“Sounds good. Well, in the meantime…what do you want me to do?”
“Find the other pieces to the puzzle.”
A warm breeze blew past. It delicately tickled my bare skin, and I was still having a hard time processing the fact that I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt. If I were back home I’d still be wearing my business slacks and pea coat. It was difficult to imagine the weather here was like this all year. What a luxury.
Briana and Grey were working tediously on the task at hand…to get me out of the country unscathed. I didn’t think I had ever seen Grey this stressed in my entire life. I bet whatever his plan was, it would have been unimaginably difficult for the brightest minds to execute. Grey was brighter. I gingerly touched the faux goatee on my face. It was so weird to feel, and I wished I could have ripped it off, but I knew it was necessary.
Necessary. Necessary. Necessary. I had heard that word thrown around loosely for days now. It made me so sick to my stomach I could have puked. Briana, Grey, and Rachel all said it at one point. I knew it was true. They were right…but nonetheless, it was still nauseating.
My elbows were propped up on my knees. I was alone, sitting on the sidewalk outside of the garage. I let my head sink forward towards my lap and I used my hands to cup my forehead. My knees bowed out from the sudden weight.
Fuck necessary. I was fed up with that word. I just wanted my old life back. To be able to walk into my office and know I was making a difference in this country. If I could just hear Cole’s throaty voice again or feel his heavy-handed slap on my shoulder one more time. How did my life fall apart so fast? Everything I worked so hard for had slipped through my fingers in a matter of days. It felt like I had known Rachel for over a month, but yet it had just been under a week.
My mind was awash in negativity. If only I had my bike. It would have helped so much at a time like this.
I took a deep breath, pulling the humid air into my lungs. I controlled my exhale and attempted to unwind. The phone call Rachel made to Ian had been lingering in my thoughts. Since it was through an encrypted connection on Grey’s laptop, the conversation was heard by everyone. Ian said something. Something that made my soul ache. I glanced down at my watch—it was past midnight. The feeling that accompanied seeing a new day had begun only added to the melancholy that enveloped me.
Tomorrow, I would be on a non-stop flight to Moscow. Tomorrow.
The words were like lead in my mind. I clenched my jaw in frustration from the utter lack of control I had over my life. Ian’s words hit me like a freight train in the gut. It resonated so sharply when I heard it that it was frightening…because, it was almost as if I knew that he was right.
Rachel had asked him what the cover stories were about recently. He said they were about us, and that they wanted us in handcuffs, or even worse—
Dead. Rachel cut him off before he could say it. Most likely because I was in the room. With good reason. Rachel was on the target now, but I was the bull’s eye. They wanted me. I wondered. The majority of the critical injuries in the bombings were in my row, maybe I wasn’t even meant to make it this far? It was a possibility. A possibility that was truer than I would have liked to acknowledge.
Russia was my only hope to stay alive.
“I was wondering where you ran off to,” Rachel’s velvety voice called from behind me.
I craned my head backward and saw her approaching the sidewalk. Her wavy brown hair swung around at her chest, and a smile tugged at her lips as she plopped down beside me.
“Did you need some fresh air?” she asked.
I nodded. For some reason, words didn’t form. She placed a gentle hand on my forearm, with her face concerned. “Owen, what’s wrong?”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” I managed to get out.
“What, was it what Ian said?”
I turned to her, looking her straight in the eyes.
“How did you know that?”
She snorted. “You’ve been down in the dumps since I got off the call. I’m not stupid.”
“Is it really that obvious?”
“You haven’t said a word, you haven’t smiled, and you just recently disappeared.”
“You’re right…” I admitted.
She brushed her hair over her shoulder and scooted in closer to me. Her eyes darted across my face and a tiny breath of a laugh slid out.
“I felt it too, you know.”
“What?”
“The fear.”
Her words clicked in my mind. What Ian said.
“Don’t worry, you’ll be fine,” I said, rubbing her knee. Her expression became tense. “Why did you just say me? You will be fine, too. We are going to get you out of this mess. I promise.”
“Don’t make a promise you can’t keep, Rachel.”
She snorted and opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out.
“You know, you have made it this far. We have made it this far.” Her grasp on my forearm tightened. “So don’t start being a cynic now just because there is risk involved.”
“My life is the ultimate risk,” I interjected.
She slightly cringed from my statement, but it didn’t deter her.
“I know, Owen. I do. I could die too, you never know. We could have died when we crashed into the bridge, and we didn’t, okay? Briana and Grey are working their asses off up there. All to get you out of this predicament safely. So don’t belittle their effort.”
“Your conviction is so fucking sexy.”
She slapped me and rolled her eyes. “You’re terrible!”
“I know you don’t mean it,” I nudged her playfully and wrapped my arm around her.
“Don’t be so sure,” her eyebrows quirked.
“Oh! Okay, I see how it is,” I laughed.
The delicate skin of her palm gave me chills as she caressed my forearm lovingly.
“I’m serious, though.”
“About?” I asked.
“Owen. This plan will not work unless you truly believe it will. Grey’s code could work perfectly, Briana’s fake passport could get you through unnoticed…but if you don’t believe it will, it won’t work. You are the most important aspect of the plan. You realize that, right?”
I let her words sink in. Honestly, I was distracted by her perfect voice. Anything she said always came out smooth and silky.
“Not really,” I admitted. “I’ve sat in the loft doing nothing while everyone else is working to get me on a plane to Russia. All I can do is sit and wait, and it’s killing me, Rachel. I think the fact that I know I have no choice is what bothers me the most. I like to be able to make my own decisions.”
I heard a prolonged sigh, and her breath hit my neck. Her lips were pressed, and her expression troubled. “I know you do. I understand because I am the same way. But, if you truly value that—value your freedom—then you know just as well as I do that if you want to keep making your own decisions, you must go. You can’t stay here, at least for now.”
“What if I never get to see you again?”
She reached around and grabbed my far shoulder, centering me so I faced her. I felt ashamed of my sudden pessimistic mood. I had been like this for hours and I couldn’t even turn to her.
“Owen. Look at me, please.”
I gave in to her request and met her gaze.
“Don’t say that. We will. When all of this is over.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“I can’t. I don’t know anything for certain, but just like I told Ian. I have a feeling that this will all work out. What I do know is, is that if you stay here, those chances are reduced to slim to none. Although you will be on the other side of the planet…at least I’ll know you’re safe.”
Her tone was nurturing and warm. It was comforting to know she was beginning to care about me because I was the same with her.
“That means a lot to me. That you want me to be safe.”
She rubbed my arm more as I spoke.
�
��I do. You didn’t ask for this to happen. You didn’t deserve this. You will go down in history as an American hero, mark my words.”
“Hopefully while I’m still alive,” I muttered.
“Stop,” she demanded. “You will be fine.”
I nodded in acknowledgement.
“So, today is your last full day in the United States. What do you want to do with it?”
“What do you mean? I can’t do shit. We are trapped here. Our faces unfortunately prevent us from going anywhere or doing anything fun.”
She bit her lower lip and her eyes darted across the pavement. Suddenly, she glanced at me. There it was—that spark behind her eyes, the passion.
“How much cash did Briana say we had left? Like thirty-five grand?”
“I think so, why?”
A mischievous smile tugged at her lips. “We are the only two that are wanted. Briana and Grey are fine. They can go wherever they want without a worry.”
My brow furrowed and I shrugged. I had no idea where she was going with this.
“Let’s spend your last night in style,” she said. Her smirk blossomed into a grin.
“What do you mean?”
“Maybe Grey can get the cash onto a card and we can stay in a hotel. It beats spending your last night here in that loft. I’m already tired of the cigar smell, so I’m sure you are too. We can have fun. You need that more than anyone here.”
I laughed. Not because what she said was funny, but because it was absolutely crazy…borderline insane. Sneaking Rachel and I into a hotel didn’t seem like the smartest idea, but the realization that she was concerned with my happiness made me happier than I have been lately. I couldn’t remember the last time I had fun. What we did in the caboose, I admit was fun, but that was sexual. It was different. I phased back into the present, and Rachel was staring at me with her lips pursed—waiting for a response.
“You are really serious, aren’t you?”
“Very,” she said. “The most expensive room in all of Miami. It’s in the Hotel Setai. I remember reading an article about it. Top of the line.”
I began to smile at the thought of it.
“Let’s get the money on a card, call the hotel, and get the room for one night. We can go to the airport from there.”
“What type of room?” I asked.
“The penthouse. We are going to live large your last night.”
- 12 -
I heard the sharp clacking of her heels first. The hallways here were wide, with no carpet. Everything was marble or concrete. I missed the sun. We were working twelve-hour shifts. Well, that was what we were supposed to work. In reality, sometimes we would be here for sixteen hours or longer. Most of us left work in the middle of the night and we would sleep all day. Only to return in the evening. The higher ups manned the daytime shifts. It must have been nice, getting to see the sun. They were much older, though. Maybe when they died off I could replace them. I felt old enough—pushing forty seemed old enough to me.
I would never, though. I couldn’t continue working here. Not after I figured out what was really going on. They threw around the word treason, applying it to innocent people, when in actuality they were the traitors. They were figuratively shitting on the constitution and spitting on the founding fathers’ graves. If only people knew. If only…
Now, every night when I came to work and pressed the button in the elevator to go down, ten floors below the ground, it was blatantly obvious. They had to keep such atrocities hidden beneath the surface. Above the surface were all the mindless sheeple who struggled to keep their heads above water in Post-Confinement America. It was madness. As a country, we were being forced into oblivion by the hands of the unknown. Doomed by corporate greed and an insatiable thirst for control, for power.
But I knew. I knew everything. But what could I possibly do? We took an oath before we got the job, and that was years ago for me. I also took another oath, back when I was a soldier defending this country. I was one of the first deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan in 2003. My oath caused a rage to build inside of me, one that I could not quell.
I, Lucas Bolden, do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.”
All enemies—foreign and domestic.
The enemies I wanted to protect my country from were domestic. I had proof. I had paperwork, and it was destroying me, knowing that I was helpless. Unfortunately for my colleagues and I, these were the orders of the President. Diabolical ones at that.
I had wondered, where did this begin? Was it George Bush Senior? Reagan? Or as frightening as it seemed to me, perhaps it all began with the killing of JFK. Maybe the conspiracies were true, but I couldn’t be certain. All I knew was this had to be stopped. Our freedom depended on it. No one dared to speak out and warn the others. They knew what was at stake.
We were given immunity, or so they told us. I didn’t believe them, not a word of it. I happened to be off work when the Confinement was initiated, and somehow my house ended up on the list. My family and I were awoken in the middle of the night to flatbed military trucks outside, to escort us to the Arlington Confinement Camp—District 4.
We were there for almost two weeks before they realized their mistake. Given my employment with the CIA, I was supposed to be excluded. To be left alone, even though I lived within the twenty-mile radius. Once we were back home, it was like living in a ghost town. Everyone was gone, my neighbors, and even the schools were shut down. What were we supposed to do? Wait? My kids were afraid. They missed their friends, and they asked me questions like, ‘Why did they take everyone, Daddy?’
It devastated me not to have been able to give them an answer. I had a feeling after Black Monday something was going to happen. We collectively knew. I mean, I was in the intelligence department. Our floor was dedicated to finding things out that the higher ups needed to know. Matters of National Security, they called it.
Her footfalls were growing closer, and the heels made such an unnerving sound. The fact that she was the one wearing them was the problem. I was convinced that she was Satan in the female form.
I was working the night she lost her shit about the two kids at MIT who were conducting experiments on animals from the Danger Zone. We knew they had been exterminated, but we didn’t know why. Seeing her reaction only heightened my curiosity to why that was so important. My wife always joked around that I must know everything. The truth was we didn’t. Anything the higher ups wanted to keep secret, they did. They wanted us to do the job and do it blindly, without questions, without resistance.
We knew the truth about this, though. We had pieced it together. Owen Marina was framed for a crime he didn’t commit. He was their sacrifice—a pawn piece in their grand plan. All so they could keep one of their parties in power. That was why they were so afraid of the Convergence Party winning. It didn’t matter which of the two traditional parties won the election, both were terrorists. The only difference was that in this country, some ill-informed person might have imagined a terrorist wearing a turban. The ones that were the biggest threat actually wore suits and ties.
I was exhausted. Tired of keeping secrets bottled up that would undoubtedly change the face of America forever. How could I let that happen? I had to find a way. My phone was tapped, my wife’s phone was tapped. My immediate family’s phones were tapped. My home and work computers were monitored. My car had a GPS tracker in it. They had me just like they wanted me—subdued.
She entered the control room. Angrily, she tossed her sandy-brown hair to the side. She stood at the front of the room and glanced around at us with her cat-like eyes. I despised every cell in her body. It was incomprehensible to fathom what was going on in her man
iacal mind. I wanted to throw up every time she spoke. More so, I would have rather put a bullet between her eyes.
“The meeting begins now,” her cold voice began. “As of ten minutes ago, it has officially been five nights since Owen and Rachel’s disappearance. Our methods have failed, and we must implement a higher level of strategic planning. We know they are in Florida. I want each one of you searching a different major city. Traffic cams, convenient store cams, you name it. Tap into it all. Your jobs and your families’ welfares depend on it.”
There she goes again. Threatening us.
“I want anything that is suspicious to be blown up on the big screen for me to see. Remember, this is an order from the Commander in Chief. Don’t fuck around with your time.”
I struggled not to scowl. I gritted my teeth and imagined myself wringing her neck in front of a crowd of thousands. The crowd would cheer in liberation once they figured out she was hell-bent on creating a totalitarian regime. I swallowed and felt sick again. She was just as guilty as Obama. She was an extension of him, and he was ensuring the continuity of a plan that began long ago.
Veronica Hall was going to be the end of this great country, and I planned on finding a way to be the mutiny.
Vinny and Luke were in the garage tending to business. Judging by the constant sound of torque drills and hydraulic lifts, today was busier than what it had been. It might have had something to do with the fact that they were going to close shop early and remain closed tomorrow. We were going to the hotel in the next few hours. Briana had called and booked the presidential suite. It was the entire top floor, apparently.
Rachel and I were all alone. We were lying on the couch, and she lay on me with her back against my stomach, with her head upon my chest. She was watching some Lifetime movie that I wasn’t paying much attention to. I was content just having her lie on me like this with our bodies so close and so warm. She had been playing with the palm of my hand with the tips of her nails, and it felt so amazing.
Simple pleasures. Spending time with Rachel was all I wanted to do. Every hour that passed, the one that followed seemed to slip by faster. The closer that tomorrow grew, the tenser I felt, but I tried to keep it out of my mind.
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