Caught in Amber

by Pegau, Cathy

  Sterling shook his hand. When they released, he looked at Sasha. “I’ll talk to you later.”

  “Sure,” she said in a flat tone. Did that mean she knew he’d be expecting a call from her soon, to say she was all right? Her face and voice gave away nothing. “Good night.”

  “Good night.”

  He turned and casually strolled down the hall to the door, each footstep sounding like failure. Failure to anticipate the lengths Sasha might have to go to. Failure to find a way to stay with her. Failure to prepare her for dealing with Christiansen on her own. No matter that it was her call, her decision. It still felt wrong to leave her behind.

  Out in the cold night air, Sterling cast a last glance at the door as it locked behind him. He walked to his car, hands shoved in his pockets. Aware that Christiansen had cameras covering him, he got in and drove away, ignoring the feeling his head was about to explode. Like it was only natural for him to leave a former addict with one of the worst dealers on the planet.

  And leaving the woman he’d sworn to protect in a dangerous situation was the best way to show he cared what became of her.

  Sterling drove out of the industrial park, past the guards at the gate, his hands white-knuckled on the controls. Less than a kilometer from the site, he pulled over and pounded the dashboard with both fists. “Fuck!” He slammed out each successive syllable. “Fuck fuck fuck!”

  He struck the dash once more, anger momentarily spent and his hands throbbing. He ran both palms over his face, through his hair, inadvertently turning off the recorder he’d forgotten about until the indicator light winked out in his peripheral vision.

  Taking deep, ragged breaths, he rubbed the heel of his hand over the scar on his forehead. If anything happened to her while she was alone with Christiansen... If Delhomme dared to do anything—anything—to hurt her...

  He would kill them. Simple as that.

  * * *

  Guy took Sasha’s hand and helped her out of the car. “Careful, it’s slippery.”

  The walkway up to the front door glistened with melted snow, the embedded heat coils doing their job. But if Guy wanted to show her his gallant side, Sasha wasn’t about to snub him. The house wasn’t as well lit as the night before, but there were lights on to indicate someone was home. When she was with him, somewhere between six and twelve people made up Guy’s entourage on any given day.

  “How many people are here?”

  “Ten on staff and about half a dozen...friends.” His gaze shifted to her. “No one special.”

  Sasha’s stomach rolled, but she neither flinched nor gave any encouragement. It was dangerous that she’d asked to come home with him. Dangerous but necessary.

  Kenneth opened the front door for them then took their coats. Genevieve Caine stood nearby, her hands clasped at her waist. The soft green sweater and brown trousers were far more demure than the red dress she’d worn the night before. Her hair pulled back in a sleek tail, the subdued clothing and low heels didn’t diminish her bearing in the least. Sasha found herself straightening her posture in an attempt to measure up to the composed blonde.

  Genevieve waited for Kenneth to leave the foyer before approaching. “Good to see you again, Miss James.” She smiled, but Sasha couldn’t tell if it was sincere or mocking. “Will Mr. Hollings be joining you this evening?”

  Something akin to jealousy flared in Sasha’s chest. No, not akin. It was jealousy, and she had no right to feel it. She crossed her arms and rubbed them as if chilled, keeping the unbidden emotion at bay. “No, he won’t.”

  Genevieve’s smile ebbed a notch. Was she disappointed? Too bad.

  Guy took Sasha’s arm and guided her toward the hall leading to his office. “We don’t want to be disturbed.”

  “Yes, sir.” Genevieve glanced at his hand then met Sasha’s gaze. What was she thinking behind that cool perusal? Probably that Sasha was nothing more than another of Guy’s playthings. She held Genevieve’s stare until she and Guy passed, refusing to explain herself. Not that she could.

  Their footfalls echoed down the empty hall.

  “Where is everyone?” Sasha asked.

  Guy unlocked the office door with similar biometric readings as those used at the warehouse. He pressed his thumb to the black stone on the lever. When the lock disengaged, he held the door open for her. “Probably at the pool. It’s become somewhat of a nightly ritual.”

  “Pool?” Sasha entered the office and the lights rose.

  Guy shut the door behind them and passed her to get to his desk. “I had it put in a couple of years ago. Off the conservatory.” He dragged one of the visitor’s chairs beside his larger chair and patted the back of it, indicating she should sit. “We’ll go over some basics first.”

  Sasha hesitated. He could have called up a holo screen that she would be able to see from the visitor’s side of the desk. But no. He wanted her beside him. She lowered herself into the chair, waiting for him to touch her. He didn’t. He helped scoot the chair closer to the desk so she could see the SI screen then sat in his own chair. He tapped the desktop and the screen came to life, along with a standard keyboard projected on the dark wood.

  Guy flicked an icon, and a multicolored graph filled the screen. “This is an overview of production and distribution for my business and the two other major dealers on Nevarro.”

  “You know how much your competitors sell?”

  “More or less. Helps to know how the market shares fall out.”

  Amber dealing never seemed so pedestrian to her before now.

  He tapped a green line, and some text appeared beside it. “Kimball, down in Pembroke, is selling about seventy million grams per annum. She’s grown six percent this past year.” Tap on a red line. “But Spencer, over on the South Continent, has declined this year. Kimball and I are vying for his territory.”

  “It won’t get dangerous, will it?”

  Guy laughed. “No. At this level, it’s all very civilized. Further down the ladder, where I distribute to local dealers, it can get ugly. That’s where Marco comes in.”

  “He keeps the local dealers in line?” From some of the menacing folks lingering about her old neighborhood, it would take someone like Marco to keep them from killing each other or stealing from Guy.

  Staring at the screen, he leaned back in his chair and smoothed his palm over his mouth and chin. “Yeah. Marco’s been with me for a long time, took care of a lot of problems that came my way.” Sasha could only imagine what those problems were and how Marco dealt with them. “But lately...I just don’t know.” He slanted a glance toward her and rubbed his jaw.

  Sasha recognized the gesture as indecision, a rarity in Guy Christiansen. What was he considering? What she should hear about Marco? Whether he could trust her not to repeat whatever he wanted to say? It was obvious that something was bothering him.

  “Forget it, Guy.” She patted his arm and gave him a small smile. “You told me last night about your doubts with him. I don’t need specifics. You’re probably feeling like you can’t trust anyone.”

  He sat up, startled. “No, it’s not that I don’t trust you. I just don’t want you to get caught up in this thing with Marco, whatever it is. He’s a dangerous man. I don’t want him hassling you to get to me.”

  Sasha appreciated his concern on some level, but it was too late for her to avoid Marco’s attention.

  “I heard Marco approached some of my street guys on his own,” Guy continued. “He may be making a move to carve out his own piece of my business.”

  Sasha’s eyes widened. “That’s gutsy.” And suicidal. No one in his right mind crossed Guy without repercussions.

  Present company excepted? Not really. She’d definitely paid a price, just not to him directly. Sasha kept her reaction as normal as she could as one word formed in her brain: yet.

/>   Guy tapped another icon on the screen and a different graph appeared. “He’s smart enough not to do anything so blatant as steal credits or product, but word of mouth has him conversing about changing supply schedules and modes of distribution.”

  “Without telling you?”

  He gave her a wry grin and shook his head. “I give my people a certain amount of leeway, but they need to keep me apprised. Funny thing is, I’d have given him his own territory in a year or so as a token of appreciation.”

  “Sounds like he got impatient.” Another Guy rule. Patience and loyalty went far with him.

  He blew out a weary breath. “Maybe. Can we continue this some other time, sweetness? I’m not in the mood to talk business all of a sudden.”

  The fact that he’d given her even that much insight into his troubles was more than she’d expected. Best not to press her luck too far too soon.

  Sasha slid her chair back and stood. “Sure. We have time.” Not really, but she didn’t want to torque him.

  He smiled. “Thanks. How about I show you the pool? I could use a swim.”

  She led the way to the door. If lounging at the pool had become a nightly ritual for Guy and his friends, would she see Kylie there? As they walked through the halls, Sasha considered how to approach Sterling’s kid sister.

  * * *

  Sterling parked in front of the Revivalist Hall, not surprised he’d found a spot. Only a few ground cars sat along a three-block stretch; Revivalists in the larger cities weren’t big on private transportation. He got out, secured the vehicle and headed down the alley, shoulders hunched against the cold. His stomach rumbled, a reminder he hadn’t eaten since that afternoon. Some InstaHeat soup would suffice. He’d learned long ago that agency work made for odd hours and always had a few cans on hand.

  Sasha was probably dining with Christiansen. What would the drug dealer serve for their first meal together? Not InstaHeat soup, that much he knew. Would Christiansen expect her to fall for the lure of her former lifestyle?

  He’d be a fool to think it would work. Sasha knew the glitz and expensive meals were too high a price to pay. She was stronger than he or Christiansen initially gave her credit for, but Sterling was learning. Still, he worried that Christiansen would push her too far while he wasn’t around.

  His shoes crunched on the grit in the alley, the sound echoing off the walls of the Hall and the neighboring furniture store. The light over the entry to his room was out, deepening the shadows made by discarded pallets and trash bins beside the buildings. Probably best to just fix the light himself than tell the manager, he thought as his false eye automatically adjusted to the poor light.

  Across from the door, a figure stood against the damp bricks of the furniture store. The hairs on Sterling’s neck prickled. He kneeled down as if needing to adjust his boot and reached for the stunner in his ankle holster.

  “Don’t shoot,” a calm, feminine voice said. “It’s me.”

  He registered the voice with surprise. The night-vision mode of his artificial eye confirmed his visitor’s identity. “You’re lucky I didn’t shoot first, Hallowell.” Sterling rose and brushed grime off his knee, eyeing her warily.

  The tall, slender CMA agent eased away from the wall, hands in the side pockets of her overcoat. “I trusted you’d see me before it got that far.”

  “Trust can be an iffy thing. What do you want?”

  “Just seeing how you’re doing.” Hallowell had his comm details, which included a locator, in case he needed her. She was one of the only people he’d trusted with the information. Still, her presence here was unnecessary.

  Unless something was wrong.

  She rubbed her palms together and blew on them, her breath a billowing silver cloud in his enhanced vision. “Can we go inside? I forgot my gloves.”

  Sterling rolled his eyes and turned to unlock the door. Natalia Hallowell had a knack for playing vacuous women, but she was one of the sharpest agents—one of the sharpest people—he knew. She hadn’t forgotten her gloves, and she wanted to talk about more than his welfare. Damn the void.

  “Watch your step,” he said as she followed him in. “And push the door hard when you close it. The latch is stiff.”

  She followed his instructions. Her boots clanged on the metal stairs behind him.

  In his room, Sterling turned on the light. His false eye readjusted and he motioned Hallowell to take either the chair or sit on his narrow bed. She chose the chair, smoothing her overcoat under herself and crossing her ankles beneath the seat. There was little room for her long legs in the space between the two pieces of furniture.

  Sterling hung his coat on the peg on the back of the door and stood at the foot of the bed. “You didn’t have to get dressed up for me.”

  “I’m a mess, I know.” She smirked and flicked at a stain on the dusty overcoat. It was a second-or third-hand garment, judging from the wear at different places near the elbows, not the crisp, black model she usually wore to the office. “I was checking out a lead before I came over. The Hannigan case.”

  That explained the chestnut coloring of her normally blond hair. Eyebrows too, and enough subdermal alteration of her features to throw off identification if you didn’t know her. Hallowell was good at little details. It made her an excellent undercover agent.

  “How’s it going?” he asked as he sat across from her but to the side, so their knees wouldn’t knock together. Springs creaked and the mattress sagged beneath him.

  She shrugged. “Lots of dead ends and rumors I can’t substantiate, but I’ll crack it.”

  “I’m sure you will.”

  Hallowell ran a hand through her damp, mussed hair. “Garces is bugging the hell out of me,” she said, getting down to business. “He’s been asking where you are for the past week, and I’m having a hard time convincing him you’re incommunicado.”

  Sterling crossed his arms. Their supervisor was a huge pain in the ass on a good day. “He approved my personal leave. Told me half a dozen times in the past five years I needed a vacation.”

  “Yeah, but you never took more than a few days off before now. Even when your father died. And you always checked in.”

  He gave a humorous laugh. “So now he’s suspicious. First he gripes I don’t take leave, now he’s unhappy when I do.”

  “Garces knows you well enough.” She leaned forward, elbows on her knees and hands clasped. “And so do I. What’s going on?”

  He recognized the to-the-point technique she used on witnesses or suspects, but it wouldn’t work on him. He wasn’t about to drag her into his problems. “Nothing I can’t handle.”

  One shapely eyebrow rose. “I’m sure, but it doesn’t mean you should handle it alone. That’s what partners are for.”

  He wasn’t alone, not really. She didn’t need to have that information either. He’d trusted her with his location, but he knew better than to get her involved. Plausible deniability of his actions would keep her record clean.

  Sterling didn’t move, didn’t twitch a muscle. Or didn’t think he had. Hallowell must have read something in his face or body language. Her eyes narrowed.

  “Personal, or something that could get you into trouble at the agency?” She stared at him, neither of them changing position. “Or both?”

  Damn, she was good. Her excellent undercover skills and the uncanny ability to read the most subtle changes in expression or body language made her one of the best agents on his team. But he couldn’t tell her. Risking her career by revealing his activities was out of the question. It was bad enough he’d involved Sasha, a civilian. That alone could get him suspended, and he had accepted the fact his own career probably wouldn’t survive the end of this operation.

  “I’ll contact Garces in the morning, but I’ll need another week before coming in.”

 
She held his gaze for a few heartbeats then nodded. “One week. If you send him a ‘Having a great time, wish you were here’ message, I can distract him for that long.” She rose and tightened the sash on her coat. “No more than that, though.”

  Sterling nodded, followed her to the door and held it open. “Thanks, Natalia.”

  “Call me if you need anything.” She strode into the hall and withdrew a pair of thin leather gloves from her pocket. “And get some sleep. You look like hell.”

  Her footsteps rang on the metal treads as she descended. The outer door screeched open then thumped closed.

  Sterling closed and locked the door. He fished the comm out of his coat pocket and made the three-step trip back to the bed. On the dresser, colorful cans of InstaHeat soup reminded him he still hadn’t eaten, but he wasn’t hungry anymore.

  He sat on the bed, called up Sasha’s chip ID on the comm and tapped the locator icon.

  A green triangle blinked near the coordinates of Christiansen’s house. All her bio readouts read normal. She wasn’t under excessive stress. For some reason, that didn’t make him feel any better.

  Sterling lay down on his side and bunched the thin pillow under his head, staring at the flashing green symbol.

  Chapter Ten

  Guy pointed out the improvements and upgrades he’d made to the house structure and security as he and Sasha strolled the high-ceilinged halls on the way to the conservatory.

  “Most of this,” he said, “was done while you were recovering.”

  She nodded and pretended to admire the new subtle blue of the walls, her lips pressed together.

  Recovering. Recuperating. As if she’d contracted some exotic illness or parasite. She suppressed a humorless laugh at that. Amber was a kind of parasite. It got inside you and ate away at your soul as well as your body. Recovery wasn’t simply a matter of taking some meds or zapping an offending bug with rads or sonics.

  Some users were able to shake their addiction by avoiding the drug. For others—like Sasha—only the nanos released by the chip quelled the physical ache. The psychological desire was another matter. Walking into The Morrissey the other night, seeing the film of amber dust on the table, inhaling the sweet aroma of citrus and cinnamon and the promise of euphoria had nearly done her in. If Sterling hadn’t been on the other end of the transmitter, waiting for her to come back to him, what would have happened?