by J. R. Ward
The street mall was busy again, people out in the April sunshine, hustling between the shops and those chain restaurants where you could eat a huge plate of food as well as a dessert for fifteen bucks. The bookstore was at the far end, and when she walked in, she casually strolled through the stacks.
One good thing about getting out of Caldwell would be never having to deal with Monty and his stupid-ass, pseudo-spy crap again.
As instructed, she went to the back, passed the magazine section, mounted the three steps up into the Romance and Fiction area, and then headed farther down to Military.
Naturally. Because when you were pretending that you were sharing intel of national security-level importance, you didn’t want to do it in the Health & Beauty section: A background of picture books of guns and wars were much more manly. Yup.
“You’re here,” came the hushed voice.
As she turned to Monty, she braced herself—but this was actually him. Same big forehead, same pinchy little mouth, right pair of sunglasses, which he kept on—because wearing something like that made you much less noticeable indoors. Another great plan.
God, her Ray-Bans…Matthias had kept them, hadn’t he.
“So what have you got for me?” she said roughly, forcing herself to plug into the conversation.
It was so tough to concentrate. The blowup with Matthias had scrambled her so badly, anything that had gone on before it seemed like ancient history. But those two women were still dead, and she was determined to finish the story before she left town.
Monty took a book on WWII aircraft off the shelf and idly flipped through the thing. “You know the victim who was found on the library steps? My pictures match what was on her stomach.”
“Her abdomen was marked as well?”
“Yup.”
“Well, that’s interesting.” And highly suspicious. “But they still don’t match the first victim’s actual body—which is the problem.”
“Don’t you think that’s curious, though? Two dead women with identical inscriptions in their skin, in the same place on the belly—and they were killed in the same way.”
“Are you sure you want me to extrapolate from that.”
“Excuse me?”
“Well, at least one conclusion is a little disturbing. Maybe you’re the killer.”
His head turned around so fast, his sunglasses wobbled on his nose. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Let’s look at things from the beginning. The true “first” victim was the one with those markings who was found in the quarry. She’s blond, she’s young, and she’s got her throat slit. Victim number two is a prostitute who colors her hair, blows it out straight, and has her throat slit. Third one? Color. Blowout. The same method of death. And here you are, in the middle of all this, showing up with a photograph of number two with markings superimposed on the abdomen—just like numbers one and three. Now, this second dead girl is a prostitute—perfect place to start if you want to be a copycat in real life. You hire her, kill her, except you get interrupted before you can put the marks were they need to go. You take the pictures, Photoshop them, and show me because you need someone to see your work—someone other than your good self.”
He snapped the book shut and took off the glasses. His eyes were dead serious. “Not at all what happened.”
“Then how do you explain what you gave me?”
“Someone tampered with her. I’m telling you.”
“No offense, but bullshit. Scars don’t disappear from skin.”
The instant the words came out of her mouth, she thought of Matthias—and then reminded herself that there was no magic in the world. There was, however, plenty of makeup. She’d used it on her own bruises. So had he.
Monty jutted forward on his hips. “I’m not feeding you any more information. I had something you might like to know, but you can go to hell—and give up your day job. I can make it so no one talks to you about so much as the fucking weather.”
Mels closed her eyes and bit her tongue.
The truth was, she didn’t actually think Monty killed anyone. Egomaniacs were not necessarily murderers—and she’d rolled out that soliloquy because she was tired of being jerked around.
After a moment, she said, “I’m sorry. You’re right….” Ego stroke, ego stroke, apology…girl eyes. “I didn’t mean to go overboard and offend you.”
“You need to learn how things are done,” Monty grumbled.
“Clearly.” Oh, teach me, big boy—blech. “So…what else do you have for me?”
He didn’t answer her in a hurry, and she had to invest some more smooth-over effort. Eventually, however, he came back around.
“Someone brought in a bullet casing that matches the ones found in the Marriott basement.”
Mels lifted her brows. “Really.”
“Yup. It’s a confidential source, apparently—but CSI established that it was indeed from the gun used in that murder. And here’s the bizarre thing. The owner’s name that was given over? A dead man by the name of Jim Heron.”
Okay, she could not believe the guy was feeding her her own damned story.
Monty leaned in. “The question is, how does the gun of a dead guy end up shooting someone in a hotel a good week or more after he died?”
“Someone took the weapon,” she said flatly. “And used it.”
Monty shrugged. “They’re sending officers over to Heron’s last known address right now to find out more. And I don’t need to tell you that any link to that disappeared body at the Marriott is significant.”
“True….” Hell, at least she knew she’d made a difference. And she’d had to bring Jim Heron in on it when she’d talked to de la Cruz: In spite of the fact that the guy had saved her life—twice—the bottom line was that a criminal was a criminal, and obstruction of justice was not just a felony; it was, in her view, a moral outrage.
“Maybe I’ll let you know what comes of it,” Monty said. “It depends.”
“On what?”
“Whether or not I’m still pissed off at you.”
As he sauntered away, she cursed and wanted to kick the stack of books next to her. Way to handle a source: by accusing him of murder.
Note to self—save the insults for after she got the information.
Although really, what had he given her?
Bracing her elbow in front of a three-volume set on Allied flight paths, she leaned into her hand and cursed—
“Don’t turn around.”
As he stood behind Mels, Matthias knew he’d better talk fast. She wasn’t going to want to breathe the same air he did, and she was exactly the kind of woman who would walk away—or worse.
“I know you don’t want to see me—”
“Or talk to you,” she gritted out.
“But I have something to give you—”
“Don’t want it.” Moreover, given by her stiff shoulders, she was probably considering throwing a punch. “I don’t want anything from you.”
Leaning in, he put the SanDisk on the shelf at her eye level and slid the thing into the range of her peripheral vision.
Keeping his fingertip on the black bullet, he said, “You believe that I shot at that man. So believe what’s in this.” He tapped the plastic casing. “It’s the whole story.”
“An autobiography of lies? I don’t read fiction.”
“Not fiction.” He tapped the thing again. “It’s the whole truth—everything I did, everything I hid.”
Her head slowly turned toward the bookcases, and he drank in her profile: The sight of her cut right through him, slicing him to the bone, and he wanted to touch her, pull her back against him, put his face in her hair and smell her.
Instead, he moved the flashdrive even closer. “It’s all in here. And I’m giving it to you.”
“Why.”
“Because after you go through it, after you verify the information—and I know you will—you’ll have to believe what I’m saying to you now. When
it came to you, and being with you, I always told the truth—that was real, the only real I’ve ever had. I’m leaving now, and I had to tell you this before I go—”
“Goddamn you, I don’t want your confession, and I will never believe you about anything—”
“Take this. Open it up. The file directory is easy to navigate.” He stepped back. “One caveat—do not review the files on a networked computer with access to the Internet. Go laptop—with no Web. It’s safest that way.”
Her head went back and forth. “You’re crazy if you think I—”
“You want the story of a lifetime? You got it.” Matthias cleared his throat. “Bear in mind, however, that the information in those files is explosive, so choose wisely who you share it with.”
“I’m not looking at it.”
“You will. You have to. For everyone’s sake, please just open the files.”
Matthias lifted his hand and held it above her hair, which had been left down and been loosely curled. Passing his palm downward, as if he were stroking the silky lengths, he then dropped his arm…and disappeared into the store.
XOps wasn’t going to come after Mels: Part of what he’d built into the organization was a self-destruct protocol. If there was ever an information data dump to the press, everyone was going to scatter, disavow knowledge, and disappear into the populace of whatever country they wanted to settle in.
After all, killers who had their murders come to light were not incented to confess and take their sentencings like good little children. If they stuck together, stood strong, or—and this was the most important piece—retaliated for exposure, they risked being put away for life, or executed for capital crimes against humanity.
Besides, if they were of a mind to lash out at having had their lifestyle taken away, they’d target the whistle-blower, not the reporter.
Matthias’s gut told him it was going to be okay—and he’d never been wrong when he was this certain. Ever.
He did not leave the store.
Calling on his years of training and experience, he made himself look like he was just another schlub with a baseball cap pulled down low, a hoodie up to his neck, and a book in front of his face.
In fact, he was a professional assassin who left no footprints, no trace, no mark of his ever having been in the store.
He kept his eye on Mels.
Especially as she palmed that SanDisk.
Standing in the Military section, Mels grabbed the flashdrive, the hard plastic casing cutting into her palm. She hated the sound of his voice, and more than that, she utterly despised the way her body seemed to recognize him, even as her mind was all about the epithets.
“Screw you, Matthias. You can take this and—”
She wheeled around, half a mind to throw the thing in his face.
He was gone.
Jogging around the floor-to-ceiling bookcase, she looked down the aisle in front of her…the stacks to the left and the right…the people milling through the store.
“Goddamn you…”
Mels marched all over, searching the Fiction section; then the lower level by the magazines, and even further on to the checkout area. Matthias was nowhere to be seen, no matter where she went or what she looked at. Hell, for all she knew, he’d taken off through a staff-only door.
Hitting the exit, she stepped out into the pale sunlight and shielded her eyes, measuring the crowds.
When it came to you, and being with you, I always told the truth—that was real, the only real I’ve ever had.
Okay, right, the healthy thing to do was throw his little parting gift in the trash and walk away from the drama to focus on something that actually mattered—like what she was going to do with the rest of her life or wrapping up that article on the dead women.
For all she knew, he’d just downloaded a bunch of eighties ballads off iTunes.
Left with a whole lot of nothing doing at the mall, Mels strode back to the CCJ offices, pushed her way inside the newsroom, and stopped as the chaos enveloped her. So familiar, the sounds of phones ringing and voices muttering and feet hitting the concrete floor as people paced by their desks or went back and forth to the kitchen for more coffee.
She was going to miss this place…
Holy crap—she was actually going to leave.
The irrevocable decision settled onto her shoulders not as a weighty burden, but more like a grounding that felt right. And God, she hung on to the positive sensation because, at the moment, she really needed something that didn’t feel like an epic failure.
That run-in with Matthias had taken the wind out of her sure as if she’d been knocked in the chest.
Walking over to her desk, she sat in her chair and took a stab at writing her resignation letter. The wording came out stiff and formal, but like there was another option? After massaging the text around for a while, and redoing the beginning, she saved the thing without printing it out. There was stuff yet to wrap up here, and Dick was just the kind of prick to take her two weeks’ notice and shove it down her throat by telling her to leave right away.
Besides, it was probably better to know where she was going first. In this economy, no one just walked out of a job.
Easing back in her chair, she stared at her computer screen again.
Hard to say how long it was before she took the SanDisk out of her pocket. Could have been ten minutes. Fifty. An hour and a half.
Rolling it around in her palm, she eventually eased down on the white slide, and extended the silver metal plug-in.
Leaning forward, she went to put it into the USB port…and stopped just short of pushing it home.
Getting up, she put her purse on her shoulder and went across the aisle to Tony’s partition. “I’m taking off for the day—just on follow-up. If anyone’s looking for me, tell them to hit my cell?”
“You got it,” he said as his own desk phone rang. “Tony DiSanto—hey, yeah, I was waiting to hear back from you….”
As he waved at her and fell into his conversation, she remembered she still didn’t have a car.
Outside, it took some time to get a cab, and of course, four in the afternoon was close enough to rush hour so that her taxi got stuck in the congestion on the Northway. When she finally got home, her mom was out, and as she checked the calendar on the wall and found that it was bingo night, she wondered why she hadn’t noticed all the entries in the little boxes before. Bridge, Pilates, yoga, volunteering at the church, manning the help desk at St. Francis in the pediatrics department, lunches and dinners with the girls…
Glancing around the kitchen, at least she knew that after she left, her mother wasn’t going to be alone.
Mels grabbed a raspberry Snapple out of the fridge and went upstairs, the wooden steps creaking in the same way they always had. Up in her room, she closed the door and turned to her closet.
For some reason, she felt like she should get out her mismatched suitcases and start packing.
But instead of starting that job way prematurely, she looked over at her desk. Her old laptop was sitting on the same stretch of painted wood she’d done her homework on when she’d been in middle school and high school.
Going over, she sat down in the spindly chair and took out the SanDisk.
Before she plugged it in, she reached around the back of the laptop and disengaged the modem wire. Then she logged on and disabled Wi-Fi.
“I’ve got to be out of my mind.”
She shoved the flashdrive in and the AutoPlay pop-up appeared in the center of the screen. Out of the options for Removable Disk (E:) she chose “Open folder to view files.”
“What the…hell?”
The file directory was so big, she had to scroll down. Word documents. PDFs. Excel spreadsheets. The titles were alphanumeric codes that were clearly part of an organizational system, but they made no sense to her.
Picking one at random, she double-clicked, and frowned, pivoting into the screen.
The data appeared to be…doss
iers of men, with their pictures, names, dates of birth, height, weight, eye and hair color, medical details, training certifications, and assignments—God, the assignments. Arranged by date, and with notes about countries and targets…and exterminations.
“Oh, my God…”
Shifting back to the directory, she opened another file, which seemed to detail sums of money, huge sums of money…and another, coded one about contacts in Washington, D.C., and the “favors” these individuals had asked…and still more about recruitment and training…
You want the story of a lifetime? You got it.
As the daylight dimmed and night came over Caldwell, she sat at her childhood desk and read everything.
Eventually, she returned to the dossiers, and this time, she took it slowly.
In a way, the men were all the same, their faces and ethnicities blending into one archetype of aggression and effectiveness. And if these assignments listed were true, she’d read about the deaths, some of which had been defined to the international public as “natural causes” or “accidents” or “counter-insurgent attacks.” Other targets she thought were still alive…but perhaps that was just a case of the worldwide news machine not yet catching up with reality?
Was it possible this was legit?
Sitting back, she took a drink from her now room-temperature Snapple, and tried on for size the concept that maybe, just maybe, this was real.
Okay, assuming it was, Matthias’s paranoia didn’t seem unjustified…and it would also explain why he’d been on the run the night she’d hit him with her car. Also might explain why the identity he’d had was someone else’s—and the reason that even with his amnesia, he’d had sensed that the house at the address on his driver’s license hadn’t been his own.
And maybe this was what was behind him killing that man down in the basement of the Marriott. If Matthias had been part of this organization—and this level of access seemed to suggest he most certainly was—then it made sense if he were on his way out of it that someone would be sent to kill him.
And he’d have to defend himself…