Agent Zero

by Lilith Saintcrow

  He was, too.

  I am never losing you again.

  “Good God, you two.” Cal rolled his window down, and the roar of the slipstream married to a burst of sage-scented, dusty desert chill filled the inside of the car. “Quit making out on the job.”

  * * *

  The next morning found them in a dusty, run-down back end of Utah, a hotel that might have been flea ridden if it wasn’t so goddamn cold. For all that, the cash from the dead soldiers’ wallets paid for a room, and the water was hot. It was enough to keep them from freezing to death, and even though Reese and Cal should have shared watches, he realized they hadn’t when he woke on one of the double beds, his arms around Holly so tightly they ached. She was still out like a light, and what had awakened Reese was Cal’s soft movements.

  The door shut, almost silently, and Reese took care not to disturb her as he slid off the bed. They hadn’t even bothered with the bedspread, or taking their clothes off.

  Sleep was the best thing for her right now.

  Outside, it was a desert sunrise, the bitter cold turning his breath into a plume, little curls of steam rising from Cal’s forehead as the other man stood staring at the eastern horizon. The parking lot, cracks in the concrete a map of contract and expand, hosted a sprinkling of older cars. The dusty Ford sedan fit in perfectly, but it needed new plates. They should have taken care of that last night.

  Oh, well. He got tired of waiting for Cal to start talking, for once. “Leaving so soon?”

  “Got to find me that girl. Trinity.” Stubble rasped as Cal rubbed at his face. “And you’ve got to stash that one somewhere safe.”

  Believe me, I will. “And then what?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Silence. The sun, just peeking over the horizon, was a smear of crimson, faint scattered clouds taking on a rosy blush. A red dawn.

  Finally, Cal spoke again. “You were right not to trust me.”

  There was a lot that statement could mean. Reese waited, his shoulders tightening fractionally.

  “Heming tried to get me, then they nabbed me when they killed Tracy. Bronson sent me out to get you. Figured it took one to catch one, and he convinced himself I wanted to be back in the agency’s good graces. Some of the files were doctored, but I managed to grab others, too. I had agency support until the storm hit, then I dug the tracker out of my hip and I thought...well. So they had leads on you up to Boulder. From there all they had to do was run a sweep with travel parameters, and they probably... I don’t know. I’m...sorry.”

  The chill was all through Reese now. The cold of a mission, where an untrustworthy element had now been exposed. There were responses he could give—including tying Cal off. Then he’d have to hide the body and hustle Holly out of here.

  For a moment he was back in the heat and the smoke, the knife clattering on the floor, and the wide dark eyes of two children mixing with Holly’s clear, beautiful gaze.

  You’re really real. To me.

  What would a really real man do? He didn’t know.

  So, then, what would Holly do? Something idiotic, like not killing this man.

  Something good.

  “You had your reasons.” Reese’s voice surprised him. Thoughtful, and even. “Are you going back into the program?”

  “Oh, hell, no.” The tension of readiness drained out of the other agent. Had he been expecting Reese to smoke him? “Division’s got all the data. They’ll make more. Maybe with less emotional noise. We’re going to be obsolete.”

  And you say you’re not good at long-range planning. “Loose ends.”

  “Yeah. You got a plan?”

  Not even close. “It seems to me,” Reese said, slowly, giving each word particular weight, “that there’s a bigger chance of survival if we work together. And it’s better for them, too.”

  “Them?”

  “Holly. And... Trinity. You really think she’s—”

  “She smells good. Damn near knocked me sideways.”

  “I can relate.” Christ, could he ever.

  “You’re going south?”

  Reese nodded. “Come and visit when you’ve got that girl of yours. We’ll see if we can’t plan something.”

  “I suppose if I ask where, you’ll just say figure it out. I’ll leave you the car—I’m sure there’s something else around here I can bounce with.”

  “Good luck.”

  “You, too.”

  Another pause.

  Finally, Reese turned, very deliberately presenting Cal with his back. By the time he stepped back through the door into the dark cave of a small sad motel room with dingy blue-striped wallpaper, Cal was gone.

  He closed the door, locked it, and leaned against the inside, listening to Holly’s steady, slow breathing. Lifted his hand, staring at the angry red flushes where he’d ripped flesh off escaping the restraints. They were fading, and his hand looked...solid.

  Real.

  For a moment he shut his eyes. In the darkness, with only her breathing and his own, it was easier to think.

  Let me, then. Let me be as real as she thinks I am. Never too late, right?

  He hoped so.

  When he opened his eyes, he found Holly had awakened. She sat on the bed, her eyes huge, her arms wrapped around her knees.

  In two strides he was across the room. Another half step and he was on the bed, and her mouth opened under his. She tasted like night air, spice and softness, her breath tinged with pain and sleep and fear, the sudden spike of musk through her scent reassuring him that even if she wasn’t happy to see him, even if she blamed him for getting her involved in this and shot at and almost killed, she wasn’t immune to him. He could still get a response.

  Was it enough to make her stay with him? Was he going to have to find something else?

  He kissed a trail down to her vulnerable throat where her pulse beat, frantic strong. “Don’t leave me,” he whispered. “Holly, please. I’m sorry. Don’t leave me.”

  “Reese,” she whispered back. “Reese.”

  It wasn’t an answer, but it was more than he’d hoped for. He forced himself to stop, to go still. “We’ve got to get out of here. Are you okay? You’re hungry—we’ll get something to eat... God, Holly. God.”

  She blinked up at him. Still wide-eyed, her lips full and a little parted, ripened by the pressure. Just begging to be kissed again. “I’m okay. You...are you all right?”

  “As long as you’re with me, I’m fine.”

  Wonder of wonders, she smiled. It was a thin, wan expression, but better than nothing. “I’m with you. But, um, can I use the little girls’ before we leave? And for God’s sake, can I stop losing all my clothes?”

  * * *

  The tiny car inched forward, a small silver beetle in a line of other beetles, under a sky so brilliantly blue it was hard to remember the color was probably smog-induced. Holly took a deep breath. It felt weird to be wearing shorts, but it was a balmy seventy-five degrees and they were supposed to be a couple on their way to honeymooning over the border. The low-slung blue-silver sports car, bought for cash in Tucson, was no bigger than a postage stamp, but just the sort of thing two crazy newlyweds would take off in.

  “Alice Hanson,” she murmured. “Of course I didn’t give up my maiden name. Alice Hanson. Thirty-six, Norbert, Iowa.”

  “Good girl.” Reese’s fingers were warm. The sunglasses hid his eyes, and his half smile was relaxed. His pulse didn’t vary, nice and even, and she was learning to keep her own calmed down. It was funny, the degree of control you could exercise over your own body. She’d never thought anything like this was possible. “In a few hours I’ll be knocking back beers, and you’ll be in a bikini.”

  “Dream on. I haven’t shaved my bikini line.”

  “I ha
ven’t shaved mine either.”

  Her chin dropped forward, and she smiled into her lap. “I wouldn’t mind sitting by a pool. Can we...”

  “Can we what?”

  “Never mind.” She swallowed dryly as the line of cars moved forward again. “What if they don’t let us through?”

  “We’d have more of a problem going north, babe. In a little bit we’ll both have tans and won’t stick out so much, though.”

  “Skin cancer.”

  “Not with the little bastards in the bloodstream taking care of things.”

  “Do you really think they would?”

  “Christ, will you relax? You’re a hypochondriac.”

  You couldn’t even smell the cancer on me. “I am not.” She squeezed his fingers, and he laughed.

  The baked wind, freighted with dust and fried food, slid through the open window and touched Holly’s bare knees. She could see the blue veins, a delicate network under the skin. The virus was pretty amazing—she could eat pretty much anything without the nausea now. She could run without getting winded. The headaches and exhaustion had gone away. “You should be nicer to them.”

  “To who, sweetheart?” He had the two passports—she didn’t want to know where he’d gotten them. Tricks of the trade, he’d said, I’ll teach you later. For right now, leave it to me. And the careful, finicky precision when it came to settling the photos in—don’t smile, they don’t want you to.

  It was hard not to. “The virus. It helps us out, doesn’t it? Saved my life, too.”

  “Mmh.” Noncommittal, but that could be because the car in front of them moved again, and now she could see the guards in their tan uniforms. Their service revolvers glinted, and they looked hot, bored, uncomfortable. The border crossing looked a little more casual than she’d imagined—on the other side, there were street hawkers pressing close to the cars that crept through. Brighter colors than she was used to, fluttering pennants flirting with the warm wind, smoke-steam rising from food carts.

  Holly let out a shaky breath. “I should be able to find a job. I can wait tables anywhere. Maybe I’ll... I don’t know. What are we going to do?”

  “One step at a time. Let’s just get past this, okay?”

  “Okay.” She couldn’t help herself. Her stress hormones were rising—she could taste them, even though Reese was just the same. Not even his breathing changed. “Reese?”

  “What?”

  “What would happen if I vanished? Like Trinity?” Since I’m deadweight you probably would do better without, even though the sex is great. I had no idea you could hold your breath that long, or that I was that flexible.

  “I’d find you.”

  “What if I didn’t want to be found?”

  “Are you saying you wouldn’t? Now’s a weird time to be having this conversation, Holl.”

  Well, there’s never a good time for a conversation like this, ever. “Reese, come on. I’m just asking. If we have a fight or something—”

  “I don’t ever want to fight with you.”

  “I know you don’t, but things happen. And...you might decide not to...that you don’t...” The memories were sharper now—Phillip sitting in the kitchen. I want a divorce, Holl. Seeing him holding hands with the other woman at the hearings. Mixed in with that was the throat-clenching panic when she realized she wasn’t alone in the small shed at the top of the tunnel’s long darkness, and Reese’s body slumping as he fell in slow motion—

  “Holly. Breathe.”

  Her heart kept trying to hammer, but Reese’s pulse, nice and slow, wouldn’t let it. He squeezed her hand again, and when they pulled up to the border guards she was able to offer a smile to the one out her window. The man, stocky and sweat greased, passed a flat judgmental look over her hips and breasts, scanned her face and straightened as Reese engaged the one on his side with a serious expression and the passports, his hand never leaving Holly’s.

  The panic attack trembled just on the verge of breaking loose. Did she look nervous? Guilty? Something else?

  Two stamps, a rill of liquid Spanish and braying male laughter, and Reese took the passports back. He wished them buenas tardes and gave a gracias, and then they were through. The hawkers clustered the car, but he kept going, creeping forward until they broke free of the press.

  Reese let out a long breath. “We’re through. Keep breathing.”

  “I’m fine.” Panic retreated. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t worry. It’s all good. If you aren’t at least a little nervous, they think you’re hiding something.” One hand on the wheel, and he was even driving differently now. The traffic wasn’t gonzo, but still, other cars swooped a little too close for comfort as he navigated a tangle of streets that looked just the same as the ones on the other side of the border. It was hard to believe they were in a completely different country. A limonada stand on a corner sat in a bubble of ranchero music while Reese waited to join a roundabout’s swirl, harsh sunlight glittering off paint and windows as the woman at the stand fanned herself and mouthed along to the song.

  Reese was silent for a long time as he drove, until they had cleared the edge of the city and a long ribbon of dusty highway stretched before them. Cacti clustered on either side, and the bilingual signs were in different colors. “We’ll make Santa Ana in an hour. I know a place. You can have your first real tequila there, too. That should settle your nerves some.”

  “I’m sorry.” She might have given the whole thing away.

  “Don’t be. I’m not going anywhere, Holl. Sooner or later you’ll get used to me.”

  “I already am,” she said, and that shy, sweet smile of his came back. The knot in her stomach eased, and she settled on the seat and watched a different country roll by.

  Two weeks later

  From the balcony she could see the cathedral of glowing biscuit-colored stone, floodlit against the night. From here you could believe it wasn’t Sinaloa, where people vanished so easily. Every time Reese left the expensive gringo hotel without her, she was on tenterhooks until he came back, and tonight was no different. The weather was beautiful, though he told her in summer it would be too humid to breathe. By then they would be somewhere else. For right now, though, they were in this quiet place with its courtyard full of frangipani and a murmuring fountain. There was a pool in the basement, and the food was incredible. Apparently one of Reese’s identities was a gringo businessman who knew his way around, and tonight he was making contacts.

  So when the sound came from the balcony, the curtains flowing white in the slow, highly scented wind, she leaped out of the chair, her water glass almost hitting the floor before her hand arrived to catch it. She was still getting used to her reflexes. Under the heavenly aroma from the courtyard came another thread of familiar scent, and Holly actually sagged with relief.

  “It’s just me,” Trinity said, peering between the curtains. The only light was from the courtyard below and behind the slightly opened bathroom door, so she was a shadow among shadows, the vines growing up the building thick and juicy. She’d probably climbed them—there was a reek of sap and crushed green. “Nice place.”

  “Temporary.” Holly straightened. “I’m glad you’re okay. How did you—”

  “Don’t worry, nobody else could. I wouldn’t have blown your hide.” She was fearfully gaunt, and had dyed her hair to a washed-out chestnut. Her gaze was still flat and dark as ever. Jeans and a gray tank top, muscle moving smoothly on her tanned arms, the other woman took a cautious step inside. “I did have to wait until he left.”

  “Why?”

  Trinity shrugged.

  Oh, for God’s sake. “So why are you here?”

  “I...” A long pause. “I wanted to...check...on you. To see if you were hap—I mean, safe.”

  “I’m okay.” Holly set the glass down on the
mosaic-tiled top of the small table next to her chair. “I was just sitting here thinking about a book I left behind.” It was a great one, too. I can buy another copy, though.

  “I also...wanted to apologize.”

  “For?”

  “He almost liquidated you.” Trinity made a restless little movement. She really was awfully thin, almost as thin as Holly had been. “And...after that. If I had calculated better—”

  She means Bronson. Holly quelled a shudder. “It’s fine. Reese says Cal’s looking for you.”

  “To tie me off, no doubt.”

  You guys and your euphemisms. It helped them, she supposed. If you could say liquidate instead of murder, target instead of human being, you were halfway to believing it wasn’t such a big deal. “No. Just to talk to you. He said Cal—”

  “It doesn’t matter.” Trinity took another half step into the room. “Tell Six that the program is shelved for now. They still have the data, though, and they will find out how to take emotional noise from the agents. When that happens, the orders for all of us won’t be capture. They’ll be kill.”

  Reese already thought about that. “I know. Look, we’re safer if we stick together. You could stay with us. Another agent will help—”

  “I am not a help.” It was the first time her tone was anything but flat, and it was shocking. Trinity’s lips skinned back from her teeth, a startling grimace. “They know it’s possible to cut the emotional noise out, because they did it to me.”

  Well. That answers that. Induction, she said. I’d better tell Reese. “Then why are you here checking on me?”

  The grimace vanished. Trinity stood, her weight balanced just so, and Holly sensed something. Maybe it was a subtle change in respiration, or something in the other woman’s sweat, or maybe it was just the sure instinct that came with years of waiting tables and seeing people in every possible shape, size and mood while they ate, hearing their conversations and predicting the size of the tip. A hesitation, a struggle inside the other woman’s contained, impenetrable shell.