[A Thousand Faces 01.0] A Thousand Faces

by Janci Patterson

  I could feel tears burning in the corners of my eyes—more from embarrassment than relief. I buried my face in his shoulder. "I'm sure that'll be a comfort after I die of humiliation."

  Kalif laughed. He probably would have been laughing with me if I could just join in. "Let's get some work done, before my mom decides she needs to forbid you from coming down here at all."

  I winced. "Is she that uptight?"

  Kalif shrugged. "I think she's mostly concerned that I show respect for you. That's always been really important to her."

  I wondered what she'd say if she knew that I was the one crawling into his bed. "Is that because of your father?"

  Kalif nodded. "She doesn't want me turning into him."

  I eyed him. "Obviously she's not the only one who's worried about that."

  He blushed. "Can we forget about that?"

  Now it was my turn to laugh. "Oh, come on. It's cute."

  He shook a finger at me. "Looking like my father is never cute."

  "Fine," I said. "Forgotten. So is your mom mad we're . . ." I realized too late I should have structured that sentence differently to avoid labels.

  "Together?" Kalif suggested.

  My heart picked up. "Yeah," I said. "That."

  He shook his head. "I'm beginning to think it's you who's the most upset about it."

  "No, it's just—"

  Kalif wrapped an arm around my waist. "I'm kidding."

  Right. I clearly needed to locate my sense of humor. "But your mom? Do we need to worry about her spying on us?" We had plenty of surveillance equipment around, so she had the means.

  Kalif thought for a minute. "Maybe."

  I looked around the room, as if a camera would just be sitting out, obvious. "Really?"

  He shrugged. "Wouldn't be the first time she did it, though it's been a few years since I've caught her."

  My neck prickled, and I scanned the walls, looking for places to hide a camera. At places of business, having obvious cameras was a type of security in itself. In a bedroom, not so much.

  Kalif watched me, sighing. "If she had a camera in here, she'd know about last night."

  I scanned the ceiling. "Unless she doesn't have a constant feed." The only hole I could see was the light fixture, and I stepped up on the bed, examining the space where the bulbs screwed in. Thankfully I didn't see one. If she'd put a camera there, it would have pointed straight down at Kalif's bed—and any mother who wanted to spy on her sixteen year old son's bed via security camera had serious, serious issues.

  Kalif sat down at his computer. "If you want to check the walls, there's a voltage detector in the second drawer."

  Kalif started working on his computer while I checked the room. I didn't find any electricity in the walls, except for above the sockets and by the light fixtures, where I'd expect wires to be. I couldn't find any cracks or recesses where Aida might have planted cameras; I checked the outlets themselves, but none of them would afford a view of the room. I found a small screwdriver in Kalif's same desk drawer, though, and removed the plates in the wall, looking for microphones, but came up empty handed.

  "Don't your parents spy on you?" Kalif asked.

  "No," I said. "At least, I don't think so. We've talked about how I could change my face and run away if I wanted to, and they know that, so we have to base our relationship on mutual trust. I don't run off or hide important things from them, and they don't spy on me. I'm pretty sure, anyway." I put my hands on my hips and gave the room one more once-over. "I think it's clean."

  Kalif nodded. "I'm pretty sure Mom hasn't spied on me in a while, but I'm never sure if she just got better at hiding the evidence."

  "Doesn't it bother you, knowing your own parents don't trust you?"

  Kalif shrugged. "You get used to it."

  I didn't see how that could be true, but I let it drop.

  "Can she watch your computer?" I asked.

  "That's what I'm checking," Kalif said. "But no, I don't see anything."

  "Okay," I said. Time to pick out our next lead. "If it wasn't Megaware that went after my parents, who else could it have been?"

  "It would have to be someone who knew where your parents were going to be," Kalif said. "There's me, and my parents—"

  "But if they wanted to get rid of my parents, they had lots of other opportunities—ones that wouldn't result in a botched job."

  "Right," Kalif said. "So who else?"

  I thought about it. "Could someone have hacked into your server, and read our files? They could have gotten enough information that way."

  Kalif gave me a look over his shoulder. "I monitor the security."

  "I'm not trying to insult you, I just thought—"

  Kalif bent over his keyboard, grumbling at me. "You're right. It's a possibility. I'll check now."

  "Other than that," I said, "the only other person who would possibly have is the client who hired Mom and Dad to do the Eravision job in the first place."

  Kalif nodded. "Circom. They shouldn't have known they were working with shifters, though."

  I stared at the ceiling. "Unless rumors have gotten around. If someone figured out that a group of shifters was operating in the area, it's possible that instead of hiring Mom and Dad to do a job, they were actually laying a trap. Think about it. That job was perfect for shifters, since they wanted to frame specific people. Maybe it was too perfect."

  Kalif kept working on his server checks, but he nodded. "That's a plausible theory."

  My parents always said that so many of us working together were bound to draw attention. Most of our targets could have figured out they'd been scammed by shifters if everyone told the whole truth, since we didn't kill people to keep them from talking. But people were more likely to assume someone was lying or had tampered with video footage than they were to leap to the conclusion that shape shifters had been stalking them. We were far outside most people's comprehension of reality. Our jobs were easier than they would have been in centuries past, when magic was a possibility. Perhaps that's why Hassan-i-Sabbah's assassins inspired so many legends and we didn't.

  "Give me the files on Circom," I said. "I'll look over them while you check for hacks."

  Kalif opened the files on his laptop, and I sat cross-legged on his unmade bed, searching.

  Still, it was hard to concentrate while sitting on Kalif's bed. The blanket bunched under my knees, and I closed my eyes, remembering the way his arms felt around me. Mom said things were intense when you fell for your first shifter, but intense wasn't the same as lasting. She'd probably emphasized that part for my benefit, and now I could see why.

  "Do you ever worry," I asked, "that you only like me because you don't know any other shifter girls?"

  Kalif didn't even take his eyes off his screen. "No."

  I glared at him. "Just no? You're not even going to speculate with me?"

  "Sorry," Kalif said. "Why, do you like me only because you don't have other options?"

  "I asked you first."

  "And I answered you."

  I sighed. "You did, but your answer wasn't very interesting."

  Kalif laughed. "What do you want me to say? To some extent, all relationships are about proximity. You don't fall for someone you've never met, and the more you're around someone, the more likely you are to like them."

  I slumped back on the bed. "So the only reason people get together is because they're near each other?"

  "No," Kalif said. "Proximity is part of it, but it's not everything. You're not the first shifter girl I've met."

  I sat up straight again. "Really?" There were so few of us, I'd just assumed that my family was the first set of shifters Aida and Mel had met outside their families.

  Kalif glanced at me over his shoulder. "Really. When I was thirteen my parents were working with another spy, a guy from Belgium, actually. He was in a mixed marriage, and he had a shifter daughter—Helene was her name. I didn't like her at all."

  "Why not?"

&nb
sp; "She was always going on about how bad her life was, how hard it was to be a shifter, how she never knew who she was. I always figured she'd have had that same problem if she'd been normal. I don't know for sure, but it wasn't attractive."

  "My life was pretty good, before my parents disappeared." I looked at Kalif. "I guess it's still pretty good, considering."

  He turned around again to smile at me. "See? You think differently than she did. So there you go. I like you for who you are, not for convenience."

  I raised one eyebrow. "And you never worry about whether I feel the same way?"

  He rolled his eyes. "Would you want me if I was a jerk to you?"

  "No," I said.

  He nodded sharply. "There you go."

  I flopped backward, bring the laptop onto my knees. "I just don't see why you have to be so sure of everything all the time."

  "Not everything," Kalif said. "Just you."

  My breath caught. "How can you say that? It's only been a few days."

  Kalif's face turned serious. "Jory," he said. "It's not like I just met you."

  I lay back on his bed, staring up at the ceiling. I didn't know what I did to earn that kind of faith from him, but I wanted more than anything to keep it.

  Thirteen

  Circom was supposed to be our client, not our mark, but Mel had done a complete security workup on them anyway, just in case. From the looks of his report, Circom's security was top notch. That made sense; if they had enough money to hire spies and saboteurs, they had money to protect their assets. Their budget for installation was big and their budget for maintenance matched its magnitude. We would probably be looking at a design that didn't cut corners, which was a shame, since cut corners were my friends.

  That was doubly true when I was dealing with another company who might already know about shifters. If I left evidence behind, I might put Mom and Dad in even more danger. Better to play it safe. Always.

  "I have some good news, and some bad news," I said to Kalif.

  "Is the bad news that their security is airtight?"

  I sighed. "You knew?"

  "That's what I remember."

  "Well, the good news is their footage is transmitted wirelessly," I said. "But if their network security is as intense as the rest of this, we'll want to get me inside first, like we did at Megaware."

  "You'd need a profile for that. Got any leads?"

  I pulled up a map search program and plugged in Circom's address. When the cross streets popped up, I smiled. Here was the first piece of truly good news about Circom; they were located comfortably inside the district of my favorite fire marshal. "Bingo."

  Kalif spun around on his stool. "What?"

  I smiled. "I think it's time for Circom to get a visit from Sergeant Menendez."

  The first thing Mom and Dad did whenever we moved to a new area was to get to know—and profile—the local fire marshals. When one was promoted last year, Mom and Dad let me profile his replacement. Some of the profiles we did made me feel sad for the pathetic lives of our subjects; others made me feel sick because of how awful people could be. But the profiling of Mike Menendez just made me happy. Mike was a nice guy with two little kids and a wife who owned her own hair studio. In his spare time he ran a side business doing controlled burns of abandoned buildings to teach people fire survival skills. He was built like Barney Rubble and laughed like Santa Claus. And most of all, he ran all of his fire inspections exactly by the book.

  I liked him so much that I had felt bad when Kalif had hacked into his personal phone to secure his inspection calendar, which he kept in an online calendar app. Luckily, we didn't need that information to frame him for anything—we just needed to be sure that Mom and Dad didn't show up for a surprise inspection in the same place that he did. For extra safety, we always scheduled those sorts of pop visits during time he'd also allocated for inspections, so if any of the companies called to follow up with his office staff, they wouldn't be confused unless they spoke with Menendez in person.

  This time we couldn't wait, so I'd just make sure to find nothing wrong. That way there'd be nothing for them to follow up about. "I'll need to figure out what I'm inspecting," I said. "And beef up on my fire code. Do you know what I need to do once I'm inside?"

  Kalif closed his server stuff and opened a web browser. "Give me ten minutes," he said.

  When Aida came down to check on us, Kalif clicked over to a server maintenance program. I kept my screen pointed away from the door. I squirmed under her scrutiny, acutely aware that I was sitting in the middle of Kalif's unmade bed.

  But she didn't protest. She brought us a plate of sandwiches and left again, giving Kalif a pointed look. The message was clear—she could come down any time, so we'd better behave ourselves.

  Her trouble was that she was looking for the wrong behaviors.

  Two hours later I was headed over to Circom in Mom and Dad's car. This was our third mission with the same car, which was bad for our cover, but couldn't be avoided. Kalif stayed behind to make excuses for me, and to get the info as soon as I gave him access from inside. Mike's uniform was laid out on the back seat, complete with a warm pair of thick, clunky boots. I'd never asked where Mom got it, but we used it often.

  I parked the car in a metered spot about a block and a half away from the Circom building. I needed to be far enough away that no one noticed it, but close enough that I didn't have far to go in a fire sergeant's uniform.

  I walked up to Circom and through the Hurculite front doors, which were made of solid glass with no frame. I was glad I wasn't trying to break in—electrified locks on those kinds of doors weren't easy to bypass.

  Inside the lobby, a desk spanned the center of the room, reaching from wall to wall in a horseshoe shape. Turnstile openings in the desk led to the elevators near the back of the building—past a security guard in a pinstripe suit.

  The guard smiled at me as I came in. "How can I help you?"

  I forced myself to smile. The guard hadn't called Mike by name, so I had to assume that they had no history, but not say anything that would seem out of place if they did. "I'm here for an inspection." I flashed Mike's badge—another piece of Mom's handiwork. "I'll need someone to show me around."

  The guard took it, and then pulled out his radio. "Hey Sam," he said, "Sergeant is here for a fire inspection."

  My thick, calloused palms began to sweat. Sam Weisner was the contact Aida had used for the Eravision job. That probably made him middle management—the higher ups didn't usually do the dirty work themselves, so they'd have someone to pin it on if their espionage made the front page news. It also made him the guy most likely to know there were shifters involved, if in fact these were the people who kidnapped my parents. It took all my training to keep smiling.

  "I'm not expecting anyone today," Sam said over the radio.

  I shrugged with one shoulder. "That's kind of the point of a surprise inspection."

  The guard nodded at me. "It's unscheduled. You want to show him around?"

  There was a long pause, and then Sam's annoyed voice blared through the speaker. "Be right down."

  Sam was a wiry man about eight inches shorter than Mike. He had his head shaved clean, and his eyebrows were such a pale blond that they disappeared into his ghostly skin. I might have interrupted his plans for the day, but when he got to the lobby he was all smiles. "Surprised to see you today, Sergeant."

  I looked Sam in the eyes. This might be the guy who took my parents, but Mike would have no reason to hate him, so I smiled casually. "Oh, you know. I have to keep you on your toes. Give me a look at your emergency lighting and I'll be on my way."

  This time Sam's smile looked a little more uneasy. I wanted to chalk that up to his guilt, but it was probably because of the inspection. No matter how many years you spend out of school, nobody likes a pop quiz.

  Sam showed me to the elevator. I pretended to survey their wiring and conduits on the way, when really I was looking for signs of shifter
detection equipment. Mike was a big guy, so if they had them, I was already in trouble. But if there were any floor plate camera combinations on the way upstairs, they were well hidden. There wasn't any way to know for sure if the floor was wired without ripping the place apart.

  We stepped out of the elevator onto the second floor, which was a maze of cubicles. I could hear keys typing away, pages turning, and somewhere on the other side of the room, a phone ringing. I looked at my watch. It was three in the afternoon, so nearly everyone here would still be at work. The cubicle environment was too open. "I'll need you to cut the power," I said. "I'm going to walk the floor and check your signage."

  Sam narrowed his eyes. "You need to cut the power while they're working? That's pretty disruptive for an unscheduled visit."

  It was, but if I wanted to get to a workstation with a rebooting computer in a time crunch, cutting the power was my best bet. I needed Sam to do what I wanted. If that meant I needed to put him on the defensive, so be it. I came in wearing this uniform for a reason. But if I went too far, he might call the fire department to complain, so pushing him around was a bit of a tightrope walk. "You have a point. Where are the breakers?"

  He pointed at the back wall.

  I craned my neck to see the panel over the top of the cubicle walls. "For every floor?"

  "This one," Sam said. "And the one above us."

  I nodded. "What's upstairs?"

  Sam gave me a dry look. "Offices."

  Offices. Perfect. "Cut the power upstairs, then. I'll disturb fewer people that way."

  Sam gave a belabored sigh, but took out his radio and warned the offices upstairs via the intercom.

  "Great," I said. "Give me a head start, and then flip them off. Wait a few minutes, and then turn them back on. I'll come back down and let you know if I need you to flip them again."

  I left Sam standing there with a sour look on his face. I hoped he was the one who'd kidnapped my parents, partly because otherwise I shouldn't be taking pleasure in pushing him around.

  I took the stairs up to the third floor. Sam cut the power when I was only half-way up, so I got a good look at their emergency stairwell lighting and glowing exit signage. I was no expert, but it looked up to code to me.