Daniel was in the bed before her, but he was still awake.
"Should I leave my rifle out, do you think?" he asked.
"It's a big room, but probably a little tight for the rifle. I can go grab the shotgun."
He gave her an exasperated look. "I was joking."
"Oh. Right."
He held his arms open for her. She switched off the lamp and climbed into her now usual place. The bed was absurd--some kind of soft, supportive cloud that was probably made from spun gold or unicorn mane.
"Good night, Alex," he whispered into her hair, and then she was asleep.
*
SHE WOKE WHILE it was still dark outside; the faint light glowing from around the edges of the shades was the unnatural yellow-green of city lights. She couldn't see a clock, but she'd guess it was around four. A solid night's rest and then some. She was glad; today would be long. For years now, all she'd been doing was running and surviving. Now she had to shift into a more proactive mode and she dreaded it. There had been her one uncharacteristic adventure in Texas, but she blamed that on the adrenaline of the moment and the unfamiliar responsibility of having a liability. It wasn't something she would ever have planned to do.
So when Daniel, woken by her movements, started to kiss her throat, she didn't mind procrastinating for a bit.
She wondered what it would be like to be a normal person. To be able to expect that mornings like this--waking up with someone you'd chosen--would happen over and over again. To go through the day certain that you'd lie back down at the end of it in the same bed, with that same person next to you. She doubted many people appreciated that certainty when they had it. It would be too much a part of everyday life to them, taken for granted, not something they would think of feeling grateful for.
Well, she couldn't count on another morning like this, but she could be grateful for it now.
She yanked on his T-shirt and he pulled his hands out of her hair long enough to remove it. Alex tugged her own shirt out of the way, greedy for the feeling of his skin next to hers. His kisses, which had begun so tenderly, started to veer more toward the unrestrained, though she could almost hear him reminding himself to be careful with her. She didn't want any of that. She kissed him back in a way designed to make him forget any other consideration.
There was no sound, no warning. She didn't hear the lock turn or the door open. And then, suddenly, the metallic click of a gun safety sliding off, just inches from her head. She froze and felt Daniel do the same. She wasn't sure if he'd recognized the quiet click, as she had, or was just responding to her.
From the sound, she knew the intruder was closer to the gun on the nightstand than she was. She cursed herself for neglecting basic security and worked to think of any move left to her. Maybe if she tried to spin and kick the gun away, it would give Daniel time to get around him.
And then the intruder spoke.
"Step away from the civilian, you poisonous little snake."
She blew out the huge gasp of air she'd been holding in. "Hoo! Huh! Okay. Ah! Let's put the gun down now, psychopath."
"Not until you get off my brother."
"This is so far beyond crossing the line, I don't even know what to call it," Daniel said in a harsh tone. "Did you pick the lock?"
"Danny, listen to me, she's drugged you again. That's what's happening here."
"As if I would waste my limited supply on recreation," she muttered. She rolled, tugging the sheet up to cover herself, and reached for the lamp. She felt the cool barrel of the gun press into her forehead.
"You're ridiculous," she told him as she switched the light on.
Kevin stepped back, blinking in the light. He still had his long, silenced pistol aimed at her face.
The bed rocked as Daniel vaulted agilely over her body and placed himself between her and Kevin. "What are you doing? Don't point that at her!"
"Danny, I don't know what she has you on, but we'll get it out of your system, I promise. Come with me."
"If you know what is good for you, you will turn around and walk away now."
"I'm saving you here."
"Thanks, but no thanks. I was quite happy with what I was doing before you so rudely interrupted, and I'd like to return to it. Shut the door behind you."
"What's happened?" Alex asked, yanking her T-shirt on. There was no time for this squabbling. Kevin was wearing only a pair of pajama pants, so whatever the catalyst was, he hadn't had time to prepare himself. It wasn't like Kevin to let something--even something this offensive to him--distract him when there was trouble. She leaned around Daniel to grab her belt and then wrapped it around her waist as she spoke. "Do we need to move?" She reached for the SIG next and shoved it into the back of her belt.
Kevin's gun lowered slowly, and he started to look less confident as he was confronted with her practicality.
"I didn't believe her, so I came to check," he admitted, suddenly sheepish. "I wasn't planning on Danny ever knowing I was here."
"Her?" Daniel asked.
"Val... she said you two were together. She was so sure of herself. I said there was no way in hell." His voice was outraged again by the end.
Daniel exhaled, irritated. "Well, I hope you made some kind of bet. With a very humiliating consequence for losing."
"This is punishment enough," Kevin grumbled.
"In all seriousness," Daniel said, "get out, Kevin."
"I can't believe this, Danny. What are you thinking? After what she did to you?"
Daniel was still between Alex and Kevin, so she couldn't see his face, but she could suddenly hear a smile in his voice. "You're supposed to be so tough, so dangerous. And yet you're saying you'd let a little pain come between you and the woman you wanted? Really?"
Kevin rocked a step back and took a few seconds to respond. "But why? Why do you want her?" The anger had vanished; when he looked at Alex, there was only bewilderment.
"I'll explain it to you when you've grown up. Now, for the last time, get out, or"--and he reached one long arm around Alex's body and pulled the gun from her back--"I'll shoot you."
He pointed the gun at Kevin's torso.
"Um, the safety is off on that," Alex murmured.
"Counting on it," Daniel replied.
Kevin stared at them--Daniel holding the gun steady, Alex watching from behind his arm--and then his shoulders squared.
He pointed at Alex with his free hand. "You. Just... stop..." He waved his hand in a big, inclusive gesture, taking in the two of them and the bed. "All of this. We leave in fifteen. Be ready."
His hand shifted to Danny. "I..." He blew out a deep breath, shook his head, and then turned and walked out the door. He didn't bother closing it. "Damn it, Val!" he shouted as he headed through the dark hall, as if all of this were somehow her fault. Einstein barked from upstairs.
Alex sighed and stretched. "Well, that went about exactly as I thought it would. No shots fired--this was the best-case scenario, I guess."
"Where are you going?" Daniel asked.
"To shower. You heard the man. Fifteen minutes."
"It's the middle of the night!"
"All the better to hide my face. You're not tired, are you? I think we've been asleep for nine hours, at least."
Daniel scowled. "No, I am not in the least bit tired."
"Well, then..." She started toward the bathroom door.
"Wait."
Daniel jumped up, ruffling his hair as he walked to the bedroom door. He shut it and then locked it again.
"What's the point of that, really?" Alex asked.
Daniel shrugged. "Touche."
He walked to her and wrapped his hands around her upper arms, holding her securely. "I wasn't ready to get out of bed."
"Kevin's not going to knock," she reminded him. "He probably won't even give me the full fifteen."
"I don't like letting him call the shots. Not only was I not ready to get out of bed, I was not ready for you to get out of bed, either."
&
nbsp; He bent his head down to kiss her, his hands running slowly up her shoulders till they were cradling her face. She knew that under normal circumstances, it would have taken very little convincing on his part to get her to agree. But these were not normal circumstances, and the idea that Kevin might walk into the room at any moment--probably with gun in hand again--tempered her response.
She pulled back. "What about a compromise?"
The look he gave her was less than thrilled. "I categorically refuse to compromise in any way for Kevin's sake."
"Can I please at least make my case before you dismiss it?"
He kept his expression stern, but she could tell he wanted to smile. "Do what you have to do, but I will not be swayed."
"We have limited time, and we both need to clean up. That shower-slash-lap pool in there will easily fit two--well, actually it could fit twelve--and I was thinking we could multitask."
The hard-line expression disappeared. "I immediately withdraw my opposition and offer my full cooperation."
"I thought you might see it that way."
CHAPTER 25
Because there's no reason for you to go," Kevin objected.
Kevin stood in front of the elevator doors, blocking the call button, arms crossed over his chest.
"Why not?" Daniel demanded.
"You're not going to be a part of the offensive, Danny, so you don't need to be a part of the preparation."
Daniel's lips mashed together into a scowl.
"It doesn't hurt anything for him--" Alex began mildly.
"Except someone could see his face," Kevin growled.
"You mean your face?" she countered.
"I'm smart enough to keep my head down."
Daniel rolled his eyes. "I'll ride in the trunk if you want."
Kevin evaluated the two of them for a long second. "Are you going to let me focus?"
"What do you mean?" Alex asked.
Kevin closed his eyes; he seemed to be calming himself. He inhaled through his nose, then looked at Daniel.
"Here are my requirements for you to join us on this very boring, standard recon exercise: No one will speak of what happened this morning. I will not be forced to remember the nauseating things I witnessed. There will be no discussion that might allude to said nauseating things. This is business, and you will conduct yourself appropriately. Agreed?"
Daniel's neck started to flush. She was sure he was going to mention the fact that if Kevin hadn't broken in to a locked room in the middle of the night, he wouldn't have seen anything. Before Daniel could object, Alex said, "Agreed. Appropriate businesslike behavior."
Kevin glanced back and forth between them, measuring again. After a second, he turned and hit the call button.
Daniel gave her a Really? look. Alex shrugged.
"None of that!" Kevin commanded, though he still had his back to them.
"What?" Daniel complained.
"I can feel you two silently communicating. Stop it."
*
IT WAS A quiet drive in the average-looking black sedan. She didn't know if it was Val's car or something Kevin had acquired. It didn't seem like Val's style, but maybe she liked to be incognito sometimes. Alex appreciated the heavily tinted windows. She felt less exposed as she sat with her ball cap pulled low over her face and stared out at the still mostly sleeping city. They were early enough to beat the morning rush.
Kevin drove through a seedier section of town--more the kind of neighborhood she would have expected his hiding place to exist in. He pulled in at a storage facility that seemed to be mostly enormous cargo containers. There was no guard posted, just a keypad and a heavy metal gate with razor-wire coils on top. Kevin drove them to a spot near the back of the fenced lot and parked behind a dingy orange container.
The lot appeared to be empty, but Alex kept her face down and her walk unfeminine as they moved to the wide double doors that made up the front wall of the container. Kevin plugged a complicated sequence of numbers into the heavy-duty rectangular lock, then pulled it out of the way. He opened one door just a few feet and waved them inside.
It was black when Kevin pulled the door shut behind himself. Then there was a low click, and rope lights lining the ceiling and the floor glowed to life.
"Exactly how many Batcaves do you have?" Alex demanded.
"Just a few, here and there, where I might need them," Kevin said. "This one's mobile, so that helps."
The inside of Kevin's cargo container was tightly packed but compulsively organized. Like the barn in Texas, there was a place for everything.
Racks of clothing--costumes, really--were wedged against the wall by the double doors. She was sure that was on purpose--if someone got a glimpse inside while the doors were open, all he would see was clothes. A casual observer wouldn't think anything of it. A more careful observer might think it was odd that uniforms for every branch of the military were hanging together, along with mechanic's coveralls and several utility companies' official garb, not to mention the raggedy components of a homeless man's outfit hanging a few feet down from a row of dark suits that ranged from off-the-rack to high-end designer. A person could blend into a lot of situations with these clothes.
The props were in bins over the clothes racks--briefcases and clipboards, toolboxes and suitcases. The shoes were in clear plastic boxes underneath.
Beyond the costumes, deep floor-to-ceiling metal cabinets were installed. Kevin guided her through each; she took note of the things she might need. As in the barn, there was a space for guns, for ammo, for armor, for explosives, for knives. There were other things that hadn't been in Texas, or if they were, they'd been better hidden than the rest. He had a cabinet full of various tech items--tiny cameras and bugs, tracking devices, night-vision goggles, binoculars and scopes, electromagnetic-pulse generators of various sizes, a few laptop computers, and dozens of gadgets she didn't recognize. He identified the code breakers, the frequency readers, the frequency jammers, the system hackers, the mini-drones... She lost track after a while. It was unlikely that she would want to use anything she wasn't familiar with.
The next cabinet was chemical compounds.
"Yes," she hissed, digging past the front row to see what was behind. "This I can use."
"Thought you'd appreciate that."
"Do you mind?" she asked, holding up a sealed cylinder of a catalytic she knew she was almost out of.
"Take whatever you want. I don't think I've ever used any of that stuff."
She crouched down to the lower shelf and loaded several more jars and packages into her backpack. Ah, this one she needed. "Then why do you have it?"
Kevin shrugged. "I had access. Never look a gift horse--"
"Ha!" She stared up at him triumphantly.
"What?"
"You told me that was a stupid saying."
Kevin raised his eyes to the ceiling. "Sometimes it's really hard not to kick you."
"I know precisely how you feel."
Daniel moved to stand between her and Kevin. She shook her head at him. It was just banter. With the brief lecture on appropriate behavior out of the way, Kevin had shifted back to his normal self--something in between a serial killer and the world's most obnoxious big brother. Alex was getting used to it; she didn't mind him as much anymore.
Grumbling about silent communication, Kevin stalked back to the ammo cabinet and started filling a large black bag with reserves.
"First aid?" she asked.
"In the knife locker, top shelf."
There were several zippered black bags over the knives, some of them about the size of a backpack, others smaller, like shaving kits. She couldn't reach any of them, so Daniel pulled them down and she combed through them on the floor.
The first smaller bag she opened had no medical supplies--instead, there were little packets of documents neatly rubber-banded together for easy sorting. She quickly pulled out a Canadian passport and glanced at the ID page. As she'd expected, there was a photo of Kevin wit
h a different name--Terry Williams. She glanced up. Kevin had his back to her. She grabbed two of the packets and stuffed them into the bottom of her backpack, then zipped the bag closed.
These particular items wouldn't be of any help to her, but she had to be prepared for other outcomes. She peeked at Daniel; he wasn't paying attention to her, either. He was looking at the array of knives with a disbelieving expression. It made her wonder how long he could survive on his own with what he'd learned so far.
Alex pulled open one of the bigger bags but wasn't thrilled with what she found inside. It was a fairly basic kit, with nothing that she didn't already have. She checked the next bag, then the last. Nothing that wasn't in the first.
"What's missing?" Kevin asked.
She jumped slightly; she hadn't heard him approach. He must have read her disappointed expression.
"I'd like access to some decent trauma supplies, just in case..."
"Okay. Grab up whatever else you want here, and then we'll go get some."
"Just that easy?" she asked skeptically.
"Sure."
She raised one eyebrow. "We're going to walk into a medical facility and ask to purchase some surplus?"
"No!" He made a face implying the stupidity of her suggestion. "Haven't you ever heard the phrase It fell off a truck? You got some of that knockout stuff on you now?"
"Yes."
"Then hurry, so we can get out there before all the trucks have finished their deliveries."
*
ALEX'S BACKPACK WAS now stocked with ammo for her various appropriated guns--the SIG Sauer, the Glock she hadn't abandoned, the shotgun, Daniel's rifle--and her own PPK. She'd taken two extra handguns from the stash, because you never knew, and ammo for those as well. From the tech case she'd grabbed two sets of goggles, some trackers, and two EMP generators of different sizes. She wasn't sure what she would use any of them for, but she might not have time to get back here if there was an emergency. While she shopped through his gear, Kevin reset the lock so that the usual birth-date code would let her back in.
Or Daniel, if things really went south.
"So, what are my options for chemically incapacitating another human being?" Kevin asked when they were back on the road. Alex drove this time.
"Let's see... do you want airborne or contact?"
Kevin gave her a sidelong look. "Which do you recommend?"
The Chemist Page 37
