The Hound of Justice

by Claire O'Dell

  Kalila sucked in a breath at the needle’s prick but didn’t jerk away. “What happened? Why did we stop?”

  “Nothing to worry about,” I told her. “We just had to check a few directions.”

  Her eyes narrowed. I smiled back at her and cradled her hand in mine while I counted her pulse. Before I’d reached the count of fifty, her pulse slowed, her eyelids drifted closed.

  “Will she live?” Salmah Sa’id said softly.

  “She will. But only if we get our tails out of here. You heard Micha—Ferret. Get your sorry ass over to that driver’s seat and step on the gas.”

  That jerked Sa’id out of her pity party and into action. She climbed into the driver’s seat and switched on the headlights. Finding the keys and turning over the ignition took a few more tries. My breath trickled out when the engine roared back into life.

  She floored the pedal and we shot down the highway. Sixty, seventy miles to the border itself. But how to cross that thrice-damned military zone? We were three women of color. We didn’t have a white man like Coyote to smuggle us through the military checkpoints. We could only hope this road led through a hole in their network, and right now, I’d run out of hope.

  An ancient road sign flashed past. DE QUEEN, ARKANSAS, 70 MI. STATE BORDER, 48 MI. The New Confederacy must’ve fallen down with highway repairs because we were bumping and jumping over ruts and potholes. Just as well I’d sedated my patient. Salmah Sa’id wasn’t about to slow down and I didn’t want her to. Better to die fighting.

  All of a sudden, a bright glare cut through the fog and the night.

  A steady thump, thump, thump of helicopter blades. The roar of engines. The dust swirling over the highway. A short sharp image of Alton, Illinois, flashes through my mind. But this time we are behind the enemy lines.

  I sucked down a breath, brought myself back to here and now. Helicopters. Three of them, including one large transport helicopter. Had Adler called up more backup before the crash? Or were these military?

  The lights overhead swung around as one of the smaller copters swooped over our truck. Sa’id momentarily lost control, then jammed the gas pedal.

  A voice boomed out from a loudspeaker. “Micha, goddamn you. Slow the fuck down. You wanted backup, you better damn well stop playing chicken . . .”

  Oh, Christ in heaven. It’s her friends.

  “Stop,” I shouted. “Stop, goddammit!”

  Sa’id slammed her foot onto the brake. Our truck swerved into the grass. I braced myself and my patient just in time, though my right arm felt nearly wrenched from its socket. Lazarus . . . Lazarus had become a dead weight, no trace of that ghostly limb nor any electrical nerves.

  The first two helicopters landed on the highway in front of us, the other neatly behind, and their lights winked off. A dozen personnel swarmed out from the transport copter, all of them armed. Several others disembarked from what looked like a medevac—one of the larger ones.

  “These are friends?” Sa’id said softly.

  “According to some definition,” I replied.

  Sa’id snorted. I couldn’t say she was wrong.

  One person emerged from the mass of shadowy figures and into view of our headlights. A woman, a stocky black woman of middle height. The others in her company spread out, military fashion. Not Adler’s people, but still dangerous.

  Moving slowly, cautiously, I unlocked the hatch and exited the truck. The woman at the head of this operation flicked a light over me, then back to our truck.

  “Where is Micha?” she said in a low, rough voice. “Where is my sister?”

  I swallowed against the sudden dryness in my throat. “Gone.”

  The light flashed back, full into my face. “Dead?”

  Her voice was flat and cold. Not—as I had learned after weeks with Micha, months with Sara—without emotion.

  “Gone,” I repeated. “I don’t know where. Sara . . .”

  “Do not talk to me about Sara. She has enough to answer for.” The flashlight flicked over the truck. Shadows masked her face, but I heard the woman’s sigh. “I see. Yes, that is a complication. You have those two women at least?”

  I nodded. I didn’t trust myself to speak calmly.

  Micha’s sister gave a shout over her shoulder. Two men with a stretcher hurried over to the truck, where they swiftly and professionally transferred Kalila Sa’id from the backseat, then jogged back to the medevac. Salmah Sa’id ran behind, her bag of notes and other evidence tucked under one arm.

  I started to follow, but Micha’s sister intercepted me. “We have our own medical attendants on board. You, come with me.”

  “But what about—”

  “Save your questions for later. We’ve got to evacuate before someone notices all the noise.”

  I wasn’t about to argue with an angry woman with a gun, so when another woman took my arm, I allowed myself to be escorted to the transport copter. When I fumbled with the safety harness, they took over, adjusted the straps, and clipped the buckle. My stump ached ferociously. Lazarus responded to my commands, but the sense of disconnection persisted.

  Lights from all the helicopters switched on. The medevac with Sa’id and her sister lifted off first, circled around once, then zoomed eastward. Ours was next, and as we rose into the air, the copter’s lights cast a wide circle over the highway and surrounding fields. I pressed my face against the window, the straps cutting into my shoulder. Down below, our truck jerked into motion, back onto the road. Just like Dane and her people, this company would leave no evidence behind.

  Without warning, exhaustion dropped on me like a fifty-ton weight. I covered my face with my hands and wept.

  ***

  No one spoke to me throughout the flight. Good thing. I could barely string two words together, and those would be fuck everything.

  Eventually I ran out of tears, if not grief. I wiped my face with the back of my hand, which still smelled faintly of disinfectant. Oh, Sara, Sara, my love. I truly believed you were invincible.

  But Sara had died, shot by Nadine Adler. And Micha . . . Micha had vanished into the night, deep in enemy territory.

  At least my patient had survived. At least we’d rescued Salmah and Kalila Sa’id from Adler and the New Confederacy. How to complete the rest of Sara’s mission . . .

  I’ll think about that tomorrow.

  Less than half an hour later, the medevac copter swung around, its searchlights flashing. Down below, landing lights appeared in the middle of the endless dark.

  The medevac dropped down to the helipad. All I could see were black dots streaming from the copter to the edge of the pad as the medics unloaded my patient and rushed off . . . hopefully to a surgical facility. Once the medevac took off, our transport copter made its descent. The crew disembarked with weapons in hand. Hostile territory? Or standard procedure? Micha’s sister had already vanished who knew where. One of the crew helped me out of my harness and onto the ground, steadying me with a hand when my knees buckled.

  “Dr. Watson. Would you come with me?”

  I blinked, adjusted my gaze to a lower level. A girl dressed in a brightly colored wrap came toward me. She might have been Tamika’s age, or a bit older. She smiled.

  “Please,” she said. “Grandmamma would like to talk with you.”

  She took my hand and led me over the lawn. By the lights of the helipad, I could make out an enormous building in the distance, and a wall of trees that enclosed this clearing. The air was cool, ripe with the scent of crushed grass and moldering leaves, filled with the whispering of branches stirred by a breeze.

  The building turned out to be a brick mansion, faced with a column-lined portico. Thick curtains blocked the windows, but light leaked out around the edges. My escort climbed the steps and opened the heavy wooden doors. “This way,” she said.

  I was too numb and exhausted to demand an explanation, so I followed her into the mansion, to the vast entryway with its two staircases winding upward, and a crystal chande
lier casting a faint glow over the whole impossible scene.

  We turned left through an archway into a formal parlor. Style: 1850s. Ivory ceiling moldings. Windows that had never seen an energy audit. Except . . . those family portraits were of black women and men. And the tapestries and rugs used patterns from West Africa and not the old Confederacy. Hmmmm.

  “Dr. Watson, welcome. I am Ekene Nkiru. Sara’s grandmother.”

  In front of me, in a padded chair next to the fireplace, an ancient woman stared at me with bright black eyes. Sara’s grandmother. It didn’t surprise me to see the array of screens at her side, nor the gleam of silver implants at her temples. With a word, she dismissed the girl, then tilted her hand toward another chair. At her gesture, the screens went blank and retracted into the floor. I stood there, glaring.

  Her mouth tucked into a smile. “Micha was right about you.”

  Right? Right? My vision blurred into a red haze.

  “Goddamn you,” I whispered. “Goddamn you to hell. You, you abandoned your granddaughter. You left her to die in Oklahoma. Micha, too. What kind of family demands a debt from their children?”

  The terror and fury of these past three weeks poured out of me. Loud. Angry. Both hands clenched into fists. Ekene Nkiru watched with that same dispassionate gaze, unmoved by my rage.

  At last my fury wound down. I stood there panting and trembling.

  “Sit,” the old woman said firmly.

  I sat.

  Nkiru touched a keypad on the arm of her chair. A boy hurried into the parlor with a tray of breadfruit, wine, and cups. I noted in passing that he carried a Taser tucked into his sash. He poured two cups of palm wine and served us before he backed out of the room.

  Ekene Nkiru drank from her cup, then continued to study its contents. Her face was thin, cut into sharp angles, but with the lines softened by loose skin. A dark, implacable face, which reminded me of Sara. Her eyes, though bright, were rimmed with red, and I had the impression she had only recently left off weeping.

  “She was my favorite grandchild,” she said at last. “My Sara.”

  My breath caught at the tears in her voice.

  “We owe you—I owe you a great debt,” she continued. “You have been a great friend to both my granddaughters. You have given trust for trust, faith for faith. I have never worried about Micha, but Sara . . . My Sara doesn’t have many friends. She can be difficult, as you know.”

  In spite of everything, I had to choke back a laugh. “Family trait?”

  Ekene Nkiru offered a bland smile. “You might say so. But.” And here she leaned forward. “Let us discuss the matter for which you risked your life, and for which Sara lost hers.”

  Together, over breadfruit and wine, she laid out her plans. First, the matter of Kalila Sa’id. Nkiru’s own private team of physicians would take over her medical care. Micha had forwarded the essential details. My own observations would be welcome.

  Thank you for your confidence. So happy to oblige.

  But I stifled any comments. What mattered was Sara’s mission.

  Which Ekene Nkiru had not forgotten. The family, she told me, would arrange for Dr. Salmah Sa’id to meet with trusted officials in the Federal States. Ekene Nkiru herself guaranteed these officials would launch a thorough investigation.

  “As for you,” she said. “You will stay with us for a time. I need a few weeks to untangle these affairs.”

  She leaned forward, took both my hands within hers. Her skin felt cool and paper dry. “I am forever in your debt. I and the family both. When you return to Washington, you will find your name cleared. You have my promise on this.”

  23

  * * *

  MAY 13. Hello, Journal.

  * * *

  I stared at those four words as if a stranger had written them.

  Perhaps I was a stranger to the me-of-today. I remembered—as if through a glass, darkly—another Janet Watson who wrote a never-ending stream of bitter-bright commentary on her life. Oh, sure, my journals had some dark entries, especially after Alton, Illinois. But today . . . today the thought of recording anything from the past few weeks left me weeping.

  I wiped the tears from my face.

  No, dammit. I will not lose this part of me as well.

  So. Start again.

  * * *

  MAY 13. My first journal entry since the night Micha confiscated my notebook. To be sure, Ekene Nkiru ordered a stack of new journals for me, together with all the expensive inks I could use in a lifetime. That I ignored her gifts, and spent my days staring out the window, was likely a factor in her decision to send me home.

  Home. Let’s think about that word a moment.

  Moment over. More tissues used to dry my tears.

  Here I am, back in Georgia on the dirt farm, with a cheap notebook and a ballpoint pen. Ekene Nkiru did not exaggerate when she promised to protect me and mine. Two bodyguards drove me to the Nashville airport, an hour’s drive from wherever the secret family fortress lay. One left with the car. The other, a slim and deadly-looking young woman, took charge of our luggage and negotiated our way through check-in. She stayed at my side through the flight and took the wheel of the rental car. I would have been terrified at the implications if I were thinking clearly.

  It wasn’t until we reached the driveway to my grandmother’s farm that my bodyguard spoke to me. “Take the wheel. Drive to the house. They’re expecting you.”

  “And you?” I said. “How will you get back to civilization?”

  “I won’t. I’m to guard you until I get word it’s safe.”

  Safe. What a funny word. I will never be safe again.

  * * *

  I took another emotion break. Breathed slowly until my thoughts cleared. Grief and rage are twins, Faith Bellaume once told me. Dear Faith, who seemed to have an aphorism for every facet of depression. Well, and, she was right. Maybe we could talk honestly once I returned to DC.

  My ghost arm shivered. The rest of me went still. I’d not allowed myself to think of DC until this moment. Maybe it was a sign. Maybe it was just a thought.

  I took up my pen to finish my entry.

  * * *

  My bodyguard handed me a familiar-looking device. It wasn’t the same one Sara had given me last year, but close enough for government work. Use this if you need to contact me, she said. It’s programmed to recognize your voice.

  I accepted the device, and as she vanished into the brush and cottonwoods, I took over the wheel and continued down the driveway to the farmhouse. One more rusted truck had joined the others. The chickens were squabbling in the yard. Four P.M. it was, on a late April afternoon. I parked the car, slung my bag over my shoulder, knocked at the front door. An extra-long moment passed with no answer. I had just enough time to believe Ekene Nkiru had lied to me, that the FBI or some other nefarious operation had carted off my family, before Aunt Jemele flung the door open.

  “You,” she breathed. Then, “We been expecting you.”

  And that was that. I spent most of the last two weeks sleeping and hiding from other humans. Jemele left me alone for the most part. She or Tamika or Letitia brought me meals and took away my clothes for laundering. If they listened to my weeping in the night, they never said anything. Eventually, I came out of the room, to sit in the sunlight or listen to Benjamin practice for Sunday choir. Then came a phone call came from Atlanta HHC, one of the premier service companies in the state. For a modest fee, they could supply a home visitation specialist three times a week, plus daily visits from a registered nurse. The modest fee would be paid through a government grant.

  All the loose ends tied up, just as Sara would have liked

  * * *

  I threw the damned pen across the room and tried to tear out the pages from my notebook, but Lazarus locked with fingers outstretched and, no matter how hard I pounded my hand against the bed, refused to obey. I gave up, cradling my left arm close to my chest, and wept.

  Damn you, Sara Holmes. Damn you,
Micha.

  “Janet?” Aunt Jemele knocked at the door. “You okay?”

  No, I am not. And you know it.

  Aunt Jemele had asked no questions since I turned up with my bag and an attitude. She had not hovered over me, exactly, but it was clear that she knew all was not right, and that I wasn’t willing or able to tell her more.

  “Dinner at five o’clock,” she said. “Gramma says she’s coming downstairs.”

  The APRN assigned by the HHC had conducted a thorough physical exam, followed by a day at the county hospital for neurological tests. The result was a prescription for medication that might, possibly, reverse the worst effects of Alzheimer’s. All because Ekene Nkiru had vowed that she owed a debt to me and my family.

  One of these days, I need to earn a reward that has nothing to do with people dying.

  I drank down the glass of water next to my bed. “I’ll come down,” I promised.

  Jemele swung the door open and eyed me doubtfully. “Still working on that paper?”

  I shrugged. “Not right now. Maybe tomorrow.”

  That provoked a snort. “Girl. Stop fussing around. Write the damned thing, or not. But don’t go singing about how you is okay when we both know you ain’t.”

  At that I had to laugh. “Fine. I’ll come down for dinner, Aunt Jemele. And . . . And thank you.”

  “Don’t never mind, child. You still part of the family.”

  She left me to my lonesome self and my journal.

  I decided I was sick of bleeding my emotions all over the page. I tossed my journal aside, then took up my tablet. Only three P.M., plenty of time before dinner. Maybe I should take another stab at that proposal.

  I called up the document labeled Possible Maybe Ideas for that Goddamned Conference. So far, I’d jotted down twelve different titles and no content.