Escalate

by Sigmund Brouwer

  “At least you didn’t text out Code Red,” Raven said, pretending it had never been her idea to use it in the first place.

  “Be okay to get rid of the whole Batcave thing too,” Jo said to Bentley. “Or was that an unoriginal fantasy belonging to your Diva Boy brother?”

  I opened my mouth to fire back, but Bentley jumped in again.

  “Let’s stick to business,” he said, turning to me. “Bro, we haven’t seen a lot of you lately. Got a private project happening? Anything we can help you with?”

  I shook my head. It just hurt, knowing how much Bentley trusted me.

  “It can’t be work that’s taking Jace away from us,” Jo said. “Unless primping in front of a mirror counts as work.”

  “Well then,” I snapped back, “clearly you’re unemployed.”

  “Hey,” Jo said. “That’s dangerously close to body shaming.”

  “Also,” Raven said, “contradicts your first statement about our makeup.”

  She grinned. So did Jo. I was no match for them.

  “If I had a gavel, I’d be banging the table,” Bentley said. “I wanted you to watch something that came to us via the forum.”

  As in chat-room forums. Bentley monitored the Internet for any discussions that involved Team Retribution.

  “It was a video request,” he said. “I think it’s worth getting involved. But it might drag us into the corporate world, which, sadly, is still biased toward males with nice threads and flashy watches. My vote is Jace fronts it. He’s used to sparring with lawyers and bean counters.”

  “Guess being a trust-fund kid is good for something,” Raven said.

  “Happy to let him deal with that crap,” Jo said. “Roll the video.”

  Bentley flipped a screen around. His fingers raced on the keyboard, and he brought up a link.

  A girl’s face filled the screen. Okay, not quite a girl. My age. Long blond hair. Big blue eyes. Tears trickling down her cheeks.

  And very, very attractive.

  “My name is Deanna Steele,” she began. “I don’t know who else I can turn to for help.”

  Going suit-and-tie was a sacrifice I would have to make, I told myself. If we were the only ones left to turn to, what choice did I have?

  FIVE

  Deanna Steele’s choice of meeting place was a Tim Hortons. The next afternoon I did the standard recon thing and showed up a half hour early. We had already earned ourselves some enemies. Sooner or later we’d show up to help someone and find it was a trap.

  Timmies is a great place to watch for watchers. Traffic flow is constant. Anyone sitting alone for more than half an hour is going to stick out. It’s easy enough to look occupied by propping a newspaper or device in front of you. Not so easy to hide the telltale signs of scanning the room instead of giving your reading material your full attention.

  Of course, the same went for me. I didn’t have a prop to fake-read. I sat in a booth, openly glancing around. But I wanted any watcher to know that I was watching.

  There was an elderly man—and by that I mean over the age of fifty and balding—who kept looking around as his coffee cooled and glancing at his watch. I was prepared to believe he was waiting for someone to join him, but I’d also make sure he didn’t follow me out of the coffee shop. I’d already been burned by an investigator who’d betrayed me to my father. Fool me once, shame on you. But twice? You know how the saying goes.

  Deanna Steele showed up exactly on time. It would have been hard to miss her. She drove a Porsche 718 Boxster—the snappy two-seater that starts at about $65,000 US. It was cherry red. I’d watched her circle the parking lot four times, even though there were plenty of spots available. She eventually parked right in front of the main window and took her time getting to the door. This was a blue-collar part of town. Lots of the men around me were grizzled, wearing work boots and paint-splattered coveralls. They definitely noticed her entrance. Even if there had been a grease fire in the kitchen, she would have been the focal point.

  She sashayed—love that word, sashayed—through the doors like she was inspecting the franchise as a possible purchase. She sported designer clothes, designer purse and designer white teeth, obviously the result of expensive braces and diligent bleaching.

  Good thing I’d been given this task. With this girl’s focus on outward appearances, Jo or Raven would have been inclined to tear her apart and leave pieces of her carcass in the sun to dry to wrinkled leather. They’d do the same to a guy who loved to pose.

  Me, on the other hand? While I wasn’t impressed by the show of wealth—my mom is sitting on a half billion dollars of generations-old wealth—I did admire her brazenness. This, I thought, might be fun.

  She surveyed the room and caught my eye. I was geeked out again, right down to the slicked-sideways hair. I wasn’t worried about her recognizing me as Jace Wyatt, as in Jace Wyatt of the Wyatt Foundation, or Jace Wyatt, son of disgraced and recently jailed surgeon Winchester Wyatt. Her money didn’t come close to traveling in the same circles as mine. I dressed this way because of some ancient Chinese military strategy I’d read about in a book called The Art of War: “He who exercises no forethought but makes light of his opponents is sure to be captured by them.” In other words, don’t underestimate your enemy. And if underestimating your enemy was a bad thing, then getting your enemy to underestimate you was a good thing. Besides, if you lower the expectations of people around you, it’s much easier to live up to them.

  I gave her a weak smile and waggled my fingers, guessing this would be the awestruck reaction she felt entitled to from a geek like me.

  I caught a subtle waft of expensive perfume as she sat down across from me.

  “Infinite,” she said.

  “Possibilities,” I answered. A little code thing that Bentley had set up for her.

  “Chai tea,” she said. “Two milk, two sweetener. And a straw. So I don’t stain my teeth when I drink.”

  This wasn’t part of the code thing. Probably more of a test on her part. Or maybe she just expected everyone to be happy to serve her. So. Would I drool and leap at the chance?

  I drooled and I leapt.

  Yeah, I thought. This was definitely going to be fun.

  SIX

  “Tell me about the team,” Deanna said. She lifted her chai tea with straw to her lips. Careful not to smear her bright-red lipstick, she nibbled on the straw to draw a sip. “It sounds so cool and mysterious.”

  Team? No. I did my thing. Raven and Jo did theirs. We traded help and favors. That was all. Bentley was probably the only one who liked thinking of us as a team.

  “What I think is cool,” I answered, “is that it only feels like you pull liquid upward through a straw. What really happens is that after you suck air out of the straw, atmospheric pressure pushes the liquid down to fill the vacuum. We’re close to sea level, which means there’s about sixty miles of air pushing down on us, so it’s about fourteen pounds per square inch, more than enough to force the tea upward. I mean, commercial jets fly based on a lift of only a few pounds per square inch across the wings.”

  I expected her to dismiss my geek comment, which was why I had thrown it out there. As a simple distraction. I didn’t want to reveal information about Jo or Raven or Bentley. Instead, she tilted her head and gave it some thought.

  “Huh,” she said. “But if all that atmosphere can push tea up the straw, why don’t I feel like I’m being crushed?”

  “We’re made of bone and water,” I said. “Percentage varies by gender. So you’re roughly 50 percent skeleton and 50 percent liquid. Fourteen pounds per inch isn’t nearly enough to crush water or bone.”

  “Huh,” she said again. She gave me a full and frank gaze. Her blue eyes were enhanced by masterfully applied makeup. “Clearly you are the brains of the team. I like that.”

  I gave her the bashful grin that any geek would give when patted on the head like a puppy.

  After another sip Deanna said, “I hear the two girls on th
e team are kick-ass. And hot.”

  “Well…”

  “And there’s the fighter, right?”

  “Boxer,” I said. Fighting is crude. Boxing takes strategy and discipline. Bloody results might be the same, but still…

  “He kind of has a Johnny Depp vibe going on, is what the rumors say. When Depp was young and before he got all seedy-looking, I mean.”

  “That’s fairly accurate,” I said. “Some people say he has the ability to make Depp look like a geek in comparison.”

  She sighed. “I’d like to meet the boxer. Was hoping he’d be here. No insult or anything.”

  I gave her a wounded but brave smile. Depp wasn’t the only one who could act.

  “Don’t get me wrong,” she said. “Intelligence has a good vibe too. Different but good.”

  I got the implication. She was establishing early that I’d been placed in the friend zone. Forever.

  “So,” I said. “Someone is blackmailing you?”

  She dug out her device, swiped the screen, found what she needed and handed it to me. “Link to a private YouTube video. Only I can access it.”

  I tapped the screen to play. A series of photos came up, taken, I guessed, by a drone. A few photos of a man and a woman, casually dressed, sitting in lounge chairs beside a swimming pool, enjoying the sun and glasses of wine. Then a couple of photos where the woman was leaning over the man, kissing him. Nothing that couldn’t be printed in a daily newspaper.

  “Must be something high at stake here. We’re not talking tens of thousands of dollars, are we? It’s more, right?”

  She blinked. “Hundreds of thousands. You guessed that just from the photos?”

  “The technology involved is expensive,” I said. “Nobody would go to that much trouble to take those photos unless it was worth it.”

  “Technology?”

  “Private link. No point in putting photos online of something that looks like an innocent kiss between consenting adults. Means either the man isn’t supposed to be kissing the woman or the woman isn’t supposed to be kissing the man. Which means if they knew there was a drone above, they’d make sure not to be caught like they were. The drone was too high to be seen or heard. Expensive technology. And close-up, high-def photos from that altitude means an expensive camera and a skilled operator.”

  I handed her back the device.

  “The man in the picture is my father,” she said. Flat voice. “And the woman is his secretary. So no, not innocent at all.”

  “Hurts?” I asked.

  “Yes,” she said. “I’m trying not to hate him. And yet I have no choice but to protect him.”

  Suddenly, with her pain so raw and obvious, this wasn’t fun anymore.

  “Tell me more,” I said. Quietly.

  “Huh,” she said.

  “Huh?”

  She studied my face. “Interesting accidental shift there. Like suddenly you’re a real person.”

  She touched the roughness of my knuckles, hardened by hours of punching the heavy bag in the gym. “These aren’t computer hands.”

  I didn’t move.

  She reached over and pulled off my glasses. She removed the plastic pocket protector from my shirt pocket. She half stood and leaned over and ran her fingers through my hair, roughing it up.

  She sat back again and examined me as she wiped her hands on a napkin to get my hair goop off her fingers.

  “Roll up your sleeves,” she said.

  This was the voice of a new Deanna Steele. Tougher than the one who didn’t want to stain her teeth by drinking chai tea without a straw.

  I saw no point in not obeying her. I’m not muscled like a steroid user. But hitting a speed bag for hundreds of hours definitely adds some definition to your forearms and biceps.

  She took her time evaluating my arms before speaking again. “So you’re the mysterious Johnny Depp one. For the record, though, he kicks your butt as an actor. In fact, even I’m better than you. Totally bought into the entitled-princess act, didn’t you?”

  My mind was flicking through what this meant. In short, she’d been the one to get me to underestimate her.

  She pulled the straw from her chai tea and drank directly from the cup, leaving a lipstick stain on the edge.

  “How about we start over?” she said. “No pretending on either side. Geek and princess are no longer at the table.”

  “Sounds good,” I said. She’d won the first round, but I wasn’t going down without more of a fight. “You owe me a beverage. I’ll take a coffee. One cream.”

  She arched an eyebrow.

  “Please?” I said, defeated again.

  “I would be happy to get it for you,” she said, rising to go stand in line.

  Not going to lie. I watched her walk away and enjoyed the view. Now it was back to fun again.

  SEVEN

  My device buzzed, showing a 416 area code. Toronto. I’d been expecting the call. Noon here in Vancouver, three PM there.

  It wasn’t the most convenient time to take a call. Victor Lang was facing another beating, and this time it looked like I had no choice but to step in.

  It was Saturday, and I was back in my geek disguise in the park opposite M.T. Matthews school, watching Victor Lang sitting alone reading comic books. Just as five high-school kids walked up to him, I’d been thinking about the unfortunate choice of initials for a school. M.T.—empty. Empty Matthews school?

  Even though I should have been thinking about the blackmailing problem that Deanna Steele had shared with me the afternoon before at Timmies, Empty Matthews school had led my brain down a very juvenile path of silly book titles and authors. Rusty Bedsprings, by I.P. Nightly, and the sequel, Down the Yellow River, by I.P. Dailey. All Alone, by Saul E. Terry. Allegiance to the King, by Neil Down.

  I knew dozens of similar titles and names because when we were younger, Bentley would sneak into my bedroom late at night when he was scared or lonely, which was basically every night. When I’d discovered that he giggled like crazy over these kinds of silly titles and author names, I’d make sure to have two or three new ones each night to distract him. Then he’d started finding ones to bring to me, and it had become another way to bond as brothers.

  Athletic Supporter, by Jacques Strap. Credit Cards, by Bill Melater. And our all-time favorite, Big Fart, by Hugh Jass. Bentley had laughed so hard telling me that one, he’d fallen on his back and kicked his legs in the air, repeating it five or six times more. He was ten.

  One of my favorite memories. And that one, like all the others I could flip through like a photo album, could be destroyed by this incoming call.

  My phone rang as I stood up from the bench and began walking toward Victor and the five bigger boys surrounding him. They were clearly high-school age like me. Looked like jocks with a sheen of nastiness to them. It’s what traveling in packs tended to do to humans oozing testosterone.

  “Jace Wyatt,” I said. “Yes. And the password is: ‘infinite possibilities.’ Is it a match?”

  I just wanted a yes or a no. I had no time for pleasantries, not with the aggression I could see rising in the nasty jocks gathered around Victor.

  The woman on the other end confirmed my identity and began the preamble about test results and the mathematical odds that made it impossible for them to be wrong on a paternity test.

  Ahead of me, two kids, one on either side of Victor, had grabbed his arms.

  “I’m sorry. I realize this will sound rude,” I said, interrupting, “but I’m in the middle of an urgent situation. I can call back later for more details. What I’d like right now is for you to give me a yes, it’s positive, or a no, it’s not.”

  She gave me the answer.

  I hit End and slipped the device back into my pocket.

  I broke into a run. Victor was about to take the first of what looked like a flurry of punches.

  EIGHT

  Some might argue that it had been wrong of me to remain on the sidelines a couple of days earlier wh
en the smaller kid popped Victor in the nose. I get that. Here’s my defense. I’d seen enough to know that Victor had, over a period of time, relentlessly bullied that kid verbally. I mean, I’d gotten a taste of it myself when I wandered over after the event.

  The problem was, Victor didn’t appear to have a good sense of self-confidence or self-respect. He lashed out at everyone else to build himself up. What I’d hoped was that by letting the two of them sort it out, Victor would realize that actions had consequences. And maybe they’d even gain a little respect for each other.

  Good intentions. Bad result.

  Especially if the current situation was any indication.

  I arrived at the outer circle just as I heard the ringleader say, “Dude. You are absolutely the jerk who spray-painted our cars. Got it on video. You should be thanking us for this. We didn’t call the cops.”

  I groaned.

  It drew their attention. Football players, I guessed. Crew cuts giving them the blocky-headed look of linebackers, matching the squareness of their shoulders.

  I ignored the collective hostility of the five jocks.

  “Seriously?” I said, speaking to Victor. “Spray paint? Their cars?”

  “Geek boy,” the ringleader said. “Might want to stay out of this.”

  He had a wispy beard. Young face. Adult body. And some serious rage.

  “I understand the anger,” I replied to Wispy Beard. “What’s the damage, you think?”

  “Their cars were pieces of crap,” Victor said. “They should pay me for hiding the rust spots.”

  “Guys,” I said, stepping between them and Victor, “I’d like to hit him myself. Trust me.”

  Wispy Beard snorted. “Be like someone threw a marshmallow at him.”

  The others laughed. Apparently Wispy Beard spoke for all of them.

  “I mean it,” I said. “All told, what was the damage? I know about this place online. Sort of like a public trust fund to help people who have been vandalized. I could fill out the forms for you, make sure you got the money within a week.”