Athena Force 9: Payback

by Harper Allen

  His manicured fingers tapped peremptorily on the shoulder of a T-shirted man rushing by with a laden beer tray on one outstretched palm and a platter of ribs on the other. The man gave him a harried glance. “Sit anywhere you can find a chair, friend. Tell me now what your poison is and I’ll drop your drinks off when I go by again.”

  Peters’s lips tightened. “A Manhattan, I suppose. Perrier for you, Dawn?”

  “We’ll have two beers, whatever’s coldest, no glasses,” she said swiftly. “Those ribs as authentic as the music, mister?”

  “Made to my dear departed mama’s recipe,” the man said and grinned. “Double portion?”

  At her nod he raced off. Weaving her way through the jammed tables ahead of Peters, Dawn hoped the composure she’d assumed with the waiter had covered her sudden shakiness.

  Aldrich Peters didn’t make small talk. His exchange with her just before he’d stopped the waiter hadn’t been idle conversation. She was as sure of that as she was that the jukebox was now blasting out Albert King’s version of “Born Under a Bad Sign,” but what she still needed to figure out was what had been behind his comment.

  He’d admitted he’d been in denial for a time while she’d been AWOL. She was under no illusions that he meant he’d had trouble accepting Lee Craig’s death, so obviously there had been something else that Peters hadn’t immediately wanted to believe. But, as he’d just informed her, at some point during her absence he’d faced reality—faced it, and made plans to deal with it as expediently as possible.

  Albert’s whisky-dipped rasp was pouring out of the jukebox, informing the patrons around her that if it wasn’t for bad luck, he wouldn’t have no luck at all. She knew exactly how the blues singer felt, Dawn thought numbly.

  Aldrich knew she’d gone over to the Cassandras. This meeting had to be a trap…and she’d walked straight into it.

  Chapter 5

  Status: seventeen days and counting

  Time: 0230 hours

  “You eat like a farmhand.” His manicured fingers beating a tattoo on the oilcloth-covered tabletop, Peters flicked an irritated glance Dawn’s way as she finished the last of her ribs, then let his attention drift with seeming unconcern to the table next to them. Its occupants were leaving, but Dawn knew he wouldn’t say anything of importance until he was positive there was no chance of being overheard. It was a cautious policy she herself would normally follow, but the music was loud enough that she wasn’t overly worried.

  She licked barbecue sauce from her fingers with assumed gusto and pushed her plate away. “You know I’m always ravenous. Besides, those ribs were fantastic.”

  Attitude was everything, she thought. Whatever Aldrich had planned for her, as long as he believed she didn’t suspect him, she had the advantage. That had been why she’d plowed through the double order of ribs that, although as good as the waiter had promised, were now sitting in a lump in her stomach; why she’d listened to the music with every appearance of being completely absorbed by it; why she hadn’t dared allow the slightest trace of edginess to show in her manner.

  She needed to look like a woman who could be taken off guard. When she’d convinced her assassin of that, he would strike. She intended to be ready for him, Dawn thought.

  He would either take her in the ladies’ room, if she was foolish enough to pay it a visit, or he would wait until she and Peters walked out to the parking lot. If it were my hit I’d choose the latter, she decided promptly. In the washroom, an innocent bystander might blunder in. In the parking lot the killer can hustle me into the shadows, maybe make it look like I had too much to drink and he’s helping me to a car. So now the only question is, who did Peters pick to carry out this assassination?

  It wasn’t just the only question, it was the million-dollar one, she realized after a momentary blankness. Lab 33 had plenty of covert operatives, a small army of guards, an indeterminate number of thugs whom Peters used for jobs that required little expertise, but there were only a few high-level assassins. One of those had been Lee Craig. Another was herself. She wasn’t sure who the others were.

  Who assassinates the best assassin? she asked herself in confusion.

  “You lied to me. Did you think I wouldn’t find out?” Peters’s harsh question broke through her racing thoughts with the explosive suddenness of a gunshot. She looked quickly up and realized that the patrons who had been seated next to them were now halfway across the room and heading for the exit. Peters followed her glance and then returned his gaze to her, his eyes coldly unreadable. “I’m waiting for your answer. Did you really think you could get away with it?”

  Her first inclination was to buy time. It was on the tip of her tongue to ask him what the hell he was talking about, but even as she opened her mouth to say the words, she closed it again.

  Buying time wouldn’t work. There wasn’t any left to buy.

  “Honestly?” She arched an eyebrow and let a small smile lift the edge of her lips. “Yeah, Doctor, I guess I did think I could get away with it. But hey—can’t blame a girl for trying, can you?”

  Her flippancy had gotten to him, she saw with satisfaction. At the side of one of his elegantly silvered temples, a vein throbbed faintly and the manicured fingers that had been tapping impatiently on the table now curled into his palms like fists. Peters’s steely control was one of his greatest weapons, Dawn told herself. She’d just disabled that weapon.

  “So how’d I slip up?” She kept her tone light and lifted her beer bottle to her lips as she spoke, hoping to increase his anger. The tilted bottle had the added benefit of giving her the opportunity to swiftly scan the room, but nothing alerted her. She swallowed, then instead of setting the bottle back on the table, she casually kept her grip on it. “Did I say something that tipped you off when I contacted Lab 33? Or, wait—your suspicions were confirmed during that meeting we had in your office, weren’t they? I thought they might be, but when you gave me this assignment I figured I’d managed to convince you.” She shrugged, her expression wry. “So tell me, Doctor, why did you send me on this mission if you didn’t trust me?”

  “Enough!” One of Peters’s clenched fists slammed down on the table and the pulse at the side of his temple sped up alarmingly, Dawn noted in cold detachment. Don’t go having a stroke on me, Doctor, she told him silently. My plans for you don’t include you dying from natural—

  Her thought was cut short by a crash as the beer bottle slipped from her hand to the floor. She wasn’t aware of it falling. She wasn’t aware of Peters’s quick frown or the knowing grins of the patrons close enough to have heard the bottle smash.

  All Dawn was aware of was the pain.

  It felt as if sharpened steel bolts had instantly shot home behind her eyes, locking her into a world of unrelenting agony. It couldn’t even be called a headache anymore, she thought as she clamped her lips tightly shut against the screams that were rising in her. By definition, headaches were in a person’s head. They didn’t send piercing tendrils down every limb until it felt as if a cruel barb had been sunk deep into each fingertip and then hauled tortuously back. Headaches didn’t claw their way through a sufferer’s lungs, ripping and tearing until it wasn’t possible to take the shallowest of breaths. They didn’t feel like a knife-thrust to the heart, a jackbooted kick to the kidneys, vials of acid searing through every layer of skin.

  This time the pain didn’t ebb in a few moments’ time. Like an endless ocean it kept coming, each wave crashing onto her with more force than the last. She had to stay conscious, Dawn thought disjointedly. She couldn’t remember why staying conscious was important, only that it had to do with some danger she was facing. She fought the blackness that was sucking her down.

  “…were a fool to think you could keep up the lie. Worse than that, you jeopardized the security of Lab 33. I should abort this mission right now and deal with you the same way I’ve dealt in the past with others whose actions have verged on the traitorous. I’m giving you one final chance to tell
me the truth—how long have you been experiencing the degeneration symptoms?”

  The pain had gone. For a second Dawn could grasp nothing but that simple and miraculous fact—the pain was gone, completely and totally. Not even the faintest throbbing remained as proof that it had been tearing her apart only moments ago.

  And Aldrich Peters hadn’t discovered her connection with the Cassandras.

  Was there a link between the two? Maybe, she thought rapidly, because as soon as he spoke just now I was suddenly back to normal. Could stress be the trigger that sets the headaches off?

  But this wasn’t the time to explore theories. Peters had suspected she’d been lying to him about her symptoms, not her loyalty. Had she said anything in this conversation that might have tipped him to the possibility that they were talking at cross-purposes?

  You came close, O’Shaughnessy, she told herself with relief, but your responses could have applied equally to either situation. You asked him if you’d given yourself away with the phone call—and although you meant the call you made when you were ready to come back to Lab 33 after being AWOL, he obviously thought you meant your phoned-in report from London’s lab. When you wondered if you’d slipped up during your meeting with him in his office the day he gave you this assignment, he assumed you were talking about inadvertently revealing your symptoms. So we’re good here, right?

  Wrong. He was still angry. He still wanted to know how bad the symptoms were. And if she told him the truth, there was a more-than-even chance he’d pull her from this mission rather than take the chance she could endanger Lab 33. He would weigh his options, assess the possible consequences and reluctantly decide to shelve his plans of stealing Sir William’s research.

  I prefer my earlier scenario of him hiring a hit man to take me out tonight, she thought grimly. Whatever it takes, I can’t let him abort this assignment. Not only my life but Lynn’s and Faith’s depend on receiving the reversal serum.

  “You’re right, Doctor—I’ve been lying through my teeth to you,” she said flatly. She saw a flash of fury behind the icy gray eyes watching her, and knew instinctively that she was walking across a minefield. She went on, realizing that a single misstep could cause everything to blow up in her face. “The symptoms started when I went AWOL from Lab 33…shortly after the time you say my blood tests revealed the first signs of gene degeneration. I didn’t worry about them at first—they were just mild headaches, and although I’d never experienced headaches before I certainly didn’t jump to the conclusion I was dying.”

  “No,” Peters conceded coldly. “But after our meeting in my office last week you knew the situation. And yet you continued to hide the facts from me.”

  “Because I didn’t have a choice!” She let a trace of fear bleed into her tone. “Don’t you understand, Doctor—I’m desperate! You’d just told me how vital it was that I retrieve London’s notes so your scientists could complete the serum for me. What was I supposed to do? Tell you I’d have to pass on the assignment that could save my life just because I was getting a few headaches?”

  She shook her head. “With Uncle Lee gone, I’m Lab 33’s best assassin. As you said, Des Asher’s a formidable opponent and at some point he might have to be taken out. I couldn’t risk handing over a job of that magnitude to some yahoo with a forty-eight Special, dammit. I won’t hand over this job.”

  She’d blown it, Dawn thought as she finished speaking and took a tense breath. Aldrich was studying her as he might study a specimen under a microscope—emotionlessly and assessingly, as if she had just revealed something fractionally interesting and he was wondering if it would be worth his while to pick up a scalpel and dissect her further. She’d had one chance to convince him to let her continue with the mission that would lift her and her sisters’ death sentences, and she’d blown it.

  The jukebox had been silent for the past few seconds. Now it launched into another number, but Dawn barely heard it.

  “Give me Bach any day.” It was the last thing she’d expected Peters to say, and she was caught unawares. She realized she was staring openmouthed at him, but before she could recover from her surprise he went on. “You really like this—this—” He winced. Reluctantly she helped him out.

  “The blues?” She met his gaze. “Yeah, Doctor, I do. What’s that got to do with anything?”

  “Just that you’re more like Lee Craig than I realized,” Peters answered remotely. “Not only in the so-called music you like, but in your reaction just now when you fought to have the responsibility of this assignment. As I recall, that was the topic of the conversation I had with Craig before he left Lab 33 on what eventually proved to be his final assignment. I couldn’t fault him then for his determination and dedication to the job and I suppose I can’t fault you now for showing the same qualities.”

  “You’re saying you trust me to be able to complete the mission?”

  Peters frowned. “If you give me your assurance that these symptoms you’ve been experiencing won’t interfere with your performance. You’re sure you had nothing to do with Asher’s suspicions of you?”

  “I told you, the man’s a control freak. The screwup over my name when I arrived made him look bad and he’s trying to cover his ass by focusing attention on me.” Dawn kept her voice steady. “The headaches are the only symptoms I’ve had and if I ever need to explain them, I’ll just give Dawn Swanson a history of crippling migraines. There hasn’t been anything else that might have aroused Asher’s suspicions, I swear.”

  Unless you count flipping into assassin mode while I was trying to convince the man I was nothing more than a lab tech, she amended silently. But since I’m pretty sure you would count that, Doctor, I don’t intend to share that particular anecdote with you.

  “Very well.” His nod was brief. “I must admit you’ve made good progress in the short time you’ve been at London’s facility. If Sir William has taken a liking to you, as you say he has, it’s possible you might not have to eliminate him to get your hands on his work.”

  “Very possible,” she agreed woodenly. She had a sudden vision of William London as she’d seen him the previous night, his white hair wildly unruly, his still-bright blue eyes excited with the realization that his theory might not have been wrong, his insistence on sharing his container of undrinkable tea with her. Despite his irascibility, London had a childlike quality about him, perhaps because his whole life had been devoted not to gaining the money and awards that had been a by-product of his genius, but simply to the pursuit of pure truth.

  It would be incomprehensible to Sir William that someone might want to kill him for that truth. But the man sitting across the table from her would see no problem in giving such an order if he deemed it necessary…which was just one more reason to feel relief that Peters hadn’t chosen anyone else for this job.

  “Well, then.” Peters pushed his chair back, taking care as he did so not to touch the sticky tabletop. “I believe this meeting is at an end. I’m glad we straightened out our little differences, Dawn.” He paused. “There is one last thing I should touch on. You asked me why I sent you on an assignment when I already had my suspicions about your capabilities. The plain and simple answer is that I had no one else to send.”

  “But I’ve reassured you on that point,” she protested. “You know now that my symptoms won’t get in the way of my doing my job, so—”

  “I wasn’t sure of that four days ago in my office. And during the months you were AWOL, I had no choice but to assume Lab 33 had lost its best assassin. I decided that’s not a position I will risk being in again.”

  “You’ve chosen a replacement for me.” This was what he’d meant earlier when he’d said he’d been forced to face reality and deal with it, Dawn thought. It was a relief to know her fears that he’d set up a hit on her were wrong, of course, but something about his casual assumption that someone else could take her place with Lab 33 stung.

  Which is totally insane, O’Shaughnessy, she argued with herse
lf. You hate the fact that you were Aldrich’s favorite killing machine, so how do you justify feeling a sense of professional pique over his giving that title away?

  It didn’t make sense. But she still felt an illogical spark of anger, and Peters’s reply only fanned it.

  “Not yet, but I intend to. I’ve drawn up a short list of qualified candidates and I’ll be making my decision soon. None of them have your unique capabilities, of course, so I expect some of them won’t return from the test assignments I’ve given them.” He stood, his figure leanly spare in the immaculately cut gray suit. “But some are bound to succeed. Those who do will be the nucleus of Lab 33’s newly formed assassination squad—a squad that will answer to you.”

  Dawn stood too, her legs feeling strangely rubbery. “I like the idea, Doctor,” she said, forcing a smile. “And the test assignments are a practical way of weeding out the excess candidates. What exactly are their assignments?”

  Peters’s smile was characteristically brief, but for once it was shaded with real satisfaction. “Each assassin has been given the name of one of the Athena Academy graduates known as the Cassandras,” he said as he stood aside for her to precede him to the exit. “Their missions are to kill their targets or die in the attempt.”

  The Cassandras had been warned, Dawn thought in relief an hour later as she waited for the feeling to come back to her limbs. She looked over her shoulder at the high-voltage fence she’d just scaled, still feeling the tingling residue of the electricity that had surged through her body and stopped her heart for a few seconds, but her thoughts weren’t on her surroundings. Kayla Ryan herself had answered the phone when she’d rung the emergency contact number from a gas station pay phone, and Ryan hadn’t wasted time in asking questions.

  “I’ll get the word out immediately,” she’d said after a moment’s stunned silence. “Some of the members deal every day with threats on their lives. Sam St. John once told me that she simply assumes that at any given time some creep somewhere in the world has a price on her head, and she never lets down her guard. But a few of the others will have to be provided with round-the-clock security.”