Fired Up

by Jayne Ann Krentz

  “Sounds crazy, all right.”

  “Her lawyers will probably go for an insanity defense. The good news is that regardless of what happens she’ll be locked up for a few years.” He grimaced. “The way the criminal justice system works is that you can walk fairly easily on stalking and attempted murder charges, but for some reason the authorities tend to take arson seriously. Lucky me.”

  She heard the door of the outer office open and then Jack’s low voice as he greeted Rose. Hector got to his feet and went through the partially opened door.

  Chloe folded her hands on her desk and looked at Fletcher. “I’m sorry you lost your position at the college.”

  “I’ll find another one.” Fletcher lounged in his chair, cocked one ankle over his knee and studied her with a vaguely troubled expression. “Where have you been for the past few days? Every time I called, your assistant said you weren’t available.”

  “I told you I had to go out of town on a case.”

  Fletcher raised his brows in faint amusement. “One of those woo-woo investigations you specialize in?”

  “I never discuss my cases,” she said coolly.

  Fletcher switched to his serious therapist mode. “Chloe, your belief that you are psychic is directly linked to your intimacy issues. You really do need to get into therapy. I can help you.”

  “Funny you should mention my intimacy issues. My little problem appears to have resolved itself.”

  Fletcher was clearly startled. “How do you know that?”

  Jack walked into the room.

  “She knows it from firsthand experience,” Jack said. He looked at Chloe. “Ready for lunch?”

  Chloe smiled at him. “Yes, I am.”

  Fletcher glowered at Jack and then turned back to Chloe. “Thought he was a client.”

  “Not anymore,” Chloe said. “Now he’s my firsthand experience.”

  “What happened to your plans to live a celibate lifestyle?” Fletcher demanded.

  “Turns out that didn’t work for me.”

  THEY WALKED A COUPLE OF BLOCKS to a small restaurant just off First Avenue and ate fish tacos at a little round table. In the three days they had been back in Seattle they had established an intimate daily routine. They spent the nights together at her place. They ate breakfast together, and then they went their separate ways for the first part of the day. Jack showed up in her office for lunch, after which they both went back to their respective offices. They rendezvoused again at her place in the early evening. Almost like being married, Chloe thought. But not quite. Nothing was exactly like being married. Marriage was different.

  “Fletcher seems to have recovered well from his ordeal,” Jack offered.

  “Yes. But he couldn’t avoid the fallout from the gossip and rumors this time. The college is not going to renew his contract.”

  “Maybe he’ll be more careful when he picks his next short- term girlfriend.”

  “Maybe, but I doubt it. Fletcher is Fletcher. He’s got issues of his own. He just can’t admit it to himself. How’s the forensic financial-sleuthing business going?”

  “There’s progress, and there are dead ends,” Jack said. “Lots of dead ends.”

  “Fallon Jones said the organization was good at covering its tracks.”

  “What I’ve got so far is a closely held corporation that owns three fitness clubs in the Northwest, including the one here in Seattle. All three gyms were independently owned and operated until last year. All three were facing bankruptcy and about to close. That’s when they were acquired by a certain LLC.”

  “A limited liability corporation? Sounds promising.”

  “I think so. Something else very interesting about this particular chain of fitness clubs.”

  “What?” she asked, the investigator in her intrigued.

  “Before they were acquired by the LLC, all three clubs catered to the Pilates and yoga crowd. But now the clientele seems to consist entirely of hard-core bodybuilders.”

  “Like the pair that tried to take us out?”

  “Right.”

  She smiled. “You’re thinking like a detective.”

  “I’m starting to realize that I always think like a detective. It’s just that, until recently, the only thing I’ve been detecting is how to turn a profit.”

  “That’s useful, too.”

  “Sure, but after a while it gets old. You know, the night they grabbed me I had been speculating to my friend Jerry about what it would be like if I woke up one morning and discovered that Winters Investments had folded.”

  “Wondering if you could rebuild it?”

  He nodded and ate some more of his taco.

  “The answer is yes,” she said. “But you already knew that, didn’t you?”

  “Jerry said I was having a midlife crisis minus the blonde and the ’Vette.”

  “Instead you got me and a trip to Vegas.”

  Sexy laughter gleamed in his eyes. “Worked for me.”

  She finished her own taco and wiped her fingers on the napkin. “You like this, don’t you?”

  “You and Vegas? Well, you’re a definite plus, but I could’ve skipped Vegas if I’d had to.”

  “I’m not talking about me and Vegas. I meant working with Fallon Jones on this conspiracy he’s trying to shut down.”

  “It’s interesting,” he admitted.

  “You weren’t having a midlife crisis, Jack. You were just getting bored. You needed a challenge.”

  “I was also getting hit with the Winters Curse.”

  “It’s not a curse,” she said patiently.

  He finished the taco. “I’m pretty sure that you were what I needed.”

  She thought about what Fletcher had said concerning her intimacy issues. “Evidently we are therapeutic for each other.”

  He looked amused. “Is that an academic way of saying the sex is good?”

  No, she thought. It’s a roundabout way of saying that I love you. But if she said the words aloud she would put him in the position of having to declare his own feelings. That could only go one of two ways: Good or bad.

  It dawned on her that after all these years of trying to be honest with men, of trying to explain the serial monogamy concept and the fact that all her relationships were destined to be short- lived, she had finally found Mr. Right and now she was scared to death it wouldn’t be permanent. Who would have thought that falling in love could be so terrifying?

  44

  CHLOE AND HECTOR WERE ON DAWN PATROL THE NEXT MORNING when Mountain Man emerged from his crib in the alley where he had spent the night. He adjusted the worn canvas duffel on his shoulder and leaned down to pat Hector.

  “Hey, there, Big Guy,” Mountain Man said. “How’s it goin’? Looks like that wound is healing okay.”

  “He’s feeling much better,” Chloe said. “How about you? Hector wants to know if you’re taking the meds they gave you at the clinic?”

  “Yep. Right on schedule.” Mountain Man reached into the pocket of his old fatigues and produced a small bottle of tablets. “Got ’em right here. Supposed to take ’em all week and then report back to the clinic.”

  “That’s great,” Chloe said. “Hector wants to buy you a cup of coffee. You got time?”

  “Sure. Got nothin’ but time.”

  They made their way to the coffeehouse on the corner. Chloe bought a cup of coffee and a breakfast pastry for Mountain Man. The barista gave Hector his usual day-old muffin. Chloe and Mountain Man sat at a table in the corner. Hector settled down beneath the table. Mountain Man liked having coffee with them, and it wasn’t just the fact that the coffee and pastry were free. Chloe knew that for him it was a way of slipping back into a half- remembered dream of a time when he had lived a normal life.

  “Hector wants to know if you’ve had any more nightmares,” Chloe said.

  “Last night was okay,” Mountain Man said to Hector. “No dreams.”

  Her work was holding, Chloe thought, checking the psi prints on
the coffee cup. Eventually the nightmares would return, but it looked like his dream spectrum was calm for now, or at least what passed for calm in Mountain Man’s badly damaged dream psi.

  Afterward they went back out onto First Avenue. A blanket of fog had settled over the city, sending it into a cold, gray twilight zone.

  “Thanks for the coffee, Big Guy,” Mountain Man said. He adjusted the heavy duffel that contained all his worldly possessions and gave Hector one last pat. “See ya.”

  Hector licked Mountain Man’s hand.

  “Good-bye,” Chloe said. “Hector says to tell you not to forget the rest of those pills.”

  “I won’t,” Mountain Man assured Hector.

  He turned and started off across the intersection, but he stopped midway and swung around. His weathered face was tightly knotted. Intelligence and a glittering urgency sparked briefly in his faded eyes.

  “Hector,” Mountain Man said. But his voice was different. No longer a vague mumble, it crackled with command.

  Hector pricked his ears in response.

  “You tell her to be careful,” Mountain Man said, still speaking in that sharp, no-nonsense tone.

  Chloe looked at him. “Hector wants to know why I should be careful.”

  “This morning feels like it did that other time,” Mountain Man said. But the flicker of awareness was already fading from his eyes, and the military crispness in his voice was deteriorating back into a mumble. “At least I think it does.”

  “What happened the last time?” Chloe said. “Hector wants to know.”

  “Bastards were waitin’ for us. Ambush. I could feel it. Told the lieutenant. He wouldn’t listen. Said the intel was good. SOBs took him out first.”

  An icy shiver ruffled her senses. “I’ll be careful.”

  Satisfied, Mountain Man continued on across the intersection.

  She looked at the glowing footprints on the pavement. Beneath the layers of the unwholesome energy generated by addiction and mental as well as physical illness was the thin, wispy light of a measure of talent. It was no doubt one of the things that had kept Mountain Man alive when he and the others walked into that ambush in the desert. One of the things that kept him alive on the streets.

  ROSE WAS AT HER DESK, deep into a heavy tome that bore the equally heavy title Fundamentals of Psychology. She looked up when Chloe and Hector came through the door.

  “We need to talk, boss.”

  “That sounds ominous,” Chloe said.

  She went on into her office, sat down behind her desk and powered up her computer.

  Rose slapped the book down and hurried into the inner office.

  “I know you, boss,” she said. “You’re afraid that maybe Jack Winters is attracted to you just because you found that lamp for him, aren’t you? That maybe what he feels for you is gratitude.”

  “Wouldn’t be the first time a man went through that phase after a case was closed.” She watched her calendar open. “Oh, good, I see you made a couple of appointments for me with new clients.”

  Rose glanced at the calendar. “The one this afternoon is Barbara Rollins. You did some work for her husband last year, remember?”

  “I arranged for him to acquire some very nice Roman glass.”

  “Turns out Mr. Rollins died a couple of months ago. The widow is getting ready to sell his collection. She wants to talk to you about moving the pieces on the private collectors’ market.”

  “The same way that her husband acquired them.” Chloe made a note.

  Rose cleared her throat. “Listen, about Jack Winters.”

  “What about him?”

  “He may be feeling grateful to you, but that is definitely not why he is sleeping with you. By the way, speaking of sleep, do you realize that in the entire time I’ve known you, Jack is the only man you’ve allowed to stay overnight? This is huge, boss. A major breakthrough for you.”

  “Rose, I really do not want to talk about my private life.”

  “I’m just afraid you’re going to screw up this relationship the way you have all the others.”

  “Screw up? I hate it when you use technical jargon. Sometimes I wish you would change majors. Ditch the psychology classes. How about accounting? We could use an accountant around here.”

  “You know what I’m talking about.”

  Chloe exhaled slowly. “I know what you’re talking about, but I am not going to talk about it. Got it?”

  Rose eyed her with an air of clinical speculation. “Wow. I don’t believe it. You really are afraid you’re going to screw up again, aren’t you?”

  “Terrified.”

  45

  HIS NAME WAS LARRY BROWN, AND HE WAS THE QUINTESSENTIAL nerd. He was seventeen and a half years old, short, thin and not the least bit athletic. He played chess, not football, and what life he had he lived online. For as long as he could remember he had been the chosen victim of every schoolyard, locker-room and classroom bully who came along. And sooner or later, a bully always came along.

  In school he had been able to avoid a lot of the traps the mean kids set for him because he had a sort of sixth sense that warned him when trouble was coming his way. But his keen intuition wasn’t much help against the biggest bully of them all, his father. A few months ago he had done the only thing he could do to survive—he had left home. Things on the streets weren’t going well, however. The bad guys were more dangerous than the classroom bullies, although none were any worse than his dad.

  But now, thanks to the online website he had stumbled across three weeks ago, his life was about to change forever. He was being offered the Holy Grail of all victims of bullying everywhere: Power.

  “You’ve had three injections of the new version of the formula,” Dr. Hulsey said. He filled a syringe from a small vial of clear liquid. “This will be the fourth. It should be more than enough to open the channels between your latent dream-psi energy and your para- senses. After that you’ll be put on a maintenance dose in order to keep them open.”

  “I don’t feel too good,” Larry said.

  He was sitting on the edge of a gurney in a small, white-walled room that looked unpleasantly like a medical examining room. He was shivering, and for some reason the fluorescent lights made his eyes water. The muffled clang and thud of heavy gym machines overhead was painful. Everything hurt.

  “Don’t worry,” Dr. Hulsey said cheerfully. “The new version of the drug is very powerful and works very quickly. Your body and your senses just need some time to adjust to the rapidly rising levels of talent. You were approximately a Level Three when you came to us. Within twenty-four hours I have every expectation that not only will you be a Level Eight or Nine but you also will have an additional talent. It will be interesting to see what it is. Second talents, you understand, are quite unpredictable.”

  Larry watched Hulsey fill a syringe. He didn’t like the doc. The guy was creepy, looked like an oversized praying mantis with glasses and a lab coat. But he was pushing past his intuition because the nice lady who had recruited him had promised that the results of the injections would be worth it. When this was all over he was going to be able to control people with psychic powers. How cool was that? No one would ever be able to bully him again.

  Hulsey gave him the shot. It stung, just like last time. A flash of sick heat rolled through him. He felt nauseous.

  “What happens now?” he asked.

  “Now we wait,” Hulsey said.

  “For what?”

  “For the lamp, of course.”

  “What lamp? Why do I need a lamp?”

  Hulsey chuckled. “Well, for one thing, you’ll die without it. But what really concerns me is that without the lamp, the entire experiment will be a failure.”

  46

  SHE LEFT HECTOR ON GUARD IN THE FRONT SEAT OF THE CAR and went up the front steps of the imposing house. The residence was one of the many secluded homes on Mercer Island, an expensive chunk of land situated in the middle of Lake Washington.

/>   Mercer Island real estate was a classic example of the oldest rule in the business: Location, location, location. The I-90 bridge linked the island directly to Seattle on the west and to the sprawling upscale suburban communities on the east side of the lake. Waterfront homes on Mercer Island were priced somewhere in the stratosphere. Large yachts were parked at the docks in front of the properties that rimmed the edge of the island.

  She checked her watch and pressed the doorbell. Three o’clock.

  The last time she had come here a housekeeper had opened the door, but today Barbara Rollins greeted her.

  Barbara was an elegantly groomed woman in her midseventies. Her hair was silver white and cut in a short bob. Her beautifully tailored cream-colored trousers and pale blue silk shirt looked like they had come from the couture department at Nordstrom’s. A small blue-and-cream scarf was knotted around her throat. There was a short stack of gold bangles on her left arm and some extraordinary rings on her fingers.

  “Miss Harper,” she said. Her voice was coolly polite with just the right touch of reserve that women in her position employed when dealing with salesclerks and the hired help. “Please come in.”

  “Thank you,” Chloe said. She knew she could not achieve the same degree of refined reserve, so she went for confident and professional instead. The combination usually worked well with clients like Rollins.

  She moved into the soaring, two- story foyer. A massive chandelier, in the unmistakable style of a famous Northwest glass artist, was suspended from the ceiling. It looked like an explosion of crystal flowers.

  “Please come with me,” Barbara said. “I want to talk to you before I show you the collection. As I’m sure you can understand, the decision to sell George’s antiquities has been an extremely difficult one for me. He was quite passionate about the artifacts.”

  “I remember.”

  She followed Barbara Rollins into a glass-walled room done in classic old-school Seattle designer-style: beige-on-beige accented with wood. Beyond the windows was an extensive garden. Beyond the garden a boat dock jutted out into the lake. She was mildly surprised to see that the boat tied up at the dock was a small cabin cruiser. The last time she had called on the Rollinses there had been a large sea-going yacht sitting in the water.