by Gini Koch
Siler shook his head. “He’s more than that. Much more.”
“He in your line of work? Whatever that line or lines actually is, I mean?”
“No.” Siler took a step, and Prince took a leap. Siler was back against the wall, Prince’s forepaws on his chest, Prince’s growling, teeth-bared muzzle in his face. “Ah, a little help?”
“I’m with the dog,” Buchanan said. “Where were you planning to go just now?”
“Honestly, I just want to sit down.”
“Floor’s free,” Christopher offered, not at all nicely.
“He needs to check in,” Jeff said. “He’s late to do so, and he wants to tell those he’s checking in with about Jenkins’ interest in Kitty.”
In addition to people and a pet we loved, and all of our historical data, what Centaurion Division had also lost during Operation Infiltration was confidence. We’d been infiltrated and taken over, our people controlled, kidnapped, and murdered. Imageering and Field, which was made up mostly of empaths, had been severely hampered because of all the empathic inhibitors our enemies had come up with and whatever the hell they’d done to the digital airwaves to block the imageers.
Considering that up until then we’d felt pretty impregnable, and Hacker International had felt they’d had the best of the best computer security in place, being taken over as easily as we were was shattering.
So it was nice to hear Jeff interpreting emotions again. He’d done it less and less because he wasn’t trusting himself. Whatever else might come, Siler being here and giving Jeff a good emotions-reading workout was a good thing.
In the olden days—you know, a year ago—in the situation we were in, we’d have taken everyone to Dulce, gone into lockdown, and figured out what to do from there. Now, we were pretty much running lost and more than a little scared. It was an uncomfortable, unnatural feeling.
“Missus Chief, call your canine cohort off, please. He should stay ready, of course.”
“Of course. Prince, we’re going to let him sit on the floor. If he doesn’t sit, take him out.”
Siler shot me a dirty look, but when Prince went back to all fours, he sank back to the floor. “Thanks. Look, other . . . things . . . are going to happen if I don’t make contact.”
“Do we let him check in?” Christopher asked. “Or do we take him into custody?”
“I want to know exactly who he wants to check in with,” Buchanan said.
“I want to know what the other things are,” Jeff mentioned. “He’s stressed about them, but the what isn’t clear.”
“Where would we take him to?” Tito asked. “Someone who can go invisible can escape police custody.”
Something was nagging at me. “I have a question. I don’t know if anyone can actually answer it, but Nightcrawler, if you can, do me a solid and tell me the truth.”
He shrugged. “If I can.”
“Okay. Is what’s going on, all of it, designed to get us to do what we used to do, which would be to run to Dulce and go into lockdown?”
Siler’s eyes flicked to Jeff and back to me. “Yes.”
“Aha, you knew Jeff had already read your emotional answer.”
“Pretty much.”
“Whatever works. Okay, so here’s my follow up question. Why? Why are all of our enemies, and I guess some of our friends, trying to get us to grab everyone and go across the country? Is it to protect us? Or is it to herd us into one spot and conveniently get rid of all of us in one fell swoop?”
Siler opened his mouth and my phone rang. Heaved a sigh, dropped my Glock back into my purse, dug my phone out, and took a look. Recognized the number this time.
“Hello, how’s it going, Squeaky?”
“Squeaky?” Yep, it was my favorite Julia Child impersonator, otherwise known as Mrs. Nancy Maurer. “What in the world?”
“Squeaky?” Jeff asked quietly.
I shrugged to indicate that I wasn’t in a position to explain this to him. Tito grinned at me, then pulled Jeff and Christopher closer to Buchanan and Siler so he and Buchanan could quietly explain what the others had missed.
Buchanan tossed me his little phone-location-finder device thing. Plugged it in like a good girl as I continued on with my phone call. “It’s your new code name. I think it fits you. So, whassup?”
“How is it that you’re American Centaurion’s top lobbyist, let alone their head diplomat?”
“You know, I ask that question all the time. No one gives me an answer I can believe, and yet, here I am anyway. So, Squeaky, are you calling to ask for a donation, to shoot the breeze, or to relay information, threats, or requests for help?”
“I’m calling to ask you why your husband is going to be running for vice president. They wanted to hurt you all before, but now? Now I don’t know what they’ll do, but I guarantee it will be terrible.” She took a ragged breath and I realized she was crying.
“Are you alone?”
“Right now, yes. He’s not my son, not any more. I didn’t raise him to hate other people, let alone hurt them. His father would be devastated to see what his son is turning into, and nothing I do or say has any impact.”
“We’re talking about Cameron Maurer, right? Your son?”
“Y-yes.”
“When did he start acting . . . unlike himself?”
“Right after the invasion. He was so pro-alien before then, telling me all about the wonderful new world we’d see once all of your people were able to fully integrate into our society. And then, he took his family to Europe for a vacation and when he came back, he was this . . . this . . . hatemonger.”
“Does your son know you don’t approve of his, ah, change of heart?”
“Yes, but I gave up trying to change his mind months ago.”
“Yeah, I’ll bet. What about his wife and kids?”
“The children and Crystal are home in Cincinnati. Why?”
“Have they been any different?”
“Ah, well . . .”
“Cough it out there, Squeaky.”
“Fine,” she snapped. “I don’t care much for my daughter-in-law. She’s much more driven by the idea of being married to a powerful man than anything else. She seems much happier since they got back from Europe and my son . . . changed. My grandchildren are wonderful, of course.”
“Of course.” So, if what I was suspecting was true, Crystal Maurer wouldn’t know or care, or else she was in on it because she was a typical political virago. I’d ask Culver for her thoughts later, you know, whenever we got to reunite with everyone else again. Right now, my gut told me I had an old lady to save. “Where are you? Exactly, I mean.”
“I went out to get some fresh air, I mean, that’s what I told them, but I didn’t know where else to go or what else to do, so I went to the park.”
“And your son and whoever else working the campaign, they let you go there alone? No guards or anything?”
“Yes. I come here all the time. Usually alone. Again, why?”
“This city is lousy with parks, Squeaky. I need a park name, and the major cross streets wouldn’t hurt, either.”
“Why do you need to know where I am?” She sounded legitimately confused. It was sweet, in a scary way.
Thought about how to say this without panicking her. Decided to go for it. “Squeaky, I’d like to know how good you are at following directions.”
“Fair to middling, I suppose. Why?”
“Because I think you’re in danger. Or they’re using you to get to us, which means we’re in danger, too. But we’re far more used to danger than you are, I’d wager.”
“Should I call the police?”
Looked at Prince and decided I wouldn’t really be lying. “No. I’m about to bring the police to you. If, you know, you ever tell me where the hell you are.”
“I—”
“Squeaky?”
“Oh thank you so much for calling, dear. It was lovely catching up. I must dash now, though. I’ll see you soon, I hope.”
>
And with that, the phone went dead.
CHAPTER 20
“MALCOLM, figure out how to keep Nightcrawler under control. We have a situation and I think saving a little old lady is going to take precedence over our Junior Assassin.”
Explained the phone call and how it had ended while Buchanan used his doohickey to figure out where Mrs. Maurer actually was, or at least had been.
“You sure you can trust this?” Christopher asked. “She could be playing you, to get you to come save her and go right into a trap.”
“She could have been, and I’m not saying she wasn’t. But she was crying and I think it was real. And . . . from what she said . . . I think . . .” Considered if I should say what I thought out loud, in front of Siler. Then again, out of everyone in the room, he’d be the least surprised. “I think Cameron Maurer has been turned into an android.”
To their great credit, none of the men with me asked if I was high or just guessing wildly. “Why?” Jeff asked.
“He used to be pro-alien, took the family to Europe for vacation, and came back a raging xenophobe who isn’t the man this woman raised anymore.”
“Sounds right,” Siler said.
“I have to ask—since when do assassins take this level of interest in all this political brouhaha?”
Siler laughed. “Since always. Sometimes we’re killing good guys. And sometimes we’re killing bad guys to stop them from killing good guys.”
“Whoever pays best and/or contracts first?”
“Something like that. And your uncles have taken a greater interest because of you. We police our own, and you have one of our own we want dead.”
“Oh, Annette Dier. Yeah, that bitch is still alive, and giving us nothing. Maybe later, after we save the scared old lady, I’ll ask my mom to let you have a go at her.”
Siler raised his eyebrow. “Seriously? You’re going to trust me with that kind of prisoner access?”
“If we let you live that long,” Buchanan said. “However, if we want to save Missus Maurer or, you know, head right into a trap, we need to move.” He pulled a pair of handcuffs I didn’t even know he carried out of somewhere and slapped one end onto Siler’s right wrist and the other onto his own left wrist. “I’ll be keeping you close. And don’t think that you can use hyperspeed on me to cause me issues. Our good doctor’s solved that particular problem.”
Hyperspeed was hard as hell on humans—it always caused vomiting, and blacking out wasn’t uncommon. Tito was amazing, however, and he’d figured out how to create a Hyperspeed Dramamine. Every human agent working with American Centaurion and Centaurion Division took it daily.
Fortunately, when we’d lost all of our data, Tito’s laptop had been offline and off system. Meaning we had all his research, which had included the secret formula for this medicine. We had only his research or whatever information his laptop had held, but, as I was reminded by our scientific teams and Hacker International, some data was a lot better than none.
“You think it’s a trap, Malcolm?”
“No idea, Missus Chief. I think we’re going to go in ready, however.”
As soon as Siler was officially in Buchanan’s custody, Prince trotted back over to me. He respected Buchanan as an impressive officer, but Jeff had saved Prince’s life during Operation Assassination and they had a Special Bond too, as far as Prince was concerned.
Jeff knew it, too, and though he tried to pretend he didn’t think Prince was better than any other animal, he thought the dog was smart and brave. Jeff hoisted Prince under his arm and took my hand with his free one. “Where are we headed?”
Buchanan sighed. “Bartholdi Park.”
“Isn’t that around the U.S. Botanic Garden?” Tito asked. “That’s close to the Capitol.”
“Which makes a lot of sense for where she could go alone,” Buchanan said. “She was at Cleary-Maurer headquarters earlier, and that’s not too far from the Gardens.”
I grabbed Tito’s hand, and Christopher took Siler’s uncuffed one. Thusly connected, we headed out of the embassy. “Should we lock up behind us?”
“No,” Buchanan said. “I’ve asked for teams to come in and verify that the building is sound.” He looked at Siler out of the side of his eye. “Unless there’s something else you’d like to tell us about.”
Siler shook his head. “No, if you found all the bombs, it’s clean.”
“How many were there?” I was just curious about how badly Siler had wanted to kill me and himself.
“Seven,” Siler replied.
“Eight,” Buchanan countered.
Siler stopped. “No. There were seven.”
“He’s not lying.” Jeff sounded worried.
“We found eight,” Buchanan said. Christopher nodded. “One was on a shorter timer than the others.”
“I only put seven in. How many did they find at the Israeli embassy? I planted seven there, too.”
“Eight again,” Buchanan replied. “And one there was on a shorter timer than the others. We assumed it was the trigger and the others were on separate timers in case triggering didn’t work.”
“No. They were set to give me plenty of time to ensure I was out of range and so was anyone who we cared about, and by ‘we’ I think you know who I mean, and by anyone we cared about, I mean Miss Katt here and those in her ever-widening circle.”
“Wow, you’re big on dropping the clues all of a sudden.” The only people who called me Miss Katt with any regularity since I’d married Jeff were my “uncles” the assassins. Meaning Siler wanted us to know that he was working with them, without confirming so out loud. Why was the Question of the Moment, which I filed as question fifty-one after the fifty other Questions of the Moment this afternoon’s festivities had identified as being vital to answer.
“We need to be sure there aren’t any more bombs in here, or in the Israeli embassy, especially since there are a ton of people in the Israeli embassy.” Why I was the one having to point this out was just another one of Life’s Little Mysteries today seemed determined to share with me.
“We can’t do this and save Missus Maurer at the same time,” Jeff pointed out.
“Malcolm, Nightcrawler, and Christopher could stay here and search. Christopher could get them to safety if needed. And the four of us are equipped to handle anything.”
“We are?” Tito asked.
“Hush.”
Buchanan made the exasperation sound. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but fine. By now, Missus Maurer could be long gone, either via abduction or simply a lack of patience waiting for you to show up to save her. Or their trap could be all set up. Or all of the above.”
“Keep in touch,” Jeff said. “Find out what Siler was going to tell Kitty before she got this call, too. Trust me,” he said to Siler, “they’ll use far more unpleasant methods than mine. Cooperate, you’ll be happy you did.” Then we took off.
I stopped us as soon as we were out of sight of the embassy, which, thanks to hyperspeed, was a second later. “Jeff, you and Prince need to go to the Israeli embassy.”
“Yeah,” he said as Prince shared that he didn’t have Tito’s Special Hyperspeed Dramamine and hacked. But, even though Jeff was still holding him, he hacked away from us. What a good dog. “I picked up what you want to do. I’m not wild about your plan, though.”
“My parents and some of our closest friends are at the Israeli embassy, and while we all think everyone’s found all the bombs, Siler may be the only one who can be sure. Everyone else, besides the six of us and Prince, are at the Pontifex’s Residence. Siler confirmed that everyone’s trying to herd us. Maybe it’s our friends who want us in Dulce. Our enemies probably just want us all somewhere they can blow up conveniently. You know everyone’s going to listen to you more than me on this one.”
“Not necessarily.” Jeff’s turn to make the exasperation sound. “I don’t want you going alone, and before either one of you start listing your competencies, you’re not A-Cs.”
/>
Dug my phone out and made the call. He answered right away. “Missus Martini, how go things wherever you happen to be?”
“Interestingly as always, Mister White. I need you and your mad skills over at Bartholdi Park. Please don’t tell anyone where you’re going, if you’d be so kind. Jeff will be there shortly and share the news at that time.”
“As always, I live to serve. I’ll bring your catsuit with me?”
“Indeed. I should be there in, oh, five minutes. If I don’t get lost.”
“Ah. Won’t be a moment.” He hung up.
Shrugged and dropped my phone back into my purse. “Richard will meet me.”
“Actually,” White said from behind me, “I felt it would be wiser to find you and have us go together. I’m sure Jeffrey would prefer that as well.”
“How did you know where we were?”
White held up his phone. “GPS tracking. I had our computer specialists teach me how to track anyone using my phone.”
“Wow.” That had never occurred to me. Decided to save being bitter that White hadn’t shared until now for a later time.
“Dog with me or you?” Jeff asked, in the resigned tone of someone who’s played out the argument in his head already and has accepted his crushing defeat.
“You. Officer Melville will be worried about him.”
Prince was done barfing and he barked. He objected to this plan. Emphatically.
“Or, um, Richard could carry Prince.”
Prince wuffed that this was far more acceptable.
“The dog is insisting on going with you?” Jeff’s tone was now Man Resigned to Living in a Mental Institution.
“Yes.”
“I’ll go with you, Jeff,” Tito said, clearly trying not to laugh. “I want to make sure everyone there is fully organic anyway. I think we’re going to want the reassurance.”
“How will Kitty and Richard know if Missus Maurer is a human or not?”
“We’ll wing it.”
“Oh,” Jeff said as I leaned up and kissed him. “So, routine.”
CHAPTER 21
JEFF GAVE PRINCE TO WHITE, White took my hand in his free one, and the three of us zipped off.