Deadline Man

by Jon Talton

  “Amber, I can’t just disappear. What are you talking about? I need to know what’s happened.”

  She becomes agitated again. “We don’t have a whole lot of time here. What happened is everything has turned to shit and the only way to keep you safe is to get you out of here.”

  “You’re FBI? Where are the other agents? Why didn’t you arrest them?”

  “It’s complicated.”

  “I can understand complicated. What? The FBI’s afraid of the CIA?”

  “They’re not CIA. They’re private contractors, mercenaries. William Blankley and Morton “Stu” Farmer, former Marine recon. Laura Monahan, former Blackwater. They called her “Gitmo Laurie.” Enjoyed enhanced interrogation way too much. They all work for a company you’ve never heard of called Praetorian.”

  I suck in a deep breath of air. Craig Summers’ CIA front company—the one that was supposed to have been dissolved.

  I tell this to Amber as she fidgets. “They’re not CIA anymore,” she says. “And they’re not about surveillance, or just about surveillance.”

  “What are they about?”

  She doesn’t give me a straight answer. “I didn’t expect to run across them here.”

  I study my wrists. They are bruised and cut from where I struggled against the handcuffs.

  “Laura killed Troy,” I say. “I saw her that day, heading toward his office before he hit the street. She rammed her shoulder into me, like she was in a hurry…”

  “Or a girl with an attitude,” Amber says, “who was going to take Troy out for talking to a member of the press.”

  “No, she seemed surprised when I mentioned it.”

  “Troy pointed you toward Olympic Defense, right?”

  I nod. But he did it in passing, to show he was the smartest guy in the room. I didn’t come to Troy’s office with the agenda to find a secretive defense unit. I just wanted to shoot the shit, add some depth to a column I was doing on a major local company. Troy never mentioned Praetorian. He did ask about eleven/eleven, but not like someone who really knew what it meant.

  “Why can’t you arrest them?”

  “Because that’s not the way the world works. And I’m on my own right now. I don’t know who to trust on my own team. I need to find a lifeline. If you stay, you’ll be killed.” She reaches down and pops the trunk. “I have a suitcase for you. Inside is an envelope with five thousand dollars in hundreds and small bills. It’s the best I can do. You can’t use your credit cards. You can’t fly.”

  “What about my gun?”

  “No.”

  “Oh, yeah, the pen is mightier than the sword.”

  “That revolver is too heavy,” she says. “Too difficult to conceal.” She reaches across me and opens the glove box. She hands me a dark triangle of fabric. It takes me a minute to realize it’s a holster. I pull out a small revolver with a black graphite skin. The hammer is enclosed by a cowling and the barrel is short but thick, adding to the gun’s compact but menacing look. It’s the lightest gun I’ve ever held.

  “Smith & Wesson 340PD Airlite,” she says. “Scandium alloy frame. Titanium barrel. Twelve ounces. The holster’s designed to stay in your pocket if you have to draw it. Here’s one Speedloader as a backup. I want it back.”

  She hands me the circular device. It consists of a black plastic circle with five bullets hanging from it and a metal catch on top. Drop them into the cylinder of the revolver, twist the catch on top, let the cartridges fall in, snap the cylinder back in, and you’re done. The name says it all. The Speedloader is about the same weight as the gun.

  I study the pistol. Open the cylinder, which is fully loaded with five rounds. “Will this work? I like my Combat Magnum.”

  “It has stopping power, believe me. Special government-issue bullets, .357 magnum. Just don’t run out.” Her voice is businesslike, knowledgeable. This is the same woman who feigned helplessness against the dogs in Ryan Meyers’ apartment.

  She reholsters the revolver.

  Still I make no move to get out of the car and she’s forced to sit with me as a light rain taps on the windshield and the panorama below us becomes runny and insubstantial.

  I ask, “So all that stuff about walking into the lobby of the Chicago Tribune building with your first reporter’s notebook. That was all bullshit.”

  “I wish it had been true.”

  “Is your name even Amber?”

  “Yes.” She gives me a sad smile and brushes back my hair. “It’s not like you never kept a secret from a woman you made love to. Anyway, I told you I was older than I looked.” She uses both hands to pull back her hair. “I didn’t plan what happened. With us.”

  I make no attempt to move.

  “This is about Megan’s disappearance and it’s about something going on in Olympic International,” she says. “The two are connected. I just don’t know how. That’s why we need to work together.”

  “Work together!” I slam a hand on the door’s armrest and let out a string of obscenities. “That begins with trust. Like telling me about this connection. The paper’s going to lay me off anyway!” I hear myself babbling. I keep it up. “Nobody seemed to give a damn about Olympic until I started writing about it. Just Conspiracy Grrl…”

  I am watching her face and expect to see a reflex of interest. Instead she stares at her lap and my stomach drops out. “Oh, hell. You were Conspiracy Grrl…”

  “I was trying to get you started.”

  I shake my head. Part of me still feels as if I am being waterboarded again. I take a deep breath. “The passion page was a nice touch.”

  Her mouth parts in a half-smile. “I knew your reputation. Thought it might help get your interest. Now you need to get going.”

  “Who is Mister EU? Another agent?”

  “He’s you, silly.”

  “EU?”

  “Emotionally unavailable.” She leans over and kisses me passionately. I hold her as tight as life.

  “Now,” she says, “you’ve got to get the story and get it out there so people know what’s going on. I’ve packed a bag for you and swept it for any listening or tracking devices. It’s clean. So be careful what else you might gather along the way.” Then she gives me a precise set of instructions.

  “I can’t do that.” The ice is back in my bloodstream. My chest constricts.

  “You will do just that,” she says. “Why are you shaking?”

  “I can’t do it!”

  ***

  But I do.

  Chapter Thirty-four

  B-matter.

  In my line of work, the term “B-matter” has an elastic meaning. It can be copy that’s written in advance—say, for a notable person’s obituary—to be topped by the “A-matter.” It can also be information that’s less important to the news story—stuff that can be trimmed if there’s not enough space. Or B-matter can simply be background on a story, whether you use it yourself or pass it along to another writer. It might never make the finished article. It’s just there. It happened. But it’s an orphan. No editor ever went to the mat over B-matter.

  Here is some of mine: My sister Jill was always a strange girl. Bookish and withdrawn as a child, unhappy about her beauty as a young woman, prone to terrible tantrums over seemingly small things. Only when I got older did I realize that she was reacting to what would now be called a dysfunctional family: alcoholic mother, a dad who was too old to be a hippy but wanted to try, until he found his calling as a crackpot who believed he had a legal right to refuse to pay income taxes. He found many like-minded souls who agreed. Unfortunately, one who didn’t was a federal judge. Fights at home and flights from creditors and ever-present shame. I did my best to protect her.

  It was only during college when her mind became a haunted house. She had to drop out. She became afraid of everything. Panphobia, they called it. By this time I was in the Army and could no longer shelter her. Grammy, my grandmother on my mother’s sid
e, had enough money to try to help. Jill would slip in and out of normality—taking part-time jobs and lovers, then falling apart over seemingly trivial things and clinging to a single room.

  Jill was hospitalized. She went through a platoon of therapists. She ended up on disability at age twenty-five, living in a little apartment in the U District that had a view of the ship canal. She had her books and music and view. She rarely left this sanctuary. When Prozac came along, she seemed to get better. But the improvements were always temporary, tentative. When I worked for the Free Press the first time, it wasn’t unusual to get her calls, sometimes magically fluent, often raving. I was dear and I was the enemy.

  The only thing Jill wasn’t afraid of was the water. She loved swimming as a child and teenager. She was very good—working as a lifeguard during good summers. In college, she became an ocean kayaker—a Puget Sound and Lake Washington kayaker. She likened it to cross-country skiing—as opposed to the high-adrenaline whitewater variety, like downhill skiing. Here, she was fearless and it always seemed to give her the peace that eluded her on land. She returned to it again and again. By the time I took the job back east, Jill seemed to have reached as much equilibrium as was possible, and I gave the kayak credit.

  That’s what made what happened so unbelievable.

  ***

  That night, I arrive at the main downtown ferry terminal in plenty of time to make the 10:30 sailing for Bremerton. I use my credit card for the last time to buy a ticket, which I place on the dashboard. It is full dark but the sky above the city gives off a washed-out turquoise glow under low clouds. The parking lot is brightly illuminated. Beyond it is the blackness of Elliott Bay and, in the distance, dots of lights from Bainbridge Island.

  The lot is hardly full, maybe forty cars spread out into three lanes. Just about the right size crowd. A few pedestrians walk past us to be ready to board. Sailors going back to the Navy base, young couples that enjoyed a weekend in the city, a family with a stroller. People who probably don’t read the newspaper. We sit in our cars and wait. I make fists and unclench them, over and over. The big boat emerges out of the dark and slides into the dock. In a few minutes, cars stream off in the opposite direction, headed into downtown.

  The ferry has the same green-and-white paint scheme I’ve seen my entire life. It’s anchored securely to the massive terminal. But I can detect a menacing rise and fall of the boat as it holds its position, the water of the bay pushing and pulling the riveted steel. A vague nausea that I’ve felt for hours becomes more pronounced. I make myself watch the streetlights. A cop with a dog wanders by but he pays me no mind. Other cars line up behind me, to my right and left. Most shut off their lights and engines. I scan the mirrors but see no sign of pursuers.

  I am out of the remains of my suit, now wearing a black leather jacket, gray long-sleeved T-shirt, and black jeans. Amber did not pack a varied wardrobe. In the right-hand pocket of the jeans, the Airweight sits in its holster. It’s barely noticeable when I stand up and the bulge doesn’t look like a revolver. In the passenger seat is the small, black duffel that Amber packed for me, along with the old brown leather briefcase. The briefcase has a Macbook, my old Blackberry, and a number of files from work. In a few minutes, it’s time to drive onto the ferry.

  The ferry is named the Hyak. What an irony, a sick, sick irony. It has five decks standing out of the water and bridges on each end. I follow the car ahead, a new Accord: we slide toward the water as crew members direct us. The car bumps slightly as it crosses the platform that connects the dock to the boat, then I’m inside it, on the long car deck. The confinement tightens my chest. The boat ever so slightly sways and my nerves start to eat through my skin. Why the hell do I live in a city nearly surrounded by water?

  I slide the gearshift into park, turn the ignition off and grip the wheel for several moments until the feelings pass. Then I grab the duffel and walk toward the stairs. I leave the keys in the cup holder and the briefcase in the passenger-side floor well. For just a moment I look back: the Toyota is eight years old and paid for, but I never fell in love with it. Then I turn and follow a lanky young man up the narrow, metal stairway.

  The main cabin is warm and spacious, far bigger than we need tonight. My quick count shows about sixty people in the room as a voice makes announcements over the PA system and the ferry prepares to sail. Then the big engines rev up and we’re moving. The sense of pushing hopelessly against the great waters of the sound. I walk to the restroom, lock the door, and lean my head against the cool wall, just standing there. I fight my gag reflex, remind myself I can breathe.

  It takes a long time for the wooziness go away. I finally sit on a long cushioned bench against a wall, staring at the floor, my hands wrapped under my arms for warmth. A column is due in a little more than fifteen hours. But, no. I am due to be “tapped,” as the managing editor warned me. Pretty soon, no more columns. I wonder if they would have let me write a farewell. I wonder if they would have let me tell the truth. My stomach gradually settles into a stew of acid, but I have plenty of time to feel better. The crossing takes an hour. I just want to sit here in the cabin, imagining that I am in the banquet room of a third-rate country club or an old American Legion hall on firm ground. I want to, but I can’t.

  The dead trail me. Now I know the three Praetorian employees are hired killers and torturers. Troy needed to be silenced quickly. But did they take their time with Ryan Meyers? Holding him to the floor as they tightened the belt around his neck? I wonder only a second about the difference between the two. Ryan might have known where Megan is, so he needed to receive their full list of services. He didn’t talk—so they worked me over to find out. Where is Megan? Somehow Megan mattered more to them than the tattoo on Ryan’s leg. They must have seen it. Without the information they believe Megan possesses, “eleven/eleven” means nothing. Two numbers. And it’s not as if they could have removed the tat easily; messing with it would only have raised suspicions. So they left it. Ryan had information about Megan; it was his death warrant. I don’t know why Troy had to die.

  I zip up the leather jacket and lever myself up from the seat. A sturdy door opens against my push, leading out onto the upper deck. It’s deserted in the cold, wet wind. The blast helps my stomach, does nothing to help my mind. The black water spreads out around us, churning from the distant engines that leave a shadowy white wake. It’s cold enough to kill, even in late October. Looking back, Seattle looks like a dream city, an open jewel box of tall prisms with lighted diamonds inside. I push back against the damp metal of the cabin wall. A young woman and her son dart past. He wants to look over the side. I zip my jacket higher against the cold and pull my head down into the collar. Then I walk to the rail and force myself to stare over the side.

  In a few minutes, I make my way to the forward cabin. On a busy morning or afternoon, it could comfortably hold fifty commuters. Now it’s nearly deserted. I push through the door to the forward deck, push against the wind and it finally opens, and I watch the sea come at us, the arms of tree-thick land at a far distance on both sides. I think about my sister, sick with guilt. I stare into the undulations of the water, pulling off my leather jacket to find some relief against the sweat that has engulfed me.

  I leave the jacket off as Bremerton hoves into view and I put on a snug, black ball cap that Amber had given me. It has a small Phoenix Suns logo. I hate ball caps. As the crew starts to make announcements, I sling my duffel over my shoulder, return to the main cabin, and sit at a table until the right moment comes to join the crowd going down to their cars. Then the big boat bumps into the terminal and the sound of starting car engines fills the crisp night air.

  I’m not with them. I walk off with the pedestrians, in the middle of the crowd, just a tall man in a gray T-shirt, carrying a jacket, wearing a ball cap, lugging a duffel. I walk neither fast nor slow, just the right pace to keep with the group. From the walkway I can see the water much more clearly, smashing and gurgling between lan
d and boat. Somehow it has lost its power to frighten me. I did not want to be here. I did not want my happy alignment of the planets destroyed or my life dug up and used against me. I didn’t start this. Now I am going to finish it. I’m not feeling terror or grief. I’m not feeling anything except that I am running out of time, trying to claw my way out of an hourglass.

  My legs carry me onto the firm land, past the news racks, across the parking area, and out into the night. It’s a choice I make, very different from the course Jill chose when she boarded the very same ferry five years ago on a cold night. It was a week before they found her body.

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Monday, November 1st

  At 8:15 a.m., I board an Amtrak Cascades train going south. As the countryside rolls by, the pictures of Megan Nyberg and Heather Brady sit in my lap. I memorize their faces. Megan is already in my head from the constant repetition of television: the straight fair hair that seems to hold every color from gold and honey to the lightest brown as it sweeps down to her shoulders. It is a limited rainbow, but more than enough for any man to find irresistible. Perfect crescents of brows set off large blue eyes hardly innocent. Her smile is wide. If she smiled at you, it would make your whole day. Heather’s smile looks more uncertain and shy. Her brown hair is lush and thick, falling across and down a red cheerleader sweater. Her nose is a little long, her chin has a small, pale mole on the left edge, and her smile too crooked to be considered classically beautiful. But she’s very attractive, or was. Something in her smile reminds me of someone. It’s a fleeting recognition and I don’t want to think about women in my life.

  I try to read the Tacoma newspaper. It’s a shell of its former self and I am through it in ten minutes. Most of it is dutiful reading—there’s little that’s compelling or interesting among the stories. Bland. Safe. I guess that’s the intention of the bosses, but it has nothing in it that I would pay to read. I am the only person in the car reading a newspaper.