“Bitch!” he cried, but before he could do more, the door opened behind him. In walked Stephen and some traitorous part of me was happy to see him. He had his hands at his sides and was flanked by two guards who looked stalwart enough to resist even the end of times. Were they guarding him?
“I told you, she’s a feisty one,” Stephen said sardonically which was altogether weird. His eyes caught my gaze, and I saw nothing in them but emptiness. It made me shiver. That was not a look I enjoyed seeing on him, especially when directed at me. It was just another confirmation he was, in fact, evil to his goddamned core.
“She broke my nose,” Graham cried, getting to his feet and giving me the evil eye. It was somehow better than the emptiness of Stephen’s gaze. Rage I could deal with. Nothing, well, that sent chills running down my spine.
“You should give her the director and let her go while you still can, Graham.” Stephen turned so his back was to me. “It’s the smart play.” It was sort of a weird thing to say given our current state of affairs. Was he up to something? And, if so, what?
“No, the smart play is for me to gut the bitch and wear her intestines like a hat.” A knife slipped into his hand as he took a step forward. “Which is exactly what I’m going to do.”
It happened so quickly, I barely saw it. One moment, Graham was charging at me. The next, he was slumped against the far wall from Stephen’s kick. Stephen had the knife in his hands, and he whirled, driving the blade into the throat of one guard before they even had time to react. It was one of the scariest things I’d ever seen because there wasn’t even a glimmer of hesitation. The only time I’d seen anything kill like that was when the flit had done it, and that was a soulless machine, not a person.
The guard reached up like he could somehow keep himself from bleeding out through his throat while the other lunged forward. Just as he was about to tackle Stephen, the superspy drove his knee into the man’s chin. There was a loud crack, and the second guard toppled emptily to the ground.
With a sort of casual nonchalance I knew I’d never have, Stephen tore the knife from the throat of the other guard as the man fell to his knees. He walked over to me, face empty and emotionless.
“I’m going to cut you out. Don’t move and it will be quick,” he said, and the blade flashed. The ropes keeping me in place fell away, and for a moment, all I could do was sit there. Stunned. Had Stephen really just saved me? I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised since he worked for the agency, but I was.
“How dare you,” Graham said. He was on his feet across the room, a huge revolver in his hands. “You choose her over me?”
“Don’t do anything stupid—” Stephen started to say but he was cut off by a gunshot. Pain exploded through my left arm. It hurt so much, spots actually danced in front of my eyes as the white hot fire of the wound became nearly all-consuming. Being shot sucked.
“I loved you,” Graham said, taking a step toward Stephen. “And this is how you repay me?” He fired again and Stephen cried out, falling to his knees as his right leg buckled. Blood poured from the wound as Graham moved forward and kicked him hard in the face. Stephen fell backward to the ground, eyes distant and glazed. “I should have known better, but I had hoped… I can’t believe I was so stupid.”
He leveled the gun at Stephen’s head, his muscles tightening as he slowly depressed the trigger. Part of me felt bad for Graham because I knew exactly how he felt. Even still, there was no way I was going to let him kill Stephen, since he seemed to be on my side.
I threw myself out of the chair. I hit Graham with exactly zero finesse, but it was enough to make the shot go wide and ricochet off the tile floor. We collided with the tile and his gun went flying. I struggled, trying to get leverage, but he was slippery and strong while I was weak and bleeding. He drove his fingers into my wound, and I screamed, agony ripping apart every thought I had.
“I’m going to kill you, Abby!” Graham screamed, spraying my face with spittle as he drove his fist into my teeth. Everything went kind of hazy as I tried to kick him off, but it was no use at all. “I don’t even like killing girls, but for you, I’m pretty sure I’ll enjoy it.” Another blow rocked me, and I felt his hand close around my throat.
I reached up and tried to pull him off, but it was too difficult to get much of a grip. Everything was fading fast, too fast. My hands fell away from him as his laughter filled my ears. It was going to be the last sound I ever heard. That pissed me off as I struggled to keep the darkness encroaching upon my vision at bay. My fingers touched something. I gripped it and swung as hard as I could.
The butt of the heavy revolver cracked Graham across the temple with a sound that reminded me of an egg smashing against the kitchen floor. Air flooded into my aching lungs as his grip loosened. He blinked, trying to steady himself, but before he could, I pulled the trigger. His head evaporated in a spray of crimson mist that cascaded down on me as his lifeless body slumped forward, pinning me to the ground as his hot, sticky blood gushed onto me.
27
“And that’s why I never wear a white shirt,” Stephen said, reaching out to help me up, a strangely disjointed smile on his lips that didn’t travel anywhere near his cold, angry eyes. Well, I supposed that was better than the emptiness that had filled him before.
He wasn’t quite standing, rather was sort of slumped next to me on one arm, blood still oozing from his leg as he shoved Graham’s broken corpse off of me. It slid off me with a sort of wet splorch. I didn’t even look at it as the smell of blood, like a bucket of rusty nails, filled my nose. My stomach sloshed as I lay there, Stephen looming over me with one hand held out.
I shut my eyes. I know I shouldn’t have, but it was all I could do to keep from being sick. My eyes opened and Stephen was still there, still looking me. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. Part of me had hoped he wouldn’t be there.
“Why?” I asked, not even really sure what I was asking nor whether I wanted an answer. Instead of taking his hand, I scooched myself backward away from him on my elbows. Pain lanced through my damaged arm. I’d been shot. I’d somehow forgotten, which was odd. It didn’t seem like a thing you were supposed to forget about.
“Why what, Abby?” Stephen asked, voice filled with emotion like he was about to burst into tears. “Why what?”
“Why everything?” I replied as I sat up, and the motion made me woozy. I rubbed my temples, as though touching my own face could make the room stop spinning. It didn’t help, but my brain had better get a grip fast. I was sure someone would be checking on us momentarily. I’d seen enough movies and had enough training to know people had to be on their way here right now. Hell, people should be in here already, so where were they?
“I will answer one specific question as long as it isn’t ‘why did you save me from Graham’ because the answer to that is simple. My orders were to save you at any costs.” He shrugged as he said the words, and I got the impression he had tried to say them coldly, but somehow anger laced every single syllable. “My orders were always to protect you.”
“Did you ever really love me?” I asked before I could stop myself, and even as the words left my lips, I felt myself start to break apart. “Please don’t answer…” I tried to whisper, but it got stuck in my throat.
“No,” he responded. The anger in his words was made worse by the snort he gave afterward. “It was my job to make you think I did,” he added even though he needn’t have bothered because my heart had already been torn asunder. I mean, I knew he didn’t love me already. Knew everything had been a lie, but some small part of me had hoped. And oh how I hated that part.
I shut my eyes as tears gathered in the edges. I didn’t want him to see my cry, but I wasn’t sure I could help it. That made everything worse.
“I’m surprised you hadn’t figured that out on your own already,” he said, voice clipped, angry. I heard him get to his feet, and when I opened my eyes he was standing over me, a grimace of pain on his face as he tested his l
eg. It looked like while he wasn’t incapacitated, moving around still hurt him. Good.
“I just hoped…” I said even though everything inside me wanted to lash out at him, but in truth, it wasn’t him I was angry with. I was angry with myself because despite everything, I had hoped. God how that made me hate myself…
“I know,” Stephen said, grabbing my good arm and hauling me to my feet. “It’s why I asked to be removed as your guardian. You were getting too attached.” He shook his head. The sneer on his face making what was left of my heart sort of harden into an aching amorphous blob. “I tried to play up the evil villain thing, but it didn’t seem to be working, so I made a call. Got your friend to shoot me with a blank. It was risky since it was the only one in the chamber, but it all worked out in the end.” He mimed shooting himself in the head with two fingers, which seemed unnecessarily macabre. “Then I got to leave you. Thank god. I was starting to worry I’d have to sleep with you…” He shook himself like it was the worst thing he could imagine.
I said nothing because I knew if I did, I’d start crying and screaming. I didn’t want to do that. Part of me knew he was just trying to hurt me, but I didn’t quite understand why. I thought about asking him, but I sort of didn’t want to know the answer… besides he’d just lie anyway.
When I didn’t respond, he harrumphed and spun on his heels. He began limping toward the door, leaving bloody footprints in his wake. It opened as he reached it though I wasn’t quite sure why. Shouldn’t it have stayed shut? Then again, maybe Stephen had access to walk the grounds. Graham had liked him after all.
I walked after him, the revolver still clenched in my white-knuckled fist. Stephen hadn’t seemed to notice it. So he’d deliberately said all those mean things to me when I’d been armed with a gun. I’d have liked to think it was because he was ballsy, but we both knew the truth. I wouldn’t shoot him. Not for this. If I was going to shoot him over being a jerk, I’d have done it already.
And with that sad realization settling down around my shoulders like a thousand pound chain, I followed him. I trudged forward, barely even bothering to look around the white halls. He didn’t seem worried, and if he wasn’t worried, why should I be? Besides, I was a little too depressed to care.
The revolver came up before I could stop myself, and I pressed the barrel against the back of his head with my shaking hands. He stopped in midstride, body stiffening. He was scared. Good. I pulled back the hammer on the gun as my eyes narrowed.
“You’re a jerk,” I said, glaring at the back of his head. “A jerk I should shoot, but I think we both think I won’t do that.” The weapon felt good in my hands, and in that moment, I knew I could shut my eyes and pull the trigger. It might break me, might send me into a freefall from which I might never recover, but I could do it. Sadly, that realization didn’t scare me as much as it should have.
“Okay,” Stephen replied, voice full of that same emptiness he’d had before. “I already told my wife and daughter I love them.” He shrugged and it pissed me off.
“I doubt that is your real family,” I said, closing my eyes and pulling the trigger. Nothing happened. Nothing at all. I stared at the weapon, barely able to believe what I’d done. I’d tried to shoot him just for pissing me off. Granted, he had it coming for multiple reasons, but still, still. What I’d done was a whole new level of bad.
Stephen stood stock still, probably surprised I’d done what I had done. I knew I was. I still couldn’t really believe it. Him being alive after I’d tried to shoot him didn’t even make what I’d tried to do better. If he’d been dead, I could try to get over it, but now, I had to look into his face and have him know I’d tried to kill him. It was worse. Way worse.
Applause filled my ears. The long slow drawn out sound of one hand smacking against another. The door at the end of the hallway opened to reveal the director walking toward us, slowly clapping. He was dressed in a tight black shirt and black pants. I’d expected to find him roughed up, or worse, but for some reason, he didn’t even look like he had a hair out of place.
“You passed, Abby,” he said, voice somehow filling the hallway as he approached, his unseeing blind eyes strangely focused on me. “How does that make you feel?”
“Wha?” I said, the revolver slipping from my fingers and smacking against the white tile floor with an echoing thud of finality.
“The director is telling you that you passed your final exam,” Stephen said, turning around and looking at me like I was some kind of putz.
“You mean?” I asked as a horrible thought filled my head. “You mean this was all another lie?”
“Yes and no,” the director said, smiling at me like he was the goddamned devil. “We had several scenarios designed to test your limits. To see what you’d do. It’s why we brought agent Jacobs back in.” He nodded to Stephen. “In case you wondered, Chuck lost his bet.”
“Bet?” I asked because if I didn’t focus on that, I was going to leap across this room and grab the director by his stupid bald head and smash it like an egg on the tile. As it was, I couldn’t will myself to stop clenching and unclenching my fists. How could it all be a lie?
“He didn’t think you’d kill me,” Stephen said, his voice full of disdain. “It wasn’t actually a requirement of passing per se, but this mission would have gone on a while longer until I pushed your buttons enough to make you do it.”
“Why? Why would you do this?” I asked and my voice didn’t sound like my own. It sounded sort of empty and far away, like I was yelling down a tunnel.
“We needed to know how far you’d go. There’s a world of difference between someone who would kill because she has to for a mission or to survive, and someone who will do it just because she’s feeling angry and betrayed,” Stephen said, glancing down at the revolver I’d dropped. “Congratulations, Abby. You’re a sociopath.”
“Okay…” I resisted the urge to slug him in his smug face and instead forced myself to be calm. He was baiting me, but why bother if everything was over? That didn’t make any sense. “How much of it was real?”
“The Israelis were really a threat,” the director said. “None of that was planned, but we improvised well. I’m standing here because Agent Jacobs freed me while Graham was busy trying to kill you.”
“So Flash and Bang are your people?” I asked, already pretty sure I knew the answer.
“Yes. Two of our best.” The director took a step forward and placed a hand on my shoulder. It was strangely cold and scratchy, reminding me of some kind of serpent. “We’ve spent a lot of resources on this test for you, Abby. On this final training.” He smiled. “We had to make sure you were worth it.”
He glanced at Stephen. “He said you had potential, but I’ll be honest, I didn’t quite believe him until you broke into our base after he was put down in the cabin.”
“So why all this?” I asked, gesturing around. “Why make me go through all this? It’s insane. All those people…”
“They needed to be eliminated. Graham’s Israelis were already targets, so when they decided to step in and get you, well, it sort of worked out in our favor. Two birds with one stone.” The director smiled, and it chilled me to the core of my being. “Life isn’t always so helpful, but in this case wishes were, in fact, horses.”
That was when I tried to deck him. Only, I missed. My blow sailed by him as he effortlessly stepped to the side. One of his hands lashed out, and the next thing I knew, I was laying on the ground, my ears ringing.
“Sir,” Stephen said and the director tore his sightless eyes away from me and looked at Stephen like the superspy was a particularly disgusting thing on the bottom of his shoe.
“Is this where you tell me to go easy on her because it’s been a traumatic time for her, and we’ve spent a lot of time and resources on her? As if I don’t know that?” the director asked angrily. “News flash, I have a whole town full of potentials. I don’t need anyone.” His gaze swiveled back to me and the look in his eyes made
me feel even more irrelevant than his words had. To him, I was nothing, just an asset to be used and discarded. All of us were. This man would chew us up and spit us out, and we would mean nothing to him. To think I’d wanted them to be proud of me made it a particularly bitter pill to swallow.
Stephen shut his trap even though he looked like he was about to say more. It was a little strange because I got the impression he’d been about to defend me, but why? Why would he do that if everything he’d felt for me was a lie? Maybe… maybe it wasn’t? No. No I was not going down that road. I wasn’t even going to entertain it. Especially since he had a family. Assuming that was real. Maybe it wasn’t?
“Was that even your family? Or was that another trick? Another lie to see if I’d kill you, knowing you had a wife and daughter?” I asked, and as I said the words, I felt sort of hollow and cold. I had been willing to kill him even though I thought he had a family. Even though I was sure it was a lie, I couldn’t be certain… and I hadn’t cared. What kind of person did that make me?
“Does it matter?” the director asked, waving his hand to silence Stephen before the agent could speak. “That is a serious question, I want to know.”
Before I could respond, Stephen shook his head once. I wasn’t sure if he was telling me to tell the director no, or if he was saying he didn’t really have a family, but something about the look in his eyes gave me the feeling he was trying to help me. It didn’t make any sense. Or was this another trick too?
“No, it didn’t matter.” I shrugged. “I was more curious. I would have thought his family would be in Folsom with the rest of us, if he had one…”
The director smirked like I was missing something huge and instead clapped his hand on my shoulder. “Good to know, Abby. I’d hate to think you were sentimental. That’s bad for agents like yourself, especially given the mission we have for you.”
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