Red Right Hand

by Chris Holm

  “Of course not. Under the circumstances, your performance has been exemplary. But, thanks to Bellum’s efforts to secure Iraq’s northwest border, we’re well acquainted with this group and their methods, which affords us a tactical advantage you simply do not have.”

  “Then read me in,” she said, her words hollow, reflexive, because she knew how he’d respond.

  “Much as I’d like to, I’m afraid you don’t have the clearance. It’s nothing personal.”

  “But—”

  “Listen,” Wentworth said, “I understand how this must seem to you, but in the end you and I both want the same thing. Bellum just happens to be better suited to the task at hand. We’re nimbler. More knowledgeable. Less encumbered by red tape. And we have equipment at our disposal that, frankly, the government can’t afford. Obviously, your AD and the president agree—they’re pushing the proper authorization through Congress as we speak. Don’t worry; I’ll make sure they both know you did outstanding work. If you ask me, you deserve a break. Take a bath. Get some rest. Order up some room service, if you like, courtesy of your friends at Bellum. I’m sure your AD won’t mind; he and I are old friends.”

  Klingenberg’s face burned with anger and shame, but she was too good an agent to let it show in her voice. “Thank you, Mr. Wentworth,” she choked out around the lump forming in her throat.

  “Think nothing of it,” he said.

  Wentworth hung up. Klingenberg sat in stunned silence for a long while. Then some sort of commotion at the pier’s guard booth caught her attention. An argument, it sounded like. She opened the car door and stood so she could see what was going on, but by the time she did, the argument was over, and the gate arm had been raised.

  Sarah Klingenberg looked on in disbelief as thirty Bellum Humvees rolled, one by one, onto the pier—and she wondered how the hell they’d gotten here so fast.

  23.

  CAMERON DREW A steeling breath, and released it slowly. It came out shaky. She told herself that was okay—helpful, even.

  She took out her Bluetooth earpiece and plucked a second burner phone from the center console. Using its browser, she Googled the number she was looking for and clicked the link to dial.

  The phone rang twice; the call connected. “San Francisco tip line.” The syllables tumbled out with neither inflection nor the appropriate stresses, as though the woman who’d picked up had said them so often, they’d ceased to have any meaning.

  Cameron couldn’t blame her. This number had been broadcast on every station, local and national, and printed in every story about the blast since Homeland Security had set it up late yesterday. She’d probably been dealing with cranks nonstop since she’d come on shift.

  “I—I’m calling to report a crime,” Cameron said, her voice a sharp whisper.

  “Ma’am, if you’re the victim or a witness of a crime in progress, you need to hang up and call 911.”

  “You don’t understand,” Cameron hissed. “I’m on Baker Street in San Francisco between Greenwich and Lombard. A man outside just dropped a backpack in the street and ran away. He…he looked Muslim.”

  Ugh. Just saying those words made Cameron feel dirty. She was preying on prejudice and the looming fear of follow-up attacks. But there was no denying, they had the intended effect.

  “Please stay on the line, ma’am,” the operator said, urgency creeping into her tone. “I’d like to put you on the phone with my superior. But first, can you confirm your location for me?”

  “Baker Street, San Francisco, between Greenwich and Lombard.”

  “And what did this man look like?”

  “He, uh, had a long dark beard and was wearing some kind of flowy off-white shirt, I think. Wait—something’s happening. He’s come back. It’s…it’s like he’s looking for something. Oh God, I think he sees me, please hurry!”

  Cameron hung up the phone. Then she popped off its back cover and removed the battery. The SIM card too, which she snapped in half.

  That done, she replaced her Bluetooth earpiece, raised her binoculars—one of the two pairs she’d purchased at Walmart yesterday—and watched the Homeland Security agents manning the perimeter of the old base. It was hard to make out fine details because her hands were so unsteady, shaking not from fear, but from adrenaline. Still, she saw enough to get the broad strokes.

  Both were startled into action when their radios went off. They conferred a moment and then left their posts and sprinted toward Baker Street, one down Greenwich, the other down Lombard.

  “You still there?” Cameron asked.

  “Yeah,” Hendricks replied in her earpiece.

  “They’re on the move.”

  “Both of them?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You must’ve been convincing, then. Good job.”

  “Thanks. I’ll admit, it was a hell of a rush,” she replied, grateful he wasn’t here to see her dopey grin or the flush in her cheeks.

  “Don’t get used to it,” he admonished. “Okay, I’m going dark. Remember: get clear, and hole up somewhere quiet—”

  “—with an open Wi-Fi network,” she finished, because they’d been over the plan a thousand times. “Got it.”

  “Good. I’ll call you when I need you.” Hendricks disconnected.

  Cameron smiled again and started the car.

  As far as she was concerned, his next call couldn’t come soon enough.

  Halfway up Greenwich, Hendricks ducked into the recessed entryway of an apartment building and patted his pockets as if looking for his keys. There was no need for the charade, it turned out—the Homeland Security agent who sprinted by didn’t so much as glance his way. Hendricks poked his head out of the entrance alcove and watched the man round the corner onto Baker Street. Then he headed west on Greenwich once more.

  When he reached Lyon, he looked both ways and then crossed it at a trot, slowing as he reached the far sidewalk. Rather than heading north toward the Presidio’s Lombard Street gate, Hendricks went south. The gate was too visible for his taste, Lombard Street too well traveled. Plus, half the cops in San Francisco were, at present, within the Presidio’s walls. If they’d bit hard on Cameron’s diversion, Hendricks figured they’d most likely leave via that gate to check it out.

  The keening wail of sirens behind him—quiet at first, but building quickly, like a migraine—confirmed Hendricks’s assumption. He didn’t turn around; he just kept walking and watched three SFPD cruisers rocket through the gate, lights flashing, in the distorted reflection of a parked delivery van’s windshield. Then they were swallowed by the neighborhood, their sirens muffled slightly by the buildings.

  The backpack he’d dropped contained a pair of road flares and a scissor jack he’d scavenged from the Altima’s trunk and taped to a spare burner phone. It was utterly harmless, but when the Feds X-rayed it, it’d look scary enough to keep them busy for a while.

  Hendricks passed behind the delivery van and stopped. It blocked him from view of the row houses to his right. To his left, beyond the low stone wall that marked the edge of the Presidio, was an overgrown rise, shrubs huddled beneath large trees. Hendricks glanced around to be sure there was no one else in sight—and then he vaulted over the wall.

  He crouched behind it for a second, listening for any indication he’d been spotted. He heard none, so he scrabbled upslope through the trees until the ground leveled.

  When he reached the edge of the tree cover, he untied the windbreaker from around his waist, turned it right-side in, and slipped it on. Emblazoned on the back, both shoulders, and left breast were yellow block letters that read FBI.

  On a campus crawling with law enforcement, blending in made more sense than slinking around. The problem was, official uniforms were hard to come by. It always looked so easy in the movies: knock a guy out, drag him into a supply closet, emerge seconds later in his clothes. In reality, it was damn near impossible to put a guy down with one blow, much less strip someone while he was unconscious. Which was what He
ndricks had told Cameron when she’d suggested it.

  She’d frowned then. Fell silent. Opened the browser on her phone. Then she turned the screen around to face him. On it was an image of an FBI raid jacket. “Is this really what they look like or is that only in the movies too?”

  “That’s really what they look like.”

  “Then why not just make one?”

  Cameron bought a roll of yellow duct tape and an X-Acto knife at a craft store just off the highway. Then they’d hit a uniform-supply place to pick up the jacket. She carved the letters freehand and applied them in the parking lot of a tamale joint that was closed on Sundays, the jacket laid out on the hood of the car. Hendricks had been dubious, but once she was done, he was forced to admit the illusion was convincing. Sure, it fell apart if you put your face right up to it, but if anybody got that close to him, he had bigger problems than the texture of the duct tape showing.

  Afterward, since Cameron didn’t need it any longer, he pocketed the X-Acto knife. You never knew when a sharp blade would come in handy.

  Hendricks watched from the trees awhile, taking in the scene. He was at the edge of a winding drive. A neighborhood of connected townhomes disappeared into the green off to his left. A pair of low-slung buildings stood to his right. Everything was off-white with red roofs, some of them actually clay tile, the others red shingles meant to convey the impression of clay.

  A Park Police cruiser rolled by. Hendricks ducked into the shadows as it passed. Once it was no longer in sight, he stepped out of the woods. The command tent—and, therefore, the cell on wheels—was northwest of his position. He could either head west through the neighborhood or go north toward the commercialized end of the old base.

  He chose north. Walked past a tennis court, a social club. A couple of uniformed cops loitered outside the latter, and they eyed Hendricks as he approached.

  He nodded at them, heart thudding.

  They nodded back, and he continued on his way.

  24.

  SWEET JESUS, DID Lois feel like shit.

  Hangover seemed like such an insufficient word for what she had. It suggested a sense of mild discomfort that could be dispelled by aspirin, water, and a greasy breakfast. This wasn’t that. No, what she had was an affliction. A full-on disability.

  Lois had slept deeply through the night—no surprise, since she vaguely remembered washing down several back-pain pills with wine yesterday. While she slept, she’d dreamed of loss, of ache, of big events forgotten until too late and important things misplaced.

  Daylight was an assault—a sharp stab between her eyes, a slithery uncoiling in her stomach. Every time her eyelids flitted open—from pain, anxiety, or her uneasy dreams expelling her from sleep—she immediately regretted it. Even the red-black static of the light through her closed eyelids was almost more than she could bear. For a time, she slung a forearm over them to block it out, but her own body heat began to make her queasy.

  She wondered how she’d managed not to throw up yet. Then she ran her tongue across her lips, tasted bile, and wondered if she had thrown up but was simply too foggy to remember.

  Lois’s bedroom was airy and light. Blond wood, mismatched whitewashed furniture, and soft-hued fabrics combined to give the place a beachy feel. Oversize mirrors, one freestanding and another on her vanity, made the space seem even bigger than it was. Her husband, Cal, called it their island retreat. Today it seemed to amplify the afternoon light. Lois felt like she was at the center of a boardwalk busker’s steel drum.

  I swear, if I survive this I’m never going to drink again, she thought.

  As her eyes adjusted to the sunlight, Lois realized someone was standing in the doorway. Male, and visible only in silhouette.

  “Cal?” she asked hopefully, though some small aching part of her knew that it wasn’t.

  “Lois, I’m sorry,” Frank said softly, “but Cal’s not here.”

  The unfamiliar voice startled her. She jerked upright, her face twisting in agony as her head responded to the sudden movement. “Wh-who are you? What are you doing here? Where’s Cal? Why are you wearing his things?”

  “Easy,” he said, stepping just inside the doorway but not approaching her. He was white. Older. Rail-thin. His eyes were the palest blue she’d ever seen. His hair was mussed, and he had on one of Cal’s sweat suits, the sleeves of the sweatshirt pushed up to expose wiry, liver-spotted forearms. His elbows were at right angles, his hands in front of him. One was balled into a fist; the other held a glass of water. Ella, improbably, followed him into the room and stopped at his feet, her fluffy tail wagging. “My name’s Max Rausch, remember? We met yesterday. You…had a little too much to drink last night, so I helped you up to bed.”

  Lois’s face fell as the events of yesterday came rushing back. Her brow furrowed. Her lip trembled momentarily, and then stilled. As fear abandoned her, the tension drained from her muscles, and her shoulders sagged. “Max. Of course. Forgive me. Yesterday, I…I wasn’t at my best.”

  “There’s nothing to forgive,” he said. “I brought you some aspirin and a glass of water. I figured you might need it.”

  She beckoned him closer. He dropped the pills into her hand. She popped them into her mouth and took the glass from him to wash them down.

  “Easy,” he said. “Sip, don’t gulp. You probably don’t remember, but the water you drank last night didn’t stay down.”

  Lois flushed with embarrassment and looked around but saw no sign of any mess.

  “It’s fine. I took care of it. The empty glass fell off the nightstand when you tried to put it back, and I heard it shatter. When I came in to check on you, you said you needed a trashcan. I barely managed to get to the bathroom and back in time. Then I, uh, sat with you awhile to make sure you were okay.”

  “Thank you,” she said. “You’re very kind.”

  Frank startled her by laughing.

  “Did I say something funny?” she asked.

  “No,” he said, smiling. “It’s just…very kind is not something I’m called often.”

  “Really? That surprises me. It seems to me you’ve been nothing but kind since you arrived.”

  “Maybe so,” he said, “but when I was younger, I was not the nicest guy.”

  “I doubt that’s true.”

  “It is. I was a thug. A criminal. Sometimes I hurt people.”

  He wasn’t sure why he’d told her that. He expected her to recoil. To ask him to leave. Instead, she said, “Are you familiar with Heraclitus of Ephesus, Max?”

  He cocked his head, confused by the conversational hairpin. “Can’t say as I am,” he said. “Is it a person or a thing?”

  “A person,” she said, smiling. “A pre-Socratic Greek philosopher, in fact.”

  “Oh. I don’t know a thing about philosophy. Never had much use for it.”

  “Mr. Rausch, you wound me. I spent thirty years teaching Classics before retiring.”

  “You were a teacher?”

  “A professor, yes, first at UNC and eventually across the bay at UC Berkeley.”

  “Huh. Then you extra wouldn’t have liked the younger me. He never met a teacher he didn’t manage to piss off.”

  “Clearly the two of you have little in common, then—just as Heraclitus would have predicted.”

  “How’s that?”

  “He believed that change was the only constant in the universe. As he observed, ‘No man can step into the same river twice, for it is not the same river—and he is not the same man.’”

  “So you’re saying I ain’t that guy anymore.”

  “I’m saying everything, even what we think of as our essential self, is fluid.”

  “I dunno,” he replied. “Seems to me, most people never change.”

  “I think you’re wrong. We all do. Most of us simply never change direction.”

  “Maybe,” he said. “Maybe not. But I don’t see how it matters. Either way, I’m stuck carrying around the memories of what I’ve done.”


  “Those memories might be not a burden, but a gift. It’s possible you carry them to remind yourself why you’ve chosen a different path.”

  “That’s a nice thought,” he said. “But if I could, I’d ditch ’em in a heartbeat.”

  Her face clouded. “I suppose we all have things we wish we could forget.”

  “Listen, Lois. About Cal—”

  “Has he called?” she asked, sounding shrill and desperate but not disingenuous, as if she’d convinced herself that he was somehow still okay but knew the illusion wouldn’t hold if examined closely. “Is he on his way?”

  “No, Lois, he hasn’t called,” he said, his tone gentle but insistent. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”

  A brief glimmer of understanding flickered across her face and then vanished, replaced once more by that same odd incuriosity Frank witnessed yesterday and had attributed to the drugs. “Perhaps later,” she said flatly, and then, the topic dismissed, she perked up some. “First, I think I’d like to try to eat some breakfast, since it seems these aspirin are staying down.”

  Last time Frank had taken notice of a clock, it was after three—a little late for breakfast, but he didn’t bother to point that out to her. It was one of many things he didn’t bother pointing out.

  Lois threw back the covers and tried to get out of bed, but she was shaky, her body weak. Frank wondered how many of those muscle relaxants she’d taken yesterday before the Park Police interrupted her by knocking on her door. Not enough to kill her, it would seem—but if he had to guess, he’d say she hadn’t been far off.

  He watched uncomfortably for a minute while she struggled to get up, uncertain if she’d accept his assistance. But when it became clear she’d never make it downstairs on her own, he took her hand and helped her to her feet. She frowned but didn’t object.

  Once she got going, she did okay, although he linked arms with her on the way downstairs for safety. Frank’s strength wasn’t what it once was—there was a time when his slender frame had been coiled with muscle—but Lois was so slight, he had no trouble keeping her upright. They apparently moved too slowly for Ella, though, because she raced past them down the stairs.