per Serene, when our teams arrived at the hospital, they were told the prisoners were in police custody, so they headed back.”
“Figures. I’m really more concerned with how Peter died. He wasn’t in bad shape, not bad enough to die.”
“I think he was murdered,” Nurse Carter said. “My cover requires me to actually perform my nursing duties. I couldn’t stay with him the entire time, and I had to go home when my shift was over because no one needed me to cover for them, and hanging around would have raised suspicions.”
“Maybe they realized he was switching sides, or at least not willing to off me anymore.”
“They might have realized we found the bugs,” Oliver suggested. “Or he was killed because he failed to kill you and ended up on the local news.”
“That doesn’t explain where the other guy went to, or how.”
“Where’s the body?” Chuckie asked as the elevator showed it was just reaching the second floor.
“The morgue,” Nurse Carter replied. “It’s on this level.”
“We don’t have the time. Caro’s in danger.”
Chuckie looked torn. “We’ll do it, sir,” Len offered. Kyle nodded.
“You’ll need me to identify and get the body,” Nurse Carter mentioned.
Chuckie shook his head. “They’re too new.”
“I’ll go with them,” Oliver said.
“No offense,” Chuckie said, “but you’re not trained to stop an operative.”
Jeff growled. “I cannot believe I’m going to say this. I’ll stay with the jocks. Kitty told Caroline you’d be wi
th her, not me.”
Chuckie and I both gaped at him. “Seriously?” I asked finally. “You’re actually okay with letting me and Chuckie go off on this mission together? Without you?”
The elevator finally arrived. Jeff nodded as the doors opened. “Yeah. Because you won’t be alone. James sent over some backup for us.”
Michael Gower stepped out. “Hey everyone. James said I needed to get here pronto and be ready to kick some serious ass. What’s going on?”
CHAPTER 35
MICHAEL WAS A SLIGHTLY SMALLER VERSION of his older brother—big, black, bald and, like every other A-C, beautiful. He was also a major player. It had bothered me a lot when we’d first met. Now, I just looked at it the way I looked at Chuckie being the Conspiracy King—part of what made him who he was.
“Good,” Chuckie said. “Martini, check on the teams who were in charge of this botched hospital transfer. We need to know if they were fooled or if one or more of them are traitors.”
Jeff looked like he wanted to argue, but the logic of this directive was too much for him. “Yeah, we’ll get that taken care of.” He stared at Michael. “You know, Michael could stay here…”
“He’s not trained either,” Chuckie pointed out.
Jeff sighed. “True enough.”
Michael grinned. “I’ll take care of Kitty, Jeff, I promise.”
Jeff grunted, and I kissed him good-bye. “Be careful.”
He hugged me. “You, too, baby.” He gave Chuckie a glare. “If anything happens to her…”
Chuckie rolled his eyes. “I’d better be dead first. Yeah, yeah, as if that isn’t my mindset already?”
“Which team should I go with?” Oliver asked.
“Stay here,” Chuckie said. “Take pictures of anything that seems remotely relevant, odd, interesting, you know the drill.”
Oliver nodded. “My cameras and investigative skills will be fully focused.”
“Let’s go,” I said to Michael as I grabbed his hand and Chuckie’s. “We’ll explain on the way. And let’s use the stairs, because these are the slowest elevators in the world.”
I let Michael control all the hyperspeed. Doubling the effect was hard as hell on a human, and I didn’t want Chuckie puking his guts out if we could help it. Michael, who worked with a lot of humans, seemed more willing to go easy on it. Then again, it might be that he didn’t have any jealousy or dominance issues with Chuckie.
