Twelve Shades of Midnight:

by Liliana Hart

  Mark gritted his teeth. “No, damn it, but I will. I have a guy on it.”

  “If this man is in your organization, why don’t you already know who he is? Aren’t you working with him?”

  “We think he’s the leak, Adiv,” Mark said, growing frustrated with the man. “This is shit you wouldn’t understand. What the fuck is your boss thinking anyway? Doing business with a motorcycle gang? They’re about as trustworthy as my ex-wife.”

  “He was in prison with the leader or something. So, you’ll be at the exchange, right? You and your team?”

  Mark steadied his gaze. “Sure. As long as this information is correct. You’re absolutely certain it’s correct?”

  “Yes, I’m certain.” Adiv turned again, looking like he was about two seconds from bolting. As he turned that time, however, Mark reached behind his back, but before I could blink, Adiv had drawn and leveled his gun on him, his aim steady, his frightened demeanor gone and in its place stood a man of calculating stealth like I’d never seen before.

  Mark stopped and put up his hands. “Easy there, Adiv.”

  “On the ground,” Adiv said, motioning for Mark to get on his stomach.

  “Put the gun down, son,” Mark said.

  Adiv was not impressed. “If I have to say it twice, your sex life ends right here.” I couldn’t help but notice his Middle Eastern accent had disappeared.

  Mark acquiesced, crawling onto his stomach then placing his hands on his head. “Your boss will hear about this.”

  “My boss, fuckhead, is Deputy Secretary Terrance Gill, and you have been a very naughty boy, Ed.”

  Ed? Who was Ed?

  The guy who was apparently not Mark gaped at Adiv, but only for a minute. Without warning, he rolled over and went for his gun.

  Adiv was right on him, gun in his face. Even I wouldn’t miss at that distance, and I was a horrible shot. “Really?” he asked, incredulous. “Take it out, Ed. Two fingers. And I still hold the record for marksmanship at Langley, so don’t.”

  “Who are you?” Ed asked, taking the gun out of his pants with all but two fingers pointed up. He tossed it at Adiv’s feet.

  Adiv kicked it away, pulled out his phone, and began dialing. “Special Agent Mark Cham. I need a—”

  He stopped, his brows furrowing as he scanned the ground a few feet from him. Then he seemed to get woozy as he looked back at Ed. I followed his gaze. Ed’s mouth gaped open like a fish fighting for air, his eyes wide, frightened. Then he just stopped. He lay unmoving, lifeless.

  I turned back to Mark. The gun slipped from his fingers and he stood there a solid three seconds without moving, as though he’d already died before gravity took hold. He fell onto the wet grass beside Ed.

  My hands flew to my mouth. It was so sudden. So fast. The one good thing was that I could tell Strand his partner didn’t suffer. He was so brave, in fact. So dynamic. I could see why the two of them would be so close.

  Sadly, the bit about his partner was the only thing I could tell Strand. I didn’t know anything they didn’t. Or at least I thought not. Farther up the mountainside that surrounded the small town sat a pickup. I found it odd because of the way it was parked, looking out over the town. Looking out over Strand’s late partner. It stayed there a few minutes as I tried to run up the mountainside toward it, but the trek was harder and the truck farther than either looked. With a newfound determination, I released time and reemerged in front of Strand.

  “Hurry!” I shouted, running back to the town.

  “What?” Strand asked, following me.

  “We have to hurry. I was almost to the edge of my twenty-four hours. We have to get up there—” I pointed to the lookout. “—fast.”

  “Wait.” He pulled me to a stop. “Wait, what happened?”

  “Strand, we don’t have time. Can you order him?” I asked Deputy Secretary Gill as he hurried behind us. “I will explain everything, but first I have to get up there.” I pointed again in case they missed it the first time.

  “Go,” the man said.

  For a split second, I thought Strand was going to argue. Instead, he took my hand and ran with me over the hill to a parked police cruiser. “We need to borrow this,” he said to the cop standing beside it. Before the guy could respond, we were in his vehicle, turning the engine over.

  “Are we going to wait for your boss?” I asked as Gill ran toward us, but the deputy secretary waved us on.

  Strand peeled out, took a couple of turns and sped up the mountainside. I wanted as much time with this person as possible, to learn as much as I could before the minutes crept up and pushed me out.

  The moment Strand put the car in park, I lowered my head and dropped, flying into the past as far as I could.

  I looked down at the field we’d just come from. The man pulled up beside me in a white pickup and parked as Mark ran across the field. Just as before, he stumbled, scrambled to his feet, and kept running. Knowing what I now knew, I lauded his performance. Stand’s partner had fooled me completely.

  I turned and focused on the man in the truck. Walking through it, I took in as much as I could. The interior was splotched with dirt-covered oily patches, most likely the work truck of a mechanic. A sloppy mechanic. With thick, wavy hair, olive skin, and clothes that looked casual and yet tailor made, the driver didn’t look like a mechanic. Then again, Strand’s partner didn’t look like a special agent for Homeland Security. Still, if nothing else gave him away, his watch would. It was far more expensive than anything a mechanic would wear.

  An envelope on the dashboard was addressed to a Beau Richter, but the discarded soda cups and sandwich wrappers, mostly from McDonald’s and the like, told me this guy was probably not Beau Richter. He was lean and healthy, and I doubted that he would ever throw a soda cup onto the floorboard of anything he drove. The truck was clearly stolen. The only thing that might have been his was a duffle bag on the seat beside him. It looked brand new, like he bought it just for this occasion.

  He took a cell phone from his pocket and dialed a number, but he didn’t put the phone to his ear. Instead, he set the phone on his thigh, reached over and pulled a gasmask out of the duffle bag. It was him. He’d killed everyone in the village, including two agents with Homeland Security. Was he deliberately trying to throw the agency off his tracks? Or was he just killing an agent who got too close and took a whole town with him? That seemed a bit extreme even for an extremist.

  None of this was making sense. The driver pulled the gasmask over his head then checked his watch. Keeping his arm on the steering wheel, he looked out over the field and waited for his victims to succumb to whatever he’d just sent out. The detonator must have been triggered with the phone call. I strained to scan the area, searching for where the chemical weapon could be. I ran to the front of the pickup, my torso swimming through the engine, and emerged on the cliff of the steep drop in front of us. I couldn’t stray too far from my body. I’d learned that a long time ago. But I needed to find that weapon. Unfortunately, I had no idea what I was looking for. It could be no bigger than my pinky, for all I knew. I should have asked Strand for more information. I should have asked him what to look for.

  The next time I looked up, both men below me were dead, and I still had no weapon. The driver sat a few moments more, then started the engine and drove up the mountain. I wondered if he was going higher to escape the gas. Maybe it was a dense gas and would linger closer to the earth. Maybe he would go up there to wait until it dispersed and he could leave the area safely. Or, more likely, the road led over the mountain and continued on the other side.

  I contemplated his escape route a few seconds more before turning back to the field. My heart went out to Strand’s partner. I would help catch his killer any way I could. For him and for Agent Strand. Not that he’d done me any favors, but this wasn’t about favors. This was about a mass murderer, including the unforgivable act of killing children.

  I’d never tried to scale down a mountain in a drop before
, but that was exactly what I was going to do. Every time I released time to change position, I lost precious minutes. I didn’t want to lose a single second, so I sat down and stepped out over the side, surprised there was no guardrail. Anyone could drive off this thing. The thought terrified me, and even though I could hardly be hurt by falling down the side of the mountain in my incorporeal state, the thought of trying to scale down it terrified me as well. I drew in a deep breath, metaphorically, and slid over the side.

  The act proved much easier than it would have had I been flesh and blood. I eased down the side and climbed to my feet, brushing my hands together to wipe off nonexistent dirt. Then I searched. It had to be around here somewhere. It had to be close if Mark was the original target. I rewound time again and again as I looked under every nook and cranny. I worked for what would have been hours had I been in real time and I got absolutely nowhere.

  Just when I was about to give up, I remembered something. Running back to the scene where Agents Cham and Kerrigan fell to their deaths, I rewound again to just before they passed out. Special Agent Mark Cham was holding Kerrigan at gunpoint, but he looked down. At first, I thought it was because he had inhaled the poisonous gas and grew confused, but as I watched him, I realized he had turned to a sound. There was a slight click then a soft hiss nearby.

  I followed Agent Cham’s gaze and sure enough, about three feet from where Kerrigan lay was a grouping of tall grasses. Because it was transparent to me, I could see a small silver needle poking out of the ground underneath it. And surely underneath that was a much larger cylinder full of the deadly gas that had been released into the atmosphere. I’d found it.

  Elated, I looked back just as Agent Cham collapsed. I stood horrified with myself. No, I didn’t find it. Agent Cham did. It was just too late for him, but at least I could help catch his killer.

  With a newfound determination, I released time.

  Sadly, time did not release me.

  This had happened once before. I’d strayed too far from my body despite the tug of an invisible tether that kept me anchored, and I’d stayed away too long. The longer I stayed, the more transparent my surroundings grew. Eventually, they would disappear altogether and I would be lost again. I would be alone in this great emptiness and I would grow a little more insane with each passing hour as time spiraled out of my control. I could no longer get a hold on it. Instead, it passed through me like a rush of icy wind. Eons came and went, and I could swear I felt the creation of the universe at one point.

  Fear tightened around my heart. I had no idea how long I’d been away, but I did know that if I could just find my body, I could force myself back into it. Last time I got lost, it took me what amounted to weeks to find myself again. I had to catch a glimpse of myself in time. It wasn’t like finding a needle in a haystack. It was like finding a needle in a mountain of needles. The glimpse I found was of my body in a hospital in a coma. It was the one and only time I’d entered my body at a different point than when I’d left it. And it was not an experience I cared to repeat.

  I fast-forwarded as I ran to the spot where Strand and I had parked. The world had dimmed so much more than I’d thought. It was almost completely translucent. How had I let time slip by me so carelessly? I scrambled up the mountain, but it disappeared. I felt myself falling through empty space just as it reappeared beneath me.

  With every ounce of strength I had, I grabbed for the mountain and began to scale it again. Sobs of relief tore at my throat. The closer I got to my physical being, the stronger I became. I fought the effects of a celestial gravity, clawing at anything of sustenance I could find. After an eternity, I made it to the top of the mountain. I looked back. Emergency workers were barely visible in the mist of eternity. Did I miss it? For all I knew, days had passed. What would Strand think when I didn’t come back? What would happen to me? Would I be in a coma? My mother had never told me about that part. Maybe she’d never experienced it. Or her mother before her.

  These same questions had replayed in my mind over and over the last time I got lost as well. I had to get a grip. I had to stop and concentrate on finding the exact spot in time where I’d dropped.

  The fall colors of the mountainside dissolved. It was almost completely white when a car appeared. A police cruiser. I almost dropped to my knees in relief. Strand sped around the last curve with me in the passenger’s seat. I consciously released time again. This time, I opened my eyes and was sitting in the police cruiser just as Strand was turning off the motor.

  I covered my face with my hands, relief flooding every molecule in my body.

  “Okay,” Strand said. “Can you do it again?”

  I gaped at him with tears suddenly pushing past my lashes, realizing he had no idea I’d already dropped.

  “Andrea?” he said, leaning closer.

  Without another thought, I threw my arms around him and clutched his wide shoulders like my life depended on it. Deep sobs shuddered through me as I curled my fingers into his duster. He pulled me over the console and held me, and I couldn’t have been more grateful if he’d saved me from a burning building. As far as I was concerned, he did.

  He didn’t ask any questions. For a few minutes, he just let my tears soak into his jacket, then I shot up, remembering why we were there and what we had to do. For a moment, his beauty stunned me. I gazed at him through what I could only imagine were puffy, redlined eyes.

  His blue ones were full of concern. His full mouth formed a straight line as he tried to dissect my emotions. One brow formed a curious line as he gazed at me. He was breathtakingly handsome. I’d noticed before. It was impossible not to, but he seemed even more so now. For one thing, he was putting up with my sudden, colossal mood swing. He had no idea what I’d just gone through, but he trusted that I had a legitimate reason for my outburst. Nobody had ever given me the benefit of the doubt before. This was new. Refreshing. Ingratiating.

  “I’m so sorry,” I said, trying to squirm off him.

  He kept his hold firm. “What happened?”

  My perch was so comfortable, so…desired, it was hard for me to insist, but insist I did. I pushed away from him, suddenly embarrassed. “I saw who did it and I found where he planted the weapon.” Ignoring the surprised expression on his face, I continued. “The truck he was in belonged to a Beau Richter, but I’m fairly certain it was stolen. I did get a good look at the guy, though. Rich. Well funded. I need paper and a pencil.” I kept talking as I surveyed the area for something to draw on. “The chemical bomb, if you call it that, is under a grouping of tall grass about three feet from where your partner was standing. He was so brave, Agent Strand.” I paused to tell him that. “Your partner. He was so brave and so skilled. And that other agent was dirty, but you probably already know that.” I went back to looking for a pencil and paper. “Only the tip is sticking out of the ground.”

  “The tip?” His throat had tightened at the mention of his partner.

  I paused again to make sure he was okay. “The bomb,” I said. “The chemical thingy. Only the tip is sticking out of the ground. It’s almost impossible to see.”

  He nodded, recovering quickly.

  “This will work.” I pulled a menu for an Italian restaurant in La Porte out of a side pocket. It had just enough white space on one corner for me to draw. “He used his phone to detonate it. You can check for tower pings, yes? Pencil. Pencil. Ah!” I found a pen in the cop’s glove box. “He used a smart phone, but I’m not sure they have an app for bomb detonation.” I began to draw the man’s profile, since that’s what I saw the most of, when Strand put his fingers beneath my chin and turned my face toward his.

  Once again, I was struck.

  Before he could say anything, I pulled away from him and started to draw again. “You have to stop doing that.”

  “Doing what?” he asked, giving me the space and time I needed. His freaking voice was almost as bad as his freaking face. It was deep and smooth and sensual and made my insides tighten every
time he spoke. Then again, I did have adrenaline avalanching through my veins at the speed of light. Maybe now was not the best time to fall in love with a guy just for being hot. Those relationships never ended well.

  “Looking at me. Making me look at you.”

  I added a shadow to the bad guy’s eyes then drew his nose. It was well proportioned. Long but thick enough so it didn’t appear too long.

  “You don’t like looking at me?”

  He was appeasing me, letting me do my work, giving me time to recuperate. “Please,” I said as I turned the menu over and started on the frontal of the bad guy’s face. I didn’t get as clear a picture, but it was burned into my memory nonetheless. I should also draw the watch he wore. I got the feeling it was custom made. Too much gold for my taste, and very out of place with the casual clothes the guy wore, but he was probably trying to fit in with the locals. He should have ditched the watch if he wanted to do that.

  “Please?” Strand asked as I worked.

  “Like any female on earth would not want to look at you.”

  “Is that a compliment?” he asked.

  I blinked up at him, surprised. “No. It’s just…I don’t know. It’s just a fact.”

  He nodded and let me go back to work. “Are you going to tell me what happened?”

  “Mmm-hmm,” I said, adding some finishing touches to my crude line drawing. It was about as good as it was going to get without an actual pencil and a clean sheet of paper. I handed them over to Strand. “So, this is the guy in the stolen truck who detonated the bomb. But he went up the mountain. Does this road go down the other side? I never saw him come back down. What about cameras in town? Did they have any? And what about the phone call to detonate the bomb? Can you get something off that?”

  Strand hadn’t looked at the drawing yet. After a long moment, he dropped his gaze to my rudimentary drawing.

  “I’ll do a better rendition later. This is just for now.”

  “No need,” he said, his voice soft with astonishment. “I know exactly who this is. And he’s supposed to be dead.” He cursed under his breath and turned away in thought. “I knew that intel was bad. Slippery fucker. If this really is Yousefi, if he really is alive, then he has something much bigger planned.”