Don't Cross This Line (The Kurtherian Gambit Book 14)

by Michael Anderle

  “What’s the meaning of this?” Fred called out, and Charles turned to see his partners practically pushed into the room by another Asian security guard who was aiming a pistol at the two men.

  “Seriously Jun?” Tabitha asked him.

  “It was part of the outfit, Kimosabe, and it was easier than listening to their complaints.”

  Tabitha spoke to the three older men, pointing to their chairs, “Take a seat gentleman, you are going to be here a little while.”

  “Why?” David burst out, “You will be arrested and charged with…”

  She interrupted, “I’m not one of the three people on trial here, dickwad!” Tabitha told him.

  Fred, his mind trying to parse the coarse language coming from the woman in front of him, turned to Charles, stupefied.

  “Well Fred, seeing how we don’t have the pistol, why don’t we humor the woman?” Charles said as he took the two steps necessary to get in front of his chair and sat down.

  The other two men less graciously made it to their own chairs and sat down. Tabitha walked over to the men and put out her hand, “Briefcases please,” the men looked at each other in question. Jun cleared his throat, and the three looked disgusted but turned over their briefcases to Tabitha.

  Taking all three of them, she walked back to the table on the side and set them down. She reached over to her right and picked up a small diary that was laying there, “Why don’t we start with what you guys have written in this book, shall we?”

  “That’s personal!” Fred burst out, “Don’t you know a diary when you see one?”

  “With a lock, no less,” David added.

  Tabitha didn’t turn around, she just read a couple of notes, “Ten thousand for a bet from C to D re: Jailing TQB CEO.”

  “So, we happen to like to wager amongst ourselves, that is hardly a crime, young woman,” Charles remarked.

  Tabitha nodded, “That’s true, it isn’t. At least, it isn’t something I particularly care about.” Tabitha turned to another page in the book and faced the three men. “Here is one wager I think relevant, and it says you won, David. ‘C & F bet D $10k TQB CEO doesn’t fight’.” Tabitha touched the page a couple of times, “It says here you won that David due to lack of evidence over two years ago.” She looked at the man, “Unfortunately, you won on a technicality, as you three are going to find out.”

  “What are you talking about?” Charles asked, suddenly realizing who she worked for.

  “Why you already know Charles,” Tabitha told him, “or at least you have a good idea.”

  “Do you, Charles?” David asked him.

  “I have a good guess,” Charles admitted.

  “So, out with it,” Fred told him.

  Charles nodded towards Tabitha, “She works for TQB.”

  The two others looked back at Tabitha. Finally, Charles’s eyes grew wider, “You’re her!”

  Tabitha flicked a stray hair back over her shoulder, “Her who?”

  Charles pointed, “You’re the one who was in the security footage.”

  “Not possible, that lady was butch,” Fred grumped.

  Jun snorted, and Tabitha shot him a scathing look promising payback later. “Probably, but you must have horrible cameras to make me look butch.”

  “What do you want?” David interrupted, “We can double, triple, hell we can set you up with your own small country. Just name your price.”

  Tabitha looked to David with sympathy, “Oh dear, David, I’ve already drained your bank accounts. By now, the money is hitting over fifty different shell corporations, banks in overseas areas, and moved into precious metals and other investments that aren’t liquid.”

  “Like what?” Fred asked.

  “Like food,” Tabitha answered, “It’s so nice of you to be buying food for those who just got hit by the the tsunami. Well, them and those who are leaving Earth to fight for our precious blue ball.”

  “We’ll do no such thing!” Fred argued.

  “We’ve already done it, haven’t we?” Charles asked, his shoulders slumping.

  Tabitha pointed to Charles, “Bingo! You are the prize kid in this class, Charles.”

  “How much?” Fred asked.

  “How much what? How much of your money did I find?” Tabitha asked, “Gentlemen, I’ve been looking for you for years. I’ve acquired so much information that was,” she put up her fingers, “this close to nailing your asses before. Now, with the final pieces in place, I’ve probably tracked over ninety-two percent of your total assets. Well, not including the money and other instruments in your two safes.”

  “Three,” Jun corrected, “Ryu just found another.”

  Fred’s face turned hopeful, before schooling it to neutral again.

  “Tell them to keep searching,” Tabitha told Jun, her eyes flicking back away from Fred.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Boston, Ma - USA

  Footsteps were heard entering the room, “You can tell them to look behind the medicine cabinet on the third floor,” Barnabas spoke. “They will find a small lock in the lower left-hand corner they need to pick before the back part will separate.”

  “Who the hell are you?” Fred asked, looking over his shoulder as Barnabas stopped beside the chess set, “I’m Barnabas,” he answered and then moved a chess piece, “And this game is now won by me moving Bishop to Queen’s three in five moves.” Barnabas continued further into the room.

  He was wearing a dark, three-piece suit with pinstripes. “I am,” he told the three, all of them staring at him. “The person who is going to decide if we,” he pointed to Tabitha and then himself, “take care of this here and now, or we bring the Queen in on this.”

  “What Queen?” David asked, “You don’t mean that trumped up piece of ...”

  “Can I call her now?” Tabitha interrupted, looking towards Barnabas, her eyes pleading.

  “No,” Barnabas answered.

  “David shut…up.” Charles ground out.

  “No, David,” Tabitha told him, her voice sounding annoyed. “You should really continue, as Barnabas needs a little more persuading that Bethany Anne should come down here.”

  “Why us? Let’s talk about her. Why is she hoarding medical advances? Let’s put her ass on trial.” Fred retorted, “We are sitting here, growing frail when totally useless, money-grabbing, self-centered bastards from Ivy-League schools are raping and pillaging our companies. Doing it for their own benefit when we could still be around, with a little help from her,” he practically spat the word, “for decades longer and make sure that doesn’t happen.”

  Barnabas pursed his lips, “Your defense, for all of your efforts, is health?”

  “Like you would know about aging,” Fred replied, flopping back in his leather chair, “You’re what, late twenties, early thirties or so young man?”

  Tabitha snorted and looked away from Barnabas, trying to keep a smile from her face.

  “No,” Charles said, his eyes narrowing slightly as Barnabas turned to face him, “You just look younger. There is wisdom in your eyes something that young men wouldn’t have.”

  This time, Tabitha rolled her eyes where Barnabas couldn’t see her.

  “My age is irrelevant to this discussion,” Barnabas told the three. “We are here to find out why you did the multitude of things you did. At the moment, it seems a common desire for more power, more money and more … just more.” He told the three.

  “Challenge, proving one is better than others, there is more to life than having more things,” Charles replied, “Certainly someone with your experience understands the desire to prove oneself?”

  Tabitha turned and looked back towards Barnabas, “How about now?” She asked.

  Charles threw an ugly look in Tabitha’s direction, “We,” he pointed to the other two men, “are responsible for over a hundred thousand jobs in the upper Northeast United States alone. If we are truly as destitute as this woman says we are, who is going to handle those families?”
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br />   Barnabas turned to Tabitha, “You drained them dry?”

  She nodded, “Asshole response 101, hit them in their pocketbook. ADAM is taking care of the results.” Barnabas nodded his understanding.

  “What about our damned families?” David asked, “Are they not part of your equation? You won’t get away with this either. I don’t know how you think you will walk away from this at all. Our security gates and these grounds are tracked continuously.”

  “Yes, and they are all connected on the Internet for downloads. Conversely, that means they are online for uploads, as well,” Tabitha told him, “Achronyx took care of your chiquitito security system, senor.”

  “I’m going to sue your asses into oblivion,” Fred said as his finger pointed to Barnabas, then Tabitha and back again. “You won’t have enough to buy toilet paper to wipe your ass when you shit under a bridge.”

  Tabitha looked over to Barnabas, “How about now?”

  Barnabas shook his head and shrugged, “I tried.” He looked out through the large window on the other side of the table to the trees beyond, “You can call her.”

  Tabitha closed her eyes as she heard David ask, “Call who?”

  “Bethany Anne,” Charles answered, “Fred, you are a world class jackass.”

  “Why? What’s she going to do?” Fred retorted.

  “Not helping, idiot,” Charles told him.

  Fred’s chair squeaked, “Bahh, these two are just playing good-cop, bad-cop. We have Bethany Anne located somewhere off Earth. By the time she can get here, the cops will be swarming this place.”

  Bethany Anne?

  One moment, she replied.

  Tabitha kept her eyes closed, she didn’t care to see these three assholes any longer.

  Ok, done kicking Eric’s ass, what’s up?

  Barnabas has given me permission to ask what you want to do with the three assholes that were behind the attack on the Jayden’s?

  Little Anne and her family? Bethany Anne’s voice came back, going frosty over their mental link.

  That’s correct.

  Where are you? She demanded. Tabitha could almost feel the fire in her eyes as she walked out of wherever she was towards her room.

  Boston, Massachusetts in a private home on wooded property outside of town.

  Where is the G’laxix Sphaea?

  Right on top of our heads, well a few miles above us, but not much.

  Ok, let me grab Ashur, and I’ll be there in about … Hold one. Ok, I’m figuring say ten minutes.

  Understood, Tabitha finished.

  She opened her eyes to see all four men watching her, “She’ll be here in ten.”

  “Hmph, impossible,” David said.

  “Not if we have bad intel,” Charles admitted, sitting back in his chair.

  “If you believe,” Barnabas spoke, “that she is with the large station you would be right.”

  “Not that I’m curious, but I’m curious. How do you know this?” Tabitha asked Charles.

  “Hmm, basing it on the length of time they hadn't seen her,” Barnabas answered when none of the men said a word.

  The three looked sharply at Barnabas.

  Tabitha walked over to the table, “Well, that secret is still a secret, it seems.” She picked up the first briefcase, “Wow, talk about old technology.” She turned to Barnabas, “Should I pick it?”

  “No, you would find the status of their present projects, a few secret files they shouldn’t possess, a ham sandwich in David’s briefcase and other various stuff you would expect.”

  “How the hell do you know that?” David asked.

  “He is reading our minds,” Charles slumped lower in his chair and turned to look out the window to the trees beyond. “Checkmate.”

  “Why are you giving up?” Fred said, “These two aren’t killers and neither is the woman coming.”

  Charles looked over to Fred, “You need to open your eyes a little more, Fred.” He pointed to Tabitha, “She’s the one that jumped out of the third-story window in Germany. Remember that video?”

  Fred looked at the woman in the attractive pantsuit and then back to Charles, “What of it?”

  “She’s a modified human, Fred.” He pointed to Barnabas, “He’s God only knows what. But, he’s either,” Charles pointed to his own head, “reading our damned minds or can see through our briefcases unless they have some magic trick I can’t fathom.” He pointed to Jun behind the men, “They have replaced all of our security, can travel faster than light somehow to get here from outer space and,” he turned to face Barnabas, “how old are you, really?”

  There was a pause before Barnabas answered, “A thousand years and then a few.”

  “Well…shit.” Charles muttered, “I hadn’t expected that answer.”

  “How could you?” Barnabas answered, “it is a pretty well-guarded secret.”

  “Secrets are our tradecraft,” Charles admitted, “At least, we thought they were.”

  The men all got lost in their own thoughts for a few minutes.

  A quiet enveloped the room and then a sense of unease permeated the men. Both of the brothers adjusted themselves in their chair and Charles started looking around.

  “She’s here,” Tabitha told them, “Vengeance has arrived.”

  The men, unsettled by Tabitha’s comment looked to each other before turning to the door. They heard footsteps, multiple pairs. The first they saw come through the door wasn’t human.

  It was the biggest damned white German Shepherd any of them had ever seen.

  It trotted over to Tabitha and looked up at her until she broke, “Fine, fine, how are you Ashur, besides begging for a head rub?” She asked him as she scratched him behind his ears. He chuffed to her, and she chuckled, “Yeah, the hound finally ran down the foxes, big guy.”

  The second through the door was a mountain of a man. White, dressed in a black suit with black sunglasses, he had to be damn near six and a half feet tall.

  He paused in the doorway, then continued when he was comfortable with the situation.

  Then, she came in. She wasn’t what they expected at all. She carried herself regally, but she held a sword in her hands. One that looked to be generations old and she carried it like it was a normal part of her life.

  Her hands had used it.

  The fear the men felt only escalated as she drew near them. She walked and stood beside Barnabas and looked the three men over. “Well, my Rangers, it seems the longest open case you have had is now going to close, well done. Here sit the instigators that paid to have a little girl laying on top of a bomb in Las Vegas.”

  Fred started to talk, but she looked to him and pinched her fingers in his direction. An overwhelming fear raced through his body, and it was all he could do to try and breath. “Judged!” She told him, her eyes flashing.

  “What are you doing to my brother!” David yelled, fear in his voice as he watched his brother’s hands pounding on his chair, clenched in pain.

  Bethany Anne turned and looked the man up and down, “Here, I’ll show you.” She pushed a hand towards him, and his body screamed at him to run, to leave, but he couldn’t move. His heart started racing faster and faster, and he couldn’t grab enough breath. “Judged,” she spoke before turning to view Charles.

  Charles tried to stand up, tried to run, but a hand grabbed his shoulder and shoved him back into his chair. Charles looked up to see the big guard standing behind him, his dark sunglasses only showing Charles his own reflection.

  Charles turned to see the two brothers struggle in their chairs, their faces turning blue. “What the hell are you doing?” he asked, his voice breaking as he watched his partners.

  “Allowing them to die, together,” Bethany Anne told him. “I’ve spoken with Barnabas, all three of you are guilty of events which killed other human beings. You willfully used your power without regard for others. Never caring what those in your employ did to accomplish your goals. You all have earned this judgment for many p
ast sins.” Charles glanced up at her from watching the twitching of his friends as the twitches slowed, the men asphyxiating slowly, painfully. He had only glanced back to her when he noticed she was looking at him.

  And her eyes were glowing red.

  Her voice, deeper than a moment ago spoke, but he heard it both in his ears and inside his mind, “Charles, you paid those who endangered a little girl in Las Vegas, that was the decision which brought you to this end. You deserved this years ago.”