“Dale and I talked to some CIA people we know,” Colleen said, “mostly low-level grunts like us, but—”
Ashley stood up suddenly and walked away from the sofa. Libby looked to see if something was wrong, but Ashley gave her a wave that said, It’s fine, go on. Libby, although puzzled, turned her attention back to Colleen, even though she had heard this narrative before.
Fenton had taken over now, relating what he’d heard from an acquaintance at the FBI’s Counter-Terrorism Division when Peters suddenly said, “Ashley! What’s wrong?”
Ashley looked at him, frowning. “My spider sense is tingling.”
“Despite the dumb movie quote, she’s not kidding, guys,” Peters said. “Ashley can sense trouble before it starts—it’s saved my ass more than once.”
The rest of them began looking around the room, as if danger could be lurking behind one of Libby’s potted plants.
“It’s not in here,” Ashley said. “But it’s close. Excuse me for a few minutes.”
In one lithe motion, Ashley lowered herself to the floor, stretched out, and closed her eyes. A moment later, she ceased all apparent movement, including breathing.
“It’s all right,” Peters said. “Ashley’s just gone walkabout. She’ll be back soon.”
Libby looked at Peters. “Astral projection?”
“Something like that, I guess. She never really explained how it works. All I know is, here body is on the floor over there, but her spirit is someplace else—taking a look around outside, most likely.”
“I’ve done something like that a few times,” Libby said. “But it takes me a lot of preparation.”
Fenton turned to Colleen. “Can you do stuff like that?”
“Yeah, but I rarely feel the need. It’s very fatiguing, too.”
“I know what you mean,” Libby said. “I’m like a limp dishrag for an hour once I come back.”
“It doesn’t affect her that way,” Peters said, gesturing toward the still form on the floor. “She’s always rarin’ to go when she gets back from one of these jaunts.”
Ashley opened her eyes, then sat up and got to her feet quickly. “We all need to get out of here—right now!”
Of course, they all stood gawking at her.
“I’m serious—move, unless you want to fucking die here. I’ll explain once were out.”
She herded them quickly out the door and into the hall. Libby was the last to leave, closing the door behind her. “Now what?” she said to Ashley.
“Lobby. Elevator’s not safe—take the stairs. Come on, move!”
Libby lived five floors above street level. Fortunately, all of her visitors were in good physical condition, and walking fast down a bunch of stairs is easier then climbing up.
The lobby of the building was deserted. It was maybe forty feet square, with worn carpet on the floor and a couple of armchairs for those who found themselves having to wait for someone. One wall was covered with the residents’ mail boxes.
Ashley headed for the corner that was farthest from the front door. “Over here—I don’t want to yell, or be overheard.”
When they were gathered around her she said, “There’s three guys on the roof of the building across from you, Libby. They’ve got an RPG and they’re planning to fire it right into your living room. They act like they know what they’re doing, too.” She didn’t need to explain that an RPG was a rocket-propelled grenade, a sort of miniature missile used in battle to destroy tanks. They had all been around the technology of death long enough to know that much.
“The only reason they haven’t set it off yet,” Ashley said, “is they’re waiting to see if any more people show up. Apparently their orders are to kill everybody in the place, if they can. And I imagine that RPG round would do the job very nicely.”
“Oh, my Goddess,” Libby said. “I’ve got to warn the other tenants!”
“There’s nobody home in the other condos on your floor,” Ashley said. “I listened for heartbeats as I left.”
“But the other floors,” Libby said. “You know what an RPG round can do. I have to—”
“Stop!” Ashley said. “Let me deal with it. Anyway, what are you going to do, Libby—bang on doors and tell them your demon girlfriend says they have to evacuate the building?”
“You’re not my girlfriend,” Libby said.
“That’s for later. I’ve got to hurry. If any of other tenants come in, spin them a yarn about a fire alarm, or something.”
She turned and began walking fast toward the street door.
“Ashley!” Peters called.
She looked back, still walking. “What?”
“Try to get one alive.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
“I DON’T THINK anybody else is coming, man,” Casco said. “Might as well get it done.” He held a pair of military field glasses trained on the living room window of the condo across the street—the one belonging to the woman they were sent to kill.
Prichard, the team leader, looked through the RPG-7’s optical sight. “Shit, I can’t see anybody over there at all now. Where’d they go?”
“Maybe they made us, and split?” Manny Acevado said.
“Not likely,” Prichard told him. You see anybody over there standing at a window and staring over this way? I sure as hell didn’t.”
“And if they decided to bail, they woulda come out the front door, right?” Casco said. “We didn’t see nobody looked like any of them come out the building, man. I been watching.”
“If they got spooked somehow, could be they went out the service entrance, come out the back of the building,” Acevado said.
“Wouldn’t matter. I walked the place earlier today,” Prichard said. “The back door comes out into an alley, and it has only one way out—right there, next to the building. See it? They’d come out that way, we’d have seen ’em, clear as day.”
“Maybe they all went into the bedroom for some sexy time, Casco said. “Get some orgy action goin’—what you think?”
“I could get into some of that shit,” Acevado said. “There’s a bunch of fine-lookin’ tail over there, man. You see that redhead? Bet she’s got freckles—all over.”
“I could go for the blonde that arrived a few minutes ago,” Prichard said. He didn’t take his eye away from the RPG’s sight. “You see her, Casco?”
“Yeah, I got a look, man. Nicest-looking piece of ass I seen outside of Penthouse. Bet she’s in that bedroom right now—one cock in her mouth, and another one up her butthole, moanin’ like a bitch in heat.”
“Oh, you boys say the nicest things.”
It was a woman’s voice, coming from the flat expanse of roof behind them.
The three of them spun around, although it took Prichard a little longer because of the weapon he was holding. Still, he was the first one to speak.
“Who the fuck are you?” he said. “And what are you doing up here?”
“I might ask you the same question,” she said. Her voice was like a caress. She nodded toward what Prichard had in his hands. “Is that an RPG you’re holding, or are you just glad to see me?”
“Jesus Christ,” Acevado breathed. “It’s her, man. The chick from across the street.”
“Can’t be,” Casco said, but not like he really believed it. “No way she coulda got across the street without us seein’ her.”
“I’d say my presence here refutes that claim, wouldn’t you?” the woman said pleasantly.
“What’s that—‘refutes?’” Casco said.
“Don’t worry about it,” she said. “There won’t be a test later. Not for you.” Excuse me.”
She was wearing a multi-color striped blouse above a pair of black pants and short-heeled shoes. At 5’9’ in her bare feet, the woman hardly needed the extra lift of high heels. Now she began unbuttoning the blouse—her movements brisk, as if she were undressing alone instead of putting on a show. She shed the blouse and dropped it on the roof surface next to her. She wore n
o bra, and she clearly didn’t need one. Her breasts were—perfect. There was no other word for it. Then she kicked off the shoes and began unbuttoning her pants.
“Lady, what are you doing?” Prichard asked. His voice was husky with lust. “I mean, did you want...”
“Oh, I wouldn’t want you boys to get the wrong idea. I am not, sorry to say, one of your sex fantasies come to life.”
She unzipped the pants, dropped them, and kicked them aside. The red bikini panties she wore underneath joined the pants a moment later. They could see that she was shaved bald, like a porn star—although no porn actress they had ever seen affected them quite like this.
“It’s just that,” she said as she straightened up, “I hate to get blood all over my clothes.”
The three men were staring at her, their brains so full of lustful images that at first they failed to process what she’d just said. Prichard, the smartest, was the first to make sense of her words.
“What? Get blood... where? What’re you—”
She moved toward them then, faster than any human being should be able to—not difficult for Ashley, who wasn’t really human.
She hit Manny Acevado with a knuckle punch that he never saw coming though he was looking right at her—or rather, at the blur she had become. His first indication that he was in trouble occurred to him as he lay on the roof a moment later, choking on his own blood and trying to remember how to breathe.
Louis Casco just had time to get his hands up for some sort of defense when his head practically exploded from the vicious karate kick that fractured his skill in three places. He was still alive when he dropped to the rooftop, but that painful state of affairs did not last much longer.
Prichard was trying to bring the RPG up, although what he thought to do with it was not clear—it is not intended as a close-range weapon. In any case, it was torn from his grasp before he could raise it to eye level. Ashley slammed the butt of the RPG into Prichard’s diaphragm, and he bent double in agony before slumping to the worn shingles of the roof surface.
This blow was not fatal—Ashley had pulled it deliberately, instead of rupturing three or four of the man’s internal organs. He was clearly the leader of this inept trio, and she had questions for him.
After a few minutes, Prichard’s pain had abated enough so that he could emerge from the fetal position he had adopted instinctively when he fell. Ashley roughly pushed him onto his back, then straddled him, her knees just touching his ribcage. The impact as some of her weight landed on his stomach was pure agony that abated only slowly. Finally, the pain receded enough so he could think, after a fashion, and his first thought was: The most beautiful woman in the world is naked on top of me, and all I wish is that I could die.
Zack Prichard finally understood what irony meant. The knowledge came to him fairly late in his life, but then some people never figure it out, no matter how long they live.
“What’s your name, sweetheart?”
“Zack—Zack Prichard.”
Ashley lifted some of her weight off him and dropped it back down onto his crushed chest. The only reason Zack Prichard didn’t scream any louder was that he lacked the air in his lungs to do so.
When he could speak again, he gasped, “That’s my name, I swear it. I got ID—see for yourself.”
“Oh, I believe you, Zack. What I just did—that’s what you get for telling me the truth. You can just let your imagination work on what’s going to happen if you start lying.”
She bent her face closer to his. “I’m going to ask you a series of questions, Zack. Every time you refuse to answer, or if you lie to me, I’m going to do something appalling to you. Do you understand what ‘appalling’ means?
“Yeah, yeah—I understand. I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”
“Very good,” she purred. “And, Zack—if you do answer each of my questions honestly and with full detail, when we’re all done, I‘m going to give you a present. Would you like to know what it is?”
“Yeah—yeah, sure.”
“I’m going to let you die, Zack. Won’t that be wonderful?”
“Yes, please—ask me anything you want, then let me fucking die. Please.” Zack began to weep softly.
“Tears! Oh, how sweet of you, Zack.” She traced a finger along the tear track on one cheek, then brought it to her lips. “Oh, yum! I’d forgotten how delicious tears taste—I once had access to a regular supply, you know, but that was some time back. There aren’t many things I miss about my former home, but I confess the taste of tears is one.”
Ashley gave vent to a contended-sounding sigh.
“Now, then—let’s begin, shall we?”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
ASHLEY RETURNED TO the lobby of Libby’s building about an hour after she’d left. She looked cheerful and refreshed, as if she’d spent all afternoon being pampered at a spa.
She glanced around the lobby. “I expected to find a group of your fellow residents down here fuming, Libby,” she said.
“A few did come in,” Libby told her, “but I used a little magic to persuade them that they had some urgent shopping to do before dinner.”
“Very nice,” Ashley said. “Well, shall we all go upstairs? It’s quite safe now.”
Back in Libby’s living room, Ashley told them what she’d learned on the roof of the building across the street.
“Only one of them, the leader, was CIA. The other two were rent-a-thug types who work for anybody with the money to hire them—CIA, DIA, one of the Mafia families, a Columbian drug cartel—it’s all the same to them. Or, rather, it was.”
“What about the leader?” Fenton asked. “What’s his name?”
“Zack Prichard.”
Fenton looked at his partner. “Ring a bell?” Colleen just shook her head.
“You sure that was his real name, and not a cover ID?” Fenton said to Ashley.
“Oh, yes, I’m quite certain that Zack told me the absolute truth about everything I asked him.”
“‘Told,’ past tense?” Morris said.
“Yes,” Ashley said. “I’m afraid that Zack has passed on, along with his two associates. But I’m sure they’ll all make a lot of nice friends in Hell.”
“What else did you get from him besides his name?” Morris asked.
“One thing I learned was that he got his marching orders from somebody named Clyde Neale, who is apparently the Assistant Deputy Director for Operations down there in Langley.”
“Clyde Neale,” Fenton said. “Yeah I know that little bastard.”
Libby looked at him. “Anything you’d care to share, Dale?”
“Ah, it’s a lot of stuff, over the years. Let’s just say Neale and I have a history, none of it good. And I’ll tell you something else—if Clyde Neale is in on this, you can bet his boss, Ted Burnett, is in it too, right up to his neck. Neale doesn’t so much as take a shit without Burnett’s knowledge and permission.”
“So, if Neale is Assistant Deputy Director,” Peters said, “then his boss is Deputy Director for Operations?”
“That’s the guy,” Fenton said.
“Sounds like somebody who swings a lot of weight at the Agency,” Morris said.
“Oh, yeah,” Fenton said. “He’s either a Number Two or Number Three guy, depending on how you figure it. I’m betting that Burnett sees himself as Number Two, if not Number One-and-a-Half.”
“He wants what’s-his-name’s job?” Libby said. “The Director?”
“Gus Hinton, that’s the guy,” Fenton said. “Thing about Burnett is, he doesn’t just want to be Director—he sometimes thinks he is the Director.”
“Things are starting to fall into place,” Libby said. “Assuming we’re willing to make a few minor leaps of faith, that is. We know the what—summoning demons and binding them, somehow. We know the why—to use them as weapons against the Caliphate. We know the who—Deputy Director Burnett, and his minions. We think we know the when—if our hunch about Halloween is ri
ght. What we don’t know is where.”
“I may be able to help with that,” Ashley said. They all turned to look at her. “My friend Zack said he wasn’t supposed to know about this, but had a night out with a friend of his from the Agency a couple of months ago. Zack says the friend had a bit too much to drink and mentioned that he’d been spending time supervising the movement of a lot of odd-looking equipment down to Fairfax, Virginia. When Zack mentioned it to the man at work a week later, he became very upset , Zack said. Denied ever saying such a thing, and said if Zack ever repeated it, he would have Zack up on charges, whatever that means.”
“What it means,” Fenton said, “is that the guy realized he’d let a pretty big kitty out of the bag, and he didn’t want it wandering around where anybody else could see it.”
Colleen looked at Ashley. “Zack volunteered this information?”
“Oh, yes—we became quite chummy there, near the end. He was ever so eager to please me. The right combination of fear, pain, and lust can render most men quite cooperative.”
Morris was muttering, “Fairfax, Virginia. Fairfax, Virginia—now where the fuck did I… Jesus Christ!”
Morris went quickly to the Pacilio file that they had copied at the National Archives. It had been sitting on Libby’s coffee table so that the others could examine it later. He started flipping through pages fast, obviously looking for something. Finally, he stopped. “That’s what I thought. Back in ’02, when those scientists accidentally opened the gateway to Hell? The lab where they carried out the experiment was in Fairfax, Virginia.”
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