The Asset

by Saul Herzog

  “And a new friend,” Laurel said.

  Lance looked at her and their eyes locked. It was the first time that morning he’d given her his full attention and it sent a thrill through her.

  “And a new friend,” he added. “And might I say, what a charmer she is.”

  Roth said nothing.

  “No, really,” Lance said. “You couldn’t have found someone more perfect for me, Levi. Bravo.”

  “What’s he talking about?” Laurel said.

  “He’s just trying to get under your skin.”

  “Am I?”

  “Yes,” Roth said.

  “Has she seen the pictures, Levi? I swear I don’t know how you do it.”

  “What is this?” Laurel said.

  “Show her, Levi.”

  Laurel felt her blood rise. “Show me what?”

  Roth sighed. “This is a waste of time.”

  “The hell it is,” Laurel said. “I want to know what he’s talking about.”

  “Sweetie,” Lance said, “you got a sister?”

  “What is this?”

  “I’m not continuing this conversation here,” Roth said. “Lance, we’re at the EconoLodge for another few hours. If you want to talk, find us there.”

  “I didn’t mean to upset you, boss,” Lance said.

  “Go fuck yourself,” Roth said as he stood.

  He made for the door and Laurel said, “Roth, wait,” but he didn’t slow down.

  When he slammed the door, the girl, Sam, woke up. She stretched and looked around the room. When her eyes adjusted she saw Laurel.

  “Oh,” she said, “sorry.”

  “Don’t worry,” Laurel said. “I was just leaving.”

  “I hope I didn’t interrupt anything.”

  “You didn’t,” Laurel said.

  Lance got to his feet. He seemed to have enjoyed getting Roth’s hackles up. “You don’t have to leave just because he did,” he said.

  “What was all that?” she said.

  “You’ll have to ask him.”

  “I will.”

  “Is that coffee?” the girl said.

  Laurel almost rolled her eyes. Whatever the relationship was between the two of them, she knew a girl like Sam wouldn’t be content sleeping on the couch for long.

  Laurel stood.

  “Really,” Lance said. “Stay. He’ll get over it.”

  “Unlike you, he’s still my boss,” she said and gathered her things. On her way to the door, Sam gave her a breezy good bye and Laurel, for some reason, found herself slamming the door even louder than Roth had.

  Roth was sitting in the car outside and when Laurel got to it he grinned at her. “You’re even more flushed than I am,” he said.

  “Don’t talk to me,” she said as she got in.

  He seemed pretty pleased with himself for someone who’d also lost his temper. He sat there like an idiot, watching her put on her seatbelt.

  “What?” she said. “Drive.”

  “We’re not going anywhere.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You want to be his handler, right?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Sweetheart, this is the job you signed up for.”

  Laurel took a deep breath. She looked at him, still with that stupid grin on his face.

  “Oh, come on. You want me to go back in there?”

  “No, I want you to come back to the hotel with me and watch some more home improvement shows while I finish the crossword.”

  “This is unbelievable,” she said, unbuckling her seatbelt.

  “This is the job, honey.”

  “It’s a waste of time is what it is. He wanted to shoot us the second he saw you. ”

  “But he let us in, didn’t he?”

  “He let me in.”

  “Yes he did, and he’ll take the bait, Laurel. Mark my words.”

  “Bait?”

  Roth smiled. “Bait, sweetheart.”

  15

  “You like omelettes?” Lance said.

  Sam was leaning languidly over the back of the sofa, the shape of her nipples clearly visible through the thin t-shirt she’d slept in.

  Then the front door opened and it was Laurel, back for more. She looked just as flustered as when she’d stormed out two minutes earlier.

  “Come on in,” Lance said. “Roth leaving without you?”

  “He’s going to wait at the hotel.”

  “And you’re back to convince me to come.”

  “You know how this works better than I do.”

  Lance wondered what she’d been told, how many of the blanks she’d been able to fill in, and how much of a shock she was still in for.

  “How about some more coffee?” he said.

  Laurel followed him back to the kitchen and sat down. He poured three fresh cups and brought one to Sam.

  When he reached her he said, “You ever have a roommate?”

  “I can take a hint,” she said.

  “Rain check on the omelette?”

  “Whatever,” she said, and he averted his eyes as she got out from under the blankets in the flimsy t-shirt and a skimpy lace thong.

  She pulled on her things and Lance said, “Take my truck into town and buy yourself some clothes.”

  “Okay,” she said.

  “There’s a credit card in the glove box. Pin is 1963.”

  “I don’t need your money.”

  He knew that wasn’t true. “Well, if you need gas or something,” he said. “1963. The year of the Kennedy assassination.”

  “The Kennedy what?”

  Lance looked at her.

  “I’m kidding,” she said.

  She left with the keys and Lance prayed she’d buy herself something decent. If he’d been sleeping with her that would be one thing, but he wasn’t, and the thongs and nipples were killing him.

  He went back to the counter and sat next to Laurel. He let himself look at her again, and had to admit Roth truly had outdone himself.

  “Where on earth did he find you?” he said.

  Laurel shifted uncomfortably. “How about I ask a few questions?”

  Lance raised his hands apologetically. “I beg your pardon,” he said. “Ask away.”

  “What happened between you and Roth?” she said.

  “What happened between us? You’re not asking the right question.”

  “And what’s the right question?”

  “The right question,” he said, “is where do you fit in to all this?”

  “What do you mean, where do I fit in?”

  “Why did he get you to step in as my handler?”

  “He wanted me for the job,” she said, betraying the first crack of doubt in her smooth exterior.

  “I’m sure he did,” Lance said. “But why?”

  “I have the skill set. The background. I’m a doctor. A psychiatrist.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes.”

  “And have you always looked like this?”

  “What does that mean?”

  “This,” Lance said, waving his hand in front of her. “This face. This hair.”

  Laurel leaned back. “You better tell me what you’re talking about or I’m going to walk out of here.”

  Lance got up. “Wait here,” he said.

  He went upstairs to the safe. He’d installed it himself, built it right into the stone of the chimney stack. He turned the combination dial and pulled open the thick steel door.

  Inside were passports, some guns and ammo, cash in various currencies, and a folder of documents. He pulled out a file and rifled through it until he found what he was looking for.

  He went back downstairs holding an eight-by-twelve-inch black and white photograph. It was a photo he’d taken. He’d developed it himself in a field lab on old Ilford paper. On it was a woman. She was naked, lying on her back, looking at the camera provocatively.

  He handed it to Laurel and when she saw it her eyes widened.
<
br />   She looked up.

  “Yup,” Lance said.

  “What is this?”

  “You never knew?”

  “I don’t even know what I’m looking at.”

  Lance sighed. He wasn’t sure what to believe, but he wouldn’t have put it past Roth to pull something like this on both of them.

  “Her name was Clarice,” he said.

  “Was?”

  “She’s dead.”

  “And she was your?”

  “She was my handler,” he said before the silence had time to hang.

  Laurel nodded.

  Lance looked away. Roth was more messed up than he’d given him credit for.

  Laurel cleared her throat. This couldn’t have been easy for her. No one wanted to find out she was a dead woman’s replacement.

  She sipped her coffee and Lance poured her a glass of water.

  “Thank you,” she said and drained it in one go.

  “I’m sorry to be the one telling you this,” he said.

  “It’s not your fault,” she said, and she looked at him for so long, so intently, he was forced to break off first.

  “When,” Laurel said, clearing her throat again, “when did she die?”

  Lance sighed. This wasn’t something he liked to talk about.

  “I’m guessing right about the time Roth went and found you.”

  She nodded. He watched her. He could see the truth percolating through her mind.

  “It can’t be a coincidence, can it?” she said.

  She was angry. He couldn’t blame her. She was only now beginning to see things as they actually were.

  And it would only get worse.

  This was the tip of the iceberg.

  Working with Roth, things were never how they seemed.

  Lance shrugged. “They didn’t make you get plastic surgery, did they?”

  “What? Of course not.”

  “And you don’t have a sister?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Then you’ve never seen this woman before?”

  “Never in my life.”

  They both looked at the photo a few seconds. Laurel stared. Her eyes filled with tears. Lance felt sorry for her.

  “You could be sisters,” he said.

  “Yes,” she said.

  “I think it’s fair to say you were recruited for more than your technical skills.”

  She nodded.

  “That’s not to say you’re not good at what you do,” he said.

  “Please,” she said. “You don’t have to sugar coat this.”

  “They wouldn’t hire you if you couldn’t do the job.”

  “The job?” she said, biting her lip.

  “It’s not what it seems,” Lance said.

  “You know what Roth said to me when I went out to the car?”

  “What?”

  “That I was the bait.”

  Lance nodded. “He knows what he’s doing.”

  “Does he?” Laurel said, and she looked so vulnerable in that moment. So like Clarice.

  He took a deep breath. Whatever he felt, he owed it to this woman to keep his cool.

  “He does,” Lance said. “We’re talking, aren’t we?”

  “Did you know last night, when you saw me at the bar?”

  “Why do you think I loaded the shotgun?”

  Laurel nodded. She went to the sink and refilled her water glass.

  “How did Roth recruit you?” Lance said.

  “I was in Iraq with the 82nd Airborne.”

  “And he just ran into you?”

  He watched her cast her mind back. He felt for her. He knew that was what Roth intended, but he couldn’t help it.

  Laurel saw everything differently now. In the blink of an eye, everything she’d thought she’d been, everything she’d thought she was doing with her life, had changed.

  Whatever she thought she knew would have to be filtered through the prism of this new piece of information.

  She’d been chosen as bait. She’d been chosen because she looked uncannily like someone else.

  Someone he’d been in love with.

  “Can I ask you a question?” she said.

  “All right,” Lance said, pouring himself more coffee.

  “Roth’s not exactly on a first name basis with the other assets.”

  “As far as you know,” Lance said.

  “Yes,” she said, and he could see she had a whole new respect for Roth’s ability to deceive her.

  Lance let out a deep sigh. “Look,” he said, “Roth has a job to do. And it’s not always the job we think it is.”

  “I see that,” Laurel said.

  “Doing his job, don’t take it personally, but to do his job well, sometimes it means lying to us.”

  “We’re not in kindergarten,” Laurel said. “I get that.”

  Lance shrugged. “Well then, whatever he’s told you, whatever he’s said about this mission, about me, about your role…”.

  “I know,” Laurel said. “Don’t trust it.”

  “You ever seen the movie, The Departed?” Lance said.

  “I’ve seen everything Leo’s ever made.”

  “You remember what Mark Wahlberg said about the feds?”

  She smiled. “Keep them in the dark and feed them shit.”

  “That’s what Roth does with us.”

  Laurel nodded. “I guess I always knew that,” she said.

  “You just didn’t see it hitting so close to home.”

  “No I didn’t.”

  “The thing about it,” Lance said, “is that to do this job, you have to take every word Roth says as gospel.”

  “Even though half of it is lies,” Laurel said.

  Lance nodded. “More than half. And you have to eat it all. You have to swallow and not ask yourself what’s true and what’s not. To do this job, you have to tell yourself that as far as you’re concerned, the truth and the bullshit taste the same.”

  “Swallow and don’t ask questions.”

  “That’s the job.”

  “Reminds me of a few other jobs.”

  “Yes it does,” Lance said.

  Laurel threw her hands up. “Fuck it,” she said. “This is nothing I didn’t already know.”

  “If you can accept it,” Lance said, “if you can really get down with it, you’ll sleep better for it.”

  “And I’ll do my job better.”

  “Sure,” he said.

  Laurel went to the window. “Do you suppose he knew we’d talk like this?” she said.

  “Sure he did,” Lance said. “He orchestrated it.”

  “Then we’re playing right into his hand.”

  “Well,” Lance said, “to be honest, he probably thought we’d be upstairs by now.”

  Laurel looked at him.

  Lance took a step toward her, and another, and she raised her hands like she thought he was about to throw a stray cat in her face. “Fuck, Lance.”

  “Sorry.”

  “I just found out I was hired because I look like your ex.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Fuck.”

  “I said I’m sorry.”

  “What do you think I am?”

  “I know. I know.”

  She took a breath.

  “You seemed game last night,” he said.

  “I didn’t know my whole life was a lie then, did I?”

  Lance shook his head. “I’m sorry,” he said again.

  “Give me some time to let it sink in.”

  He nodded.

  He sat back down and they stared out the window in silence for a minute. Some birds were circling in the sky.

  “They’re going to kill something,” Laurel said.

  “Look at you, all maudlin.”

  “I can’t believe I was hired because I look like your ex.”

  “Ex-handler,” he said.

  “Come on.”

  He sighed.

  “You had a thing with her,” Laur
el said.

  “I did.”

  “And something happened.”

  “Something always happens.”

  “And Roth was involved.”

  “Yes he was,” Lance said, and the way he said it made it clear there was more to the story.

  “Was she ever here?” Laurel said.

  “Who?”

  “Who do you think?”

  “Clarice?”

  “Yes, Clarice.”

  “What do you care?”

  “I’m curious.”

  “Try not to get hung up on her.”

  “Just tell me.”

  Lance sighed. “Fine. Obsess.”

  “Cut me some slack. I’m practically her twin. I just want to know.”

  “She was never here. I came back after she died.”

  “Was that before or after Roth hired me?”

  “I don’t know when Roth hired you.”

  “Two years and four months ago.”

  Lance did the math. “It was a little before that.”

  “Why did you come back?”

  “Because I needed to get my head straight.”

  “So he gave you time?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’ve been on the books this whole time?”

  “I guess so.”

  “He could have ordered you killed.”

  “I know.”

  Laurel shook her head. “You guys,” she said.

  “Laurel, believe me when I say, you don’t know the half of it.”

  “Do I want to know?”

  “No you do not.”

  16

  Sofia had to stop. She was covered in blood.

  She went to a sink and scrubbed her hands. She didn’t realize she was crying until Olga shook her.

  “Sofia. Sofia.”

  “Please,” she cried.

  “Wash your face, Sofia. You’re covered in blood.”

  Sophia washed and Olga brought her through some doors to a private area. For the first time since she’d arrived, Sofia felt like she could breathe.

  The emergency room was still armageddon. The victims kept pouring in. First they’d come from the textile factory. Young women in pink uniforms, their hair tied up in nets, coughing blood, choking, clawing at their necks. Then from the surrounding areas. Children in school uniforms, little girls in navy blue jumpers and white blouses, boys in matching gray shorts and blazers. Then shoppers from the Pokrovsky department store. And finally, residents from the massive apartment blocks south of the textile factory.

  “Sit down,” Olga said. “Have you had any water?”