Music: Out of the Box 26 (The Girl in the Box Book 36)

by Robert J. Crane

  I looked into the crowd, searching for a familiar face.

  And found him toward the side.

  Harry Graves.

  “You bastard,” I muttered, pretty sure he knew I was saying it.

  This damned thing had never been about Mills or Lotsostuff. Oh, sure, I’d saved his life, but still...

  Harry had sent me here...for me.

  What was it he’d said? Sienna wasn’t here to look after me, so...

  “Bastard,” I said again.

  “I should have a personal life again,” Mills announced. “I haven’t had one in a long time. A date, even.”

  “Cuddling up to me during the fight there almost counts, I think. Another few seconds—”

  “Hah,” Mills said. “But no. Actual intimacy of the emotional kind, I’m talking.”

  “You’ll figure it out,” I said, as another thought occurred to me, and I blasted wind beneath my feet. “Good luck, Mills.”

  Mills just stared at me as I started to blast off. “Where are you going?”

  “I have something I have to do back in Minnesota,” I called, already surging into the sky. A minute later I was above the clouds, wind blowing me home.

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED NINETEEN

  Brance

  The back of the police car was quiet, and Brance was basking in the—well, not silence, because he could hear everything going on outside, but...

  He was basking.

  Jules had betrayed him, and that stung. He’d let himself get dragged down, though. Fallen for Jules’s bull. How could he have not remembered suppressant? Everyone knew about that stuff. He just hadn’t thought about it, he’d been running so much. Running scared.

  Brance had been ready to die not thirty minutes ago. Now he was facing a prison term of some length, and...

  It wasn’t that he didn’t care, it was just that he could finally see beyond that, however long it lasted, to...

  Hope.

  Brance opened his cracked lips, split by long exposure to the cold night air and whipping winds up on the tower, and warbled out the opening strains of “Folsom Prison Blues.”

  He stopped.

  No glass shattering.

  No screaming.

  The door opened, and the TBI cop—Chandler, Brance thought his name was—got in, shutting the door behind him. He looked over his shoulder at Brance. “You going to serenade me on the way?”

  Brance hesitated. “I won’t if you don’t want me to.”

  Chandler looked him over once. “The suppressant is in, so we should be good.” He shrugged. “You’ve got a nice voice, and I think the Opry is probably off the air for the night so...yeah. Why not?”

  “Okay,” Brance said, and picked up right where he left off with the second verse.

  Chandler nodded along with the beat. “You know, you’ve got a real love for the music. And it shows.”

  “Thank you,” Brance said, smiling. And then he kept singing.

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY

  Sienna

  I’d just gotten back in my borrowed BMW, sliding against the leather seats, when my phone started to ring.

  It’d been ringing on and off all night, and I’d mostly ignored it.

  My time to ignore it was pretty much over now, though.

  Heather Chalke, read the caller ID.

  “Yeah?” I answered, feeling about as tired as I sounded.

  I could tell Chalke was a little surprised that I answered. “I heard you wrapped up that Tennessee business,” she said primly.

  “It’s done,” I said.

  “There’s a ten o’clock flight to DC,” she said. “I’m having my secretary book your flight right now. Be on it. I’ll make sure you get the directions to your temporary housing along with your plane ticket.”

  What the hell else was there to say? “Roger that.” I was bone tired, too tired to argue. If I even had an argument.

  She hung up, leaving me looking at the time on my phone. It was already almost nine. A ten o’clock flight?

  I punched in the GPS directions to my hotel and got on the road. If I floored it, maybe I could collect my battered luggage and make it to the airport in time.

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-ONE

  I dialed Chandler on the way to the hotel, figuring I should at least let him know I was going to be exiting town in a hurry. There was a lock box in the trunk of the BMW; I could drop the firearms that the TBI had been kind enough to lend me in there without fear they’d be stolen—unless the whole car was. Either way, I left him an urgent message as I sped through the night, the Nashville skyline bright, beautiful and growing increasingly closer. It almost seemed to wink at me as I sped toward town, hurrying to get to my hotel.

  When I parked, I shot Chandler a follow-up text letting him know, since I hadn’t heard from him. He was probably in the labyrinth of the jail, out of service reach. The elevator ride was interminably long, but I made it, opened up my room, and threw all my shit in the suitcase. Two minutes later, I was headed back downstairs, back to my waiting car and hauling ass for the BNA airport with less than an hour to go until my flight.

  As I drove, Nashville’s skyline winked at me again from the rear view. I gave it one last look, then looked away.

  Fortunately the drive to the airport was through almost non-existent traffic, and I made it from downtown in less than ten minutes. My phone lit up as I was about to have to make the fateful choice between the parking ramp and the Departing Flights, and I hit the speakerphone as I was about to commit. “Hello?”

  “Hey,” Chandler’s voice cut through. “I caught a Lyft to the terminal. When you get here, just drive up to Departures and I’ll take your car and stuff back to TBI, okay?”

  “Sure thing,” I said, cutting across three lanes of traffic and into the Departing Flights lane. Fortunately, there was no one for me to cut off.

  I slid up to the curb when I saw Chandler wave at me. I put the BMW in park and slid a hand appreciatively over the steering wheel. It had been a long time since I’d driven, and maybe even longer since I’d realized how fun and how freeing it could be.

  “Did you enjoy your trip, Ms. Nealon?” Chandler asked, opening my door for me.

  I chuckled, handing him the keys. “I sense there’s a good time to be had in Nashville—if I was maybe a little less preoccupied with...stuff.”

  “‘Stuff’ is always getting in the way,” Chandler agreed, pocketing the keys. “You want to, uh...dump the guns in the trunk? I already told the airport police on duty what was up.”

  “Yeah, sure,” I said, and he popped the trunk. I dropped the spare Sig and the HK into the lockbox. “The HK might need to go to forensics for Metro PD,” I reminded him. “Because of the house shooting thing.”

  “I’ll make sure everything gets ironed out.” He opened the back door and pulled my suitcase out for me, setting it on the curb and pulling up the telescoping handle. What a gentleman. Then he waited, awkwardly clapping his hands together. “So.”

  “I’m going to miss this,” I said, pausing, my hand a couple inches above the suitcase handle.

  “The guns? The freedom to do your job?” Chandler asked, little hint of a smirk.

  “Also, the lack of bitter winter,” I said, “the BMW, the actual freedom...thank you.”

  Chandler cocked his head. “For what? I mean, all that stuff was easy—”

  “For reminding me that I’m a human being and that, occasionally, people are not entirely shitty.” I smiled.

  His smile disappeared. “Why are you doing this?”

  I knew what he meant. “I have to. It’s the job.”

  “Doesn’t seem like what you want, though,” Chandler said. “What...what do you actually want?”

  A long, running answer formed in my head. Something about a normal life, far from the crowds and the pressure of New York and DC. Somewhere quiet, pastoral—in the romantic, poetic sense of the word. Where I wasn’t always being told what to do and when to do it.


  I said none of it and meant all of it, but buried it inside. “I don’t know,” I answered instead. Other, darker answers came to me, and those I kept to myself as well, for they were all more immediately likely to come true than any other distant dream.

  “I hope you find what you’re looking for, Sienna,” Chandler said.

  “Me too,” I said, and started to walk away. “But...I would like one thing from you.”

  Chandler perked up. “Name it.”

  “Send me your playlist?” I asked. “I’ll admit it—you’ve got me interested in country music.” I held my thumb and forefinger centimeters apart. “A little.”

  “Sending it now,” he said, messing with his phone. I started to walk away, but he called after me. “Oh, and Sienna?”

  “Yeah?”

  His eyes were glittering. “I suggest you try Johnny Cash’s song ‘Oney.’”

  I frowned. “Why?”

  There was a delicious sort of subversive look on Chandler’s broad face. “It’s about a man on his last day of work before retirement, and he’s going to...well...punch the shit out of his annoying supervisor’s face on the way out the door. I think you’d like it.”

  I couldn’t help but smile. “It really does sound right up my alley, doesn’t it?”

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-TWO

  I was done with checking in my battered bag, the clerk giving it a pitying look before putting it on the carousel, when someone slipped up to me and hung an arm around mine.

  Always ready for murder, I turned on this person who’d taken such a liberty with me, only to find a smiling, sweet, benevolent face looking back at me.

  Mayor Clea Brandt.

  “Looks like someone saved the day,” Mayor Brandt said, her arm looped through mine. “I thought I’d walk the triumphant hero to the security checkpoint at least.”

  “I don’t know how much of a hero I was today,” I said. “I basically just arrested a couple street criminals, killed some sex traffickers, didn’t really help my partner knock off a few gangsters, and talked a whiny millennial down off a falling antenna.”

  “I don’t think many people could have done what you did here,” Mayor Brandt said. “And let’s face it—even if this was the easiest thing you’ve done in a while, you do things no one else does. There’s real value in that.” Her eyes glittered.

  “I’m glad someone finds use in it,” I said.

  “Honey, I guarantee you that more people than me see value in what you do,” Brandt said knowingly. “If they didn’t, there’d be no demand for your services.”

  “Maybe not,” I said. “But there’s a dark aspect that comes with my services.”

  “Property damage?” Brandt asked.

  “No. I mean, yes. But also—I know Foreman has told you I’ve got an impulsive, wrathful anger. Maybe even a little bit—a tiny smidge—of a god complex.”

  “You’re a woman, sweetheart; we’ve all got that,” Brandt said dryly.

  “Mine’s worse than most,” I said. “People look at me two ways—”

  “Black and white,” Brandt said, smile disappearing. “Good and evil.”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “I see a scale,” Brandt said. “I see a young lady striving to balance. Not many have the power you do. There’s a weight that comes with that. You carry it well—as well as you can.”

  “It’s heavy,” I said. “Other people are adding to it.”

  “So take some of that weight off.” Brandt pursed her lips. “You could find a home here. We could help you reduce the load.”

  She already knew my answer before I gave it voice. “I can’t.”

  Brandt unlooped her arm from mine. We’d been at the security checkpoint for a few minutes, and I’d barely noticed. “Think about it? The offer’s open, if you change your mind.”

  “Thanks,” I said, and started toward the TSA agents waiting. I turned back, though, one last time. “Really. Thank you.”

  Brandt cocked her head at me, smiling so sweetly. “For what?”

  “For making me feel...human again, for a minute.” With that I waved, and didn’t dare look back for fear I wouldn’t catch my flight. And wouldn’t want to.

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-THREE

  Reed

  I let myself into my apartment in Eden Prairie after a long, chilly flight across the nighttime sky. Isabella greeted me at the door with a wary look and carrying a gun at her side. I reflected on how many ways my life had changed since I’d met Sienna for the first time all those years ago. I had a girlfriend, and enough worries about our safety that she came to the door armed at night when she heard it opening.

  Whether this was good or bad, I couldn’t even say anymore. All I knew was that it was how it was.

  “How did it go?” she asked.

  “Figured it out,” I said, closing the door and locking it behind me. She pulled her nightie closer around her, taking care not to go pointing that pistol anywhere dangerous. As a doctor, she had once seemed concerned about the ethics of picking up a gun. Running with me for a few years had erased her reservations, apparently. “Turns out the CEO of that big, huge company was belly up financially and had trouble admitting it to himself.”

  One of Isabella’s eyebrows arched up. “Oh?”

  “Yeah, it seemed a little high on the déjà vu scale,” I said, shedding my coat. “He was talking about how he’d failed and lost everything in life, and I couldn’t help but feel...really bad for the guy.”

  “How so?” she asked.

  “Because he literally spent his whole life on his business,” I said. “And now that it’s leveled, he has nothing else to show for it. At all. It really made me think.”

  Pushing a lock of dark hair out of her eyes, she furrowed her brow at me. “What did it make you think?”

  “It made me think about what’s important in life,” I said, taking up her free hand. “About what really matters. And it gave me some clarity on—oh, to hell with it.” I dropped to one knee. “Will you marry me?”

  She just stared at me for a moment, gun in hand, like she hadn’t heard me right.

  It took a little while to convince her I was serious.

  But then...she said yes.

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-FOUR

  Sienna

  I settled back on the plane to DC, headphones in my ears, Chandler’s playlist downloaded. I scanned it, the anticipation of digging my way through it the only thing I had to look forward to at this point.

  Distantly, I heard the flight attendant talking. Ignored it, save for that the flight time was an hour and forty-five minutes.

  An hour and forty five minutes and I’d be dealing with Heather Fucking Chalke full-time.

  I hovered my finger over the screen until I found “Oney” by Johnny Cash, then pressed it.

  It only took a minute of listening to a man scheme about punching his asshole boss in the face, and I was smiling.

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-FIVE

  Jaime Chapman

  Man, was Chalke in a mood tonight. Chapman watched the words rip across the screen at high speed, the FBI director venting her spleen in near real-time. He checked the clock; hopefully Gwen would be along sometime this evening. She was so hard to predict. That was both a blessing and a curse. It was nice to have a girlfriend he could actually discuss intellectually weighty things with. Be charmed by.

  On the other hand, a little more predictability wouldn’t have been so bad. As it was, it tended to feel like they were ships passing in the night sometimes, since Gwen tended to be working on her startup until after midnight and Chapman had countless things to do at Socialite or his other companies.

  The screen of his cell phone lit up with the conclusion of another long screed from Chalke about her favorite subject: Sienna Nealon.

  CHALKE: She needs to produce some useful results soon or I think we’re done with her. She’s nothing but a pain to me.

  BILSON: I have things I can us
e her for.

  This was all so blah blah. Chapman couldn’t think of many uses that a political operative like Bilson could get out of Sienna Nealon. Or maybe he just didn’t want to contemplate it. Chalke and Bilson were so focused on the hard power world of politics and law enforcement. Chapman preferred soft power.

  KORY: Make her available to me for an interview, I’ll get mileage out of her. She needs to rehab her image anyway.

  JOHANNSEN: Same. I want an exclusive if you’re handing out interviews with Nealon.

  Hmm, that sucking sound was the press trying to get their piece of her as well. Chapman wore a little smile every time he thought about those leeches. Without the search engines he and others had built, or the desire of people to socially share Kory’s hacky, clickbait content, Flashforce would have been out of business years ago. Johannsen’s Washington Free Press was struggling. Hell, they’d both be toast in a decade or less.

  CHALKE: No interviews, not after the Gail Roth fiasco. Other government parties are interested in her. Probably going to have to bow to them thanks to Gondry’s influence soon. None of this has worked out the way I’ve hoped. She’s not serving our priorities.

  Chapman pulled up the surveillance report from the Remote Access Trojan—RAT, to him—they’d installed on Nealon’s phone via the Cloud. He’d had some of his people monitoring her constantly, checking where she was at all times. Chalke had access to it, but he doubted she availed herself of it.

  CHAPMAN: Want some good news?

  CHALKE: Dear God, yes. I need some.

  CHAPMAN: We own her. She was within however many miles Murfreesboro is to Nashville—I don’t know much about the middle of the country—but it’s close, right?

  FLANAGAN: 30 miles or so I think, yeah.

  Chapman smiled, typing.

  CHAPMAN: She never once got close to Murfreesboro. She’s that close to her brother and they don’t even touch base? She’s ours.