by David Dun
"Why are you telling me this?"
"For the good of the cause."
"How do I know I can believe you?"
"Was I right about the money? Was I right about who would deliver it?"
Corey could feel the manipulation, and yet everything he said rang true.
"Why would killing Kim Lee make any difference? Someone will replace him."
"Fear. They would know someone knows their dirty secrets."
She was still unconvinced. She liked to do things her own way in her own time. The voice on the line was pushing her and she didn't like it.
"I'm not trying to tell you what to do. You seem to manage fine in that department. Just think it over. Oh, and turn on your TV. The local news, channel three. It starts in three minutes."
The line went dead. Hanging up on her was a form of control. One of these days she would make him regret it.
Sweat poured down the young man's chest in little rivulets and beaded on his face like rain on a wax-slick car. Corey gently squeezed his testicles, sensing that any moment he would come despite her attempt to hold him on the edge. Sitting in a slump against the headboard, his back supported by pillows, he obviously struggled to find release, to overcome her maddening rhythm that was just fast enough to keep him excited but not brisk enough to end his torment.
She had been waiting for this for a while, starting even before she brought home Denny, watching this Mike guy every day as he painted her house and did the landscaping. But every time Mike had touched her, she had shrugged and turned away, teasing him, waiting until she was ready. And then today she had looked at him while he painted the wood trim on the patio and said, "We can have sex if you want to." And now here she was astride him, one foot on the floor, her knee on the bed, her eyes closed, concentrating on the very moment she had pulled the trigger in the shower. Killing Denny still excited her. Her orgasm was long and slow, unfolding like a distant peal of thunder.
When she finished, Mike reached for her, trying to pull her to his chest, but she slid quickly from his grasp, picking up a towel and wiping herself. Then she turned to pull on her shorts. She had stripped only minimally-just enough to accomplish her purpose-and when her shorts were on, she was dressed and ready to go.
"You're not particularly cuddly for a woman who just made love." Mike watched her from the bed.
"It was good sex," she replied, otherwise ignoring him.
"You could be a little more friendly about it, that's all. Do you hate all men?"
"I need to work."
He shook his head incredulously. "When can I see you again?"
"When my shades aren't pulled, I suppose you'll see me through the window."
"That's not what I mean."
"But that's what I mean."
After he had dressed in silence, she watched his curly brown head disappear down the stairs. At least he had the fortitude not to whine like Denny. She wouldn't kill this one.
She opened a locked door off her bedroom, accessing another large room. It contained nothing but numerous shelves, a rack from which hung a wide assortment of tools, and a single large table.
On the table was a twenty-four-inch length of six-inch diameter pipe, crammed with nails and TNT. Next to the pipe was a battery, and the innards of a clock lay beside a pile of clocks. Even an untrained observer would have been able to tell that she was building a bomb.
As the time drew near, the adrenaline rush began. A feeling of power surged through her veins. The time of the blast, its lethal force, the manner of its placement- everything was hers to decide. The only problem with the arrangement was that she wasn't certain that Kim Lee's car would still be in the parking lot after dark. On Monday nights his habit was to leave late, between 9:00 and 9:30. According to a local human-interest article, many Amada executives and supervisors ordered pizza and watched Monday-night football together. On two Thursdays in a row, Kim Lee's car had been in the lot.
Once again the voice on the phone had instructed her to turn on the news. And there was Kim Lee explaining that violence against timber companies only strengthened their resolve. Damaged logging equipment could and would be replaced and more effective safeguards were being implemented. Then Maria Fischer was interviewed, claiming that people who committed violent acts against others could not be considered environmentalists. She and Lee were two different faces of the same liar.
Something about the arrogant confidence of Kim Lee as he read the words had infuriated her. Perhaps because they had been preceded by the prodding voice on the phone telling her that the only way to get the attention of the masses was to move directly against the spokesman for Amada. It would draw the world's attention to the plight of the redwoods unlike anything else. Then the facade of the industrialists' power would crumble, their vulnerability exposed.
The likelihood of press coverage was good. She was certain the media would ask-and answer-the question of why anyone would want to blow up Mr. Kim Lee's car with him inside it. She had included the nails in the pipe bomb for a heightened sense of drama. Nails could have no purpose other than shredding the body. The concussion from the TNT would be enough to kill.
Taking up the six-inch pipe, she felt its heft, much as a hunter might take stock of his rifle. Running her fingers along its rough gray surface, she noted the little pits left by the galvanizing process, then studied the flawless threads she had turned herself in her work shed. There was a clink when she placed the end piece on top, and a quiet sound like glass sliding on metal when she screwed the heavy cap slowly into place, noting with satisfaction that the threads were smooth and unmarred.
"Come on, lover boy," Corey said to herself as she caressed the large bomb.
She walked through the master bedroom, past the hand-carved hope chest, made in China for a wealthy socialite in the 1920s; she passed the sideboard and the paintings in the wide hallway, several of which were worth thousands. Occasionally she supposed her little painter friend imagined that he might steal some of these things when his work was completed. But then he would think about her rock-hard core, the trappings of her military training, the strange, scary looks she gave him sometimes, and decide it just wasn't worth it. She knew that he was afraid.
Back in the bedroom, she placed the bomb in a nylon travel bag. Pipe and timer were packed in a rectangular wood box, about twice the size of a shoe box-because of its weight the muscle rippled on her arm when she handled it. Suddenly she felt an even bigger rush. That box was real. She was actually going to hurt somebody who mattered.
There were three entrances to the Amada office complex that were passable by vehicle. She took none of these. Instead, she entered via a park and wooded area of several hundred acres nestled between a huge rock and gravel quarry on one side and the office buildings on the other. After parking a large Ryder rent-a-truck several miles away, she had opened its rear doors and rolled out a white Ford Mustang, about as plain vanilla as there was-except for the bored-out engine and the custom suspension. She sped through the dusk to the park, where she left the souped-up car. Using a dim red light, she proceeded down a trail through the forest for about a quarter mile, arriving at the edge of a large parking lot.
It was well lit. Metal stanchions rose at least forty feet into the air, before splitting into a T-shaped top. There were very few cars remaining, no more than ten in the area that she could see. A very black 1998 Buick with a gray interior and specialty license plate (KIM LEE AM) was parked within thirty feet of the tree line. Probably he had come to work later than most and therefore had to park in this far corner.
She thought it odd that a big shot like Lee didn't have an assigned space near the front door. When she first observed his customized license plate at a demonstration, she had felt a great sense of superiority. Her adversaries were dumb shits.
Like a lot of company cars, it sported a small black telephone antenna in the back windshield. She could put the bomb under the car, but it wouldn't be absolutely guaranteed to penetrate
the floorboards and kill him. On the other hand, she wasn't sure the bomb would fit under the seat. The stock-model Buick she had experimented with had just enough clearance under the seat to hide the bomb.
Staying low, she made her way to the vehicle, crouched down, and removed her field pack. She took out the two rodlike tools-the kind used by emergency vehicles to aid motorists who have locked their keys in their car. Although she had practiced at home, she didn't have a lot of experience and she had never tried a Buick. She inserted the two rods and attempted to grab the lock bar.
As she worked, she began to think about the voice on the phone. Whoever it was had prodded her to do this. While killing Kim Lee was something she might have thought about doing herself, it unnerved her that she had this unknown accomplice. Suddenly she felt like the puppet instead of the puppeteer. Though no one had told her to kill him, the thought had somehow slithered over the phone line even if not embodied in a word.
Did Kim Lee know that this unknown someone wanted him dead? Would he know why? What was the real reason for the money? Would he know anything about it? Slowly a new idea began to emerge. Maybe she shouldn't kill Kim Lee right away. Maybe she should take him home and toy with him.
Corey Schneider had always been careful to follow her own meticulous plans. Being spontaneous was dangerous, given her vocation. But somehow she couldn't shake the feeling that she was being manipulated for reasons she didn't understand. And she wanted to understand.
The door lock to the Buick clicked open as she pulled gently upward on the internal latching mechanism. She paused and tried to fathom how she might kidnap this man without any preparation. She had a roll of heavy duct tape to hold the bomb under the seat. It would certainly bind him sufficiently. The truck would be very useful. She could hide the Mustang and Mr. Lee as well. Without further equivocation she determined she would do it. Quickly she put the bomb back in her pack and retreated to the forest.
The forest edge was so quiet that a ringing in her ears made the silence uncomfortable. Winter brought with it cold dank air, along with a moisture-laden forest that seldom enjoyed the sun's warmth even on its uppermost parts. A pocket of black shadow created by the light of the halogen bulbs of the parking lot seemed to deepen the bone-chilling cold. Occasionally she heard the rushing air from a passing car in the distance. The access road to the office complex was a quarter mile or more from the two-lane highway that served it. Most workers had gone home two hours ago. Only the management football fans remained.
She could feel her heart beat as a slight pulse in her stiffening neck. Her mind sorted through her rapidly forming plan. Considering that she might even build a cage in the basement for her resident corporate asshole, she contemplated whom she might hire to construct it and how she could explain it to him.
A beam from a spotlight mounted on a security vehicle swept across the trees on the far side of the lot. Cruising around the edge of the parking area, the patrol would be one more impediment to a kidnap. If the security people were around when Lee exited the building, she would be forced to abandon her plan.
For this new scheme to work, Lee had to disappear. When she was through with him, his body could be discovered in a manner that would maximize publicity for the cause.
She considered what she might do with the bomb. It would make a great gift for Dan Young or that the bitch Maria Fischer. Since Young and Fischer were becoming such buddies, maybe it would suffice for both of them.
As the patrol car swept past, she noticed a figure coming down the lit glassed-in stairs in an outside wall of the Amada office complex. It looked like Lee. He was alone; apparently he was leaving early. The patrol car was moving away now. Waiting was an ordeal. Every second brought a hope that no one else would come, that the patrol car would not double back. One person seeing nothing more than two shadows in the night could spark an inquiry that would lead them to her.
The chair was a 200-year-old solid wooden affair from Spain. A nobleman had been tortured to death in it. She had been kind enough to tell Kim Lee that. There was a creaky friction between ancient dowels and their sockets every time he moved vigorously. Held together with some sort of pre-modern glue and wooden pegs, it was massive and still stout. Slightly frayed fabric, probably the fourth or fifth recovering, played under Kim's fingers. Some other heavy thinker had also squeezed his fingers on the rich material. Kim did it just to remind himself that he was alive, to allow his mind to sense something in the blackness even if it was only tired fabric against his fingertips.
His chest and back were bathed in sweat; sometimes his hands gripped the chair so tight the last knuckle of each finger ached with the strain. He tried to think-about the chair, the room, the details of each. It worked for a few minutes at a time, but then the terror would return.
He didn't want the fear to grip him so fully that he quit feeling, quit thinking. It was amazing really that his mind could be suffocated, his emotions clamped in a vise, with just a simple description of what she intended to do to him. It was incredible luck the way she managed to discern his deepest fears. Of course he was afraid of dying. He wanted to live. He wanted to live so bad it hurt inside, so bad that the sum of his life had become this moment and his sole mission to survive. But beyond the fear of death, there was a much greater fear-the fear of her kind of death.
When his chest hurt and his sides ached, when he had run out of tears, he made himself think about his wife and young child. Perhaps at this moment he actually felt closer to his wife. Only twenty-five, she had frizzy black hair that touched the tip of his nose when she sat in his lap and giggled-just curled up like a ball, scrunching her toes under her bottom, her big white teeth grinning out from her skinny lips. That's what he called her sometimes to tease-"skinny lips." Then she would rub her nose against his and make little snarling yaps like a mad Chihuahua. And he'd run his hands up her shapely dark arms, and the love would be pouring over him and out of him, and that was the best thing in life.
Then there were his dreams of their baby girl growing up. Now she gurgled and smiled, barely able to walk, knowing her parents only as the source of all comfort and sustenance.
But one day she would know them as people: their favorite books, what they did on Sunday afternoon, which relatives were invited often, Dad's favorite sake, and Mom's favorite perfume. Kim wanted to be there so that she could know him. He wanted to watch her roll her eyes and smile at his jokes. But he had forgotten these things and had started thinking that being a rich and successful corporate lawyer was the best thing in life. Now here he was locked in a black closet, sitting in an antique, history-making chair, waiting for a madwoman to come and do something he tried desperately not to think about.
He had a sense that whoever had taken him was cold to the core, completely unreachable. Now he thought of the watchmen who had lost their ears, and recalled the terror in their eyes. Now he understood.
Then he heard someone climbing stairs-he'd figured out about the stairs, because of the stair-climbing footfall, marked by a feather-light stride on the wood, and the sound of a barely discernible slide on the ball of the foot. Whenever she brought him food or water, or led him to the toilet around the corner from his dark little room, he heard these things.
Just missing Kim's knees, the door creaked open to the inside and there stood his enemy.
"If you'll just let me out of here, I'll do anything."
"Tell me why the timber industry wanted to give five hundred thousand to the environmental movement."
"Most in the industry want the government to buy the Highlands Forest to stop all the protests."
"Who wanted me to steal the money, and why?"
He hesitated. Sweat broke out on his forehead. Kenji Yamada had grown dangerous. Perhaps his boss was as dangerous as his tormentor.
"You really aren't willing to take the steps necessary to escape the fate I've promised you."
In the dull light, before he noticed what she was doing, she took out heavy shea
rs and snipped off the end of his little finger. The torture she had promised was so elaborate and what she had just done so simple, that it was a surprise. It was a moment before he began to scream. For a time he couldn't think; he could only yell. Then suddenly he was sopping wet and terribly cold. She had dumped a bucket of ice water over him.
"I'll tell you! I'll tell you everything. Just don't hurt me anymore. It's a new process. Incredible. But the bats, they're-" He gasped. A heavy weight pressed on his chest and pain shot up into his throat. He tried to take a breath. What could she be doing to him? What could he tell her? The room spun around and then there was nothing.
Lying on his belly on the massage table, Kenji began to relax. The young woman's hands were working on his buttocks and along with a slight erection came a general feeling of well-being. Because it was sexual it was the only part of the massage that compellingly did the job of distraction so that relaxation was possible.
When she got to his lower thighs, his mind departed to the cares of Amada, and his muscles took on a resilience that made deep relaxation impossible.
He picked up the phone, heard his masseuse sigh her discontent, but knew that she would say nothing about his placing a call. She normally tried not to irritate him when he was in these moods. What no one knew was that these moods of late had Dan Young's name written on them.
"How is it going?"
"I was going to call you in an hour," Groiter said. "I'm afraid it's not going so well. Turns out they did have another set of photos. Young sent them to Fischer in Sacramento and she's had them developed. Apparently she's given them to Patty McCafferty who has forwarded them to some university."
The erection was long gone. "Can't you get control of this? They're crawling up our ass."
"We are carefully going through and figuring out what papers were taken. There is a very good chance they didn't get the right stuff."