Finally, Torq stood and gave me a hand up, looking sexy in a hot, sweaty, dusty hero sort of way that sent my meager flirting skills packing and left me practically speechless.
“Anyone ever tell you this camp is hell on automobiles?” I said. Cars, I could talk about. “I suppose this is part of the deluxe, custom spy camp package we paid extra for?”
He didn’t answer, just sort of cleared his throat. That’s when we simultaneously noticed we were still holding hands and each let go self-consciously.
“Hey,” I said to cover the uncomfortable silence, “fifteen years of a clean driving record literally blown to smithereens. This better not affect my car insurance rates or I’ll never forgive you guys. That blown-tire thing was not my fault. That was probably a defective tire. And the explosion, no way did I do that.”
“I’m sure the camp will cover it—” Torq was interrupted by Max charging us.
“Domino!” Max pulled me into a full-body hug.
Max’s hair was peppered with dust and sand and the odd leaf, and his face was streaked with dirt and sweat, but was I glad to see him!
“I’m really sorry about nearly mowing you down and squashing you into a roadside pancake,” I said, getting teary-eyed as I broke free from his grip. “How’d you—”
Max did a little dodge-and-duck move. “I’ve got the moves. I’m quick on my feet,” he said. “I saw the tire blow and hit the pavement facedown. Thank goodness you steered away from me. The car flew right over me.”
“I think Torq did that,” I said, flashing Torq a smile. “Where’s everybody else?”
As if on cue, our fellow CTs emerged one by one from behind cacti and trees, large rocks, whatever cover they’d found.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” Torq said to Max and me. “They’ve actually learned something.” Then he addressed the group. “Excellent work, CTs. Looks like everyone dies another day.” Then he grinned.
There was a general buzz as CTs gathered around us. Emma pushed to the front of the group.
“Now that’s grandstanding if I’ve ever seen it.” She pulled me into a hug. “How do you get all the luck?” When I didn’t answer, she said, “Is this camp fantastic or what? Two car explosions in less than a week.”
Oh, that.
Torq and the two NASCAR guys stepped away from the group and consulted among themselves while speculation ran high among the CTs and the car continued to burn off in the distance. Surrounded by sand, it wasn’t going to damage anything else.
“No way that car could’ve exploded on its own. No way, man,” Ethan said. “With that roll bar installed, it was designed to roll and protect the vehicle, not get beat up. No way the fuel system could’ve gotten damaged. Not from what we seen. It friggin’ had to be rigged as part of the camp.”
Heads nodded all around.
“But wouldn’t it be dangerous to carry explosives on board?” I said.
“Hell, no,” Wade said, like he was some sort of expert. “Explosives are inert until detonated.”
Heads nodded. The group consensus seemed to be that the explosion was a planned part of the camp experience gone a little awry by the untimely tire blowout that almost took out Max. The eyewitness accounts all corroborated the same thing—the car exploded only once we were safely away. In my mind I couldn’t figure out how else Torq knew the car was going to explode. But if the explosion was staged, how did that explain his apparently genuine urgency in getting us out?
“But why would they blow up an expensive, modified training vehicle?” I protested. The banker in me didn’t see the sense in blowing up a capital asset.
“Why do they do anything here?” Bishop answered. “For the thrill.”
The answer satisfied everyone but me. “The tire thing still bothers me,” I said. “Torq checked them just before we went out. How would one suddenly blow? It makes no sense.”
“Oh, hell,” Ethan said. “Like you’ve never seen dead tires alongside the road. You think those were planned? Tires blow out all the time. Maybe you ran over something. Like a nail.”
“On the track?”
Ethan shrugged. “You could’ve picked it up anywhere. Or a cactus needle. Hell, who knows?” He glanced over at the smoldering car, a look of childish awe in his eyes. “Looks like we’re never gonna know now.”
Rockford roared up in a Hummer and jumped out to talk with Torq and the two driving instructors. They spoke in low voices so we couldn’t hear, but there was a whole lot of gesturing going on and Rockford looked none too pleased about something. I was guessing the torched car. Everyone else chalked it up to the blowout.
After a few minutes Rockford stalked over to me. “Get in the Hummer. I’m taking you back to the compound for a medical evaluation. I’ve called a doctor friend of mine. He’s on his way now.”
I waited for Rockford’s doctor friend in the sick bay, leafing through the only reading material available—old copies of the Wall Street Journal. Geez, that Rockford was a real cheapskate. I mean, I love the Journal, but I read it for my job and I was on vacation, for Pete’s sake. Like he couldn’t afford a subscription to something fun, like In Style or Cosmo. Even Paramilitary Quarterly would add a little variety.
Bored, I leafed through the most recent copy of the Journal, skimming headlines as I went.
IBM EARNINGS BEAT EXPECTATIONS
San Francisco—International Business Machines Corp. (IBM), the world’s largest computer company, Monday posted a rise in quarterly net profit. Results topped Wall Street expectations …
BOEING ANNOUNCES RECORD ORDER JUST PRIOR TO
FARNBOROUGH AIR SHOW
Chicago—The Boeing Company announces …
Movie reviews—Another James Bond collector’s set is on the market—all EON Productions plus a bonus disc for each. MGM gives Bond fans a view to a thrill with this impressive collection of remastered films, with frame-by-frame restoration for ultimate picture and sound quality. Hear Goldfinger utter his most famous line, “Forgive me, Mr. Bond, but I must arrange to separate my gold from Mr. Solo,” who has just been pulverized inside a Cadillac in a car crusher, as if Goldfinger were uttering the line today, not in 1964 …
I shuddered. The car-crushing bit was just a little too close to home right now.
… see million-dollar hit man Scaramanga’s third nipple…
Eeuww, third nipple! Thanks for reminding me, I thought. This was a set I had to have.
To my dismay, the doc knocked and walked in, interrupting my reading before I could finish the article. Ever notice how doctors have a sixth sense about that? Their reading-enjoyment ESP kicks in and suddenly they’re flying into your room like you’re an emergency case. Like they just can’t stand the thought of their patients reading something juicy. Keep them bored and waiting forever, they ought to add that to the Hippocratic oath. I reluctantly tossed the paper back onto the stack and submitted to an examination.
The doc bandaged my ouchies, prescribed a few hours of rest, and gave me a clean bill of health. “Call me if you experience any new symptoms or discomfort,” he called over his shoulder as he left.
Like I couldn’t have given myself the same prognosis and treatment. Without the wait.
Due to the few-required-hours-of-rest business, I missed the afternoon sessions on hostage negotiations and a war-game simulation. Instead, I took what should have been a relaxing shower but was really just an opportunity for too much thinking and my vivid imagination to run amok.
Had that double entendre talk in the car before it blew up patched things up with Torq? Is that how spies apologized, in code? I think I preferred the straightforward approach. Candy and flowers didn’t hurt any, either. No matter how much I puzzled over it or wanted it to be true that Torq was trying to tell me the scene at the bar hadn’t been faked, my internal jury remained hung on the matter. I turned my thoughts to other, equally serious matters.
By the time I’d removed sand from every possible crevice and orifice in my body, I�
��d decided that my half-flip bootlegger was not part of the thrill-a-minute camp experience the lotto winners had paid extra for. And nothing explained the sudden blowout satisfactorily. So maybe that wasn’t an accident, either. Which led directly into …
Two accidents in two days. Nearly being plowed down and nearly being blown up. Too much coincidence? My camera being taken took on a new, sinister context as I recalled Torq examining the first blown-up car. Had I caught something incriminating? Had someone been intentionally shooting at us? I cursed, wishing I had that camera.
It might have been only my crazy, overactive imagination acting up, but if someone was trying to kill Torq, Max, or me, I had a right—no, an obligation—to know and to stop them.
At dinner that night, Rockford gave a speech about safety. “All CTs will stay well away from the driving track when not in a vehicle on the course. As evidenced today, CTs should always expect the unexpected … blah, blah, blah.
“FSC would never knowingly endanger its participants, but the very nature of the camp carries inherent risks….
“The tire blowout was an unfortunate and totally unforeseen occurrence that is still under investigation….
“If any CT wishes to go home we’ll make the necessary arrangements—”
Which was met with a resounding chorus of boos by everyone but me. Why would they want to go home when camp was such a kick? I could have booed, too, but not for the same reasons. I was watching Rockford closely. I decided he was worried and trying to cover his ass. Which verified my assumption that the “accident” wasn’t planned, even without the blowout thrown in. I didn’t mention my theory to anyone, not even Emma. I didn’t want to be branded a nutcase. But having been the only CT in the exploded vehicle, I still had the strong sense that more had gone wrong there than a blown-out tire. What about that pop I’d heard? I was still trying to remember if I’d heard it before the tire blew or concurrently with the blowout. It all had happened so fast….
Add that to my missing camera and pictures, Torq’s suspicious behavior around the first blown-up car, which seemed to me like more than worry that someone had used the car for target practice earlier, Pussy’s gun-under-the-mattress trick—speaking of which, where the hell was Pussy?—and you came up with something sinisterly strange definitely happening at camp. And I meant to get to the bottom of it if it killed me. Of course the “if it killed me” was just a figure of speech. Which, come to think of it, suddenly seemed more sinister than it had in the past. I made a note to scratch it from my vocabulary.
Two things that made me a good bank officer were my nosy, suspicious nature and my ability to sniff out fishiness. I didn’t authorize a loan until I decided everything was on the up-and-up. Right now my fishiness meter was pegged on high. Which meant one thing—more snooping!
Torq was suspiciously absent from dinner, but Fry was there in full charm mode. After Rockford’s speech, he slid in next to me, joining Emma, John, and Max at our end of the table. To her credit, Emma didn’t bear him any obvious grudge and flashed him a flirtatious smile, which he returned.
“Heard y’all had a little excitement this afternoon out on the track,” he said, addressing me. “And, damn my luck, I chose this afternoon to run some errands in town and missed all the fun! You weren’t hurt, I hope?” He put a whole lot of sympathy and concern into his softly drawled words.
If only a girl could believe it.
“No, I’m fine. Thanks for asking.” I was hoping Fry didn’t notice how closely I was watching him for any micro expressions that would give him away as a liar. Frankly, since the bar scene “test” bit, he’d lost a lot of his appeal to me. He was looking more and more like the traitorous 006. Especially in light of my suspicions that he’d taken Pussy to town. “Town must have been hopping today. We heard Pussy was there, too. Did she snag a ride with you? I hope she’s all right. We haven’t seen her today.”
“You’re a sharp one,” Fry said, still grinning. “Poor little thing had a powerful migraine. Forgot her meds and her prescriptions back at home. I took her in to the doctor and dropped her by the pharmacy. She’s still recouping. Rockford had a dinner tray delivered to her room.”
I made the appropriate murmurs of sympathy as I put his response through my crap filter. I couldn’t see any evidence that he was lying, but then, he was a professional spy. How easy would it be to tell? He could probably put on any micro expression he wanted, just like Torq. What had he and Pussy really been up to?
Before I could grill him further, Max broke in and started recounting his daring escape.
“He earned his secret, lucky decoder ring today, that’s for sure,” Emma broke in dryly as Max reiterated for the third time how he’d sprung to safety.
“I hear Torq’s in some trouble over the incident,” Fry said, dropping a bombshell.
“Really?” John asked.
“That accident wasn’t his fault.” I was a little too forceful with my assertion. Fry gave me a speculative look. “It was a weak tire.” I could play the game and reiterate the official spiel, too. Not that I believed it.
Fry smiled and shook his head. “He was the officer in charge of an operation that nearly took out several trainees. The cause is insignificant. Torq screwed up. A commanding officer always takes the fall. He failed to foresee possible operation failures.”
“What’s going to happen to him? Will FSC fire him?” If Torq’s job was on the line, I’d be obligated to share my suspicions and observations with the Chief. Though I’d prefer to have some concrete evidence first….
“Don’t worry about old Torq. Rockford’d never fire him. There’ll be an investigation. He might get a reprimand. Not much more. How about we change the subject?” Fry looked around the group. “Anyone up for an evening paintball battle?” He pointed his fingers like guns and did a pow-pow motion.
John, Max, Emma, even Ethan, Bishop, Wade, Q, and Tanner from the far end of the table, all exuberantly volunteered.
Fry turned to me. “Domino? How about you? Wanna be on my team?” He winked.
Enticing as the offer was, I had some heavy-duty spying to do.
“That’s a mighty tempting offer,” I said, trying to sound Texan, or at least Old West-like, “but I’m beat. I think I’ll take it easy tonight, like the doctor recommended.”
“Sure we can’t convince y’all?” He reached over and gave my thigh a squeeze as he leaned over and whispered in my ear. “I hear Ethan was giving you grief this morning. This is your chance to whump him one. I don’t mind giving you a few pointers on how to shoot.”
I shook my head no. “Pelt him once or twice for me, though, will you?”
Emma walked back to the room with me. On the way, I stopped by the pop machine and got a bottle of Sprite … for Pussy. My ticket into her room. No one could be uncheered by a delicious lemon-lime beverage, especially if they’d been experiencing the ravages of migraine nausea.
“I’d like to stop by Pussy’s room and check on her,” I said to Emma as we neared Pussy’s door.
“What on earth for?” Emma’s tone indicated we should leave the bitch well enough alone and count ourselves lucky she was out of commission for as long as she had been.
“Oh, come on,” I said. “She’s sick.” Though, of course, my kindness had an ulterior motive.
“What are you, Florence-friggin'-Nightingale now?” Emma scowled her displeasure.
I shrugged. “I’d do the same for you.”
“I should hope!”
I knew a thing or two about migraines. Logan was a major sufferer. It wasn’t inconceivable that Pussy had a migraine that had sent her flying to the doctor. The way Logan described them, they were like having a whole-body headache. Everything felt crappy. Even medicated, I’d seen Logan knocked out for days, spending her time in darkened rooms with cold packs over her eyes and heavily dosed with antinausea drugs. “Heed the package warning on the antinausea pills,” she’d warned me. “When they say ‘do not operate heavy mach
inery,’ they mean it. Take one, and half an hour later it’s boomboom, out go the lights … for hours.”
“Go on ahead if you like,” I said to Emma. “You have a paintball match to prepare for.”
“All right. I’ll see you back at the ranch.” Emma sounded relieved.
I knocked on Pussy’s door.
“The door’s open,” Pussy called to me.
I let myself in. She lay on her bed with an empty dinner tray on the nightstand beside her and a pair of headphones in her ears. Her nightstand light was on. I thought it odd. Usually walking in on a migraine sufferer is like walking into a tunnel of darkness and silence, or seeing someone who has a powerful hangover. Light is bad, very bad. Sound is not so good, either. All the noise, noise, noise!
But Pussy didn’t seem to mind either at all.
“How are you feeling?” I held up the can of pop. “I brought you something for your stomach.” My gaze flicked to her empty food tray. Hardly a crumb left big enough for a Who’s mouse, let alone a human’s mouse.
She adjusted the volume on her MP3 player, pulled her headphones out of her ears, and stared at me a moment in confusion before holding her hand out for it. As I handed it to her, her earphones slid off her lap onto the floor. I bent to retrieve them. As I picked them up, I heard a voice coming through them. A faint voice, but a voice I knew—Max!
I kept a straight face, trying not to give myself away. Pussy was eavesdropping on Max. Why? She hardly paid Max any attention at all. I handed the headphones back to her. I wanted a better look at that MP3 player of hers. I had the feeling it wasn’t an MP3 player at all, but an electronic ear. Yeah, I knew about electronic ears. I’d had one on my Christmas list for years. But no one ever seemed to buy me one. Guess they thought I was nosy enough as it was.
“Thanks.” Pussy set the headphones on her tray.
“Tough day?” I said, straining to hear more from the headphones. But they were too far away now. “I sympathize. Migraines can be killers.”
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