Smokescreen

by Meredith Fletcher; Vicki Hinze Doranna Durgin

  “Bastard.” The epithet came out weak, with nowhere near the force she’d intended. If she could just keep him talking a few more minutes, gloating or feeling sorry for her or whatever the hell it was, either Fielding would have units available to take him down or she’d catch her second wind. She hoped it would be the second wind.

  “Save it for the guys that did this.” He started to walk away from her, then stopped as if he was unsure of what he was doing. “It was the Bronze Tigers Triad. I saw a tattoo on one of the men inside the warehouse. You want to vent some hostility or arrange a little payback, start there.”

  “I’m just supposed to believe you?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “I saved your ass up there—”

  “I saved yours, too.”

  “Yeah, you did. So I owe you this one. It’s always nice to know who your enemies are. Saves on a lot of confusion.” He started walking away.

  Trembling, trying hard not to throw up, Christie threatened, “I’m going to find you.”

  “Don’t waste your time,” he said. “Save it for the Tigers.” Then he turned the corner and was gone.

  Raising her head, fighting the vertigo that spun ceaselessly inside her senses, Christie looked at Arturo Gennady’s dead body lying out in the street. Tears filled her eyes but she held them back. She wouldn’t cry now, not with Fielding’s reinforcements on the way. But later, when she was alone and no one was watching, she’d let go.

  “Chace! Chace!”

  Looking up, not believing she’d heard the voice, Christie spotted Dwight Yeager stumbling through the rubble toward her. Two other agents from the team stumbled along in his wake.

  Thank God, Christie thought. Someone survived. But her thoughts turned dark at once. There was no getting around the fact that they had walked into an ambush. All the survivors were going to be suspect.

  Including her.

  Chapter 4

  Dalton skillfully drove the motorcycle through downtown Washington, D.C. traffic on Wisconsin Avenue NW until he spotted the Adonis Club on the corner. Weaving through the traffic, he headed onto the side road that led to the parking area behind the club.

  Three stories tall and covered with neon images of male strippers, the Adonis Club fit the urban decay that had settled over that area of the city. Other bars and sex clubs offering adult entertainment lined both sides of the street for blocks. Domestic and international politicians and corporation execs enjoyed partying in the red-light district, and the fixes were in with the metro law enforcement to make certain their activities were protected.

  Dalton didn’t care for the club or the area. It reminded him too much of the demilitarized zones where he’d spent time. Red-light districts didn’t change much from Hong Kong to Singapore to Korea to Czechoslovakia. They all thrived on illicit commerce and weathered the constant fear of sudden death.

  Hot, sluggish wind stirred through the city, spinning trash in miniature tornadoes. A mixture of music—rock and roll, blues, country and techno—slammed the neighborhood. The time was 12:32 a.m. and the red-light district was just getting its second wind.

  Dalton wore wraparound sunglasses equipped with night-vision capability that stripped away the shadows hunkered in the alley. After leaving the Potomac commercial docks, he’d retreated to the rooftop of an abandoned building where he’d cached a change of clothes. Once he’d dressed in jeans, a dark green T-shirt, square-toed motorcycle boots and a leather riding jacket, he’d walked back to the parking garage where he’d left the motorcycle.

  A huge video screen showed a nearly nude male gyrating on a polished onyx stage in front of offset mirrors that rendered shadowy echoes of the dancer. Purple lights pulsed over the sweat-slick body in motion.

  Dalton paid at the front door, waving a disposable cash card with an equally disposable ID through the reader. One of the steroid giants working the door waved a wand over Dalton.

  “No fighting, no rude behavior,” the other bouncer stated. “The ladies are here to have a good time, not to be hassled by a guy figuring he’s shooting fish in a barrel. You want to party, we have professionals upstairs to take care of that.”

  Dalton took no offense. The Adonis Club pandered to the female execs, diplomatic attachés and government assistants that sought out sex on the wild side. And to men looking for men.

  “Sure,” Dalton said.

  “The reason I say that,” the bouncer continued, “you don’t look like a regular or a street hustler.”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

  The bouncer picked up a tattooing laser that issued temporary imprints that faded out of the skin within hours. “Hand stamp.”

  Dalton shook his head. “Not going to be in that long.”

  Nodding, the bouncer lifted his left arm and spoke into the microphone concealed there. “One. Male. He’s clean.”

  The front door led to a short passageway. A locked door at the end opened and thumping bass filled the hall. Two more bouncers greeted Dalton before they allowed him in.

  The main room was filled with screaming women cheering on the naked men working three stages. Club scrip, paper money issued by the Adonis Club and paid for through debit and credit cards, littered the stage floors. Women, and the few men in evidence, paid for the privilege of having paper scrip to lure their favorite dancers over to them. Other men worked table dances and more amenable arrangements in the deep chairs on the right side of the club.

  Monitors above the stages showed magnified views of the dancers so the attendees in the back wouldn’t miss anything. The music was dirty blues, a low and throbbing beat that lent itself to suggestive movements and grinding.

  Dalton turned to one of the bouncers. “I’m here to see Katsumi. Is she around?”

  “She’s in her office,” the guy said. “If she wants to see you, she will.”

  Dalton walked toward the stairwell to the right that led to the second-story offices the club’s owners used or leased out to businesses that fed off the club scene. Masseurs, escort services, tattoo artists and photography studios worked club hours and more.

  Katsumi Shan kept an office there as well, but it was generally manned by automated services. Dalton had met her while he’d served in the military. Katsumi had been with the Central Intelligence Agency as a freelance information specialist and had functioned as a liaison for missions Dalton and his team had undertaken.

  For a while, Katsumi and Dalton had been lovers, joined by similar interests in history and culture. Unfortunately, Katsumi had learned how to play both sides of the street and had sold almost as many secrets as she’d kept.

  After she’d gotten bounced from the CIA, who hadn’t wanted to deal with the grief she could bring to them if they tried to jail her or kill her, Katsumi had ended up going into business for herself. She’d bought—some said blackmailed—her way into a part ownership of the Adonis Club in Washington, D.C., gradually ending up there after knocking around Asia and Europe. The nation’s capital, as she’d told Dalton, offered a number of intrigues. Katsumi lived for intrigues and secrets and behind-the-scenes power plays. That was why the CIA had enlisted her.

  In addition to the income she derived from the Adonis Club, she also performed other services that tapped into her spy skills, working with some of the same people she’d gotten to know while liaising in other countries. From what Dalton had been able to learn, Katsumi dealt in security, spying and murder. None of that had been confirmed.

  Dalton had met Katsumi again when, shortly after taking the security assignment with Grace and Michael, it had become clear that she’d been employed to spy on Grace’s cybernetics work. Dalton had convinced her to pursue other assignments, though she’d never said who hired her. For a while, they’d renewed the physical relationship because they’d been good in bed together, but after Katsumi had offered to cut Dalton in on her business, bringing to the forefront the basic differences between their values, he’d found reasons to stay away from her.

&nbs
p; Until he’d met with her three days ago and found out about the Bronze Tigers, Dalton hadn’t seen Katsumi in over a year. He knew the only reason she’d given him the information that had led him to the scene at the warehouse tonight had been because it was no business of hers.

  Now Dalton needed more information. He wanted to know why the Bronze Tigers had escalated the blackmail scheme to an assassination.

  At the top of the stairs, Dalton buzzed Katsumi’s door and waited. Dalton buzzed again. He grew impatient. Whoever the blonde was that he’d met back at the warehouse, she was both in trouble and was going to be trouble. But he hadn’t been able to walk away without telling her about the Bronze Tigers. She’d deserved that.

  And maybe it’ll keep her busy enough to stay away from Grace and Michael, Dalton thought. But he couldn’t help thinking about her. She’d been easy on the eyes and she’d impressed the hell out of him with her abilities.

  He buzzed again.

  No answer.

  Apprehension crept into Dalton’s mind. He opened the LokTek security pad to reveal the alphanumeric keypad. Katsumi had given him the current access code three days ago, stating that she hoped to see him again on something other than business.

  He coded the door and it slid back soundlessly. The door closed behind him when he stepped into the large office lit by recessed lighting that left the interior dim.

  Japanese decor, red betel nut finish mixed with ebony, replete with dragons and tigers, furnished the office. One wall was covered with a large aquarium that concealed the recording equipment Katsumi sometimes used to record prospective clients’ eyes to use on optical locks. Large colorful koi swam slowly through the water. With the fourteen-foot ceilings in the room, the aquarium was as impressive as hell.

  Katsumi kept private living quarters in the back that were equally as impressive.

  “Katsumi,” Dalton called over the low volume of the video screen pumping a twenty-four-hour news channel on the holograph at the center of the kidney-shaped desk. The scene showed the destroyed buildings in the Potomac commercial docks. An FBI spokesperson answered a reporter’s questions. In the background, a picture of the blonde showed, listing her name as Special Agent Christie Chace. She looked young in the picture.

  Dalton raised his voice and called for Katsumi again.

  Silence answered him.

  The apprehensive ball in Dalton’s stomach coiled more tightly. Katsumi had been cagey while giving him the information about Arturo Gennady, telling him that just knowing about the blackmail plans was potentially lethal. He’d brought her a picture of Sammy Bao, one of the Bronze Tigers’ chief enforcers and she’d immediately known who he was.

  She’d called him that afternoon and let him know about the drop. Even though he’d asked, Katsumi hadn’t told him how she’d found out about it. But she’d known about Gennady, too. Having a part ownership of the Adonis Club created a pipeline of information about corporate and political activity. Katsumi had a group of regulars in that club as well as in other sex-for-hire agencies that she employed to ferret out secrets.

  Dalton wished he’d brought his pistol, but he knew he’d never have gotten it past the club security. Cautiously, he advanced on the open door leading to Katsumi’s private quarters.

  She hung nude from the large ceiling fan, a belt around her neck and her body slack in death. In life, she’d been petite, only an inch or two above five feet, with a slender figure that hinted at curves. She’d been thirty, two years younger than Dalton, but she could easily pass for half that. In her way, she’d been ageless. Her hair was cut spiky short and currently colored reddish-orange with gold tips. She was a gifted chameleon, could change her looks and her demeanor with the addition of a wig or a change of clothes. She’d loved fooling people.

  That was over.

  Grief hit Dalton hard. He hadn’t been in love with Katsumi, hadn’t even completely trusted her except for those times when he knew they had similar interests or when she had no reason to lie to him. But she’d been one of the ties to his past, one of the ties to Mac and the Ranger team. He was losing all of those.

  And with Katsumi dead, Dalton knew the danger to Grace and Michael had multiplied. He focused on that and put his grief and anger away for the moment. He couldn’t do anything for Katsumi, but he could protect Mac’s family.

  Blood hadn’t yet pooled in Katsumi’s lower body, so she’d been killed in the last couple of hours. Bruises, cuts and scrapes covered her arms and legs, mute testimony that she hadn’t gone without a fight.

  Crossing over to the floor-to-ceiling video screen that covered the wall and pulling on his leather gloves, Dalton punched the keypad to blank the outside feed and keyed the code that activated the security system. The screen filled with snow, telling him the vid-capture program was off-line. Already knowing what he was going to find, he searched anyway, searching back through the vid-log.

  The first image didn’t show till 10:32 p.m. that night. Katsumi had been practicing her martial arts in the open space in front of the big circular bed in the middle of the room. The vid-feed turned to snow abruptly at 10:34.

  She’d been killed shortly after that, maybe at the same time Dalton had been fighting for his life.

  Damn, Katsumi. Was this connected to what you told me? Or was this something you got into on your own? Not knowing was potentially dangerous.

  Dalton checked the video memory to see if the security system had recorded his arrival, intending to erase it if it had. Katsumi’s system offered radical file purging. Not even an expert in computer forensics could recover files she’d erased. Only blank snow filled the screen. The system was still off-line. Maybe it would even look like it had failed out when police lab techs investigated later.

  He took a last look at Katsumi and hated leaving her like that. But cutting her down would interfere with any chance the forensics team might have at discovering who had killed her. She’d fought. There might be physical evidence. He hoped so.

  But Dalton’s cynical nature told him a crime-scene team would find nothing. The Bronze Tigers hadn’t left bodies of their own men behind at the warehouse. He doubted whoever killed Katsumi had been careless enough to leave evidence behind.

  He turned and left. With Katsumi dead and the scorched-earth tactics at the warehouse, he knew the danger to Grace and Michael had grown. It was time to get home and batten down the hatches, maybe even see if he could talk some sense into Grace.

  Chapter 5

  “So you don’t know who this guy was?” Director of Operations Stuart Fielding demanded.

  “No,” Christie replied as she watched the fire department rescue teams carry another body from one of the bombed-out buildings. Four of them had survived the attack. Bill Cather’s injuries were going to put him out of the Bureau, though, and Jerry Templeton was going to be sidelined for a month working out rehab.

  She and Fielding stood at the edge of the battle zone. Yellow police crime-scene tape surrounded the area. The D.O. had called in the metro units to work scene security and the fire departments to work search and rescue, but the Bureau forensics teams were going to process the scene.

  Out in the river, police boats kept curious mariners away. The red and blue lights whipped through the darkness, layering bright slashes across the dark water and through the night. More gawkers lined the crime-scene tape but there weren’t many of them. The commercial docks were a dangerous place to be at night, and sometimes during the day.

  Scattered fires still hollowed the night out in three buildings. Three fire department pumping units had laid hose to the river, using the water there to extinguish the fires.

  Two Bureau helicopters circled overhead, keeping the media copters from hovering. That didn’t stop the long-range lenses, though. The D.O. monitored the live news releases on a video screen in the site command vehicle only a short distance away.

  “This guy just comes out of nowhere and drops in on your stakeout?” Fielding said.

 
; “He was already here when I got here,” Christie said.

  “My question is why was he here?”

  Christie hesitated, then looked at her supervisor. “He was peeping them.”

  “Peeping them?” Fielding’s interest showed. “Why?”

  “He didn’t say.”

  “Then guess.”

  “He was protecting someone.”

  “Who?”

  “If I knew that, I’d know who he was.”

  Fielding craned his head. Vertebrae cracked and popped. “What makes you say that?”

  “Because he tried to protect me. That’s his nature.”

  Fielding didn’t say anything.

  “He could have cut and run when everything hit the fan,” Christie said. “Instead, he stuck. His first instinct when the helicopter arrived with the machine gunner was to pull me to safety.” She didn’t tell Fielding that she’d knocked No-Face to the ground. “He backed every play I made inside that warehouse.”

  “That doesn’t give us a lot.”

  “He was a pro,” Christie said. “You’d have had to see this guy move.” She saw him again in her mind, the diving and sliding, the way he’d handled both his pistol and the assault rifle. The quiet calm he’d radiated even in the heat of battle stayed with her. Even though she didn’t know who he was, she was certain she’d met very few men like him. The only thing that jarred was the way he’d cold-bloodedly killed the man she’d knocked unconscious. “I had trouble keeping up with him and I’m Enhanced.

  “When we find out who he is, we’re going to find out he’s had military service,” Christie said. “Or maybe he’s still in it.”

  “Corp security?” Fielding asked.

  “Spying on Gennady?” Christie experienced a pang as she thought about the kindly old scientist again. He’d taken his life in his hands by reporting the blackmail attempt.

  He put his life in my hands, Christie thought bitterly. I failed him.