The Collective

by Jack Rogan

  Again, Josh and Chang remained silent.

  “Look, I appreciate what you’re saying,” Boyce said, “but if you have questions or concerns about the answers you’ve gotten here, you’re more than welcome to go up the ladder and see if you get anything more to your liking.”

  Josh sighed, his patience at an end. “This is a whole different kind of cloak and dagger than you’re used to, Boyce. Now, you think you don’t have to tell us the truth. Maybe you think the truth is above our pay grade or our clearance, but the best thing about working for the InterAgency Cooperation Division is that my jurisdiction is what I say it is, unless and until my boss calls me off the scent.”

  “Josh,” Chang said, “we don’t have time to waste on this.”

  He nodded and pulled out his cell phone. “You’re right.” He looked at Boyce. “I’m not kidding about your phone ringing, Mr. Boyce. But don’t worry about it. It isn’t about screwing your career. I just want to expedite this whole thing.”

  “Hold on,” Boyce said.

  Josh started scanning his contacts list.

  Boyce rose from his chair, pulling out his own cell phone. “I said hold on. Just give me a minute, all right?”

  Josh nodded. “All right.”

  Boyce looked as though he expected them to leave the office to let him have a private conversation, but nobody moved. Finally he scowled and headed for the door, stepping out into the corridor and shutting the door behind him.

  The moment it closed, Josh and Chang turned to Herskowitz. The man had been quiet and deferential with Boyce in the room, but now Josh saw a different person in his place. His gaze had hardened, his chin lifted in grim determination, and Josh realized that though he might work in an office, the man had been forged by his work in intelligence.

  “Sean was murdered,” Herskowitz said. “Poison. But we don’t know a damn thing about who or why.”

  Josh glanced at the door, hoping Boyce didn’t rush back. “You’re sure there’s nothing that would give us a lead?”

  “Nothing,” Herskowitz replied. He seemed to be studying them, gauging how much he could say. “Do you really want to help Cait?”

  “Yes,” Chang said, with a quick glance at Josh. “We really do.”

  “I take it you realize there are some pretty powerful people who don’t want you to help her?”

  “The people who are calling her a terrorist, for instance?” Chang said. “Yeah, we know. But we’re here, asking the questions they don’t want asked.”

  “Why?” Josh asked, sitting forward in his chair. “Do you know where she is?”

  Herskowitz wrestled with the question for several seconds, obviously weighing the risks to himself, perhaps even to his life, if he answered truthfully.

  “No,” he said at last.

  “Damn it—” Josh started.

  Herskowitz stopped him with a look.

  “But I know where she’s going to be.”

  “Hoboken?” Voss said. “What the hell’s in Hoboken?”

  She lay in the hellishly uncomfortable hospital bed—made even more so by her attempts to stave off pain by remaining still—and held her cell phone to her ear. The hospital never slept, but it had quieted down enough for her to have managed to rest a little. Then Josh had called.

  “Are you alone?” Josh asked.

  Voss glanced at the door. “As I’ll ever be while I’m here.”

  “How’s your shoulder? Tell me the truth, Rachael. Are you mobile?”

  “I’m fine.”

  She could hear him sigh over the phone.

  “You’re not fine. You took a bullet. But I know you, and I’m sure you’re antsy as hell in that hospital bed. I also know that if the case is about to blow up, you’re going to want to be here. So I’m asking you, bullet wound and painkiller haze and all, can you travel? Can you get out of there without telling anyone where you’re going?”

  Voss hesitated, considering the pain in her shoulder. The sling helped keep pressure off it, but didn’t solve the problem.

  “Yeah,” she said. “It hurts, but I’m mobile. What about Turcotte, though? Aren’t you with Agent Chang?”

  “I am,” Josh said, an odd tightness in his voice. “But if our information is correct, FBI chain of command is compromised. Agent Chang is following ICD protocol, taking directives from us.”

  “What, did you promise her a job? If she fucks over Turcotte, she’s screwing her career.”

  “I disagree,” Josh said. “She’s protecting him by keeping him in the dark. He’s not a fool. He’ll figure that out.”

  “Talk to me, partner. What’s in Hoboken?”

  “Get moving, Rachael. Call me when you’re rolling and I’ll lay it out for you.”

  “Done. Twenty minutes. I need to find a vehicle.”

  As she ended the call, her thoughts were already racing ahead, solving that problem. Bracing herself against the pain, she sat up in bed and pressed the call button for the nurse. Painkillers had made the bullet wound a dull ache, but she would need more of them.

  The nurse came in as she was pulling her pants and shoes from the closet, one-handed.

  “Ms. Voss—”

  “Agent Voss.”

  “I’m sorry—Agent Voss, what are you doing?” This nurse had just come on duty an hour or so ago. Short-cropped, bleach blond hair, and an almost military air about her, she seemed competent enough, and Voss had expected her disapproval.

  “Signing myself out. I need a prescription for something for the pain and a shirt to wear. I assume mine is in the trash somewhere?”

  Agitated, the nurse approached her. “Agent Voss, please—”

  “I need a shirt. I assume they sell something downstairs that I can wear? Please tell me it opens at nine o’clock.”

  The nurse nodded. “I think it’s nine, yes.”

  “Great. I’ll leave the gown at reception,” Voss said as she sat on the bed and tried to maneuver her way into her pants without using her left hand.

  “Agent Voss, this is a very bad idea.”

  Voss stood up and buttoned her pants, then gingerly removed her sling and began the painful process of putting on her shoes. The nurse came a couple of steps closer, then backed up a little, obviously uncertain how to handle the situation.

  “If you insist on leaving against your doctor’s advice, there are some forms—”

  “Get them, please. I’m in a hurry,” she said, reaching into the drawer in the nightstand to retrieve her sidearm and strap on the shoulder holster she normally wore. Persuading the hospital to let her keep her weapon in the room had been a bitch, but logic and authority won out. Someone had tried to take Voss out last night. No way was she going to be anywhere, including a hospital bed, unarmed. Turcotte hadn’t liked it much, either, but Voss was used to being a source of frustration to him.

  “There is a procedure for this, ma’am,” the nurse said, getting strident now, trying to pretend she wasn’t intimidated by the gun and Voss’s Homeland Security credentials. “You’ll need to be seen by a doctor.”

  Voss stood, pain flaring as she slid her arm back into the sling. She went to the closet and pulled out the FBI jacket she’d been wearing the night before … or so she had thought, until she examined it now and saw no trace of bloodstains. They couldn’t have left a T-shirt?

  “You want a doctor?” she said, putting the jacket over her shoulders, partially covering the gun and the gown, thinking what a vision of beauty she must be at the moment. “Go ahead and get one. If you can catch up to me in the gift shop. I’ll be buying an ‘I Love Hartford’ T-shirt or something.”

  The nurse turned on one foot, not wasting any more time, and rushed off to rat her out to someone in charge. Voss had given up on the idea of getting a prescription from these people. It would be an hour or more of sitting around, doing paperwork, and waiting for a doctor. She would call in from the road and have the office arrange a prescription for her to pick up somewhere along her route.

>   She headed for the elevator. Another nurse tried to stop her but Voss only smiled and stepped on, then pressed the button for the lobby.

  “Miss!” the second nurse cried in alarm.

  “Sorry. Talk to my nurse. She’ll explain it all,” she said, but even as she spoke the elevator doors were shushing closed.

  In the lobby, two security guards were waiting for her. They started to give her a hard time, but the FBI jacket and her ICD identification with its Homeland Security stamp made them fall in line, leading her to the gift shop and helping her pick out a T-shirt, even blocking the entrance to the shop while she got rid of the gown and put the shirt on, pistol conspicuous in the armpit holster, even though it was mostly covered by her sling.

  The T-shirt offerings had consisted mostly of NEW DAD and BIG SISTER, but she managed to find a Boston Red Sox tee in just her size. She went out through the hospital’s front door and hadn’t gotten ten feet from the lobby when two FBI agents popped out of a car parked at the curb. She’d picked them out the instant she walked out into the sun—wondered, in fact, why she hadn’t run into any of them inside, even guarding her room—and now headed straight for them.

  “You guys aren’t exactly inconspicuous, y’know?” she said as she approached.

  “Agent Voss—” one, a cute Italian, began.

  “I mean, the dark suits and sunglasses … it’s all so clichéd. Never mind that you look more like Secret Service,” she said as she walked over to the car.

  “What happened to Agent Foran?” the Italian—the driver—asked.

  Voss smiled, wincing at the pain in her shoulder. “So you did have someone keeping an eye on me up there? Must have been his bathroom break. Or time for a cigarette, maybe.”

  She went to the back door on the driver’s side and opened it.

  “What are you doing?” said the other agent. He was blond, with a linebacker’s neck.

  “Pulling rank,” Voss said, no longer interested in smiling. “Please get in the car, gentlemen, and take me to the local airport. En route, I want to talk to Ed Turcotte, so if you could get him on the phone, I’d appreciate that.”

  “Agent Voss—”

  “I’m getting sick of my own name today,” she said. “Get in the car, boys. I won’t say please again.”

  They exchanged a hesitant look. It was the driver who complied first, and the linebacker followed his lead. In seconds they were pulling out of the hospital parking lot as the linebacker handed a phone over the front seat to her.

  “Hello, Ed,” Voss said.

  “What are you doing, Rachael?”

  “Don’t call me Rachael, Ed. I’m going home. I hate hospitals and I was getting claustrophobic. This is good for you, though. You don’t have to have a team babysit me anymore. How’s the case going?”

  “You’d have to ask your partner. It’s his case now, remember?”

  “I know. But I also know that the Bureau is the Bureau, and no matter how much you’re cooperating, there are other factors at work here. For instance, I assume there’s an internal FBI investigation right now to figure out which one of your people shot me. Did you notice Norris and Arsenault didn’t show up last night? Almost like they didn’t want to be there when the ugly went down. Deniability, Ed. It’s the new black.

  “Where are they, by the way? Batman and Robin, I mean.”

  For the first time, Turcotte hesitated.

  “Ed?”

  “I don’t know where they are. I’m told Mr. Norris has other consulting work that needs his attention, and SOCOM won’t say where Lieutenant Arsenault is currently assigned.”

  “So now that ICD is in charge of the investigation and their observations and consultations are unwelcome, they’ve made themselves scarce. After they made all of those bodies vanish, swept a bunch of murdered children under the rug, and got the world thinking Cait McCandless is a terrorist—”

  “That didn’t come from them. It came from the Bureau,” Turcotte said.

  “Are you sure about that?”

  Another pause, and then Turcotte said, “Where did you say you were going, Rachael?”

  “Home, Ed. I said I was going home. We could all use a rest.”

  “You can say that again. Rest well, Agent Voss.”

  But she could tell from his tone that he knew she wasn’t going to rest. That had been her intention. They had no choice but to cut Turcotte out of the loop—he had to report to Hollenbach, and Hollenbach seemed to be compromised—but he would get the message and understand that.

  “You, too,” Voss said. “Take it easy.”

  She tried to close her eyes and drift off on the twenty-minute ride to the airport, but every time the car went over even the smallest bump, the jar to her shoulder made her grit her teeth.

  “Either of you guys got any Advil?” she asked as they pulled up to the departures terminal.

  They didn’t. Voss thanked them and the agents wished her a safe trip home. She waved as they drove off and as soon as they were out of sight, she went inside, checked in with airport security, so nobody started freaking about the woman in the Red Sox T-shirt with the gun, and started looking for the rental car desks.

  “What kind of car did you have in mind?” the short Indian man behind the counter asked.

  Voss smiled. “Something fast.”

  Cait sat on the edge of her cot, lacing up a pair of work boots she’d found in the extensive clothing supply room left behind when Lynch’s old Resistance friends had given up the fight. In the shower, she had scrubbed her skin raw. Now she wore a clean tank top and her jeans from the night before, as none of the pants in the supply room had fit her well enough. She’d put her hair into a ponytail to keep it out of her eyes.

  She stood, feeling good. Ready. Caffeine had her wired up tight, but she didn’t mind. Today she had to treat her home soil like Baghdad, and she would need all the fuel she could get.

  Despite the rattle of the air-conditioning units, the summer heat had already begun to make the air inside the warehouse feel close and sticky. All the more reason to get out of there, to put the plan in motion. Getting to the Resistance HQ had not gotten them any help in terms of reinforcements, but it had provided them beds and showers, clean clothes and sanctuary. More important, next to the supply room where the clothes and bedding were kept, the warehouse had an armory. Given its size she imagined that once upon a time it had held many more weapons than it now did. But how many guns did one woman need?

  Cait clipped a pair of SIG Sauer nine millimeters to her belt at the small of her back—one for each hand. Then she slipped on a loose light-cotton shirt of a summery pale green that hung down far enough to cover the guns. But she could have been carrying an arsenal and no one would see the real weapon. Men looked at her and were distracted by her face, her smile, her body. They saw the cute, petite young woman without ever imagining how easily she could hurt or kill them.

  The Collective—or whoever they were—had murdered her brother because they were afraid of him. They hadn’t realized what it meant to be Sean McCandless’s little sister, but they would learn.

  Cait headed down the corridor into the main room, where the A/C unit sounded like distant applause and the television array continued its constant chatter of news. Most of the cubicles were still covered in dust, but a vacuum stood against one wall and someone had run it across the carpet. Jordan sat on a blanket that had been spread on the floor, playing with Leyla. He had the baby on her back and was letting her play with old remote controls and an empty plastic water bottle. These were what passed for toys in her child’s life now.

  Just for today, she thought. I swear, baby, just for today.

  “Hey, Leyla,” Jordan said, picking up his car keys and jangling them above her. “Look who it is. It’s Mommy.”

  Leyla reached for the keys, staring in fascination. She raised one fist and thrust the knuckles into her mouth, seeming to forget about the keys until Jordan shook them again.

  “You�
��re really something with her, y’know?” Cait said.

  Jordan glanced up at her, eyes shining. “She’s really something. Like her mom.”

  The moment he’d spoken the words he dropped his gaze, focusing on Leyla, embarrassed by putting voice to the compliment. Cait watched him a moment, amazed that, in the midst of all this, she had finally seen the feelings he had for her. It helped, knowing there was someone who cared for her and for Leyla that the bastards hadn’t managed to kill.

  “You’re wrong about this,” Jordan said softly.

  Cait knelt on the other side of the blanket and bent to kiss Leyla’s forehead. She let the baby clutch at her fingers and swung her hand back and forth.

  “What else can I do?” she asked, the question nearly breaking her.

  “I don’t mean the plan. You’re right about that. They haven’t left you any other options. Even if it works, you’ll still have the jihadists to deal with. But all right, deal with that if you get the luxury. I’m talking about me.” He gazed at her, and this time he didn’t look away. “You shouldn’t be leaving me behind.”

  She leaned over and kissed his cheek, then hugged him close, the two of them like a bridge over Leyla.

  “I know you’d like to keep me safe. It means a lot to me. But I can’t do what needs doing if I have Leyla along, if I have to worry about her, and you’re the only person I can trust with her right now. The only person.”

  She withdrew, sliding her hands along his arms before letting go. Jordan had the pain of unspoken words in his eyes, but he nodded.

  “You know I’ll take care of her.”

  “I know,” Cait said. She reached out and touched his face, then stood up. “I’ll say good-bye to you both before I leave.”

  Jordan started playing with Leyla again. As Cait walked away, she felt a hook in her, trying to drag her back. How perfect a day could the three of them have had together, if only they’d had the freedom to leave this place without the fear of bloodthirsty men?

  She passed by Lynch’s cubicle. The computer was on, but abandoned. The chairs in front of the TV array, where they had spent a little time this morning, were empty. Then she came around the last cubicle and saw him standing in front of one of the whiteboards, studying the new photographs he had taped up—his new targets.