“Well,” said Nicholas. “They say the woman always knows.”
“She does.”
“I wonder what else she knows,” said Nicholas.
“That you don’t know? I’m going to run out of voice minutes before I can finish listing them.”
“Someone has been going to a lot of trouble to harass my organization lately,” said Nicholas. “A lot of petty disruption. No real trouble, but it has become annoying. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you, Kat?”
Damn. He knew what I had been up to. Well, he hadn’t been able to find me or stop me, and I had proof of that. If he had been able to find me, he would have had one of his goons put a bullet in my head.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said. “Your organization is filled with incompetents, and you have some powerful enemies, Nicky. You would have all kinds of trouble even if I sat at home in my sweatpants eating potato chips.”
“Really? You’ve put on weight? Well, I suppose women do let themselves go after the first child.”
I decided on a new line of attack. “What about Hailey? You get her pregnant yet?”
Nicholas laughed. “No. My devotion is to my work. As is Hailey’s. We have no time to spare for children.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I mean, if one of your Gatekeepers got herself pregnant, that might be inconvenient.”
He didn’t say anything for about five seconds.
“One of my what?” said Nicholas. His voice was still calm, but I recognized the hard edge there.
“One of your gardeners,” I said. “Did I say something else? Well, I slur my words. I try to get drunk before lunch.”
“I’m sure,” said Nicholas.
I smiled. I had just let Nicholas know that I had indeed been behind his troubles, even if he couldn’t prove anything and I hadn’t admitted anything. We both knew that we couldn’t talk freely over the phone. The Inquisition theoretically had the ability to listen to any phone call in the world, though in practice they only observed people who had drawn their interest. I think they had software to detect certain keywords. So, if I started shouting that Nicholas was a Rebel against the High Queen into the phone, the conversation would likely come to the attention of the Knights of the Inquisition.
For an idle moment, I thought about doing just that. Except if I did turn Nicholas in, it would break Morvilind’s deal with the Forerunner, Morvilind would stop casting his cure spells, and my brother would die of frostfever. For that matter, turning Nicholas in would accomplish nothing. He would fade away or escape to Venomhold, and since we were both using burner phones, not even the Inquisition could find either of us before we escaped.
Morvilind’s warning flickered through my thoughts. I had raged against him when he had sent me to steal three things for the Forerunner. With his usual cold, brutal logic, Morvilind had pointed out that throwing a tantrum would accomplish nothing, and that if I wanted to defeat the Rebels, I had to work with them.
So, here I was, talking on the phone to one of the most brilliant and worst men I had ever known…and I was pretty sure that the time had come to steal the second thing for him.
“It’s always delightful chatting with you, Nicky,” I said, “but I’m betting you didn’t call just to chat.”
“And as enjoyable as it is to talk to you, Kat,” said Nicholas, “I’m afraid work must come before pleasure.” That was his veiled way of saying he was going to enjoy killing me once I had stolen all three things for him. “And the time has come for us to work together once again.”
“Well, super,” I said. “What is it this time?”
“You will recall the deal your employer made?” said Nicholas. “That you would perform three contracted tasks for me?”
“Gosh, I forgot all about it. All that drinking before noon, I suppose.”
“The time has come,” said Nicholas, “for the second task.”
“Great.” I rubbed my temple. I felt a headache coming on. “Where’s your office this time?”
“You won’t come directly there.”
“That just seems rude,” I said. But he had no reason to trust me.
“Where are you right now?”
I grinned. “Eating potato chips on the couch while watching daytime TV.”
“I hope you are close to Denver, Colorado,” said Nicholas.
I was, come to think of it. If I took the interstate, it would only be about three hundred and thirty miles to Denver.
“Why?” I said.
“Because you will meet one of my associates,” said Nicholas, “who will then escort you to my temporary office.”
“Your associate,” I said, wondering if he was sending Swathe or Morelli or, God forbid, Hailey to come pick me up.
“Yes, a new recruit,” said Nicholas, “but one who has already proven his value several times over. The two of you ought to get along splendidly. His name is Rory Murdo.”
“Rory Murdo?” I said. “Sounds like an Australian game show host.”
“To the best of my knowledge, Mr. Murdo was born in the United States.”
“Right,” I said. “Fine. Where I am supposed to meet the non-Australian Mr. Rory Murdo?”
“You will be meeting Murdo at the Rocky Mountain Mile Hotel And Restaurant,” said Nicholas, and he rattled off an address. “It’s a pleasant enough place. Most of the customers are retired tourists on their way to Rocky Mountain National Park. Wait for Murdo in the lobby of the hotel. I have given him your physical description. When he approaches you, he will use the password ‘Five Minutes To Midnight.’”
“Yeah, that’s not overly dramatic,” I said. “What then?”
“Then you will depart with Murdo in his SUV to join me for our next enterprise.”
I thought about it for a moment.
“That’s unacceptable.”
“Why?” said Nicholas.
Well, there were just all kinds of reasons, but I couldn’t go into them on the phone. For one, I didn’t know this Murdo character, and I couldn’t lower my guard around him. For another, the whole setup sounded fishy. Nicholas knew that I was a deadly threat to his plans, and he might decide to cut his losses and kill me before I stole two more things for him. This whole setup seemed like an elaborate trap.
But I couldn’t discuss any of that over the phone.
“What if he hits on me?” I said. “I would have to file a harassment complaint with your HR department. That would be just all kinds of awkward.”
Nicholas laughed, long and loud. “Really, Kat? I think you are perhaps uniquely equipped to discourage unwanted suitors.”
He wasn’t wrong.
“Fine,” I said. “Then let’s be blunt. I don’t trust you.”
“And I don’t trust you, either,” said Nicholas. He said it without rancor, but some coldness crept into his tone. He had sounded like that after he had murdered Dr. Andrea Tocci for developing moral qualms about his plan. We had almost come to blows then and there. “But trust is not required for this deal. I need your assistance to complete a task that would otherwise be near-impossible. If I wanted to terminate your involvement with my company, I would not be wasting time talking to you.”
That was true. Someone like Martin Corbisher or Swathe or even Victor Lorenz would have gloated before killing me. Nicholas, when he decided to kill me, would do it in the most efficient manner possible, and only allow himself to gloat when I was safely dead. He had already tried that once before, attempting to leave me behind in the ruins of Chicago for the myothar and its pet undead to kill. If I hadn’t anticipated his treachery and prepared for it, I would have died.
No doubt he had something similar in mind.
Once again, I was going to have to play the game and keep my guard up.
“Whatever,” I said. “When I am supposed to meet Murdo at the Rocky Mountain Mile?”
“8 AM on March 12th,” said Nicholas. That would give me two days to get there, which was more than I needed.
It would only take six or seven hours to drive there, and then I would have ample time to look around and make sure that there wasn’t an ambush waiting.
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll have to leave immediately. If I drive all day and all night, I should be able to make it in time.”
“Where are you located now?” said Nicholas.
Like I was telling him that.
“Under a Cloak spell in your office, watching you,” I said. “I don’t like your shirt.”
“Fashion tips are always appreciated from a woman who wore a sweater and a navy pea coat in July,” said Nicholas. “Be seeing you soon, Kat. I look forward to working with you again. It’s always so…stimulating.”
I wanted to get the last word, but then he would also want to get the last word, and we would spend the next ten minutes trying to upstage the other with clever insults. So I just said “Bye” and hit the disconnect button on the phone.
I stared at the screen for a moment, then set the phone back on the desk.
“Shit,” I said at last.
The last time I had worked with Nicholas and his crew of Rebels, I had almost been killed by an alien tentacle monster and its army of undead.
Somehow, I just knew this time was going to be even worse.
Chapter 3: Unmarked Vans
It was still early enough that I thought I could get to Denver a little before dark, so I packed up my stuff, checked out of the hotel (while Masked, of course), loaded up my van, and headed out.
I’ll admit the drive from Rock Springs to Denver was beautiful. I headed east on Interstate 80, and then south on Interstate 25 once I got to Cheyenne. In the process, I drove through deserts and forests and scrublands and rocky hills, all of them scenic. There was nothing quite like it back home in Wisconsin. I could almost understand why many retirees liked to buy RVs and ramble around the country from national park to national park.
I wondered why the High Queen let them do that. I mean, I wondered why she didn’t command elderly people to stay at home and look after the grandkids or something. She was so ruthless…but many of the RV-owning retirees were former men-at-arms who had fought in her wars for six, twelve or even twenty-four years.
Maybe the High Queen was grateful.
What an odd thought. But I suppose long cross-country drives are the time for odd thoughts. Unfortunately, I didn’t have enough of them to distract me from my other thoughts, which were full of blood and death.
What did Nicholas Connor want me to steal for him this time?
I brooded on that as I drove. I also thought about the Eternity Crucible and what Arvalaeon had done to me. I thought about Russell and the Marneys. I wondered how Russell was doing, if he was still dating Lydia Valborg. I wondered how Riordan had handled our breakup. I hoped he had moved on. I hoped Riordan had forgotten me, maybe found someone better. The awful things I said when I broke up with him had to have hurt, but I hoped he had put it behind him and forgotten me.
Guess I hadn’t gotten over him. Not if I was still thinking about him eight months after I had broken up with him.
But it was for his own good. I was a mess, and I was bound to get killed in some destructive way sooner or rather than later, and the fewer people around me when that happened, the better.
It was for the best.
If I kept telling myself that, maybe I would believe it someday.
Because of my brooding, I was in a foul mood when I arrived at Denver, the sort of mood where I had to grit my teeth and stop myself from summoning a fireball when someone cut me off in traffic. Another vigorous exercise session and a searing hot bath sounded nice, but first I had work to do.
I had to get ready for my meeting with Rory Murdo, whoever he was. Probably another one of Nicholas’s crew of killers and crazies. I hoped I wouldn’t have to spend a lot of time with him. If Murdo tried to bully me the way Corbisher and Swathe had, I would slap him down fast. I suppose Nicholas would get pissed if I just killed Murdo, but if Murdo showed up with a broken leg or a few burns, it wouldn’t be the end of the world.
The Rocky Mountain Mile Restaurant And Hotel was on the west side of Denver, facing Rocky Mountain National Park and the mountains themselves. As it turned out, calling the place a “restaurant and hotel” was an understatement. It was huge, twelve stories tall, with an enormous attached convention center and acres of parking lots. I suppose come summer this place was going to be full of tourists and retirees visiting the national park.
Right now, it was nearly deserted. The only cars I saw belonged to the employees and a few business travelers. Denver in early March was cold – it was 20 degrees Fahrenheit when I arrived – and it had been necessary to drive carefully on the way south from Cheyenne because of a light snowfall.
As night fell, I drove past the Rocky Mountain Mile and instead checked in at a much shabbier (and cheaper) hotel, and did my usual routine of exercising to exhaustion, taking a bath so hot that I could barely stand it, and passing out in bed after. The next morning, I got up and set to work.
Oddly, that made me feel better and helped shake off the dark mood that had gripped me. Or maybe it wasn’t surprising. Ever since the Eternity Crucible, ever since I had left Russell and Milwaukee and broken up with Riordan, the only time I had ever felt…well, if not happy, then not terrible, had been when I had been working, when I had been setting up for a job, and all my jobs had been harassing the Rebels and stealing from them to fund further harassment.
I was good at this kind of thing, and I enjoyed doing it. Even before the Crucible had enhanced my magic, I had been a very good thief and covert operative.
Everyone needs to be good at something, I guess.
I headed back to the Rocky Mountain Mile, noted the color of the uniforms worn by the staff, and then Masked myself as a middle-aged woman in the jumpsuit of a housekeeper. I then made a thorough exploration of the Mile, walking through every floor and the convention area, noting the layout of key features and the position of the main rooms. Whenever someone drew close enough to speak with me, I dropped my Mask and Cloaked before they could notice me.
After a day of exploration, I found absolutely nothing. The Rocky Mountain Mile seemed like nothing more than an expensive hotel, and I found no trace of lurking Rebels or bombs or traps. If this was all an elaborate scheme to kill me, it was so subtle that I couldn’t see it.
Nicholas didn’t like subtle. No, that was wrong. When necessary, he could be as subtle as a snake and as charming as the devil. What Nicholas didn’t like was complicated plans, and I agreed with him. Too many things could go wrong in a complicated plan. If someone like Martin Corbisher wanted to kill me, it would involve an elaborate ambush with overwhelming force. When Nicholas decided to kill me, he would have a sniper put a shot through my head at a maximum safe distance. Or he would have someone drive a truck bomb into the lobby of the Mile, especially since he didn’t care about casualties so long as his goal was met. If forced to choose between a surgeon’s scalpel or a sledgehammer, Nicholas would choose whichever one was the most effective.
It was one of the reasons he was so dangerous.
Once I had finished scouting the Mile, I rented a storage unit for three months and stashed my van inside. I loaded up a big backpack with everything I would need, clothes, tools, ammunition, guns, and so on, and then walked back to my motel. One more session of rigorous exercise and one more hot bath, and I passed out on the bed.
The next morning, I got up at 5 AM and dressed in thermal underwear, black jeans, a black T-shirt, a heavy gray sweater, and my black pea coat. I tucked my little revolver in the coat’s interior pocket, hefted my backpack, and set off for the Mile. It was a walk of about four miles in lightly falling snow, and it helped clear my head and get me focused.
I shivered, but I was cold all the time anyway.
I got to the Mile and walked inside. The lobby was a big space, with dark carpet and tasteful green chairs, while four levels of balconies looked down from overhead.
A gift shop sold various souvenirs of Denver, the state of Colorado, and the Rocky Mountains, including an entire wall of cowboy hats of various colors, sizes, and designs. There were a pair of decorative fountains and a tasteful minibar that offered complimentary doughnuts, cookies, and coffee. I hadn’t been big on sugar even before the Eternity Crucible, but I still drank coffee, so I helped myself and sat down in a chair that had a good view of the parking lot and the front doors, and I waited.
Rory Murdo walked through the doors at exactly 8 AM.
Whatever else he might have been, at least he was punctual.
It had to be him. A few dozen people had come and gone in the last two hours, and most of them had been either elderly tourists or business travelers, and business travelers all had the same well-dressed, overfed look.
Not the man who strode through the doors at 8 AM.
He was tall, well over six feet, and impressively broad in the shoulders and chest. He looked about forty, and his black hair was close-cropped, and his black eyes swept the entire lobby at a glance. I recognized the stance. He was someone acclimated to violence, someone who automatically assessed a room for enemies whenever he entered it.
I suppose I did the same thing.
He also wore a dark three-piece suit and a red tie knotted around his throat, the coat just loose enough to conceal a shoulder rig. He wasn’t particularly handsome, but he looked strong and dangerous, and strength is better in my book any day of the week.
Of course, he was working for Nicholas, so I supposed that made him a murdering scumbag.
The man in the suit stood motionless for a few heartbeats, and then turned and walked towards me. I watched him, keeping my expression blank, my hands under my coat. My chair was in a little conversation circle around a table of expensive wood, and the man in the suit sat in the chair across the table facing me.
For a moment, we stared at each other. His expression was just as blank as mine, but the black stare was intense. It was like having a wolf stare at you.
“Miss Katrina Stoker?” he said at last. His voice was flat and unemotional.
Cloak Games: Hammer Break Page 4