Inside Out: A novel

by Barry Eisler

  “Bitch,” he said, turning his head and spitting blood. She tried to hit him again and he caught her wrists and pinned them to the bed next to her head.

  She struggled and kicked. He slid down onto her thighs to control her legs and looked down at her breasts. He couldn’t think anymore. He lowered his head and took a nipple into his mouth. She sucked in a breath and her pelvis arched and he almost let her go but then thought no way, he wasn’t going to let her hit him again.

  “Fuck you,” she said again. “Fuck you.”

  He moved his head to her other breast and she moaned, and the sound of her own pleasure seemed to incite her.

  “You want this, don’t you?” he said, past caring about the consequences. “All right. You win.”

  He let go of her wrists and she hit him in the mouth again. There was a shock of pain and his head rocked back. He grabbed her wrists again and pressed his body down onto hers.

  “You want to play?” he said. “Fine. Fine with me.”

  He slid his right hand under her waist and fed her right wrist into it. She struggled and tried to bite his ear, missing it and scoring her teeth against his scalp instead. He sat up and jerked her arm around, turning her over onto her stomach.

  He sat on her thighs and with one hand pinned her arms behind her back. She kicked and struggled underneath him. He pulled the belt off his robe, slipped it under her top wrist, pulled it around, and yanked it tight with his teeth and free hand. He tied it off in a square knot, then wrapped it around her other wrist and repeated the operation so that her bound wrists were side by side.

  He slid lower over her legs and tore her robe out of the way. She grunted and tried to twist loose.

  He lay down on top of her and pushed his knees between hers. Then he sat up and spread her legs with his own. Her ass was a ripe, dark peach, the shadow between her legs maddening, beckoning. She turned her head and looked back at him and again said, “Fuck you.”

  He didn’t answer. He put his weight on her bound wrists with one hand and with the other began to touch her. She was completely wet. He eased a finger inside her and she groaned.

  His heart was slamming away in his chest like a battering ram. Panting, feeling like he’d lost his mind, he flipped her over onto her back. He got his knees between hers again and spread her legs. He bent to kiss her. She jerked her head to the side and again said, “Fuck you.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, that’s right.”

  He moved lower and took a nipple into his mouth again and touched her with his fingers and the sound of her moaning made him insane.

  He slid lower. He got an arm under one of her thighs and forced her legs farther apart. Then he put his mouth against her belly and bit her, the way she’d tried to bite him. She cried out, and before the cry was done he’d slipped his other arm under her so that her thighs rested on his shoulders, and he pushed his mouth against her so she could feel his lips and his teeth and his breath, and he slipped his tongue inside her. She gasped and the sound of it made him dizzy, the sound and her taste and how hot and wet she was against his mouth and face. He moved one hand up and rolled a thumb around her nipple. With the other, he started touching her with his fingers in time with his tongue.

  She groaned. His lips hurt and his heart was pounding and he was so hard it ached.

  He glanced up at her. She was watching him, panting, her head off the pillow, the muscles of her neck straining. Her body was slick with sweat.

  He paused and put his fourth finger in his mouth, coating it with his spit and her juices. He lowered his head and started up again. He kept his eyes on hers. He slid his slicked finger slowly into her ass.

  Her eyes widened and she sucked in a breath. He felt her muscles clench. He worked her with his mouth and fingers. He didn’t take his eyes off her.

  Her panting grew faster, deeper. A low sound came from her throat. He kept going, out of his mind with the need to fuck her.

  The sound deepened and rose and changed into a drawn-out cry. She squeezed his head with her thighs and pushed her pelvis into his face and shuddered and arched and cried out. Her back arched farther, and farther still, and then suddenly all the tension in her was gone and she collapsed back to the bed. There was no sound but her breathing.

  He brought his arms around and moved up between her legs.

  “Kiss me.”

  She didn’t answer. He took her face roughly in his hands and looked in her eyes and pressed himself against her. She struggled but there was nothing she could do, she was too wet and too tied up and he was holding her too tightly. He pushed forward and moved a little inside her and somehow made himself stop. She grimaced and pushed back against him and he slid in a little farther. He watched her, their faces an inch apart.

  She groaned again, her mouth open, her head tilted back. He eased away, then clenched his stomach and ass and drove his hips forward and buried himself inside her. She cried out and he pressed his swollen lips down on hers. She groaned into his mouth and he held her face in his hands and spread her legs wider with his thighs and he fucked her, long and deep and desperately hard, and he forgot where they were and why they were here and what had happened that day and he fucked her, and when she started kissing him hungrily and hard and fucking him back it was too much, he couldn’t stop, and there was nothing else in the world but her face in his hands and her body pinned beneath him and he gripped her harder and cried out into her mouth and he came, he came and she sucked on his tongue and it went on and on until he had spent himself inside her.

  When it was over, his exhaustion was so sudden and complete that he felt momentarily unsteady. He pushed himself away from her slightly, his breathing ragged, and looked into her eyes.

  “Damn,” he managed to say.

  Her breathing was as rough as his. She said, “Untie me.”

  He touched a hand to his swollen lips. “Not if you’re going to hit me again.”

  “I think I’m done with that.”

  “What the hell got into you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  He turned her on her side and untied her wrists, then lay down facing her. “Were you trying to provoke me?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Don’t get me wrong. I liked it.”

  “Yeah, I could tell that.”

  “Why, though?”

  “I was just … mad. You were being so nice, it made me lower my guard. And I could tell you wanted to, and I told you I needed you to, and then suddenly you got all high-minded on me … it just really made me angry.”

  “I didn’t mean it like that. You know I wanted to. I just thought it was a bad idea.”

  “Well, you changed your mind pretty fast.”

  “Maybe it was all that talk earlier about interagency cooperation.”

  She laughed. “Yeah, we’re a model for the way Uncle Sam should function. ‘Make love, not war.’”

  He ran his hand gently along her face and the side of her head.

  “I like your hair. The way it feels.”

  “You’ve never been with a black woman before, have you?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re not supposed to touch a black woman’s hair.”

  He thought for a moment. “Now that you mention it … I did get that vibe a few times here and there.”

  “They were straightened, right?”

  “Yeah. You know, not like yours.”

  “You can touch it if it’s natural. It’s the straightened and hair extensions and wigs that can get you in trouble.”

  He eased his hand around to the back of her head. “I like yours better.”

  “You wouldn’t believe what it takes to make black hair straight. I don’t have time for it. Besides, I’d rather just be myself.”

  They were quiet for a moment. He said, “So … I guess we can sleep in the same bed tonight?”

  She laughed again. “I guess so.”

  “Good. Because I’m so tired, I’m going
to pass out.”

  “That sounds good.”

  “Tell me something first.”

  “What?”

  “Why wouldn’t you kiss me?”

  There was a pause. She said, “It was too intimate. I wanted you to fuck me, not make love to me.”

  He’d never thought of it that way. “Does that mean you won’t kiss me now?”

  “It’s a bad idea.”

  “You’ve got some pretty finely parsed notions about what separates a good idea from a bad one.”

  There was another pause. She touched his cheek with a hand and kissed him, long and tenderly. His lips hurt but it was delicious anyway.

  She broke the kiss and looked at him. He said, “Was that so bad?”

  She shook her head. “It was okay. But it was the first part I really wanted.”

  31

  Squeaky Clean

  Ulrich checked his watch for probably the tenth time in an hour. Almost ten o’clock. He needed to go home and get some sleep. But he’d become so afraid of being away from the secure phone that he was hurrying back to his desk even from bathroom breaks. Anyway, it wasn’t like he was going to sleep even if he left. All he could do these days was toss and turn until the sun rose and he could get up and come into the office without it being so early he would seem deranged or obsessed.

  The secure line buzzed. He jumped and then snatched up the receiver.

  “Ulrich.”

  “Clements. Okay to talk?”

  “I’ll tell you if it isn’t, okay? What is it?”

  “We have a problem.”

  Ulrich flinched. If Clements had been a doctor, “problem” would doubtless be his favorite way of informing patients they had inoperable brain cancer.

  He closed his eyes. “Tell me.”

  “We lost everybody. Twelve Blackwater contractors, two Ground Branch operators. They’re all dead.”

  Ulrich shook his head. It was unbelievable. This was just … this couldn’t be happening to him.

  “What about Larison?”

  “We’re pretty sure he’s not among the dead.”

  “Why just ‘pretty sure’?”

  “Because there are no survivors. There’s no one to report in. So all I can tell you right now is the math. We sent twelve contractors and two operators. Costa Rican media is reporting fourteen dead. Yeah, it’s possible one of the dead is Larison or one of them is Treven, but if that were the case, it would mean at least one of our guys was still alive. And if one of our guys were alive, he would have reported in by now. So I think it’s a pretty safe assumption that Larison killed all of them, or that he killed the Blackwater snatch teams and Treven killed the two Ground Branch.”

  Ulrich dropped his glasses on the desk and scrubbed a hand across his face. “What about the tapes?”

  “No sign of release. Yet.”

  “What’s our next move?”

  “We don’t have one. The op has been turned over to JSOC.”

  Ulrich didn’t respond. It was really almost funny. How just when you thought things couldn’t possibly get worse, they always found a way.

  “You there?” Clements said.

  “How did this happen?”

  “The national security adviser was furious when I told him the snatch teams were Blackwater. ‘You deceived me, you told me they were Ground Branch, blah, blah, blah.’ I told him it didn’t matter, that the Blackwater guys were all former government, anyway. I mean, he was only pissed because the op failed. If it had worked, he wouldn’t have cared if we’d hired goddamn al Qaeda to do it. And I told him so.”

  It was actually amusing, imagining Clements growing some balls that way. “Very diplomatic of you.”

  “It didn’t matter what I said. His mind was already made up. At which point, Horton made his move. And now he’s the national security adviser’s best friend.”

  “For all we know, Horton’s people took out the snatch teams. So Horton could go back to the national security adviser, say I told you so, and take over the op.”

  “It doesn’t matter. It’s done.”

  “Fine. What does he propose?”

  “That we give Larison the diamonds.”

  Ulrich laughed. “That’s his plan? That’s what he proposed? That we just capitulate to this pyscho’s demands and call it a day? That’s ingenious. I can’t believe no one else thought of it.”

  “Yeah, well, the national security adviser seems to like it. We’ve got an interagency meeting in his office first thing to thrash out the details.”

  Ulrich tried to think of anything he’d seen that had spiraled this far out of control and still been righted in the end. Nothing came to mind.

  “Well,” he said, “I guess we just have to hope that Horton knows what the hell he’s doing. And maybe he does. It’s not like he’s squeaky clean on all this. After all, he’s the one who took care of the Caspers.”

  PART THREE

  There are different kinds of truths for different kinds of people. There are truths appropriate for children; truths that are appropriate for students; truths that are appropriate for educated adults; and truths that are appropriate for highly educated adults, and the notion that there should be one set of truths available to everyone is a modern democratic fallacy. It doesn’t work.

  IRVING KRISTOL

  No, there will be no review. The President has determined that they are all enemy combatants. We are not going to revisit it.

  DAVID ADDINGTON, CHIEF OF STAFF TO VICE PRESIDENT CHENEY

  Sometimes in life you want to just keep walking …. Don’t always be issuing papers and reports. Some of life has to be mysterious.

  PEGGY NOONAN, ABC NEWS

  32

  Maneuvering

  Ben’s phone buzzed. He opened his eyes and saw faint light coming through the window. He picked up. “Yeah.”

  “You get any sleep?” Hort said.

  Ben looked at the clock readout. Shit, he’d been unconscious for over six hours. He’d needed it. “Yeah, believe it or not.” Paula opened her eyes and Ben raised a finger to his lips.

  “Good. We have a task group meeting with the national security adviser in thirty minutes. We just got an email from Larison, and he says he’ll be calling. I want you to listen in.”

  “Listen in? How am I going to do that?”

  “I’m going to leave my mobile phone on. Set to speakerphone. A little oversight on my part.”

  “You can do something like that in the White House?”

  “The meeting’s not in the White House. The national security adviser wants to keep this thing as far from the president as he can. The meeting is at his house in Potomac.”

  Once again, Ben was intrigued that Hort was including him in management stuff, if only on a listen-and-learn basis. “Okay … ,” he said.

  “It’s just him, me, and the deputy director of central intelligence, Stephen Clements. Clements is the genius who convinced the national security adviser that it made sense to try to snatch Larison. And by the way, the snatch teams weren’t Ground Branch. They were Blackwater.”

  “Are you kidding? The Agency contracted out this snatch?”

  “They did. The good news is, the national security adviser is very unhappy about it. With a little luck, that means he’ll listen to reason.”

  “You mean listen to you.”

  “Son, believe me, on this one there’s no difference.”

  “So those two guys who tried to drop Paula and me … they were Blackwater?”

  “That’s a little unclear right now. Clements says they were Ground Branch, there to supervise. He thinks Larison killed them along with the snatch teams. Or he’s pretending to think that.”

  “What do you think?”

  There was a pause. “I don’t know what to think. There’s always a lot of maneuvering between the various agencies. I’d hate to think it’s gotten to the point where we’re trying to bump off each other’s players.”

  “I told you, it was s
upposed to be a hit.”

  “I don’t doubt you. Believe me, there’s more behind-the-scenes bullshit on this op than I’ve ever seen.”

  “Yeah, I’ve been getting that feeling.”

  “Well, for that reason as much as any other, I want you to be able to see how decisions are getting made here.”

  So that’s why Hort wanted him to listen in—to prove that he had nothing to do with the two guys outside Nico’s office. To show that, even after Obsidian, Ben could trust him. Or maybe this was more management grooming. Or both.

  “Okay,” he said again.

  “I’ll call in a half hour. Keep your phone on mute. And I’ll call again after, when it’s done and we can talk securely.”

  “Roger that.”

  “How’s your FBI friend?”

  It was the second time Hort had referred to her as his “friend.” He wondered whether Hort suspected something was up. He would have seen her photo from her Bureau file.

  “She’s okay. A little shaken up by what happened yesterday, but okay.” He looked at Paula’s face, but couldn’t learn anything from her expression.

  “All right, good. Be ready in thirty minutes.” He clicked off.

  Ben put the phone down. Paula said, “What was that?”

  Ben wasn’t sure how to answer. He couldn’t really get rid of Paula before the next call. And the thought of needing to do so, when they were lying next to each other naked, was exceptionally strange.

  “It was my boss. He says Larison is supposed to call in again in thirty minutes. He wants me to listen in.”

  “Why?”

  “So I’ll know what’s going on.”

  “Which is …?”

  “I don’t know, exactly. But it seems like the snatch teams were Blackwater, and the two guys who showed up after were CIA Ground Branch.”

  She frowned. “Are you sure?”

  “No, I’m not sure, but my boss’s information is usually pretty good. Looks like the CIA doesn’t want you to recover those tapes. And doesn’t want anyone else to, either.”

  She didn’t say anything. He thought she looked a little ill.

  “I know,” he said. “It’s a dark day for interagency cooperation. Outside of you and me, I mean.”