Black_Tide

by Patrick Freivald

  "Janet LaLonde."

  "Janet. Matt."

  "Holy crap what happened? They found a whole squad of marines just torn to pieces, and no sign of either of you."

  "Yardley's dead. Hone in on the GPS of this phone and then go a half mile north-west straight through the woods. Send a recovery team, but make sure they're men we can trust."

  "I'll call the FBI—"

  "No! Keene betrayed us. Used Yardley to distract me while he took Sakura."

  "Took Sakura."

  "Yeah. She's gone. They have her."

  "I'm on it. Be careful out there."

  "Thanks, Janet."

  * * *

  Sitting naked in a pool of congealing blood, Janet looked from the ruined body of Anita Yardley to the split-open German Shepherd to the black char where her pentagram used to be, and burst into tears.

  "I'm sorry, D. I'm so sorry."

  Chapter 19

  Libby Kamen held her head high as the bailiff led her toward the courtroom. In the white marble hallway, she tried not to smile at the FBI man she'd bribed to take her from that god-awful house near the turkey farm. He'd kept his word, but with nowhere for her to run he'd also kept her in custody.

  She rounded the corner into a sea of reporters. No stranger to flashing bulbs, she wondered how her unkempt hair and orange prison jumpsuit would play on the tabloid covers. She cursed the garish whitehead on her right cheek, and the lack of foundation to cover it up.

  Well, the fashion police had to talk about something, and jail gave her street cred.

  The judge droned on about charges, stupid crap like resisting arrest and conspiracy to commit murder. She zoned out through the boring litany, perking up when her fat lawyer nudged her arm.

  She raised her chin and spoke in a loud, clear voice, as coached. "Not guilty, your honor."

  Lardo nodded his approval, chins jiggling.

  The sexy dude in the cheap suit spoke next. "Your honor, the prosecution requests that the defendant be remanded to a maximum-security prison without bail. She is a flight risk with the means to go anywhere in the world, and has a history of volatile behavior."

  With great effort Libby managed to not roll her eyes, and instead glared at Fatty McFatso.

  He cleared his throat and held up a wad of papers. "Your honor, my client is a fifteen-year-old girl with no history of violence. Yes, she has some minor infractions on her record, but has never risen to the level of needing to be placed in jail, much less remanded without bail. Her accounts have been frozen, so she has no means. She got involved with some bad actors much older than she, and it is they who perpetuated these atrocities, not she. Miss Kamen is keen to face these baseless accusations against her character, and will appear before the court on the appointed day."

  Her stomach knotted and she schooled her face to calm. Big K had been her mentor, her world. He'd taught her everything that mattered, the value of loyalty and dedication, to take no shit, no prisoners, and whatever you wanted. He'd committed himself to his friend Murdock even to the point of death. He'd taught her everything she knew about cause, about justice, about righteousness, about how to live. Hot rage flushed her face. How dare this blob of lard call him a "bad actor?"

  The judge nodded to both lawyers. "After taking into consideration both concerns, Miss Kamen will be remanded to house arrest upon the remission of one hundred million dollars bond, or two hundred fifty million dollars cash."

  He banged the gavel, and Libby whirled on her lawyer. "Pay it."

  * * *

  Matt stalked through One Center Plaza, a growing flurry of discombobulated functionaries and at least one security guard in his wake. He ignored their entreaties and took the stairs four at a time, leaving everyone in the dust, to Suite 600.

  He crashed through the fire door at a steady walk, and everyone turned in his direction, a bevy of white shirts and ties not quite tight and coffee cups and paperwork.

  "Where's Keene?"

  A brunette in her late forties, smartly dressed in a gray pants-suit that didn't quite cover her middle-aged pudge, approached him. "Do you have information on Agent Keene's whereabouts?"

  Matt frowned. "I was hoping he was here."

  She didn't react except to say, "When was the last time you saw Agent Keene?"

  "Thursday."

  "Five days ago Thursday?"

  "Yes."

  She exchanged looks with almost everyone. A young man ducked into an office and picked up a phone. "Mister . . ."

  "Rowley."

  "Mister Rowley, what is the nature of your relationship with Agent Keene?"

  "He sold me out and kidnapped my partner."

  The stairwell door burst open and two security guards huffed through, faces red, hands on their holsters. The woman in charge held up a hand but didn't dismiss them.

  "Let's talk in my office."

  Without waiting for his reply or agreement she walked into a glass-walled room, "Agent in Charge Cheryl Battisti" engraved in brass on the door. She allowed him through, closed it behind him, and walked around to sit at her oversized desk, cluttered with two computers and several stacks of files.

  "Agent Keene hasn't reported to work in almost two weeks. The Bureau filed a missing persons report on his behalf eleven days ago. A search of his home found no signs of struggle, and aside from his keys and wallet missing there were no signs that he'd left town. Where did you see him Thursday?"

  "Centralia, Pennsylvania." He explained the situation, leaving out Yardley's name and the giant sci-fi exo-suit, but deliberately brought up the dead squad of marines.

  "The news called that a training accident."

  Matt shook his head. "That's a cover up. We sent in a recovery team but they never made the site. The Shop had already taken over under guise of an environmental disaster relating to the mine fire and some minor earthquakes, but FEMA crews don't need military hardware for a toxic gas leak."

  As he spoke, her expression went from dispassionate curiosity to bland distaste. She plucked a card from behind her keyboard and slid it across the desk. "If you have any other information, don't hesitate to call me."

  She glanced up, out of the room, and stood, her palms on the desk.

  Before the security guards could get there, Matt produced his own card and held it out. "You think I'm crazy, but I'm not."

  She took it. "Special Threats, huh? That's the Bureau the President created after ICAP disintegrated." She waved down the guards. "And Special Threats was working with Agent Keene. Why didn't I know of this?"

  He held up his hands in a plaintive gesture. "We have extensive communique records that show you did, including authorizing joint FBI-Penn PD ventures and a cooperating statement with USMC Recon."

  She sat back down. "Never happened."

  "Gathered that. Only it did." He slid a folder across her desk. "You going to help me find Keene or what?"

  * * *

  Janet LaLonde walked from the government sedan, up the marble steps, to the front door of Humans for Humanity's world headquarters. The cold snap had even reached Martonville, Texas, making it a brisk sixty-five degrees, but she'd chosen a low-cut cream-colored skirt suit that came almost halfway down her thighs and had cost her six thousand dollars. Given the leer from the security guard, it would do its job just fine.

  She smiled and chomped on a piece of gum. "Hi there."

  The giant black man in an expensive black suit kept his eyes glued to hers, and she could almost see him sweating with the effort. "Afternoon, ma'am. Do you have an appointment?"

  "Nope. But I'm here to see Mr. Kellett about a donation. It's . . ." She leaned in, too close. ". . . urgent."

  He cleared his throat. "Let me see if he's available."

  Holding the door like a proper gentleman, he let her in out of the cold, then stepped back outside to talk on his radio. A schoolmarmish lady in a floral print dress sized her up, shook her head with a disapproving cluck, and went back to her paperwork behind a reception cou
nter.

  Two minutes later, Mr. Kellett appeared in the inner doorway. A frail old man with frail old manners, he extended an arm to help her navigate the ridiculous purple carpet in her four-inch heels. She took it, and ran a fingertip across his dry, wrinkled skin.

  She entered his office, ten times more preposterous than the ornate hallway, and pretended to admire the giant painting, a Kellett hale and hearty, less taken by entropy if not much younger. They sat in a pair of plush chairs, facing one another, and his eyes flicked down between her legs as she sat and crossed them.

  Yeah, old man. Scarlet lace. See it and want it. She strangled a twinge of remorse in its crib. Of the seven deadly sins, she'd mastered only one.

  "So what is this about, Miss . . . ?"

  She leaned forward and put out her hand, giving him just a glimpse down the front of her dress. He took her hand, kissed it with dry lips.

  "Janet LaLonde. Call me Janet."

  He pulled back. "What can I do for you, Janet?"

  She removed a folded piece of paper from her thousand-dollar calfskin purse and slid it across the coffee table, the public and secondary reason she'd come.

  He picked it up, unfolded it, and frowned. "You can't be serious."

  She shrugged. "Couldn't trust a process server with that, sorry. Given the evidence we already have you'll probably go to jail, but meantime we'll be suing you for every penny you've ever had. We froze your US assets this morning, and scheduled the press release for two o'clock."

  She stood and he leapt to his feet, hands balled into fists. Wrath might work, if lust didn't. She turned around, giving him a coy look over her shoulder as her hands reached up to the zipper under her hair and pulled it down.

  "What is this? Get out of my office." He flushed, anger and, she hoped, something more.

  Janet pulled the rest of the way, exposing the massive Jade Cross on her back, and whirled around. She tugged and her dress fell. His eyes widened—she wore no bra—and with a sigh he dropped to his knees, eyes transfixed by the gem between her breasts.

  She plucked it from its chain and held it out, the ancient lapis lazuli orb bluer than the Texas sky. "Lust isn't just a sin, Mr. Kellett. It's a deadly sin, a mortal sin, one of seven, and to succumb to it is to forfeit your soul."

  She approached, her dress falling to the floor, and his eyes followed the stone. Her high heels clacked across the marble tile as she stalked up to him. She looked down at him in her terrible glory, black wisps of power coalescing around her.

  A tear appeared in his eye. "Why?"

  "Because I may have need of you before all this is done, and if you're not already damned, close enough."

  She stepped over him, putting her sex in his face, and pulled the red lace to the side. His tears fell freely now, and as he buried his mouth in her, his eyes never left the gem.

  Ten minutes later, Janet shook Ronald Kellett's hand and left the building, his soul around her neck.

  * * *

  Matt picked up the phone. "Go ahead."

  "Kellett gave me a little something," Janet said. "But I don't think it will pan out. I'll run with it, let you know what turns up."

  "Okay." Salomon had been a dead end, too. "Battisti at FBI Boston is working a manhunt on the down-low. They suspect CIA or military, what with the quality of Yardley's hardware. It's way beyond anything DARPA's even dreamed of, so we'll have to dig deep. It'll get dangerous."

  "Screw the danger. We'll find her."

  "You're damned right we'll find her. Thanks again."

  He hung up, and looked across the kitchen table. "We can't trust her."

  Jason Rees sighed. "I know."

  "How do you know?"

  Jason shook his head. "The same way I knew how to get down into that cave, and that Monica had to be there. I did and she did, or you'd be dead and so would your son."

  Matt looked at Adam, playing with a toy fire truck in front of the living room fireplace. "He's just a boy, Jason. There's nothing odd about him."

  "So you feel nothing when you pick him up? Hold his hand?"

  "Sure I do. But nothing more than any dad would feel, I guess."

  "Peace? A disinclination toward violence?"

  Matt ran his tongue over his teeth. "I'm always disinclined toward violence."

  Rees sighed again. "I'm serious, man."

  "So am I. I hurt and kill when I have to, but never for fun, never because I want to or like it." He looked out the window to where Monica worked on all fours, tearing out the last of the autumn weeds in the flower garden. "I kill to protect my family, my town, my country. I kill bad people when they need killing."

  "It's that simple, is it?"

  He shrugged. "I considered pacifism once, way back. Lasted about a week."

  "Why'd you change your mind?"

  "I saw the Jensen twins getting fresh on Cindy Baglio. Remember her?"

  "Remember Fun-bags-lio? I dreamed about her my entire adolescent life. How could I forget?"

  "This was maybe eighth grade, so she was what, tenth? I come around the corner and those two shitwits had her backed against a wall, eyes closed, slapping at their hands as they groped her."

  "Shit. Those kids were twice your size. What did you do?"

  "Cracked their heads into the wall at a dead run, kneed them in the balls, and kicked them a couple times while they were down." He looked out the window at his wife and chuckled. Monica waved, and he smiled back. "Then Baglio kissed me—my first French kiss—and it took every ounce of willpower I had not to start in right where the Jensens had left off." He smirked around a cup of coffee. "Never amounted to anything. She was grateful, not attracted to a little pipsqueak like me. Still . . . ."

  "And you never told anyone?"

  He shrugged. "Monica, years later. My recruiter. The shrinks at ICAP—I had to tell them everything. Cindy asked me not to, you know?"

  "So why tell me now?"

  He shrugged again. "I don't know. It came up. How about you? You ever think about hurting anyone, Mr. Catholic Priest-man?"

  Rees sat back. "I fantasized about your death for years. It wasn't a malicious thing, not in the true sense, but envy consumed me. I couldn't think about you without a white rage overcoming me. And then you showed up at my church with the girl of my dreams, asking for my help. And I had to help her."

  "You betrayed me."

  "I did."

  "Men died because you betrayed me. Good men, doing their job to keep the world safe."

  "I know, and I live with the shame of it every day. I won't ask you to forgive me, or ever trust me. I can only say that I've learned what guilt truly is."

  Matt blinked. The world kept turning without the slightest inclination to forgive, but at the same time he didn't hate Jason. "I appreciate your help back there. But you ever even try to touch my wife I'll pull your arms off and beat you to death with them, and that's not an exaggeration."

  "I know it." He turned to look at Adam. "It wouldn't be right for so many reasons."

  Matt sighed, put his hands on the table, and stood. "Well, I've got to get to work, then spend some quality time with the girl of your dreams. So why don't you get the hell out of my house, and I'll see you next time?"

  Jason stood, shook his hand, and headed for the door. "Bye, Matt. Thank you, and sorry."

  Matt nodded.

  He left, stopping on the deck to rub Ted's belly. The dog rolled onto his back without opening his eyes, and his delighted groans carried through the glass. Jason waved goodbye to Monica—she reached for her headphones but left them in when he didn't stop to chat—got in his car, and pulled out onto Turkey Vulture Lane.

  Matt walked over to his son and picked him up, spinning him in the air before zerberting his exposed belly. They both laughed, and he booped Adam's nose.

  "There something you're not telling me, little man?"

  "Dada."

  "Yup. That's what I thought."

  He squirmed, pointing. "Doggie!"

  M
att smiled. "That's a new one. Let's go say 'Hi' to the doggie."

  Once on the floor the little man hobbled toward the deck on enthusiastic but uncoordinated legs. They grow up so fast.

  He walked out onto the porch and sat next to Ted, who shifted as Adam plopped down and petted him with clumsy hands, leaning in to put his head against the dog's chest. Matt breathed in the brisk mountain air, dead leaves, pine, and clear, crisp water, and savored the moment.

  His thoughts drifted to Sakura and the dead ends that led them no closer to finding her.

  Monica pulled off her headphones. "What you thinking about, baby?"

  He smiled, allowing the small joy to overwhelm the big worry. "I got to go to Washington for a couple days, to testify in front of some top-secret oversight committees about this Yardley mess. You want to come along? We'll make a vacation of it."

  Her dazzling smile gave him his answer. He hopped off the steps, bounded to her, and swept her off her feet. She giggled as he kissed her and nibbled her shoulder, and responded with a bite.

  "Ow!"

  "Oh, I've seen you take worse, you big baby."

  He kissed her again. "Pack up and we'll leave tonight. I hope Ted does okay on the helicopter."

  Chapter 20

  "You're kidding me." Libby Kamen glared down at the man she'd paid ten thousand dollars to come to her house, no questions asked, just so he could sit her on the couch and tell her "no."

  "I'm sorry." Already kneeling on the floor in front of her, he tapped the ankle bracelet. "These things are state-of-the-art technology, with all kinds of redundant backups. A fiber-optic prevents you from taking it off or even loosening it too much, and you'd have to move faster than light to foil that. You can't mask the GPS or remove the battery without setting off the alarm. It's like a dead-man's switch, you know?"

  "No, I don't fucking know," she snarled. "How am I supposed to take the fucking thing off, then?"

  He laughed. "You're not. That's the point."

  "Are you laughing at me?"

  He choked it down. "No, I'm not laughing at you. Sorry."