Black Is Back (Quentin Black Mystery #4)

by JC Andrijeski

  Black wasn’t about to underestimate him again.

  When Kiko pulled up in a second featureless rental car, Dex opened the back door and Black shoved Travis onto the back seat. He climbed in next to him as he did it, sliding over on the hot vinyl upholstery without letting go of the other man.

  He jammed his gun back into Travis’ ribs right as Dex opened the front door and took the shotgun position.

  Dex now had his own gun, a Smith & Wesson M&P45, aimed at Travis’ face. He kept it between the seats, where it wouldn’t easily be seen by anyone outside the car, as Black holstered his own gun and tightened plastic cuffs around Travis’ wrists, yanking them until they cut into the other man’s flesh.

  Once he had, he handed the guns he’d taken off Travis off to Dex in the front seat.

  “Be nice, friend,” Dex advised Travis. “This will all be over in no time, if you play nice. We just have a few things to talk to you about.” At Travis’s openly disbelieving scowl, Dex glanced up at Black with a faint smile. “Looks like he got in a few hits too, boss.”

  Black rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah.”

  “When’s the last time that happened?”

  “None of your fucking business.”

  Dex laughed. “See, I just don’t want to have to answer to the missus, boss,” he said, winking at Kiko without taking his eyes off the gun or off Travis. “Knowing the doc, she’s liable to make me a childless motherfucker, and my own woman won’t be having it.”

  From the driver’s seat, Kiko laughed.

  Black glared at them, unamused that time, mostly because they’d mentioned Miri.

  Of course, he knew if this Travis decided to hunt him down, or if someone he worked for did, nothing Dex said right now would probably make much difference. If Travis was really with Archangel, they would have files on Black already.

  They might even have files on Miri by now, if they were keeping tabs on him still.

  Black never intended to negotiate this intelligence-gathering exercise via threats. He was hoping to use persuasion to discourage retaliation––and money. He had zero illusions about the ability of people like this to find him if they got it in their collective heads to do so.

  Even so, he didn’t like the idea of anyone in this part of his life knowing about Miri.

  Not even in the abstract.

  He’d left most of this behind for a reason. Now that Miri was in his life, he had no intention of ever going back to it, for any reason. In fact, he’d already had it in his mind to close out most of the military contracts he still had on the books altogether, even those that didn’t involve the kind of work he did in the old days, back when he was a lot angrier and had a lot less to live for.

  Something in his face must have reflected an element of what he’d been thinking, because the humor evaporated from Dex’s expression the next time he glanced at Black.

  Kiko was moving the car out onto the main road by then, staying well within the speed limit as they hit the highway that bisected the small town, heading North. She stayed in the middle lane, her driving as nondescript as the car.

  They’d already set up a place to talk, not far from here.

  A place where they wouldn’t be interrupted.

  “YOU’RE FUCKING INSANE,” Travis said, staring up at him from where they’d tied him to the chair. His wrists were still bound in front of him, along with his ankles now, too. Duct tape held him to the chair itself.

  “You know that?” he spat. “You’re a fucking dead man, for coming to me for this. And for what? What’s it to you?”

  Black frowned, sitting on the edge of a heavy wooden workbench next to a rusted vice grip bolted into the pine on one end.

  “I have no intention of hurting you,” Black said. “And I’ll pay you. Well. I just didn’t have time to go through the regular channels...”

  “So you blow my fucking ID? You fuck with my woman? My kids?”

  Black’s frown deepened. Maybe this guy wasn’t as much of a rodent as he’d thought.

  Also, he might have to erase him after all. Seems like Travis might be taking this more personally than Black would have expected.

  “Does Archangel know they have a rogue?” he said. “Or is Templar working a job?”

  “What the fuck are you talking about, man?”

  “You’ve seen the news,” Black growled. “You must have put the same things together. Someone has, if not you. It was obvious to me, and I’ve barely had contact.”

  Travis shook his head, his eyes incredulous again. His thin mouth twitched where he stared up at Black. “Walk away from it, friend. Let the company deal with its own.”

  “They haven’t been,” Black said. “Dealing with it. Why?”

  Travis shrugged, staring at the sawdust-covered floor.

  They were in an old machine shop Kiko found for them on her way down to meet Black and Dex. The building was a run-down wooden artifact that stood on what used to be marshland and had probably been deserted for at least a few years. Adjacent to an also-abandoned gas station, it stood on the edges of a town that looked and felt like it more or less died after a manufacturing plant that used to sustain it got moved overseas.

  People not from here rarely saw this side of California, Black knew. He also knew from personal experience there was a lot more of this kind of thing in the Golden State than most people would believe. California usually generated images of Hollywood and Beverley Hills and Malibu, Disneyland and Universal Studios and beaches with bikini-clad nymphets sporting year-round tans. Nowadays, they also thought of Silicon Valley––and maybe earthquakes, if they were paranoid and liked disaster films.

  Most didn’t think about burnt out ghost towns filled with drunk rednecks and speed freaks who couldn’t get work since the last big recession.

  “Why haven’t they brought him in?” Black repeated, sharper that time. “He’s an exposure risk, isn’t he?”

  Travis gave him a knowing smirk. “That guy? No.”

  “Meaning what?”

  “He’d sooner cut off his own dick than betray the brotherhood. Fucker’s so solid he probably shits diamond rings.” Travis glared at him. “Loyalty. You should look into it, fucker. You never bite the hand that feeds. Or the cut the heart that sustains.”

  Black frowned, glancing at Dex and Kiko, both of whom were also frowning down at Travis. Black focused back on the man tied to the chair.

  “Then you know who it is?” he said.

  Travis let out a disgusted sound. “Of course we fucking know! How stupid are you? You think one of ours could do all that and no one would know?”

  “So again, I’m asking... is he on a job? Or is he doing this on his own time?”

  Travis shook his head, his eyes hard. “You’re wasting your breath.”

  Black was reading him though, and frowned.

  “It’s not a job,” he said, answering his own question. “He’s an ideologue of some kind. But he’s serving some kind of purpose for the org, is that it? Generating fear? Or is it something else? Something about the people he’s targeting?”

  “You’re barking up the wrong tree,” Travis said, his voice contemptuous.

  Even so, Black could tell his words had rattled him.

  He was still reading the man in the chair when Travis turned, snarling at him like a cornered animal, his face red. Black could feel the fear on him now. Hell, he could see it. It plumed off the other man’s light in a crimson wave.

  “What the fuck is this to you?” The sinewy man writhed in the heavy chair. “You got a death wish? Or is this personal for you... Black? He kill your mama or something?”

  Black frowned, glancing again at Kiko and Dex.

  Travis laughed. Again, it wasn’t a very nice laugh.

  “Yeah, I know who you are, fucker. I know who you are.”

  Black considered pursuing that too, then dismissed it. He hadn’t taken the sunglasses off during this exercise with Travis, and he wore colored contact lenses under th
e sunglasses even now, but he knew he’d still likely be ID’d if he went through with this. For all he knew, Clive got on the phone the second Black walked out his door.

  Anyway, Black had never been one of those spooks could move around easily because he was inconspicuous. He only got away with it because he could compensate in other ways.

  Even as he thought it, he decided talking to this guy was worthless.

  “Take over, Dex,” he said, glancing at the other men. “You and Kiko see if you can get anything out of this piece of shit... I’m going to get something to drink.”

  He said it like he was done. Like he’d given up.

  Walking out the front door of the machine shop, he walked around to the back end of the building, where they’d left the rental car. Popping the trunk, he pulled a water bottle out of the cooler back there, then walked around to sit in the front passenger seat.

  Snapping the seal on the water bottle, he drank down about a third of it, wiping his forehead with his palm as he gazed into the trees behind the machine shop.

  He never once stopped using his sight to read the other man’s mind.

  Nine

  WAITING

  “BLACK CALLED IN.” Nick slumped into the seat across from me, sitting next to Angel in the cramped booth. Looking up, he motioned for the waitress to come over and take his order. Once she did and he’d rattled off an impressively large order of mixed sashimi, wakame and a rainbow maki roll along with four pieces of nigiri sake, he looked back at me.

  “Well?” I said, not hiding my annoyance. “Are you going to tell us what he said?”

  “He might have an ID on the guy. Well...” Nick shrugged, giving me a grim look as he broke apart his wooden chopsticks. “Sort of.”

  “Sort of?” Angel said. “What does that mean?”

  “He says he knows the guy’s operating name, but the person he contacted has never met him in person. He doesn’t know what he looks like. And the name’s probably an alias.”

  I smiled humorlessly. “And that helps us... how?” I said.

  Nick gave me a hard look. “The guy’s definitely Archangel. Or was, anyway. Black says they know about him, too... and have pretty much since he started this. They’re letting him do it, but Black doesn’t think it’s a job. Not in the usual sense.”

  “What does that mean?” I glanced at Angel, who looked as puzzled as I felt. “Like... they’re just letting him kill people for fun? Isn’t that kind of risky for them?”

  “Black thinks it’s ideological. And that it might be a message of some kind.”

  “What kind of message?” Angel said.

  Nick waved his chopsticks, digging into the bowl of cold seaweed salad that the waitress had just brought him. “He’s trying to find that out, but said the guy he’s questioning might not know the specifics. It seems there’s some kind of power struggle going on though. Something to do with rich corporations that Archangel contracts with, including defense contractors. Black thinks these guys are really into what they perceive as ‘order’ and that they view the corporate culture as growing too anarchic in a sense. Too many wars. Too much instability and greed. This Templar guy might be a message around what Archangel could do if they feel the herd needs a bit of thinning... to bring things back to their idea of ‘order.’”

  I stared at Nick, then at Angel, who also looked a little bewildered.

  “They’re trying to remake corporate culture?” I said, that stunned note making it to my voice. “Seriously? What makes them think they can do that?”

  Nick shrugged, swallowing a mouthful of seaweed.

  “No idea. From what Black said... maybe they can. Maybe they have enough influence to try, at least. Black thinks so. They’re kind of ‘putting their foot down,’ is how Black phrased it, and not just here in the United States. But apparently they think a lot of the loss of stability started here. They want the 1% to start policing their own, I guess... to bring down some of the excesses. Or Archangel will do it for them.”

  I let out another humorless sound. “By killing them?”

  Nick shrugged, giving me a flat-eyed look. “It’s what they do, Miri.”

  “But why would they need a person to do that?” Angel said. “They have drones for that kind of thing now, don’t they? Hell, they probably have space cannons by now.”

  Nick shrugged. “You’d have to ask Black about that. I suspect it’s psychological though. For a lot of people, a drone is more abstract than a guy who’s going to cut off your head with a sword and quote the Bible at you.”

  “Fair enough,” Angel muttered, pushing the fish and salmon around on her plate. From her expression she might’ve lost her appetite somewhat.

  “So we’re not just talking about a security company, are we?” I pressed. “Not anymore. Even contractors don’t do this kind of thing. And if they’re making threats to create some kind of ‘new world order’ then they think they can counter the surveillance stuff, too. And the governments involved... not just the private groups.”

  Nick shook his head, but I could tell he was agreeing with me. He finished swallowing his mouthful of food and glanced up at me.

  “Definitely not just a security company. They might have started off as that, but from what Black said, they’ve branched out. Like... a lot. I have no idea what their connection is to the surveillance crowd.” Grunting a little, he glanced at me. “I’m almost afraid to ask my buddy at the Pentagon, after some of the stuff Black said. I don’t exactly want to disappear in the middle of the night, either.”

  Angel spoke up from his other side, her voice even more incredulous than mine. “You think that might happen to Black?” Angel said.

  I didn’t say anything.

  I knew Angel asked for me as much as her.

  Nick shrugged again, his eyes darting briefly around the room. I almost got the impression he was checking to make sure no one was near enough to overhear us.

  “Black didn’t really say much about that,” he said, his voice lower than before. “But I assume he’s not being stupid. He mentioned he thought Archangel is using the Templar thing in some kind of talks they’re having. Like a ‘state of the world,’ summit-type thing, maybe something they hold every so often. He thought it might be going on now, or maybe it’s about to happen. Either way, the impression he got from his source is that Archangel hasn’t intervened with this guy because he’s part of their negotiation strategy for a directional change... intimating what might happen to others if that change weren’t to happen.”

  “Who’s his source?” I said.

  Nick snorted. “You think he gave me a name?”

  “Are they going to stop this guy then?” Angel said. “When this summit of theirs is over or whatever? Are they going to bring Templar in?”

  “Doubtful,” Nick said. “Black didn’t think so anyway. They’ve let it go too long. And apparently the guy who’s doing it has a rep for being tight-lipped. They’re not worried about him saying anything about Archangel itself, so they’re letting the police handle it.”

  “And Black’s sure this guy isn’t lying to him?” I said, frowning.

  Nick shrugged, looking at me. “It’s Black. Do you really think he got most of this from stuff the guy told him?”

  When I only frowned harder in response, Nick lowered his voice still more.

  “From what his source knows, they’re using this Templar thing as a warning. But it’s opportunistic... meaning, they likely didn’t put him on this directly. Black thinks there’s a specific group they’re targeting for large scale policy changes. The ones they blame for causing instability in the overall system. Apparently, Archangel envisions themselves as the enforcers of the health of that system as a whole. They’re framing this as ‘self-policing’ or as a ‘system self-correction action’ or something to that effect. For the benefit of all, but yeah, they’re willing to muscle that change in, if they have to. The message is, we have a lot more where he came from, and we can and will wield that
sword any way we see fit. Particularly if it means the bettering of security and stability for the system as a whole...”

  I stared at Nick.

  Suddenly, I found myself thinking about something else.

  Maybe it was the language he was using.

  “Is my uncle involved in any of this?” I said.

  Nick gave me another of those flat-eyed stares. “You’d have to ask Black that too, doc. But from what he said, Uncle Charlie isn’t un-involved, if you catch my drift.”

  I did. Catch his drift. As I turned over Nick’s words in the silence that followed, it occurred to me, not for the first time, that I didn’t really know how the world worked. Not really. Not in the ways that mattered.

  Maybe none of us did.

  “How does this help us?” I said finally. “Does this even help us?”

  Nick sighed at that, combing his hand through his straight black hair as he looked up from the maki roll he’d just started eating.

  “Honestly?” he said. “I don’t know. Black said it’s unlikely he’d be able to get close enough to anyone who could actually ID the guy. I got the impression he thinks he needs to walk away from this pretty soon as it is.” Maybe feeling me stiffen, he added, “He seems to think he’ll walk away clean, if he doesn’t go any higher in the food chain... he’s got some protection via your uncle as well. But he doesn’t want to risk himself or his team by getting too close. Not until he knows a lot more. His intel confirms the killer’s got a pretty scary amount of training under his belt, and that we’re dealing with a serious pro... but it probably won’t help us ID him beyond that. I think we’re back to trying to find him through the victims.”

  “Did you tell him?” I said. “About Dougal? About me?”

  Nick gave me a level stare.

  Sighing, I nodded. “Thanks, Nick.”

  “Don’t thank me,” he grunted. “I’m regretting it already.”

  “When is he coming back? Black. Did he say?”

  Nick met my gaze over the plates of sushi that the waitress had placed around him strategically, filling all the empty spots of table. I could tell he was studying me again, like he couldn’t figure out what the hell was going on with me. I could also tell that something about how I was acting was really starting to annoy him.