Double Down

by MB Austin

  Celeste didn’t stop to think. “Screw them. Skinny is not what makes you sexy. If you feel good, it shows. That’s what makes you sexy.”

  “You think I’m sexy?” Erlea stared at her like Celeste had just suggested she give up singing to become an astronaut.

  The room was much too warm now. “My opinion is not important. And neither is Nigel’s, or some troll’s on the internet.” Celeste hopped up and opened the balcony door a crack, sucking in the cool night air. And sneezed. Dammit. “Let’s get back to your goals. What do you want, for yourself?”

  Erlea leaned back, crossing her arms. She looked up at Celeste with a challenge in her eyes. “I want to feel sexy. Even when I’m sober. I don’t want to starve myself, or weigh everything I eat, or keep a fucking food journal with calories. You got a plan like that?”

  “Yes, of course.” Celeste perched back on the couch. She’d love to see Erlea feel about herself what Celeste felt all too much. “I will even write down the key pieces for you. They are: protein, vegetables, healthy fats. Lots of each. On the less side: alcohol, sugar and simple carbs, nicotine. And stress. Also you must have some fun each day, do something quiet just for you, and sleep eight hours. See? A very simple plan.”

  Erlea’s challenge shifted to astonishment. “You want me to pretend I’m at home.”

  “This is your normal regimen at home? Tell me more.”

  Erlea picked at the upholstery by her tucked-in feet. “I’m pretty boring, I guess. I shop at the market, I cook, I read, and of course I play with the cat. She demands it. I work on songs, and when they won’t come, I go for long walks. Sometimes I meet friends for tapas or a coffee, or go to see someone I know play. Oh, and Aikido. Three, maybe four times a week.”

  “That sounds like a lovely life.” One I would enjoy. “Which market? Not the Boqueria?”

  “God, no. My neighborhood has one just as good, without the tourists. But here I can’t do any of that.” She paused and smiled. “Except the Aikido. Maji’s going to train with me before call each morning.”

  “Excellent.” Celeste set her notebook aside and asked more about life in Barcelona. They exchanged notes on parks, museums, favorite restaurants. Celeste didn’t need more information for the consult, but she loved seeing Erlea animated and at ease. Plus, Barcelona was her own favorite place to visit.

  Erlea seemed impressed by how well Celeste knew her city. “Why don’t you live there?”

  “I meant to after I got through med school. But you know, life and family. I visit friends as often as I can.”

  “Well, let me know when you’re in town.” Erlea frowned. “Assuming I’m ever home again.”

  When Celeste shivered a short while later, Erlea noticed and got up. “You want me to close the door? Or I could bring you a blanket.”

  Celeste stretched. “I should probably go. You have an early morning, and we ran out of shoptalk ages ago.”

  “Yeah. It’s easy to lose track of time with you. Thanks.” She gestured for Celeste to stay put and popped out to the balcony. Returning seconds later with her guitar in hand, she said, “Can I play you something? I need an unbiased opinion.”

  Celeste doubted she had any opinions about Erlea in that category. “I don’t know if I can help, but I’m happy to listen.”

  “Perfect. Just let me run through it once, then tell me what you like and don’t like.”

  Celeste watched Erlea play, finding her eyes drawn to her hands. Erlea’s fingers were so dexterous and sure between the frets and on the strings. The room grew too warm again, but Celeste no longer wanted to cool off.

  It was a beautiful song, lyrical but compelling. Hearing Erlea’s husky alto with just the acoustic guitar made Celeste’s scalp tingle. And when she met her gaze as the last chord faded out, the rest of Celeste tingled as well.

  “So, tell me what didn’t work, first.” Erlea looked surprisingly vulnerable. “Too sappy?”

  “Not at all,” Celeste said. “But I am not sure I trust my Spanish. Are you singing about a cat?”

  “Yes.” Erlea’s warm brown eyes shone. “My Athena. How she is like a tiny jaguar, prowling the rooftops of Barcelona. Fierce and independent, but she knows where her home is.” She spoke one of the verses, then translated, “She will not be controlled. I love her as she is, free to come and go.” She snorted. “Nigel loved the sound until I told him what it was about. Then he sniffed like he does. You know.” When Celeste shook her head, Erlea imitated his imperious tone. “No children’s songs on your next album. Or any album I produce.”

  “Pardon my bluntness, but your manager is a jerk. And not so smart.” Celeste bit a lip, pulling her thoughts together. She wanted to reward Erlea’s openness with more than just praise. “Perhaps he doesn’t like the metaphor. Or can’t see it.”

  “What do you think it is?” Erlea sounded genuinely curious.

  Celeste blinked at the question. “Women and self-determination. I could see your fans at marches, linking arms and singing it in unison. Wearing those pink hats with the cat ears.”

  “I like the way you think.” Erlea glowed, and Celeste basked in her happiness. Then Erlea dropped her head. “But Nigel would say that we are too late to ride the wave of that movement. He’s all about the next big thing.”

  “Women will always want someone to love them that way. That will never go out of style. And they will always fight against bad lawmakers and bad lovers who want to control them.” Celeste wanted to confess how deeply the song touched her, but she had gotten much too personal for a professional consultation already. Still, Erlea was hanging on her words. “It is like a love song and a fight song, both. There is nothing sappy about those claws,” she added, playfully showing her nails.

  Erlea stared at Celeste’s fingers, then closed her eyes. “If you don’t want to get scratched, don’t hunt me like a dog.” She smiled and met Celeste’s gaze across the little room. “You’re right. It is a love song to strong women.” She stood and laid her guitar aside, stretching.

  Celeste glanced at her phone. “Oh, my. I really must get going.”

  “Thanks for working late,” Erlea said. “For everything, really.”

  “It was a pleasure,” Celeste replied. Too much so.

  Erlea followed her to the door and they touched cheeks good-bye, friends now. “Can we do this again sometime?” Erlea asked softly, her face close enough to kiss.

  Celeste backed into the open door. “I don’t think that—”

  “Oh, shit, I’ve made you uncomfortable again.” Erlea withdrew her warm hands and crossed them over her heart. “I wish I had a time machine, so I could go back and stop myself from doing that.”

  Celeste held herself back, resisting the urge to take Erlea’s sweet face in her hands. “It’s not the past that worries me. Right now, you are my client. And I like you very much, but I must keep clear lines. You understand?”

  “Can you be friends with your clients?” Erlea asked. “Or is that too much?”

  Erlea sounded sincere, not bitter. Celeste sighed. “No, not too much at all.” But so much less than I want. “Thank you. For everything.” Celeste slipped away before she could betray herself.

  Chapter Twelve

  Maji sat quietly on the hard wooden pew, enjoying the solitude and the patterns of color from the early morning light through the stained glass windows.

  “Company approaching on the plaza side,” came Dave’s voice through her earpiece. “Two photogs and a camera van.”

  “Want me to stay put?”

  “They can’t get in. What do you see in there?”

  Looking around at all the frescoes, the stations of the cross, the stained glass, and the gilt work, Maji could almost imagine being here in the 1700s. Well, minus the sneakers and jeans. She’d probably be in rags, a peasant. “Just a really nice church. Soaring ceilings, aroma of incense and candles, the usual.”

  “Way to sell it. You must have grown up with serious Catholic bling if that place does
n’t impress you. No sign of him?”

  “Not everybody with a Spanish surname goes to mass, Brown. But, yeah, it’s pretty cool.” Looking at the emblems of the cockerel on the floor tiles, Maji wondered if Arturo Echeverra had discussed those with his daughter as well. It was pretty funny, roosters all over the floor of an otherwise grand and cathedral-like church. Her own Catholic father would have made it seem hilarious. “And spooky quiet. How long do we give him to show?”

  “Until staff arrive to open the place to the public. Keep checking out the interior. We’ll make sure the press stay out.”

  So Maji wandered to the side chapels, checking out the smaller altars of the saints. None of it spoke to her of a higher power the way the ocean did, or the mountains or desert, for that matter. But the deep silence was soothing.

  The massive front door rattled. “The press seem pretty sure Erlea’s in here.”

  “Roger that. One of them is going around the side of the building.”

  Maji heard movement and faded back into the shadows. A man in work clothes emerged from the sacristy and headed for the rattling door. “Staff’s here already.” Paid off by a news outlet to provide access? “The sexton may be letting them in.”

  “Stay out of sight.”

  “Roger. Rios out.”

  Maji slipped into a shadowed nook. Not a great spot to run from, but…

  “We’re closed!” the sexton yelled through the slot in the front door, first in Catalan and then in Spanish. For good measure he did so one more time, in thickly accented English. Maji couldn’t make out the voices on the other side, but the sexton sounded resolute when he replied, “Come back at ten,” and stomped away. Bless his cranky heart.

  “Still out front. Setting up video,” Dave said, updating her. “Stay put. Any sign of Echeverra?”

  The sexton stopped in the dead center of the church, sweeping his eyes over the side chapels in Maji’s vicinity. “Please tell me you didn’t leave,” he said in a low voice, his Spanish more cultivated than what he’d yelled at the reporters. “It should be safe to talk now.”

  Daddy in the house. Maji waited to hear if Dave had caught Echeverra’s entreaty.

  “Proceed with caution,” Dave instructed.

  Maji stepped out of the shadows. “I’m here.”

  “Beatriz.” Echeverra crossed himself and headed toward her, stopping short when he was a few feet away. “No. Who are you?”

  “A friend of your daughter. Hired to protect her. We needed to make sure it was safe for her to meet the person claiming to be her father.”

  “I know my face is different, but I swear to you, I am Ar—”

  Maji acted alarmed. “No. I haven’t swept this place for bugs. We should go somewhere more secure. The press already thinks”—she mouthed Erlea—“is in here.”

  “I never dreamed the whole world would call her by my pet name,” Echeverra said. “How do I know you are really her friend?”

  Maji gestured toward the flower-petaled stained glass. “She told me about the peek at heaven and”—she pointed to the wall over the altar—“Mary on the half shell.”

  Echeverra laughed. “Oh, what a fool I was. To be angry about such trifles, so pious and self-righteous. What can I do to assure you, and her, that I am me? And that she should see me.”

  Maji was convinced. But she had instructions. “We’ll set up a meeting in a secure location when we’ve verified your identity and what it is you want from her.” He flinched when she reached inside her jacket pocket. “Relax. I’m unarmed. I have a DNA swab. And I promise we’ll keep the testing a secret.”

  “Oh,” he said, taking the vial. “What do I do?”

  “Just scrape the swab inside your cheek and seal it back in the tube.” Maji took a seat on the nearest pew and motioned for him to join her. He sat, perched near the end, still wary.

  “Tell my daughter that I still make sure no one eats the roosters. She’ll understand.” He used the swab and handed the vial back. “Technology. Keeps making it harder for a man to disappear.”

  “Especially one who wants his life back. Do you?”

  “I can never get back the years stolen from my family, the pain of losing me. But I am still committed to peace, and I would help if it did not endanger them.”

  “I’m told the government will wait to prosecute you until after the talks, if you attend.”

  Echeverra gave a bitter laugh. “It was the government who set me up. The National Police infiltrated my group, and the two men who orchestrated the bombing were rewarded with promotions. They are quite high up in government today.”

  Oh, crap. If Romero was with GEO, he was clean. But GEO was under the National Police. How classified was his mission briefing, and who had access to it? Would they hear this? “Stop,” she said. “Don’t say their names out loud. Don’t tell me them at all.”

  “Of course. I should not endanger you for helping. But I have evidence. And if I can get it to…my daughter, she can give it to the press. They pay attention to her. Once it is out, I will be safe and so will my family.”

  Was Romero listening on the comms? The whispering voice of intuition said to get Echeverra out of there. “Sir, it may not be that simple. Who helped you to disappear? Got you papers, changed your face?”

  “Some bad men of a different sort. Criminals. They would sell me out in a minute.”

  Yes, the Nuvoletta would indeed. Intel trading was one of the many rackets that put them on Delta’s hit list. And a corrupt official in the National Police might already have bought whatever they had to sell on Echeverra. “I think we should move this conversation, sir. Now.”

  Romero’s words, “Keep him there,” rang in Maji’s ear. In response, the little voice in her head switched from whisper to scream. Get Echeverra out now, let Dave sort out whether Romero was compromised or not. Get out now.

  * * *

  Maji pressed a finger to her lips and motioned Echeverra to get up and run with her. He clearly knew this place well, so she followed him toward the sacristy, across the church from the side door Maji had used to enter.

  “No one uses the emergency exit but workers,” Echeverra said, starting to suck wind after only a short jog down the back hall.

  “Stop,” Romero commanded as they rounded the next corner.

  Echeverra smacked into him and flailed backward, panic on his face.

  Maji caught him and stepped between the two men, keeping both within reach. “Stay calm,” she urged.

  “Yes, please.” Romero stood with his hands out in a placating gesture, his suit tidy as always. “Ms. Rios, I am on your side.”

  “Maybe you are,” Maji said, “but consider who you work for.” She avoided the words National Police. Echeverra already looked close enough to a heart attack.

  “I understand your concern,” Romero said with a tiny nod. “But my unit is very much like your unit,” he said, using the name Delta used for itself, with emphasis. “If you had a general under suspicion of corruption, wouldn’t you investigate? Independently.”

  So she was getting her operator-to-operator talk after all. Maji had pictured chatting over beers, but this would do. “You may be clean. But are you sure your team isn’t compromised? Because this man is under my protection now. So I need to be sure, too.”

  “Downshift, Rios,” Dave’s voice said. “Our team will escort them both. Hand him over at the back entrance. Play nice.”

  Romero heard that, too, Maji realized as he flashed her a brief, hopeful smile. But he spoke to Echeverra. “We have had Aguilar under watch for years, Mr. Echeverra. He’s on the brink of retirement and likely to disappear if we don’t get him soon. We haven’t confirmed the second man’s identity, but if you have proof, we’ll gladly take him down, too.” He met Maji’s watchful gaze again. “I’m going to reach inside my jacket for my ID. Okay?”

  Maji nodded.

  Echeverra read the ID to himself. “Internal Affairs, eh? You don’t think I’m a terrorist, then
?”

  “That will depend on the evidence you provide,” Romero admitted. “But I hope not. My wife is Basque. I understand that peace is long overdue.”

  “Sounds like you have a lot to talk about,” Maji said. “Mr. Echeverra, will you go with him?”

  Echeverra nodded. “You will keep Beatriz safe?”

  “Yes, sir.” Maji shook his hand and walked back through the church. “Dave, you got another exit in mind for me?”

  “Out the way you came. Keep the paparazzi focused on you,” he instructed. “Put on a show if you have to. Anything but singing.”

  “Roger that. Listen for the side door.”

  The minute Maji appeared in the alley, a voice rang out, “Erlea. Over here. Hey, I’ve got her.”

  Maji turned quickly, as if startled, and headed for the main plaza. “One guy in the alley, behind me,” she told Dave. At the corner she paused and peeked out to check on the video crew. A local constable was gesticulating at them while giving a lecture on parking in the pedestrian plaza. She started across it at a slow jog, watching her footing on the uneven paving.

  Hearing a shout behind her, Maji glanced back and saw a guy with the video camera on his shoulder leave his fellow journalist to deal with parking enforcement. Fortunately, he couldn’t gain much speed while looking through a viewfinder and running over the treacherous stone surface.

  She could be out of range in seconds, if she didn’t prolong the diversion. “What do you need from me?”

  “Just take your time,” Dave replied. “Clear the plaza, duck into that café with the green awning. A white van’s waiting by the back door.”

  “Roger that.”

  Behind her, there was a thud and crunch followed by a keening laced with curses. Maji glanced back and saw the videographer on the ground, clutching his knee. With all eyes on her, his colleagues didn’t seem to notice. She sprinted back to him and knelt by his side.

  “Medic,” he gasped, all the color drained from his face.

  Maji stood and pointed at the constable by the camera van. “You. Call a medic,” she yelled at him in Catalan.