by Kari Nichols
Lying there cradling his knee, he realized that he’d blown it and his boss would be pissed. There was no way to make it look as though the guy had lost balance and fallen down the stairs. He had to do something to disguise the scene, at least in the short term.
He rolled over and managed to get to his hands and one knee. Unwilling to put any weight on the wounded knee, he hoisted himself to his left foot and used the wall for support. Jarvis’ body was starting to void. The smell was horrific. Stale cigarettes, beer, urine and waste.
Seeing the pack of cigarettes lying on the floor next to Jarvis, he decided that a fire would confuse the issue long enough. Hobbling his way back up the stairs to get his pack, which he’d left next to the door of the spare bedroom, he set the bomb in the bedroom. At first blush, it would appear as though the idiot had fallen asleep while smoking in bed. Panic would have sent him rushing for the stairs, where he tripped and fell. That diagnosis would end the instant that the coroner found the bullet in his head. By then, it wouldn’t matter.
Once set, he put the bomb on remote, giving him enough time to vacate the premises without getting caught in the blast. The bomb wasn’t designed to explode with great force. It was designed to create a burst of flame that would last long enough to catch onto anything flammable and ignite it. The bed linens would be the perfect accelerant. Hobbling back down the stairs, he worked his way to the kitchen and then out the back door.
Blackburn hung up the phone with a satisfied smile on his face. His man had come through on both accounts. Parker and Jarvis would no longer ask the wrong questions, poking their noses into a situation that needed to disappear. He had a couple more loose ends he needed Morrison to tie off, but it was still early days.
Plus, his man had indicated he would need a few days off. Blackburn didn’t bother to ask why, since he had no pressing need for Morrison’s services just then. In a few days Blackburn would call him and set up the last few jobs and then Godin would have a clear run at his objective.
Picking up his phone again and selecting an outside line, Blackburn activated his scrambler before he placed his next call. As he waited for the connection to reach across the distance, he thought about the day he’d first been approached. The rain had fallen for two weeks straight and his second ex-wife had just called to tell him she was out of money, again. He made his alimony payment on time every month, but the silly bitch couldn’t make it last the entire month. She didn’t understand that once the money was gone, it was gone. He wasn’t her personal bank machine anymore.
And yet, every time she called, he gave her money. He was a sucker for a pair of doe eyes and soft breasts. His ex was always very grateful for the cash. If he’d known he could pay for her services he never would have married her. He had gone to the bank to get her the money she wanted. He had ended up spending three hours at the pub instead. Two men had approached him as he’d left the bank. Blackburn was armed, so he didn’t fear a robbery. They had paid for the drinks and told him what they wanted.
At first, Blackburn hadn’t been interested. What they were asking him to do would be seen as treason by the powers that be at The Sector. If he got caught, they’d string him up by his testicles. They had approached him two more times before Blackburn had been seduced by their plans. The money they’d thrown his way hadn’t hurt, either.
The thrill of deception had given him a new lease on life. Moldering behind his desk for the past few years, he now felt alive. He had gone back to the gym. He’d lost the twenty-five pounds that had crept on over the past few years. His ex enjoyed his renewed shape. Blackburn had used the money his partners had given him to purchase new clothes, a new car. He was careful not to get too extravagant. Too many expensive purchases would bring unwanted attention. It was no secret that he had two ex-wives to support.
Blackburn was a handler and the job didn’t pay a fortune. He barely broke six figures and a third of that went to his first wife. His second wife got quite a bit less than that, but then she’d only been with him for three years. Still, he wanted a few new toys.
His call connected and Blackburn gave his update. He reviewed the next few steps, confirmed that the loose ends were being tied off and then he ended the call. The scrambler, technically illegal and if anyone ever found it he’d be screwed, would block the internal bots from tracking his call. A listener bot would hear static. A tracer bot would get confused and start running around in circles. Removing the scrambler, he placed it inside his safe and locked the door.
Soon, Blackburn would be able to close the door on this shitty office for the last time. He could return to the surface and fucking stay there. No more hibernating in the ground like a damn vampire. He didn’t know why The Sector had chosen to create their building underground. Everyone knew where it bloody well was. Like everything else in this business, it was a secret, which meant it was on the internet for everyone to see.
In the movies, offices for higher level spooks showed a window with a terrific view, stately office furniture and a few pictures taken with high ranking officials. In reality, Blackburn had a fucking cave. His desk was metal, painted puke green. The walls were beige. His door was a metal blast door that snapped back so fast he often spilled his coffee on himself. He had a decent chair, because he’d paid for it himself. And he had a leather couch. He’d had numerous fantasies about the women he’d like to have on that couch.
He wondered if he could convince Fiona to visit him on that couch. He knew stuff that he could hold over her head. He immediately squelched that thought. She was too good with computers to mess with. He might get laid, once, but she could fuck him over for the rest of his days. She could make his money, what little of it he had, disappear into thin air. She could bring a world of hurt and he was too close to his own objectives to let a nice piece of ass get in the way. Best to leave her for Morrison.
Fiona leaned against the counter separating her kitchen from her small living room. Her fingers trembled as she read the internet news story on Jarvis. Parker’s death had surprised her. Jarvis’ death scared her. The local coroner wasn’t making any statements to the media. He was directing one and all to the police liaison, who was saying that Lieutenant Dan Jarvis had been found inside his home, once the firemen had gotten the fire out.
She didn’t need a magic magnifying glass to read between the lines. Someone had silenced two of the four people familiar with the details of TA-4’s disappearance. Soon, she would be next. Freemantle had taken stress leave after hearing about Jarvis. Fiona couldn’t blame him. She knew that he’d gone to his wife’s home in British Columbia. She also knew that she couldn’t afford to telegraph her own moves like that. If she was going to survive, she had to disappear without a trace. She wouldn’t return to the office. She regretted not being able to clear her desk, but it wasn’t worth the risk of going back.
Walking into her bedroom, she pulled a small carry-on suitcase from her closet and placed it on the bed. She tossed in some clothing and a change of shoes. She left just enough room to slip her laptop inside and then closed the case. Grabbing her coat from the rack, she locked her apartment and headed for the elevator. Her car was parked a block away on the same side of the street. Scanning both sides of the street, she didn’t notice anyone lingering nearby. It was a work day and people were dashing for their cars or the bus. As she came up alongside her car, she fingered the button for the remote starter then pressed the button for her trunk instead. She stowed her suitcase inside and closed the lid.
Fiona pressed the button to unlock the doors and then locked them again. She crossed the street and walked into the Starbucks. If she was hitting the road, she needed to have something for breakfast. She ordered a grande latte and a breakfast sandwich and paid the girl at the counter. Standing in line to wait for her coffee to be prepared, Fiona looked at the other customers.
It was 8:30 in the morning and people were grabbing their coffees before they headed off to their jobs. No one paid her any extra attention, t
hough one man smiled when he caught her eye. Fiona ignored him and looked outside. No one appeared interested in her car. It wasn’t cold yet, but the slight drizzle kept people moving along the streets at a quick pace.
Fiona took her coffee to the bar and attached a to-go lid. She fitted a straw into the lid and took a tentative sip. Her coffee and sandwich in her left hand, Fiona pulled her keys from her right pocket and pressed the button for the remote starter. She had just leaned against the door to push it open when the force of the blast pushed it back into her. She fell to the ground, her coffee cup hit the floor and the lid popped off. Coffee sprayed in a wide arc. The windows rained safety glass down on her as she sat there, staring across the street.
Her car was a smoking ruin. People around her were screaming and crying. Fiona looked around the coffee shop at the customers. They were all in a state of shock, looks of horror on their faces. Getting up off the floor, she stepped over the broken glass to the door and pushed it open. On the sidewalk a large crowd was gathering. Fiona stayed to the back of it and moved down the street.
Whoever had set the bomb might still be in the area and she didn’t want them to know she hadn’t been in the car. Unless they were watching her and had seen her go into the coffee shop. Would they be coming for her, even now, as she moved away from the wreckage? Fiona turned up the next street and broke into a run. Two blocks later, she saw the traffic snarl caused by multiple emergency vehicles trying to make their way through the crush of morning commuters.
Fiona ran ahead to the front of the jam and hopped into the first taxi that was free. Instructing him to take her to the airport, she pulled out a mirror and did her best to fix the damage to her hair and clothing. She was wearing most of her coffee and she had small cubes of glass tucked into her bra. Plucking them out, she redid the popped buttons and smoothed her hair a little before putting the mirror away.
She lived close to the airport, but it still took fifteen minutes to arrive. She paid cash for the cab and headed for the front entrance of the airport terminal. At the ticketing counter she paid for a direct flight to Toronto’s Pearson International. The police followed the paper trail to Pearson where Fiona Engleton vanished.
Chapter 3
San Francisco – one week later
Tate parked her Ninja ZX-14 three blocks from her target. Midnight in the financial district kept cars to a minimum, relatively speaking. She could see her destination in the distance, McMaster Industries, distinguished from the crowd of towers by the twenty foot billboard at the top.
Tate Ryan was a Sector Agent. A lone operative sent in because she didn’t exist. She didn’t bother with anything more than a basic disguise. Her picture had never appeared in any database that her tech people hadn’t been able to access and modify. At six feet tall, she stood out. People would remember her height even as they forgot the salient details about her features. Hair colour could change, eye colour, same deal. Her natural hair colour was black, cropped short; her eyes were dark blue; today they were both a deep brown. That was all the disguise she had ever bothered with.
Her eyes tracking left and right, she searched the shadows between the buildings as she approached her target. Rounding the front of the building, she headed straight for the underground parking, keyed in and stepped up to the elevators. There were five main elevators for the rest of the staff and one private elevator for McMaster. The private elevator was positioned further into the car park. Tate vetoed it as an option, since it opened straight into McMaster’s office.
“Cameras?” Tate asked.
“Distracted,” Tommy whispered in her ear. She needed eyes in the back of her head and Tommy was hers. Best hacker she’d ever worked with. He’d already assured her a clean entrance into the building, distracting the cameras with a pre-programmed video loop of what each one expected to see at this time of night. He’d be with her every step of the way for the remainder of the job. McMaster had on-site security that did regular sweeps of the building and Tommy would be her advance warning system.
After pressing the call button, the elevator descended and the doors opened. She stepped in and pressed the button for the top floor. Her stomach muscles quivered as the car raced upward. The doors whispered open and Tate stepped into the darkened reception area.
Scanning the room, she noted the stairwell to her right and another on the far side of the main reception area, both viable exits if necessary. Offices extended down both sides of the main hallway, leading to a larger reception area at the far end. Tate strode forward, past all of the closed office doors. No lights were on, but then Tommy had already confirmed that her target was alone on this floor.
At the far end, there was one desk outside of one office door. The door was also closed, but Tate could see a vague suggestion of light emanating from beneath it. Pulling her gun, she selected the round she wanted, chambered it and flipped the safety off. “Door?” she whispered, standing before McMaster’s office.
“Locked,” Tommy confirmed.
“You ready?”
“Yes.”
“On my one,” she said as she counted out loud for Tommy. “3…2…1.” The lock snicked open as she reached for the handle. The door swung in and she stalked into the room, toward the desk, her gun tucked into her side.
McMaster looked up and frowned. He stood up and she raised her gun, firing at his torso from six feet away. The dart sailed across the room and the tip embedded in his gut. McMaster fell back into his chair, wheezing from the pain of the belly wound. As soon as the dart struck flesh the four-pronged tip splayed out, digging into the subcutaneous fat. When the arms locked in place, the computer chip in the outer casing of the dart sent a signal to jettison its cargo. Once complete, the arms retracted and the dart could be removed. Start to finish, it took four seconds; quicker than any human could react to it.
McMaster left the dart where it was. He knew what she’d done to him. He’d stolen the prototype gun himself and was busy trying to race its production through to the black market. He looked up from the dart with fear in his eyes. “What do you want?” He’d started to sweat.
“Payback,” Tate replied. She chambered a new round. Walking around the desk, she shoved the gun against his neck and pulled the trigger.
The tranquilizer worked in seconds. Pushing him back into his chair, she saw that his eyes remained focused while his body refused to obey his commands. He could talk, he could turn his head, but he couldn’t move a muscle below his neck.
Turning away from him, Tate focused her attention on the rest of the office. Behind his desk was a wall of windows looking out over the San Francisco Bay area, with the lights of the East Bay Bridge twinkling in the distance. To her left, near the entrance, was another door. Checking it, Tate saw that it led to a bathroom. Empty. The elevator car was on this floor.
There were no other doors in the office. On the opposite wall was a waist-height sidebar that ran the full length of the wall. It was here that Tate focused her attention. Pulling a pair of sunglasses from her pocket, she tapped a tiny button on the right arm and switched from regular mode to EM-scan. She spotted the telltale pulsing blue light straight away. Walking toward it, she pulled the cupboard door open and stared in at the safe.
It was loaded with security measures. Retinal scan, thumbprint scan, 128-bit encrypted digital combination lock. Of the three, the combination was the biggest pain in the ass. Tate had no way of hooking Tommy into it, so she’d have to crack the safe the old fashioned way.
Pulling a small lump of clay from another pocket, Tate split it into two pieces and attached one to each of the two hinges on the door of the safe. Sticking a lead into each piece, she tied them both into a receiving unit synched to a remote detonator. Stepping back a few feet, she pushed the button on the detonator and watched as the clay exploded.
The clay, small clumps of C-4, destroyed the hinges. The door was still connected by the bolt shot through the hasp. Tate gave it a tug and it dropped to the floor wit
h a thud. The heavy duty steel of the safe had protected its contents from the blast.
Tate gave the documents a quick visual scan and found a schematic for the gun she held in her hand. She’d repeated the same process three times before this one and each of those safes hadn’t held anything to prove she’d found the right guy. Fourth time was the charm. Shoving the papers into a nylon bag, she slung it over her shoulders. Walking back over to the far side of his desk, she looked down at McMaster. “You should never have crossed us.”
“It won’t ever happen again, I swear!” Tears leaked from the corners of his eyes. He couldn’t raise his hand to swipe at them.
“Who gave you this gun?” she asked, raising her hand to indicate the dart gun.
“I don’t know his name.”
Tate placed the gun on the desk and reached into her coat pocket. She removed a device similar in shape and size to an iPod Nano. In actuality, it was the remote synched to the cargo the dart had dumped in McMaster’s belly. Spinning the dial on the front of the remote caused the cargo to leak. The more she turned the dial, the larger the leak became.
Watching his face, Tate turned the dial the barest fraction of a millimeter. The results were immediate. His body was paralyzed from the neck down, but the tranquilizer didn’t dampen his pain receptors any. Trace amounts of white phosphorus were leaking into his skin, burning everything in its path.
The pain built from an uncomfortable sensation not dissimilar to heartburn and progressed toward ulcer levels. Sweat was dripping down McMaster’s face. The salt stung his eyes.
“Who gave you this gun?” Tate asked again.