Lineage Most Lethal

by S. C. Perkins

  Serena and Jo looked at each other, then back at me.

  “This must be big drama if you’re going top shelf,” Serena said.

  “And something must be really wrong if you’re forgoing rocks for frozen,” added Josephine. “You told me last time that slushy drinks should only have low alcohol content so you can drink more of them and crunch on all those lovely little bits of ice.”

  “Ohhh, don’t say ‘ice,’” I groaned.

  Ana, seeing that something was amiss with me, brought me an order of guacamole and chips before the other table of four guys who’d ordered ahead of us.

  “Hey,” one guy complained as I scooped up a liberal amount and practically stuffed it into my mouth, “we ordered ours five minutes ago.”

  “You have your choice,” Ana replied, leaning casually on their table with one hand. “You can wait until I get yours, or you can try to take that one away from Lucy.” A broad smile with just a touch of challenge spread across her face. “Go ahead, I would like to see what happens. Lucy may be pequeña, but she is—” She turned to Josephine and me, and said, “¿Cómo se dice ‘poderosa’ en inglés?”

  “‘Mighty,’” Josephine replied at once with a laugh.

  “Small but mighty,” Serena said, giving me grin. “Yep, that about sums you up.”

  The guys at the other table gave us sullen looks mixed with a little fear and didn’t attempt to take my guacamole. Which was good, because we would have had a second stabbing that night if they’d tried.

  “Now,” Josephine said when Ana left with our order and the four guys weren’t paying us any attention. “Spill the tea.”

  “Huh?” I said through a mouthful of guacamole-loaded tortilla chip.

  She turned to Josephine. “This is what happens when you’re besties with someone who spends so much time with their head in the past. They know archaic phrases like ‘Bob’s your uncle’ and ‘the bee’s knees,’ but they’re woefully undereducated when it comes to modern slang.”

  “Darling,” Josephine replied, “that’s what she has us for. To drag her into the twenty-first century.” She grabbed my non-tortilla-chip-holding arm and pretended to yank on it.

  “Very true,” Serena said, eyeing me like she had quite a bit of dragging me into the current century to do before she’d be confident I was at one with the times.

  I gave my friends a haughty look, which I was totally up to doing now that my blood sugar had resumed normal levels. “May I actually spill some tea now, ladies, or are you going to continue to blather until our food comes?”

  “Blather,” Serena said. “See what I mean? She belongs in another era.”

  “I take that as a compliment,” I said.

  “Of course you do, darling,” Josephine said with a grin. “But please do spill. We’ve been on pins and needles since you texted us the words ‘high drama.’”

  I glanced over at the table of guys next to us. Ana had brought them their guacamole—a very generous scoop, I noticed—and they attacked it with gusto, paying us absolutely no mind.

  “I just came from being interviewed by the police. The chef at the Hotel Sutton was killed today. Someone stabbed him in the ear canal with a leopard-handled ice pick.”

  Josephine gave a horrified gasp. Serena sat back, nodding at me like the proud mother of a certified gossip monger. “Now that’s some tea.”

  * * *

  Two fish tacos later—one fried in Flaco’s special tempura-style batter because I was feeling naughty, and the other grilled because I was trying to be good, and both with an extra spoonful of Flaco’s delicious lime crema and a good layer of pico de gallo—I drove back to the Hotel Sutton. Thinking of Grandpa’s earlier words about being watched, I took a roundabout way, checking to make sure I wasn’t followed. I felt a bit safer when I found that Mrs. P. or someone had locked the hotel’s front doors earlier than normal, making guests like me have to use their access key to get in.

  Standing at Mrs. P.’s desk was Terrence, the relatively new night porter, whom I’d heard Pippa and Mrs. P. refer to, but had never met until now. I introduced myself and asked if Mrs. P. was still around.

  “No, ma’am, she went home with a headache after being interviewed about Chef Rocky,” he said, his voice somber. “She was mighty broken up, as we all are. It’s shocking, that’s for sure.”

  “It definitely is,” I said. I was about to thank him and go upstairs, but instead I asked, “Did you know Chef Rocky well?”

  Terrence stood about six foot four and had some impressive muscles showing underneath his hotel uniform of a white shirt, black vest, and black pants. I recalled Pippa calling him a gentle soul, even though he’d worked as a bouncer before coming to the Hotel Sutton, where he doubled as extra security. He shook his head.

  “Not really. I’ve only been working here since Thanksgiving, and Chef Rocky has always been busy in the kitchen for the dinner rush when I came on duty. Fact is, I’ve barely even had a conversation with him—not a real one, at least, because he was always working. When he was done for the night, he never stuck around, either. He was out the back doors and gone in that sweet black Porsche of his.”

  Then Terrence screwed up his face. “Come to think of it, he did come talk to me once, a few days after I started here. He asked me if I ever did any personal-security work.” He made a fist and softly hit it on the desk in consternation. “Damn, I forgot to mention this to the cop who interviewed me.”

  Though I was exhausted, I perked up at his words. “Personal-security work? Was he worried for his safety?”

  “Nah,” Terrence said. “He said it was for a friend of his. I gave him my card and told him to tell the guy to contact me, but his friend would’ve had to pay really well to get me to leave this job.” He shrugged his big shoulders. “I never heard from the friend, so I forgot all about it.”

  “Any chance you think Chef Rocky could have been lying, and he really needed protection for himself?” I asked.

  Terrence gave me a hint of a sad smile. “At the time? No ma’am, I was sure.” His expression sobered again. “Though now I wonder what he could have been mixed up in. An ice pick in the ear is no joke, and not a random act, either. You’d need black ops training or doctor training to get that right. I’ve heard of contract hits like that and I gotta say, someone must’ve hated Chef Rocky real bad.”

  On that unpleasant thought, I thanked Terrence and went upstairs.

  I showered and crawled into bed, my mind still whirring. I hadn’t told my best friends that Grandpa knew the man who’d died at the hotel yesterday, and I definitely hadn’t mentioned that my grandfather was a real, honest-to-goodness spy. Or had been for many years, at least. That information was just now truly beginning to sink into my brain and my heart.

  I thought about the things Grandpa had said to me over the years, the stories he’d told me of his life, of his work, and of his dreams when he’d been younger. Were those stories, those dreams, real? Or were they fabrications of a man taught to lie when lying was a skill he’d needed to survive—to help us win the war, for pity’s sake—and who had never quite gotten used to being able to live a life where he needed nothing but the truth?

  It was nearly an hour later that I finally fell asleep, but I did so with a lighter heart. Grandpa had never given me cause to doubt him and, in the end, I decided I had two choices. I could either question everything Grandpa had ever said to me, or I could believe him when he said that he only lied when absolutely necessary, and to protect others.

  I decided to believe.

  TWENTY-SIX

  In my dream, I was in a baseball game. It was my turn at bat. The pitcher kept throwing the ball, which turned into a palm frond, each time falling short of my bat’s reach. I kept swinging, becoming more and more frustrated. And with the last two throws, a bee was buzzing around me.

  “You’re not close enough, Ms. Lancaster,” came the voice of the catcher behind me. “And yet you’re too close. You’re always too clo
se.”

  I knew that voice, and turned to see a pair of blue eyes with green around the pupils looking out at me from the grill of a catcher’s mask. I wanted to ask him why he hadn’t called me, but the words wouldn’t come out of my mouth.

  The bee buzzed again and the umpire yelled, “Strike!” I sat up, breathing heavily, blinking at the clock by my bed. It wasn’t even midnight; I’d barely been asleep three hours.

  Bzzzzz. My phone, on vibrate, signaled a voice mail. It was an unfamiliar number, but it had called twice, leaving a message each time. This had been the bee in my dreams.

  My eyes too bleary to read the transcription of the message that came up in my voicemail, I played the message back. I was out of bed and searching for my jeans as soon as I heard the words, “Ms. Lancaster, this is Dr. Kristen Brozo from Austin Regional Medical Center. Your grandfather will be okay, but he’s been badly hurt in a car accident. We were given your number to call. Please call us back at the following number…”

  I got ahold of the nurse as I tore out of the hotel’s parking lot. All she could tell me was that my grandfather was in intensive care, but was in stable condition at present. The doctor, I was told, would explain things when I got to the hospital, as they could not give out any other information over the phone.

  Despite the late hour, parking in the hospital garage seemed to take forever and I uttered a long stream of blue words every time my forward motion was impeded. Then finding my way to the right desk nearly had me in tears, until a nurse looked at my stricken face and escorted me to intensive care.

  I asked for Dr. Brozo, and after a few agonizing minutes, a blond beauty who could have been Pippa’s sister walked up and introduced herself. She wore teal-colored scrubs under her white doctor’s coat, and the requisite stethoscope hung across her shoulders. Her hair was parted on the side and tied back in a low ponytail and her eyes were an ice blue. Though instead of being cold, they were kind and sparkling with intelligence. I felt her confident and calming presence on my frayed nerves and was grateful.

  “Is my grandfather still okay?” I asked, wiping tears away from my face with the sleeve of my sweater. “Please tell me he’s still okay. And when can I see him?”

  Dr. Brozo led me around the nurse’s station to a little alcove with a water dispenser. “He’ll be all right, Ms. Lancaster. Your grandfather got really lucky. But he’s banged up and in a lot of pain from a few broken ribs. He’ll need to stay here for a couple of days at least. However, he was alert and able to talk when he came in. He knew his name and the year, and he asked after you.” Her lips curled up into a pretty smile. “In fact, he seemed more with it than some of our patients half his age.”

  “He is,” I said, anxious for her to know my grandfather wasn’t your typical ninety-two-year-old man. “I was with him all today, and I was with him at his most recent checkup not too long ago. He’s healthy in mind and body.”

  She smiled again. “Good. We have him sedated right now, so he’s asleep. You can see him after we talk, but he’ll likely sleep until the morning.”

  I nodded, feeling like I was going to ugly cry if I said a word. She handed me some cool water in a paper cup and I sipped it, letting it soothe my throat.

  “What happened?” I finally asked. “How was Grandpa involved in a car accident? He barely drives these days, and almost never at night.”

  “This is what I know, Ms. Lancaster,” Dr. Brozo said. She checked her notes, then nodded to herself that she remembered the details correctly.

  “Your grandfather was driving in a residential area of Wimberley around seven fifteen this evening. At a crossroads, your granddad had the right of way and was driving through when another car blew through the stop sign, hitting the tail end of your granddad’s car and sending him into an embankment. The other driver drove off without stopping. A good Samaritan was about fifty yards away and saw the accident, but couldn’t get the driver’s license plate. He only got a brief look at the driver and could only say the person looked elderly as well. The gentleman immediately called nine-one-one and checked your granddad’s vitals. He stayed with him, talking to him, until the ambulance came.”

  “But then how did Grandpa get here?” I asked, pointing at the floor. “To Austin Regional?”

  Dr. Brozo said, “Due to his advanced age, it was felt that he should be brought here, just in case. Also, apparently your grandfather was lucid enough to ask the gentleman to write down your name and phone number, saying that you specifically should be called.” She pulled out a slip of paper from the pocket of her doctor’s coat.

  “There’s also another word on here,” Dr. Brozo said. “Is your grandfather a bird watcher?”

  I frowned. “No, why?”

  She gave me the paper, which was folded in half. Inside, I saw my name and number written in a neat, masculine hand. Underneath it, in all caps, was the word GREENFINCH.

  “Could it be his address?” Dr. Brozo asked. “Or possibly the name of the street where he was going in Wimberley?”

  “Not his address,” I said. “I couldn’t tell you if there’s a street in Wimberley called Greenfinch, but I’ll look it up later. Thanks for this.” I tucked it into my wallet for safekeeping. Now that I knew Grandpa was going to be all right—in time, at least—the anger that had accompanied my fear was taking center stage.

  Someone, even if it were an elderly someone, ran into my grandfather and took off without even stopping. Grandpa could have been killed!

  Even the objective side of me, who knew Grandpa’s area was filled with elderly citizens, didn’t make me feel any better. I was growing livid, but I strove to stay focused on the positive.

  “And what about the gentleman who found my grandfather? Do you have his name? I’d like to thank him.”

  “You’ll have to check with the police on that,” Dr. Brozo said. “To my knowledge, he didn’t give his name. As I understand the report, he gave his account of the accident and this paper to the EMT technician and then left.” She then motioned for me to follow her. “Come on. Your grandfather’s asleep but you can go see him now.”

  I began to follow. I was feeling calmer, but anxious to see Grandpa for myself. Then the events of earlier today caught up with me, and I remembered one big detail. My grandfather was a spy, and keeping his lips from becoming loose was of the utmost importance to him. I stopped in my tracks. “Dr. Brozo?” She turned and walked back to me.

  I looked around and didn’t see anyone watching us. Still, I lowered my voice. “Look, my grandfather was in World War Two.” I paused. “Specifically, he worked in intelligence. I know he’ll be concerned he might say … you know, things he probably shouldn’t while sedated, and it will stress him out to think that he might have spoken about … you know, whatever things he knows and has never spoken about. Is there a way we could put him in a private room?”

  I was also already thinking about hiring a private nurse for him, one who could keep her mouth shut about any ramblings about “V for Victory,” palm fronds, microdots, and Montblancs, to say the least, so it took me a second to realize what Dr. Brozo just said.

  “I beg your pardon?” I said, blinking.

  “It’s already been done, Ms. Lancaster,” she said. “In fact, he has a guard on his room. Within minutes of your granddad showing up, I received a call from one of my hospital administrators saying that your granddad should be kept private, and someone would be arriving to stand outside his door. The dude was there when we wheeled your granddad into his room, matching the description I was given. Big guy. Not half bad-looking, either, if you like the strong-jawed and silent types.”

  Her eyes were twinkling, but mine narrowed. “Who made this call to put a guard on him?” I asked, not caring that I sounded suspicious.

  Dr. Brozo hitched her shoulders. “I’m afraid I don’t know. It’s above my pay grade, as they say.” She looked around, then lowered her voice to just above a whisper. “Though I’ve only seen a guard like that once before, and
we knew he was, shall we say, government-issued. No one is getting to your grandfather, that’s for sure.”

  She smiled at me again when I still looked hesitant. “Look, my great-grandfather was World War Two as well. Worked on the atomic bomb, and died as a result of Agent Orange. The point is, I get your concern, and so I’ve assigned him Nurse Angelique, who was a former army nurse. She’ll work with your granddad until we know he’s off any meds that might make him loose-lipped. And if the guard is for any reason not on the side of the angels, Angelique will find out and send him packing, believe me.”

  My eyes welled up again in gratitude. “Thank you,” I whispered, unable to say it louder.

  “Don’t mention it,” she replied, turning to lead me to see Grandpa. She and I both had to show our IDs to the guard, who was about six-three, bald, square-jawed, and had the Fed Face down to a science. Once he checked us both off, I introduced myself and asked him who had sent him. It would be the only time I got a hint of a smile from him. “’Fraid I can’t tell you that, Ms. Lancaster.”

  “You can’t tell me, or you won’t?” I asked.

  “Both, Ms. Lancaster,” he said. “But the hospital administration is aware of the situation.”

  “Right,” I replied. Dr. Brozo had just told me as much. “Thank you for keeping my grandfather safe, then.”

  He nodded and held the door open for me with one long, muscular arm, and I rushed in to Grandpa’s side.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  I slept in a chair by Grandpa, holding his hand, and woke with a start when I heard him croak, “Lucy, my darlin’.”

  Nurse Angelique and Dr. Brozo were in the room in moments, checking him over. The pain quickly overwhelmed him, though, and he was given more medications to make him sleep. In the brief moments I had with Grandpa alone while he was conscious, I promised him his friend John McMahon was taking care of his cat, Bertie, that he was being guarded, and that he hadn’t spoken while under the influence. This made him more restful as he started to drift back off.