by Mike McCrary
Is that why Brubaker came here?
Thompson and Dr. Peyton had no idea what she was up to—or so they say. Murphy knows it has to be about money. Almost always is. There are a lot of homes to invade in the world with far less security and risks. No reason to target this individual unless it’s about the dollars.
Maybe she’s here using his funds, or his access to funds, to build something up. Fund a master plan. Create a war chest of some sort. Or she’s using his wealth to transport them somewhere. Maybe out of the country. Maybe seeking refuge after the CIA attack squads came after them. Find some fast funds and flee the USA for a beach island dream life.
That would make perfect sense.
A shadow flickers upstairs.
The first proof of life he’s seen in hours. Instinctively he reaches for his gun. If only for comfort. Fingers wrap around the grip as some kind of odd safety blanket. The volley inside Murphy’s mind is difficult to sort. The bounce between terrified and bloodlust. He imagines a life somewhere in the middle. Currently, Murphy has set up shop in the extremes.
A shadow moves from window to window.
His pulse quickens.
The shadow is moving along the upstairs, and then to the lower level. There's a pause. Murphy loses the visual. He blinks, straining to see through the dark. Apparently, it's too much for the almighty agency to throw him some night vision tech.
The shadow appears in the downstairs picture window.
Singular shape.
Can't make out if it's male or female. He or she seems slender. Fit. From the looks of the hedge fund manager’s file, he’s coming in at 6’4, 300 pounds. This is definitely not that guy in the window. The shadow disappears. No sign of movement. Murphy holds his breath.
The garage door opens.
A red Mercedes four-door backs out of the driveway.
Murphy ducks down into the shadows.
The Mercedes pulls out into the street then speeds up through the neighborhood exceeding the recommended speed limit. He can’t see through the driver’s blackout-tinted window but there is a driver behind the wheel. He thinks. No way the self-driving AI would break the speed limit. Especially in a residential neighborhood. One other detail catches Murphy’s attention. The garage door was left open. Wide open.
A hasty, sloppy exit?
Or inviting me to the slaughter?
Murphy struggles with the very real idea this is a trap. Or perhaps it is simply negligence created by the driver’s haste. He entertains the idea of starting up his beaten-to-hell clunker, but realizes he can never catch up to the speeding Mercedes. Also, there’s a high probability of being made by the driver.
He looks to his phone then glances to his tablet.
Peyton and Thompson wanted updates. They said he could message them via the phone or tablet with anything that might be helpful. There’s more data security on these things than around missile launch codes.
Anything at all, they stressed.
The second they said that, Murphy understood he needed to filter all information internally. He cannot trust either one of them under any circumstances. Murphy decides to table the details of this project for now.
He steps away from the street.
The night air feels good. The blood pumping through his veins feels even better.
“Buckle up,” he tells himself.
More like he tells his other half. His less mayhem-friendly Mr. Nice Guy half.
Crossing the street, Murphy checks the homes nearby. There’s a lot of space between the residences, by design he’s sure. The closest homes are fifty to a hundred yards in every direction. High fences. The wooded area behind his car is deep and backs up to a golf course. There are streetlights but Murphy keeps to the shadows, as if he’s doing a dance he’s practiced the steps to his entire life.
Alarms, cameras and motion detectors would normally be a massive concern at a house like this one. The place drips of wealth and understandable paranoia. The cameras he won’t know about, too small to see and he doesn’t have the tech to hunt them down, but the garage door being open is worth a gamble on the alarms.
As he passes from shadow to shadow, he pulls down over his head one of the ski masks that he grabbed from the trunk. The fabric is smooth and soft. A breathable fiber you won’t find in the bargain bin. He must check the label for the brand later. These usually come down your face like fresh sandpaper hell.
A memory floods into Murphy’s mind.
As real as anything.
He sees himself pulling on a much cheaper ski mask. The scratchiness of the material. It stinks of peanuts and bourbon. All so clear in his mind. As if he wore it yesterday. He feels the mask go over his head and face as he pulls a gun. There’s an ocean breeze. The salty taste of the air. The sun shines bright behind him.
He kicks in a door.
Guns blast.
Bodies drop.
An older woman screams at him from the corner.
Murphy snaps out of it. His body trembles. He’s seen this memory before. The ski mask is new. That memory was last coupled with his much happier thoughts of the man and woman at the bar. Along with the vision of a rolling car wreck.
Peyton talked about Mr. Nice Guy being killed by a drunk driver.
Is that what he’s seeing?
Is the scene at the ocean house one of the many moments that terrified Dr. Peyton? Was this what Thompson was talking about? How he went off the rails and landed on death row in Leavenworth.
He looks to the house.
Is that what’s waiting for him in there?
More blood?
As he removes the gun from behind his back, he tests the weight in his hand. It’s familiar, and yet it has never been heavier. Mr. Nice Guy has probably never fired a gun before, while the other half has pulled the trigger with as much thought as taking a breath.
He stops. Wait, that’s not right.
Mr. Nice Guy knows a little about weapons.
There’s a handshake of sorts in his mind.
Was Mr. Nice Guy military too? Not the level of Murphy, but there’s a similarity in the way someone trained them in basic. Flashes of those days blur. Drill sergeants scream. Gunshots rattle from the memory of time spent training. Unable to zero in on specifics. Impossible to reconcile.
Mr. Nice Guy was a fit, she said.
His sight slips out of focus. A folding in of thought between the two minds. Murphy wants to sit down and have a drink with his own mind. Wants to keep at it, to push it. Go farther. Dig deeper. There has to be so much more to access. So much more information they’re not telling him.
He knows he can’t.
Not now.
He looks to the open garage.
Whatever is in that house is the first step. Murphy knows it. Flashes of the lab escape video pop as he closes his eyes tight. The unbridled violence. The soulless rage. The funeral eyes of Lady Brubaker.
She and her friends are out on the loose.
What does she want?
He thinks of the people asleep tonight who don’t understand what madness is roaming the countryside. The random violence this homicidal pack is capable of. Something has to be done. Half of him is ready to roll. Half wants to stop and talk about it.
Murphy opens his eyes.
The suppressor attaches. Like holding hands with a long-lost lover.
A warm streak of blood rolls from his left eye.
Chapter 16
Inside the house is exactly what Murphy expected.
A place so nice it pisses you off.
The main lights are off, but the floor dimmers offer a warm glow. Still dark, but the soft fuzz of light along the edge of the darkness is a nice effect. One he couldn’t see from the outside, but enough to create a shadow viewable from the outside. Murphy can almost see the bloated price tags on every item in the home.
Fairly sure that was the idea, after all.
These rooms were put together so there was no mistaking the owner’s pl
ace in the world. The kitchen is steel gray, with pops of black steel. Next-level appliances with the occasional knickknack from a Japanese artist, along with assorted somethings exported from places beyond.
All the lines are clean.
All slicker than shit.
The place stinks of cash, Murphy thinks while holding his Glock, his finger pressing the side of the weapon. Off the trigger for the safety of others.
Murphy hears a low moan echo from the dark.
Sounds like it’s coming from down the hall.
Pushing through the doors, across the marble floor of the dining room, he passes a long table for entertaining that could easily seat twenty comfortably.
There are only two places set, however. Thick, tree stump-sized red candles are lit in the center. On either end of the table are plates littered with the scattered remains of what must have been a fine meal. Each plate has a wineglass sitting beside it.
One empty.
One full.
The moan echoes again.
Murphy works through a simple, yet probable, scenario in his mind. Turning it over and over. A little wine, a romantic meal and then some moaning. He can’t decide if he wants to walk in on a less than professional sex show or not.
He knows there’s another probability as well.
One that involves blood and pain.
Moving toward the sound, Murphy crosses the dining area into a sprawling living room. It is lit with the same soft glow but without the help of candlelight. His scenario has a missing piece, however. Who took off in the Mercedes like a bat out of hell? Staff more than likely wouldn’t take off in that car.
Jilted lover?
Is Brubaker a pissed offed date gone wrong?
Moans get louder. He can now tell it’s a man.
Murphy steps onto a rug that runs through the living room. Making sure his footsteps make as little noise as possible. Careful to minimize his auditory footprint. More artistic expressions from exotic locations pepper the living area. From behind him, the dining room candles’ flames flicker creating dancing shadows along the far wall.
Another, deeper moan.
Is Lady Brubaker screwing him to death?
A small pool of blood lies on the marble a few feet ahead. Smeared and black. Spills and drops lead an uneven path down a hallway. Murphy places his finger on the trigger. The light turns green.
Hate being right all the time.
His senses pull wire tight. Gun raised with both hands, how someone trained him to clear a room. Murphy scans the area with his legs scissoring long strides toward the sound.
His pulse quickens, breathing slows.
He taps the tiny flashlight attached to the barrel of his gun. A two to three-foot area in front of him illuminates. He tilts the gun down every other step to check the dark blood trail below. The moans sound more like cries from here. The mixed prayers for help are hard to mistake.
The trail ends.
Murphy has reached a set of bare feet.
A large, fortysomething male lies naked on the marble floor. A half-dead slab waiting for the drawer. He’s bleeding out heavily from his gut with his hands pressing hard to stop the flow. Murphy recognizes him from the files as Buckley the hedge fund god. Above the god—the one bleeding like a pig—is a massive eight-foot oil painting of himself.
Murphy’s seen a lot of wounds. Seen a lot of blood.
He knows a dead man when he sees one. At the back of his mind is a person who wants to call an ambulance. There’s a chance we can save him. He wants to comfort this poor soul no matter how hopeless. That guy—Mr. Nice Guy—is being thrown to the back of the theater. Markus Murphy owns the stage tonight. He has no interest in passing the mic.
“Where is she?” Also not interested in small talk.
“Who are you?” Buckley spits out.
“Look, man.” Murphy kneels down. “You’ve got one, maybe two hours of living left.” He’s lying; this guy will bleed out in minutes. “I can call someone in and patch your ass up, or I can walk away.”
“Please. I have money.”
“Don’t want your money. What I want is to know where she went. And don’t do that who bullshit. Neither one of us have the time.” Murphy pretends to ponder. “You had a nice meal, thought you were going to get laid, then things went horribly, horribly wrong. Right?” He pets Buckley’s head like a pet. “We’ve all been there. Not me, but I’ve heard.”
“Call someone, you son of a bitch.”
“Getting there.” Murphy turns. There’s a hologram image of a laptop desktop projected, floating in the room next to them. “What was going on in there?”
“I thought she was a pro.” Buckley strains to get words out through the pain. “I paid for the girlfriend experience.”
“And you got it, brutha.” Murphy giggles. “Sorry, keep going.”
“She slipped me something in my wine. Forced me to log into my business laptop. I don’t know what she’s doing. She wanted my clients’ information. CRMs, emails.”
“Oh yeah?” He moves to the hologram.
He runs his finger up and down scrolling through the screen in midair. Murphy scans through the other open emails.
There are several open with the same subject line—Options for Success.
Murphy takes note. They are all about a meeting taking place in a few days in New York. Fairly nondescript. There are also several open emails to and from one guy.
“Looks like she was digging into a couple of things here. One dude in particular. Zeroed in on a guy named Pruitt. Eryk Pruitt a big deal?”
“Yeah.” Buckley would laugh at the question if the hurt wasn’t so intense. “He’s the CEO of one of the largest tech firms on the planet.”
“Ya don’t say? Got a lot of folks like this Pruitt in there?”
“I run the largest hedge fund—”
“I know, I get it, you’re a really big deal.” Murphy stands over Buckley, realizing time is short. He glances above Buckley at the massive painting of him. “That’s a horrific picture.”
“I can’t feel my legs. My fingers.”
“Not good.” Murphy grips his gun.
Murphy looks to the email projected from the laptop. A floating, three-dimensional rendering of a message that was sent to Buckley from Pruitt telling him how to reach him while he’s traveling. Says he’s at an exclusive resort.
A resort in Baghdad.
“Okay then.” Murphy turns back to Buckley. “We’re almost there. Last question. What’s the password.”
“Badboyforever99, but without a confirming biometric the laptop will lock up into a brick.” Buckley coughs hard. “Come on, man. Fucking help—”
Murphy fires a bullet into his head.
Mr. Nice Guy can only watch on in horror.
Murphy is so glad he used a suppressor.
The gunshot would have echoed through all six thousand square feet of the place.
Chapter 17
Shooting Buckley was part mercy, part personal test of will.
Two birds.
Murphy knew Buckley was dead anyway—not long for this earth in any shape or form—and his remaining time would be pure agony. At the same time, he also wanted to see how strong the new dude sharing his head truly was. Needed to know the limits of Mr. Nice Guy. Wanted some confidence in the way this tug of war will play out. The line that cuts between morality conflicts can be uneven in a single mind. Even more so in a group setting.
Is one side stronger than the other?
Is one winning?
Will it always be like this?
As Murphy starts the car, his hands vibrate violently. Barely able to push the ignition. His stomach twists. Pulse pounds. It’s as if Mr. Nice Guy has awoken. Perhaps he was napping in an empty corner in his mind.
In a strange way, it’s like Murphy is watching another version of himself come undone. Unable to calm him or snuff him out. He pulls the car away from the curb and into the street of Buckley’s gated commun
ity. His teeth gnash as the emotional flood rolls.
Whispering to himself.
“You did what you had to do.”
Numbness setting in.
“This can’t be me,” escapes his lips.
Doesn’t even feel like he said it.
He locks up the brakes. The gate guarding Buckley’s community is an inch from his front bumper. Murphy was so adrift in his own head he was seconds away from ramming through the iron. He waits for the luxury community’s gate to open. He hacked the cameras into a digital loop before he reached the neighborhood—did that hours ago—but Murphy leaves his mask on all the same. He’ll dump the car soon. Knows he needs to make contact with Peyton and Thompson.
The gate slow-swings open.
Murphy presses down the gas slipping out into the night. There’s a local bar close. Both parts of him want a drink. At least there’s some internal agreement between them.
He needs to reset.
Murphy also knows he needs to put some distance between him and that house, but his need to regroup is becoming nonnegotiable. His entire body shakes. Not going to make it too far in this state of near meltdown.
Feels as if he’s physically separating.
Two sides firing shotgun blasts of thought back and forth.
Peyton and Thompson can wait.
Murphy parks the car behind a gas station not far from the house. Stumbling out from the car, his feet barely leave the concrete. Shuffling, dragging, he pulls himself along the side of the car. His hands planted on the steel for support, struggling to make it to the trunk. He pops it open, pulls his things from the back.
Buckley was right about the laptop locking up. Murphy couldn’t get more intel from it before the security protocols turned it into a hockey puck, but he took the laptop from the house on the off chance the big brains of the CIA could crack it open.
He did his best to arrange the more interesting emails so he could take a picture with his phone. It’s not perfect, but you can make out most of them.