Orphan X

by Gregg Hurwitz

  Evan pointed violently, stabbing a finger behind her.

  She turned abruptly, shooting a look across the restaurant, and went full-body tense. Slatcher noticed her spot him, and he slowed, one hand sliding beneath his T-shirt at the hip.

  Evan could never get there in time.

  A waitress was at his heels. “Sir, I’m gonna have to ask you to—”

  Focused on the scene across from them, Evan let her voice fade away.

  Morena backed up to the window, edging away from Slatcher. He sidestepped a busboy, closing in slowly, cutting off her angles if she decided to run.

  A hand clamped onto Evan’s ankle, accompanied by a much deeper voice. “All right, buddy. I need you to get your ass off the table or I’ll have to drag you—”

  Evan glanced down as the no-neck bouncer reached for him with his other hand. Crouching to catch the wrist, Evan twisted the meaty arm across itself, locking the elbow, and planted the bouncer’s face neatly on the table. He stepped on the wrist, pinning him down, then straightened up again, returning his attention to Morena.

  Her shoulder blades were now pressed to the window as she slid along the wall. Nowhere to go. Her palms, down at her sides, flat against the glass. Slatcher closed in. A trio of waiters whisked between them, bearing a birthday cake with sparking candles, and Slatcher used the distraction to skip closer to Morena. They were maybe ten tables apart now.

  Beneath Evan’s foot the bouncer lurched, his other hand flopping awkwardly over his own head, trying to reach Evan. A few partiers at the fringe of the dance floor took note of the non-scuffle, but for the most part the blaring music and swirling movement provided sufficient distraction to buy him some time.

  Slatcher was pursuing Morena only to get to Evan. Evan was the true target. And yet he was stranded here with two windows and a stretch of dancing fountains between them. Helpless.

  He stared at Morena, willing her to turn around and look at him again. At last she did, her eyes wide. He pointed at Slatcher, then at his own chest. And then again.

  Show him I’m here.

  It was all he could think to do.

  Beneath him the bouncer bucked and flailed.

  Morena’s head swiveled back to Slatcher. He was closing in. Six tables away. Now five.

  She looked directly at him, then lifted her arm and pointed through the window.

  Slatcher’s stare turned slowly until it locked on Evan.

  A frozen moment.

  Evan held out his hands. Come get me.

  Then Slatcher broke away from Morena, running for the door of the restaurant.

  Evan watched the air leave Morena as she sagged with relief. He waited for her to look over at him again, then gestured for her to flee.

  After this scare he doubted he’d be able to coax her into the open again, but right now he cared only about her safety. He gestured again, more emphatically. Finally Morena burst into movement and sprinted along the far wall, disappearing through the swinging doors of the kitchen.

  Footsteps thudded behind Evan—heavy men running. He turned as two more bouncers ran toward him. He held an instant for them to reach the table, then jumped between them, sailing over their broad shoulders. He landed on the neighboring table, careened down and across the dance floor, and shot out into the casino between two high-limit blackjack tables.

  A commotion echoed up the wide row of shops to the left, one of the radial corridors feeding into the gambling floor. Evan swung around in time to see two women knocked down hard, as if before a truck, purses wagging up on their arms. Slatcher bulled into view as they parted and dropped to the marble. He barely slowed, sprinting for Evan.

  Evan reached past the blackjack players and swept their tall stacks of black chips off the felt, sending them airborne. The hundred-dollar chips rained down across shoulders and slot machines, bouncing through the walkways between tables. The gamblers surged. Chairs toppled, grown men dove, even passersby waded in, scrambling after the rolling chips on their hands and knees.

  Evan shot past the ruckus, threading between approaching security guards talking into their radios. On the far side of the scrum, he turned and looked back.

  Slatcher had hit a wall of security, closing off the zone from the far side. A head taller than the crowd, he glowered across at Evan. Trapped behind the temporary barricade.

  Evan turned and bolted past the craps tables, hitting the next wide corridor, already crowded with security guards and onlookers drawn toward the disturbance. Pulling the brim of his cap low, he jogged through a flock of little-black-dress college girls ornamented with Santa caps. He had to get to an exit before word came down from the eye in the sky upstairs.

  A woman with cropped blond hair swung around a roulette wheel and into the corridor. She wore a fitted black shirt tucked into dark blue jeans, showing off her curves. Her hand was in her Louis Vuitton purse, and Evan’s brain double-clutched before placing her alluring features.

  Candy McClure, Slatcher’s associate, captured in a few grainy surveillance stills astride a Kawasaki.

  Her hand whipped out of her handbag toward his face. Evan ducked, throwing his weight backward, his momentum carrying him on even as he dropped. An honest-to-God stiletto flashed past, missing his upturned face by inches. He landed in a forward slide on his knees, skating across the marbled surface, rotating around to face her. Her hand was already back inside the purse, replacing the knife. She offered Evan a pert, Well, I tried smile.

  It was as though nothing had happened.

  More security guards and gamblers crashed forward all around them, driving on, and McClure allowed herself to be swept along by them.

  Evan shook off his disbelief. Too much time had passed now, so he shouldered into a bathroom, the one public location in a casino where security cameras were not legally permitted. He shoved his hat into the trash bin, then flipped his reversible jacket inside out, the black shell now turned to white. With a paper towel, he wiped the sweat from his brow, then moved back out into the corridor, hustling along once again.

  An elevator dinged to his right and ejected a raft of fresh security guards. Evan kept his same trajectory, slicing into their midst. He eased out a breath, caught a whiff of aftershave and hair gel on the inhale. The guards breezed past, jabbering into their radios, enlarging images on their smartphones.

  Reaching the end of the corridor, he spun through a grand revolving door into the river of people clogging Las Vegas Boulevard. Bucking through two oblivious policemen, he scanned the sea of heads frantically, looking for a scared seventeen-year-old. As he rushed up one teeming block and down the next, he realized he wasn’t going to find her any more than Slatcher was.

  Morena was long gone.

  33

  The Long Haul

  On his way home, Evan exited the freeway by Dodger Stadium and cased the address that Memo Vasquez had given him. The ramshackle structure, more shed than house, seemed to be deteriorating into the hillside. Dead ivy clung to the cheap cladding. Plywood boarded one of the front windows. Gangbangers congregated on neighboring front porches, sipping 40s, their plaid shorts tugged low. A group of kids played ball, using a shopping cart hung on a Dumpster as a basketball hoop. Strings of Christmas lights blinked sporadically from various rooflines.

  Evan made a cautious approach and walked the surrounding blocks but found no signs of surveillance. He’d repeat it on Wednesday even more thoroughly before the arranged meeting.

  He thought about Morena in the wind, more scared than ever. He’d have to wait for her to contact him, if she decided to. But he imagined that after the near kidnapping in Jasmine she would vanish again, far from her sister and Danny Slatcher and Evan himself. The thought of her out there somewhere, vulnerable to Slatcher’s next move, grated on him, a metal file working his nerves.

  As he headed back to his car, his phone rang. The caller ID showed the burner phone he’d given Katrin. A sense of betrayal surged in his chest, lava-hot.

  He ans
wered, holding the phone to his face.

  “Where are you?” she asked.

  Paranoia has a taste, an acidity on the tongue as sharp as the side effect of a potent medication. Evan’s breath fogged in the midnight chill. The air smelled of mowed grass and car exhaust. Up the street a woman wearing hot pink heels with fabric straps that laced all the way up to her thighs strutted through a chorus of catcalls.

  Evan asked, “Why do you want to know where I am?”

  Her laugh was musical. “I don’t, really. I suppose what I really want to know is why you’re not here.”

  He said nothing.

  “So,” she said. “Why aren’t you here?”

  “I’m figuring out how to fix it.”

  “What?”

  “Everything,” he said. “Don’t call unless it’s an emergency. I’ll be back to you Wednesday night.”

  “Okay.” Her tone had cooled. “Emergency only. That’s fine. I hope I didn’t…”

  “What?”

  “Nothing. Just—thank you.”

  He hung up.

  He switched vehicles in Burbank, parking the Taurus two lots over from where he’d left his truck. After driving home he made it upstairs and went straight to the Vault. He checked the surveillance feeds from the loft, picking up the minute he’d left and fast-forwarding to observe Katrin’s every move. She’d slept, showered, stretched, ordered groceries in, napped. Everything as she’d been instructed.

  He caught up to the present, finding her standing at the big tinted windows, looking out at the freeway beyond. Her shoulders shook slightly. She was crying.

  Perhaps she knew she was being observed.

  He trudged from the Vault, climbed onto his levitating bed, and fell into a deep sleep.

  In his dream Jack came to him, his lips rouged black. Slowly the black liquid rose in his mouth, glimmering, then spilled over onto his chin. Jack tried to catch it in his hands, cupping the blood as if he could scoop it back into his body. His wild eyes looked up into Evan’s.

  “‘The past isn’t dead,’” Jack quoted through slick black lips. “‘It’s not even past.’”

  “What does that mean?” Evan said.

  “Hell if I know.” Jack shrugged, the terrible fluid streaming through his fingers. “Dream interpretations,” he added with disdain. “I hate that shit.”

  Evan woke breathing hard, his flesh clammy, the sheets churned up around him. It was 5:00 A.M. His thoughts were disheveled, scenarios cascading one after another.

  The air conditioner blew cool and steady across his drying sweat. He sat up in bed and crossed his legs to meditate. As Jack had taught him, he freed up a space inside his mind and populated it with the oak trees of his childhood. He put a Virginia summer sun in the sky and a carpet of wild grass underfoot. Walking between tree trunks, he breathed the dusty scent of the bark and listened for birdcalls. He came into a clearing, and there Jack waited, his smile still rouged, his chin dripping black, his teeth stained vampirically.

  Evan opened his eyes, more annoyed than distressed.

  From his nightstand drawer, he removed a Tibetan gong the size and shape of a soup bowl. He ran the wooden baton around the rim, making the bowl sing. And then he struck the bronze side once and closed his eyes.

  Feeling the tone against his skin, he attended to every micromoment of sensation within him, cultivating the same hyperawareness he used when fighting or setting up a sniper shot. He let the vibrations travel through him, sounding the inside of his body, defining his shape anew. He waited as the noise faded, until there was not a trace of sound lingering, until even the last shiver in the air had stilled.

  He opened his eyes refreshed.

  His mission priorities clarified.

  He could not trust Katrin. He could not trust Memo Vasquez, the second caller. He was meeting Vasquez tomorrow, which gave him a little more than twenty-four hours to surveil Katrin and see if she tried to make contact with a handler.

  If she did not, he’d see Vasquez in the morning and press him hard.

  It was all about applying pressure until one of them crumbled.

  His empty stomach got him off the bed and moving toward the kitchen. The living wall had seen better days. The drip system appeared to be balky, herbs browning at the edges. Nonetheless he found two robust red tomatoes, harvested some basil and sage, and made an omelet.

  Back in the Vault, he sipped fresh mint tea, forked breakfast from a plate, and watched Katrin sleep. Her straight, shiny hair, laid like a wedge against her flawless cheek, made her look as though she were being rendered in black and white.

  At last she awakened, stretching herself into an expansive yawn and heading into the bathroom. She freshened up, changed clothes, and moved to the kitchen, searching the cupboards until she found a frying pan. She made eggs and sat at the counter, pushing them around her plate with a fork.

  It was as though they were eating breakfast together.

  He remembered how she’d called him over to the window, then reached behind her to pull him to her. Her skin like silk. The lipstick smearing on her plush lips.

  If she was playing him, she’d done a spectacular job.

  His RoamZone gave off a sonar ping, the GPS signal coming up in response to the food hitting her stomach. The microchips in her system would have to be replenished soon if he wanted to keep tabs on her, and right now there was nothing he wanted to do more.

  The GPS dot blipped on his phone, pinning her location even as he watched her in real time on the monitor. Sipping his tea, Evan settled in for the long haul.

  34

  The Samurai-Sword Incident

  Angles of Katrin White filled the monitors, bird’s-eye, head-on, profiles—even aesthetic shots from severe angles. It was like some pop-art collage, cubism parted out into Warholian repetition: Katrin Reading a Magazine on Her Belly, One Foot Dangling in the Air.

  Evan watched her at intervals, exiting the Vault to work out at the stations in his great room, to eat lunch, to run on the treadmill near the south balcony. The treadmill gave him a clean shot down to 19H in the neighboring building, the apartment where the digitized, encrypted conversations for 1-855-2-NOWHERE, after zigzagging through telephone-switch destinations around the globe, emerged from Joey Delarosa’s Wi-Fi access point and then vanished again into Verizon’s LTE network.

  Every time Evan returned to the Vault, he reviewed the footage from the loft. And every one of those times, Katrin showed herself to be doing almost precisely what Evan was himself doing—waiting. She made the futon, paced around the kitchen island, did some half-assed yoga while looking at the view. For one thirty-minute period, she curled up on the couch and sobbed. Evan reviewed every last minute, waiting for the slightest misstep. But not once did she exhibit any behavior he deemed suspicious.

  At six-thirty Evan’s doorbell rang, the sound muted by the thick walls of the Vault. With a few clicks of the mouse, he switched the feed to bring up the pinhole camera hidden in the air-conditioning vent outside his condo.

  Mia waited at his door, holding Peter’s hand. Though she stood in place, her legs moved in a faint simulation of running, alternate knees dipping forward, a show of nervous impatience.

  Evan felt a stab of annoyance. It took him a minute to extricate himself from the Vault and walk to the front door. As he opened it, he braced himself for some parental complaint, but Mia looked anything but peeved.

  Her eyes, puffy from emotion, her nose tinged red, the set of her face severe. What he’d mistaken for impatience was fear.

  “Hi, Evan. I’m so sorry to bother you. But I have a work emergency. I have to get into the office now, and since it’s last-minute, all my sitters are tied up.”

  Peter stared at him, the bruising around his eye now faded to a jaundiced yellow. He wore a backpack, stuffed to the point of bursting. How many things did an eight-year-old require on his person at any given moment?

  “Wait,” Evan said. “What?”

  “Please.
”

  “I can’t,” Evan said. “I’m sorry. I’m dealing with a work situation of my own today. Something I really can’t step away from.”

  “You wouldn’t have to watch him,” she said. “He could just do homework in another room? Check on him every half hour or so?” She stepped forward, lowered her voice. “This is a real crisis. As in life or death.”

  He matched her lowered voice. “Is that a metaphor?”

  “No,” she said. “I’ve got no one else right now. I really need your help.”

  If by some long shot they attacked him here in his stronghold, could he protect the boy? Evan bit down on the inside of his lip. Looked over at Peter. Back to her. “How long will you be?”

  “Oh, thank God,” Mia said, propelling Peter forward. “Just a couple of hours.”

  Evan held the door open, and Peter scooted past him. Mia started for the elevator, then halted and looked back. “I cannot tell you what this means to me.”

  Evan gave a little nod and closed the door.

  From behind him: “This place is so cool!”

  Evan spun around. “Hang on. Where are you?”

  Peter was walking around the kitchen, checking it out. He left fingerprints on the Sub-Zero. Turned on the power blender. Tugged out the spray head of the kitchen faucet and let it snap back into place.

  Evan ran over, switched off the machine, wiped down the refrigerator. “Don’t touch anything.”

  “Okay. Sorry. It’s just … this place is all hard and concrete, like the Batcave.”

  Evan looked over at the winged patch sewn onto his backpack. “You’re a big Batman fan, huh?”

  “Know why?” Peter waited for Evan to shake his head. “’Cuz he’s not magic. He’s not a alien like Superman with superpowers. He can’t fly. He’s like you and me. His parents got killed, and so he wants to help people now. That’s all.” Peter thunked his backpack onto the counter and hopped up on a stool. “I’m hungry.”