Jonathan smiled, squeezed her hand gently. He’d seen a lot of people die in his time, and he always admired the ones who accepted their fate with guts. Good guy or bad, heaven reserved places for those who showed courage to the end.
He continued to hold her hand as he fished his flashlight from his web gear and thumbed the switch. The white light hurt. He held the light in his teeth, and with his free hand he started patting her down. “Let me know if any of this hurts,” he said.
“Who are you?” the girl moaned.
Blood soaked into the waistband of her jeans as Jonathan reached into the front pocket and found an Indiana driver’s license. “You’re Christine Baker,” Jonathan read aloud. In this light, it was finally get naked and make love, it was supposed to be a wonderful thing. Tiffany would have been his first. But then it turned to blood and violence.
They flew in complete darkness. The silver glow of the moon on the meaningless landmarks below was Thomas’s only evidence that they were flying at all. It wasn’t till his eyes adjusted fully that he noticed the pilot was wearing night vision goggles.
Their flight lasted less than half an hour. From what Thomas could tell, they landed in a dark field in the middle of nowhere. The rotors were still turning at nearly full speed when the commando at his side unclasped his seat belt and rose to an awkward, half-standing position. He took a half-step forward and said something in the pilot’s ear, soliciting a nod and a thumbs-up, and then he turned to face Thomas.
“Okay, Tom, here’s the deal. I want you to stay put with your belt fastened until I come back for you. We have a car waiting.”
“Why can’t I just come with you?”
“Because I want to make sure that this last step is truly secure. If anything is wrong, I’ll tell the pilot, and he’ll take off outta here like a rocket. That’s why you stay in your seat with the belt on. You’re almost home.” With that, he opened the side door, inviting in all the racket of the rotors, and stepped out into the night with his weapons. When the door closed again, the quiet-which wasn’t really all that quiet-seemed oppressive.
Thomas couldn’t take it anymore. “Excuse me,” he said loudly, nearly a shout. “Mr. Pilot?”
The pilot turned, still only an ink stain against the night.
“What’s happening?” Thomas asked.
“You haven’t figured it out yet?” the pilot asked, his tone light with amusement.
“No. I haven’t figured out anything. I’m totally lost.”
The pilot laughed. “Like hell. You’re as found as anybody could hope to be.”
Jonathan had stashed the rental Explorer in the back forty of someone’s rolling farmland nearly six hours ago. They’d chosen this location by studying aerial maps and determining that it offered privacy while still being reasonably accessible. It also offered a good chance to fly in and out unnoticed.
He approached the vehicle by the book-slowly and methodically, with night vision in place as if anticipating an ambush. Nobody ever died of caution. With the scene secure, he went about the business of transforming himself from Night Stalker to Regular Guy. He moved to the back of the vehicle and opened up the tailgate. No dome light came on because he had disabled it first thing. Two zippered duffel bags waited for him just where he’d left them, looking like two deflated balloons. His rifle and rucksack went in one, his vest, web gear, and night vision equipment in the other, along with his black coveralls, mask, and boots. The transformation was complete within three minutes.
Just like that, Jonathan could have been anyone-a rancher, maybe, on his way to town. A rancher with a. 45 still strapped in a high-hip holster that was concealed by a denim jacket. When the duffels were full, he zipped them up, closed the gate, and headed back to the chopper. He opened the side door and announced, “Okay, we’re all set.
“But if they do.”
“They won’t.”
“But if they do.”
The Explorer bounced in a deep rut. “You think that the police are these efficient do-gooders that you see on television. You think that they can chase bad guys with impunity, crash doors, and save the good guys. Well, that’s not always true, because ridiculous rules get in the way. If I had to jump through all the hoops that police and prosecutors do to assemble intelligence and put together a plan, you’d be dead now. And if they knew who I was, they’d put me in jail for saving you. Not because of the outcome, but because of the process. And this is ten times more about my business than you ever needed to know.”
“What about trace evidence?”
Jonathan laughed. Everybody on the planet watched CSI these days. “Look, I know what I’m doing. There is no trace evidence. I am entirely untraceable.”
“But I’m not. I’m way traceable.”
Jonathan agreed. “To a certain extent, yes. That’s why I didn’t want you touching the girl. I didn’t want you transferring fibers or fingerprints onto Chris… Tiffany.” Hard to know which name the kid would find more comforting.
Even in the darkness, Jonathan could see Tom’s displeasure. “We have to report this!”
“Not gonna happen. Not by me, anyway.”
Thomas turned sideways in his seat, beginning a serious negotiation. “If we call the police right now, then they’ll know it was all self-defense. If we don’t call, then they’re going to draw all these wrong conclusions, and I can end up in jail.”
“Nobody’s going to put you in jail, Tom. Don’t be so melodramatic. We’re not calling the police. Period.”
Thomas wasn’t done yet. “I don’t think you understand, Scorpion. I don’t think I can keep a secret like this. I’m going to have to tell somebody. Not even to call for help, necessarily, but just because it happened, and when I get together with my friends over a couple of beers, it’s going to slip out.”
Jonathan shrugged again. “Then it slips out. You can tell anyone anything you’d like. You didn’t do anything wrong. You’re a victim here, for God’s sake. You have nothing to feel guilty about. Rejoice in your freedom and quit worrying.”
Thomas started to speak, but then swallowed the words to reconsider. “So you’re saying it’s okay if I report this all to the police, but that you’re not going to. If I do it’s fine.”
“As far as I’m concerned it’s fine,” Jonathan said, directing this conversation down the same path he’d steered it so many times in the past. “Once I drop you off, your life is yours to do with as you please. I don’t care who you call or what you tell them.”
Thomas grunted and turned back around in his seat to face forward. He seemed satisfied.
“Just understand that what you say may hurt the people who hired me. What I do, because of the nature of its outcome from time to time, might not reflect so well on them.”
“H from here. Time to get on with the rest of your life.”
Still, the kid didn’t move. “I still don’t know that I can keep all of this a secret,” he said. His eyes looked sad.
Jonathan gave a half-shrug. “You can only do what you can do.”
“What about you?” Thomas asked.
“I already told you. I’m untraceable.”
That wasn’t what he meant. “If I say something, are you going to come back and…Well, you know.”
Jonathan allowed himself a tired sigh. “I’m not an assassin. Don’t make life unnecessarily difficult, and you’ll never see me again.”
Thomas smiled nervously. “So I only worry if I see you knocking on my door?”
Jonathan chuckled. “Well put. Now get out.”
Thomas still was not comfortable leaving the truck. He looked to his lap, searching for something to say.
“It’s okay,” Jonathan assured.
The kid nodded. He held out his hand for Jonathan to shake. “Thanks.”
Jonathan smiled and shook. “You’re welcome. Here’s to never seeing each other again.”
Thomas opened the door, and Jonathan watched as he walked toward the pharmacy’s doubl
e glass doors. This was what he loved about his job. This was why he kept putting himself in harm’s way: the look on the PCs’ faces when they realized-really realized for the first time-that their nightmare was over. It was like being the Lone Freaking Ranger.
He watched until Thomas reached the door, then slipped the transmission back into Drive.
As he pulled away from the curb, Jonathan pressed a number on his speed dial.
Chapter Three
Venice Alexander never slept well on the nights when her boss was on a mission. (It’s pronounced Ven-EE-chay, by the way. Everybody got it wrong the first time, but second mistakes were not suffered kindly.) She always tried, but until the phone rang with the all-clear, she never really rested. In a perverse way, she preferred the larger, more dangerous operations where she was needed to man the computer and the phones in the office over these so-call “milk-run” 0300 ops. Add to that the stress of managing the details of a dozen or so investigation cases by other associates in her charge, and even fake sleep was impossible tonight.
Pulling on a Karen Neuburger robe-Roman, her eleven-year-old son, called it “teddy bear material”-Venice rolled out of bed and pushed her feet into a pair of luxurious slippers. She knew for a fact that Mama had fried more chicken than she’d served at dinner, and a cold drumstick seemed exactly the right prescription to settle her down. That and a cup of hot water with lemon. Snagging her cell phone from the nightstand and dropping it into a big patch pocket, she headed for the hallway and the stairs beyond.
“You’re up late,” Mama said as Venice opened the kitchen door.
She jumped. “Jesus!”
“Watch your mouth,” Mama scolded. The rotund black woman sat at the long oval table, in front of a plate that was nearly as loaded with chicken and green beans as the one she’d consumed at dinner.
Venice padded to the cabinet over the flatware drawer and pulled out a wh
Venice had no memories of her father, a policeman killed in the line of duty before she was born, and it was a source of pain that she’d never truly overcome. For as long as she could remember, she’d always dreamed about what her father might have sounded like and smelled like. The picture on Mama’s dresser gave her a face, but she’d never know the voice that went with it. She regretted that she’d passed the fatherless legacy on to her own son, albeit with a huge difference. If Roman ever wanted to do the research to track his daddy down, he was welcome to. Last time Venice heard, Leroy was somewhere in Afghanistan.
Mama mourned every day for her beloved Charles. As she closed in on her sixty-eighth birthday, she talked a lot about her fear of dying lonely. Not likely, Venice told her. Not with Resurrection House in her life. Seated on two acres in the middle of Fisherman’s Cove’s business district and next door to St. Katherine’s Catholic Church, the gleaming new boarding school was the most stunning building in town, having wrested the honor from Mama’s sprawling Victorian mansion that shared the same property. Except for the courthouse and the hospital, which was not technically a part of Fisherman’s Cove but rather of the unincorporated environs of Westmoreland County, Resurrection House had more square footage than any other structure.
Until five years ago, the mansion and the land that housed the school had been the boyhood home of Jonathan Grave. Upon inheriting the property from his still-living father as part of a court proceeding that no one fully understood, Jonathan decided that he didn’t need any of it, and he signed the property over to St. Katherine’s parish for a dollar. A change to the deed dictated that the property be used in perpetuity as a school for children of incarcerated parents. Mama Alexander would live in the mansion for the rest of her life, and she would hold the position of house counselor for as long as she wanted it. Jonathan covered all costs out of his own pocket.
A third condition was more a matter of paperwork than substance: Jonathan’s involvement in the modification of the building and the endowment of seven teaching positions, plus his high-six-figure annual contribution to the care and maintenance of the place were never to be publicly disclosed. As far as anyone outside St. Kate’s immediate family was to know, those expenses were covered only by the Family Defense Foundation, a nonprofit that Jonathan had formed through one of the many cutout identities he had established over the years.
“No word from Jonathan yet?” Mama intuited.
Venice avoided eye contact. “I’ve got a lot of things on my mind.”
“I suppose he’s on one of his missions?” Mama leaned on the last word in a way that made clear her disapproval.
“Mama, I don’t want to talk about it, and you shouldn’t either. Digger’s safety depends on secrecy.”
Mama didn’t like it, but she didn’t fight. “I hate it when you call him that. I don’t need to know the details to know that you’re worried. I see it in your face.”
Venice sighed. “He’s late reporting in.”
“How late?”
Venice’s veneer started to crack. “A couple of hours.”
Nobody looked too old to be working this late. “What can I do for you?”
“You scared the shit out of me.” Thomas meant it as a simple statement, but it came out angry.
Al’s face darkened. “I don’t much like that language.”
Thomas blushed. “Sorry,” he said. “I’m here to wait for the bus to Chicago. Comes in about an hour, right?”
Just like that, all was forgiven. Al checked his watch. “An hour and ten if it’s running on time. I think I’d count on something closer to an hour and a half. Want something to eat while you wait? Some ice cream?”
The mention of food brought Thomas’s stomach back to life. “That would be great. Are you still serving food?”
Al smiled and started for the soda fountain, beckoning Thomas to follow him. “All night means all night, young man. I’d prefer not to fire up the grill, but if it can be microwaved or taken from the freezer, it’s available.” He stopped halfway there and turned to extend his hand. “Al Elvins,” he said. “I’m the late-night manager. My brother owns the place.”
“Thomas Hughes.” He returned the handshake, and wondered if it had been a mistake to use his real name.
“You as hungry as you look?” Al asked, walking again.
“More tired than hungry, I think.”
When they arrived at the soda fountain, Al lifted a section of the bar to step behind, and Thomas mounted one of the stools.
“That’s it,” Al said. “Make yourself comfortable.”
The light was better up here, and in it, Thomas caught something odd in the clerk’s expression. It was the way he looked at him and quickly looked away.
“You want a hot dog?”
“Can I have two, please? And a large Sprite.”
“You can have as many as you like,” Al said, again with a quick glance. He seemed to prefer concentrating on the task of opening the package of frankfurters. “You know,” he said without eye contact, “there’s a bathroom in the back of the store if you want to clean up a bit.”
That sounded like a good idea. While his meal cooked in the microwave, Thomas walked to the men’s room. One look in the mirror explained everything. He was filthy. The face in the mirror was years older than the one that he’d last seen. His hair was a matted, mottled mess, and the bags under his eyes reminded him of one of his sixty-year-old uncles. Stripping off his T-shirt so that he could really wash, he could actually count the bones in his chest through his skin.
He let the water run hot as he stuffed paper towels into the sink’s drain to fill the basin, and added six pumps of liquid soap from the bulbous dispenser on the wall. With the water off again, he cupped his hands into the cloudy, bubbly mixture, leaned low to the sink, and buried his face in his hands.
That’s when it hit him. Contact with something as civilized as hot soapy water made him realize how fortunate he was to be alive. He understood that strangers had risked their lives to deliver him from an agonized death.
&
nbsp; As his face pressed into his palms, and the water drained through his fingers, Thomas began to cry.
“Thought maybe you fell in,” Al said cheerily when Thomas returned to the lunch counter. Then his face darkened again. “You okay, son?”
Thomas nodded, knowing that he looked like holy hell. “I’m fine.”
Al looked like he wanted to press further, but heOver an hour. You were out cold.”
Jesus. Fastest hour in history. He spun himself off the stool and found his feet again. “Thanks for waking me.” He paused. “You didn’t, you know…what we were talking about?”
“Call the police?” Al shook his head. “Naw. I’m still not convinced that I shouldn’t have, but you’re old enough to know when you’re in trouble. I don’t want to pry.” As he finished that last sentence, the phone rang, prompting Al to look at his watch. “At this hour, it’s got to be somebody’s baby is sick.” He stepped behind the counter again to answer it. “Travel safely.”
“Thanks,” Thomas said. “And thanks.”
Al acknowledged with a friendly wave, but aimed his voice at the telephone. “Simms Pharmacy.”
Thomas could see the silver and blue bus waiting at the curb on the other side of the store’s front window. He felt naked as he walked to the door, as if he should be carrying something; if not luggage, then at least his school book bag.
“Hey, Tom!” Al called. He hadn’t yet taken five steps.
Thomas turned.
“There’s a Julie Hughes on the line. Says she’s your mother. Don’t have to take it if you don’t want to.”
Thomas couldn’t think of a voice he’d love to hear more. “I’ll definitely take it!” he said and he spun on his heel to head for the phone. Outside, the bus blatted his horn. “Can you ask him to wait for a minute?”
As the druggist handed over the phone, they changed places. “I can ask, but I don’t know if he’ll do it. They’re pretty jealous of their schedules.”
Thomas snatched the receiver to his ear. “Mom?”
No mercy Page 2
