I really wasn’t hurt that badly. A few scrapes and bruises and sore muscles weren’t really a big deal. But after the stress and fatigue of the past few weeks, I couldn’t seem to shake off the urge to just curl up and cry. I took a deep breath and determinedly rerouted my mind to my bookkeeping clients. I’d have to do a little desk work today, just to be ready for next week…
My eyes were welling up in spite of myself when Tom’s half-ton pulled up at the gate. A small moan escaped me. If I’d been sitting around the back of the house, I could have ignored him and he’d never have even known I was here. But I was in plain sight, so I hauled myself to my feet and did my best to hide my limp while I trod stiffly across the lawn. Apparently I’d landed hard on my butt at some point last night, too.
He swung out of the truck as I approached and his smile vanished when I got close enough for him to see my injuries. I cursed myself for not putting on a T-shirt and jeans to hide the scrapes. I looked like I’d gone a couple of rounds with a renegade belt sander.
“Aydan, what happened?” he demanded. “Were you in an accident?”
I grunted as I unlocked the gate and swung it open. “Accident for me. On purpose for the other guys.”
“Who did this to you?” His eyes blazed with blue fury.
“Bill Harks and his buddy. And don’t worry, they’re in jail. Where they’ll stay for a while.”
“Two of them? Two of them attacked you?” His fists clenched.
“Yeah, brave guys. They cornered me last night in town.” I really didn’t feel like going into it, so I changed the subject. “What’s up?”
“Shouldn’t you be in the hospital?”
I sighed. “I got cleaned up there last night. I’ve just got a few bruises and some scrapes from rolling around on the pavement. It’s nothing serious.”
“Aydan, you can hardly move.” His tanned face was creased with worry.
I shrugged slowly and carefully. “Harks decided to sling me around by my hair, so my neck’s pretty stiff. It’ll settle down in a couple of days.”
Anger blazed from his eyes again, and I held up a restraining hand. “It’s no big deal. They’re in jail. It’s all good.” I tried again. “So what’s up?”
I could tell he didn’t want to let it go, but after a few seconds he sighed and turned back toward the truck. “We had far too much food at the potluck last night, as usual. I thought if you were still feeling under the weather from yesterday, you might appreciate some of it.” He frowned again. “I didn’t realize how under the weather you were going to be.”
“Food?” My stomach emitted an eager growl. I clapped a hand over it. “Sorry. Comments from the peanut gallery.”
He gave me his crooked smile as he indicated the cardboard box on the seat. “Where do you want it?”
I considered. I didn’t really want him near the house, but I also didn’t really feel like carrying a heavy box of food today, either.
Fuck it. He was just a neighbour. As long as Stemp didn’t see him too frequently, he should be safe.
“Why don’t you just drive on up to the house with it, and I’ll put it in the fridge.”
“Okay, hop in. It’ll save you the walk.”
That seemed like a fine idea. I climbed carefully into the passenger seat.
He pulled up in front of the house, and I held the door for him while he brought the box inside. As I unpacked the food on the kitchen counter, my stomach growled again.
Tom gave me a quizzical look. “Maybe you should eat some of this right now.”
I grinned at him. “I was trying to be polite and not stuff my face in front of you.”
“Forget that.” I got the crooked smile again. “Where are your plates?”
I loaded up a plate, exclaiming over the variety of food while my stomach roared its eagerness. After packing the remainder of the food into the fridge, I made for the front door, carrying my plate. The sooner he was out of the house and away from the bugs and cameras, the better.
“I’m going to eat this outside,” I told him. “I’ve been cooped up inside buildings all week.”
He got the door for me and followed me out. I had half-hoped he’d leave, but instead he trailed me to my chair in the shade. I sat carefully and he lowered himself to the grass, leaning back on his elbows with his long denim-clad legs stretched out.
I dug into the food enthusiastically and he squinted up at me from the ground, the lines crimping around his eyes. “You were starving. And your fridge was completely empty. Don’t you have any food in the house?”
“I’ve got tons of food in the freezer. I’ve just been too lazy to cook lately.”
He gave me a piercing look. “I wouldn’t say lazy. I’d say you’ve had a tough week.”
Uncharacteristic tears threatened again. I hate sympathy. I swallowed hard and looked away.
“Yeah, not one of my better weeks,” I agreed lightly. “Hey, I meant to ask you. Or somebody who knows more about hay than I do, anyway. What’s going on with my hay field up there?”
He glanced up the hill. “What do you mean?”
“It looks pretty sad to me. Should I be doing something with it?”
The conversation veered to farming, and I relaxed into the comfortable topic while I finished the excellent food. At last I scraped the plate clean and leaned over slowly and stiffly to put it on the ground.
Tom turned a troubled face to me. “I wish there was something I could do to make you feel better.”
“Not unless you can recommend a massage therapist.” I eased my aching neck around to give him a rueful smile. “I know a good guy in Calgary, but I’m not driving two hours to see him.”
“There’s one in Silverside, but I know she’s on vacation this week.” He frowned. “If you’d like, I could probably help a bit. I don’t have any training, but one of the women I dated for a while was a registered massage therapist, and she taught me a lot.”
I threw caution to the winds at the glorious thought of somebody, anybody, doing something to ease my screaming neck and shoulders. “Would you? That would be wonderful.”
“Sure.” He rose and looked down at me dubiously. “You should lie down.”
“I don’t think I can. I’m too sore.” Also, I had no intention of bringing him anywhere near the house.
“Tell me if I hurt you, then.” He stepped behind me and stroked my hair away from my back. His firm, gentle hands started to work my shoulders and neck.
I slouched forward and propped my head in my hands while the heavenly touch eased my stiffened muscles. A small moan escaped me, and he stopped instantly. “Did I hurt you?”
“No. That feels amazing.”
He started again, and I blinked back tears of gratitude. Even if he’d been doing a lousy job, the caring touch of his hands would have been worth it. And he wasn’t doing a lousy job. Far from it.
I lost track of time while I floated mindlessly. Finally he stopped, and I did my best not to whimper a complaint.
“I have to get going now. Sorry,” he said.
I straightened slowly in the chair before dragging myself to my feet. “Thank you. I feel so much better now.”
He smiled, his eyes soft as the summer sky. “Good.” He hesitated. “Aydan... I hope you’ll call me if you ever need help. I’m here for you if you do.”
I blinked and swallowed. “Thanks, Tom.” I cursed the quiver in my voice. Suck it up, for chrissake.
He surveyed my face for a moment before stepping forward to put his arms around me. I gulped hard. I really didn’t want to get involved with him. And I do not cry in public.
I managed to hold out for a couple of seconds before I slid my arms around his lean body and hid my face in his shoulder. We stood in silence while I struggled for composure. His corded arms held my aching body as softly as if I might break.
And I might.
I took a deep breath and pulled away.
He let me go immediately and took my hand instead. �
��Call me if you need me.”
I didn’t meet his eyes. “I will.”
Chapter 25
I heard the phone ring through the open window, and trailed back into the house. The message on the machine was from Lola, worrying about me. I called her back and chatted for a few minutes, reassuring her.
After hanging up I blinked heavy eyes at my heaped-up desk in the stuffy office. I was trying to motivate myself when the phone rang again, and I picked up to another of the women from the previous evening, expressing concern.
I hung up after the short conversation and sighed. Then I tucked my cell phone in my pocket and made for the garage, where I opened the main door to let in the breeze and curled up in my comfortable nest in the corner.
A couple of hours later I finally roused myself and creaked back into the house. My body still hurt, but the urge to cry was gone. I headed for my desk, feeling much more positive, and immersed myself in the pleasantly predictable world of bookkeeping.
The phone rang frequently as several more of my new friends from the previous evening called to check on me, along with Spider, Blue Eddy, Jeff Latchford, and Kane.
By suppertime, I was feeling thoroughly loved, my bookkeeping work was caught up, and my fridge was still full of delicious food. The phone rang again, and I smiled as I picked up.
“Hello?”
“Watch your back, bitch. I’ll be waiting for you.”
A lump of ice formed in the pit of my stomach. “Who is this?”
“You’ll find out.”
Click.
I sat and regarded the receiver trembling in my hand for a moment. Then I laid it carefully back in the cradle. My newfound optimism somewhat dented, I headed for the kitchen and consoled myself with potluck leftovers.
With my belly filled, the world looked rosier. I loaded the dishes into the dishwasher with a shrug. Whatever. I was in no more danger than before. Stemp’s analysts would be busily tracing that call.
I got to bed early and managed to sleep most of the night. Only one call with silence on the other end, which I chose to regard as comforting. Somebody was looking out for me. And only one more nocturnal threat. Could have been worse.
Creeping stiffly out of bed, I made a point of being showered, dressed, and ready to go when Kane arrived at eight-thirty.
“How are you feeling?” he asked sympathetically as I climbed into the Expedition.
“Pretty good today, actually. Still stiff and sore, but it’s better already.”
“Good.”
“Did your guys get a trace on those calls?”
“Public phone at the Silverside Hotel again. But we couldn’t find anyone who could tell us who’d been using it. Everything is in chaos over there now that Harks is in custody. The owners are trying to find a replacement for him, and nobody knows what’s going on.”
“Harks wasn’t the owner?”
“No, just general manager.”
I snorted. “Well, anybody they hire will be an improvement.”
When we pulled up outside Sirius, my heart sank. Kane turned to study my face. “Are you okay?”
I sighed. The hand tremor was back. “All in all, I think I prefer taking a shit-kicking in the open air to living unscathed underground. As long as I’m outside, I have the illusion that I might be able to escape.”
He regarded me in silence, his face troubled. I lifted a painful shoulder. “Let’s go do it.”
I made it into Spider’s lab without panicking. Sinking slowly into my usual chair, I breathed deeply and carefully.
“We’re going to do things a little differently today,” Kane informed me. “Webb will monitor from the lab as usual, but I’m going to come into the network with you. If you’re incapacitated for any reason, I’ll be able to get you out.”
“Or we’ll both die in there.”
“No.” Kane shook his head. “That won’t happen. Don’t forget, I can be woken from the network easily from outside the sim. It’s only dangerous for you because you can’t be roused from your trance externally when you use the key.”
I gave him a wry look. “Are you sure you want to come in with me? How are your pigshit-dodging skills?”
He laughed. “My job in the sim is to create virtual umbrellas.”
“Yeah, that would have worked. Too bad I didn’t think of it.”
“You were doing more important work. Speaking of which, Stemp wants you to take a new direction today. He wants you to leave the files for today and get into the network traffic to see if you can track down some more IP addresses for Fuzzy Bunny’s sites.”
I frowned at Spider. “Any suggestions? I really don’t know what I’m doing.”
He returned a shrug. “Whatever you did before worked. I know how I’d do it if I was working externally, but your sim visualized things entirely differently than I would have. Just go with what you did before. If that doesn’t work, we can collaborate on an approach.”
“Okay.” I sighed. “Wish me luck.” I closed my eyes and concentrated on stepping into the network void.
My heart lurched as I entered, but there was only familiar whiteness this time. Just as Kane popped into existence beside me, a wisp of black mist drifted by, carrying the faint reek of burned flesh.
“What was that?” he demanded.
“Sorry. I just...” I took a deep breath and stood on the mountain top. It still looked flat and two-dimensional, and I struggled to open the long vista. I sagged with sudden relief when the scent of spruce came to my nose. The crisp, fresh breeze sighed across the deep valley. I flopped onto the ground before my wobbling knees could drop me.
Kane sat down beside me. I gave him a quick sideways glance. “Thanks. Nice umbrella.”
His mouth quirked up, but his eyes were grave. “You’re welcome.”
I sighed. “Well, I guess I’ll start poking around. I don’t really know what this is going to look like to you. Last time I did this, it was kind of like... being sentient Silly Putty. Or something. I kind of stretched in all different directions. And I need to be invisible.”
“This is going to be complicated.” Kane frowned. “I don’t dare try to follow you. The key makes you undetectable, but I’d stick out like a sore thumb with my fob. But if I can’t see you, I won’t know if you need help.”
“Spider? Any ideas?” I asked the virtual sky.
“I haven’t a clue,” he admitted. “I don’t even know how you did it the first time. I don’t know what your rules would be.”
“Shit!” I churned my hands in my hair. After a couple of minutes of thought, I turned to Kane. “Okay, let’s try this.” I took his hand. “I’ll turn invisible and stretch wherever I need to go, but I won’t let go of your hand. If I squeeze your hand, or if you need to bring me back, just start pulling.”
I grimaced. “It might take a while to reel me in. I might be on the other side of the globe.”
He scowled and took a firmer grip on my hand. “All right.”
I faded into invisibility and felt Kane’s hand tighten around mine. Then I let the sim dissolve around me and floated my consciousness up into the tunnels of the network.
I effortlessly intercepted and opened data packets, snooping on network messages and services. My invisible self was infinitely flexible, and I stretched into multiple channels simultaneously, sniffing my way along. Vast amounts of data rushed by me, and I absorbed it as easily as a dark cloth absorbs sunlight.
In the virtual file room, I poured my attention like water over and around the files without bothering to interpret their content. Instead, I touched and smelled and tasted, listening to the faint echoes of electronic signatures.
Find a path that feels like these files.
Casting down infinite corridors, I caught a sudden whiff. My consciousness snapped into focus, burrowing down the corridor. Yes, this was definitely the right one. I methodically backtracked, holding the scent.
Kane startled when I snapped back into existence beside him. He
was clutching my hand painfully, and I gave our clasped hands a little shake. “Go easy, Superman.”
“Sorry.” His grip loosened. “Your hand just... shrank. To almost nothing. I could barely feel it.”
“Mm. Oh well. Hey, Spider, I’ve got some IPs.”
“Great, shoot!”
I passed the first batch over to him. “I’ll go and get the rest. Hang tight.”
I quested down the tunnel again, snapping back to report IP addresses as I discovered them. Finally, the scent led me to a firewall. I poked my virtual head cautiously through, sampling the data packets. Triumph flowed through my attenuated body.
Gotcha!
I laid a careful trail of virtual breadcrumbs on my way back.
I flopped on my back on the mountain-top, gasping and grinning.
“What?” Kane demanded.
“I got one. Found one of Fuzzy Bunny’s sites.”
“Are you sure?”
“If it smells like a bunny and tastes like a bunny, it must be a bunny. Hey, Spider, can you see my breadcrumbs?”
I heard his laugh through the network interface. “You have the most bizarre sim imagery. But yes, I can track the markers you left. It’ll just take me a while.”
“Good, then we’ll take a break,” Kane said. “It’s past lunch time.”
I gazed up at him from my supine position. “That explains why I feel like I can see through my stomach.”
He glanced over, and then looked away. “I can see through your stomach. Let’s get out of this stupid sim.”
“Sorry.” I tried to pull myself together. Literally. My body oozed like tar over the warm rocks.
“Stop,” Kane said firmly. “Come on, let’s dance.”
Vertigo whirled my head as the mountain top changed to a ballroom. A waltz played and I stepped into his arms. He waltzed me expertly over to the portal, and we went through together.
I moaned and swore when the pain ripped through my head. The aches and bruises of my real-world body pounded me again, and I keened miserably for a few moments.
Straightening was a punishing effort. My body had stiffened considerably after being immobile in the chair for so long. When I finally groaned my way upright, Kane and Spider were both watching me with worried eyes.
Reach For the Spy Page 14