Mud Run Murder

by Leslie Langtry

  "I don't know, but it won't be good. Years ago there was this guy who wrote a book about all of his missions—without the Agency's approval. He was never seen again."

  Rex rolled his eyes. "Oh, come on! They can't just kill people! That's illegal."

  "What? No! He was never seen again because he was sent to work at a science station in Antarctica. They didn't kill him." At least, I think they didn't…

  "Why don't you and the girls"—he nodded at the cats—"stay with me for a bit. We can keep an eye on your house and see who shows up. If it looks ugly, I'll send officers over here."

  "That's not a bad idea," I mused. "Only Riley and Maria know about you, and they won't tell."

  Rex stood up, upsetting the cats. "Come on. I'll get Philby and Martini's things, and you pack a bag."

  I rummaged around in my closet and found my suitcase. It took only a few minutes to throw clothes in there. As for the bathroom, I pretty much just scooped everything into the bag and zipped it up. Rex and the kitties were waiting for me by the front door. He had a box of kitty toys, cat food, and a few tins of tuna.

  "Let's go," I said as I headed for the garage.

  Rex frowned. "Where are you going?"

  "To your house," I answered. "I'm just going to take an indirect route in case anyone is watching me."

  We piled into the car, and I had Rex duck down. I wasn't going to make it easy for anyone to find me. Maria hadn't called to say they were already here, but if it had been Riley I'd seen and he was in on this, I wasn't taking any chances.

  I hit the garage door remote and backed out of the driveway. To anyone watching, they'd just see me in the car. They'd have no idea I had a suitcase or even the cats with me. They'd just think I was running an errand. I took in every vehicle and person as I drove past Rex's house and down the street. Nothing seemed out of place. Maybe they weren't here yet.

  After about ten minutes of driving and making sure we weren't followed, I took a very complicated route to the alley behind Rex's house. Pulling into the garage, Rex got out of the car with a cat under each arm. He ran to the back of his house and went in. Five minutes later, I joined him. We left the stuff in the car. We'd bring those in under the cover of darkness.

  He closed the curtains and turned to me. "I'm going to run out for takeout. You stay here."

  I nodded. I wasn't going anywhere. As soon as he was out the door, I ran upstairs to his bedroom and, with the lights off, surveilled my house. Nothing was happening. Which was good. It was only a matter of time though. I took out my cell and tried Riley again, but it went to voice mail, and I hung up.

  I went over the facts in my head. Philby and Martini came in, jumped on the bed, and went to sleep. I'd have to find a way to keep them out of Rex's windows. If the Agency was half the spy company I thought it was, they'd know Rex had no pets and that I did. Seeing Philby in the window would give us away.

  The events that led up to this point included a corpse and a movie. Obviously, the movie came first. Probably a year in advance. I grabbed Rex's laptop and googled the movie. A website for something called Black Ops Productions came up. How original. They only listed one movie—Spy Diary. Whoever they were, this was their first production.

  I clicked on the movie's icon but was sent to a blank site with an apology. This page had already been wiped. I went back to the website, but it was no longer there. The CIA was closing it down.

  Heading back to the search page, I found two other listings. One was a review by some movie critic for the Chicago Tribune. The other was an interview with the actor who played me. I clicked on that.

  A video popped up, and I hit it. The actor was named Max Steele. Really? Max Steele? That's terrible. The actor was smiling at the screen, so I hit play.

  "I was so excited to be part of such an amazing movie," the man gushed. "It's an existential look at how our government acts when nobody is watching. The whole movie was a metaphor for political upheaval and how one man can change the course of history."

  Please. A metaphor? I know I didn't think it a metaphor when I was being chased by Dobermans in the Netherlands. And one man making a difference? That was annoying. I'm a woman. I did all that. No man did. This guy was trying to make something out of nothing. Well, if nothing had guns and bad guys, that is.

  "I'm looking forward to the sequel," Max Steele said happily. "I hear the screenwriter is almost done with the script."

  That made me sit up. Now he just needed to say who had written the damn thing so that I could kill him.

  "The producer wishes to remain anonymous," Steele said. "They want the focus to be on the art and the philosophy. Their identity might detract from that."

  I wasn't sure I could roll my eyes any harder. I tried. It hurt.

  "And what's really exciting about this movie," the actor said as he looked carefully around him, "is that it's all true!"

  Then the screen went blank. No! Right when I was getting somewhere. The screen then reappeared, but without the video of Max Steele. The guys at Langley were working fast. I quickly clicked on the Tribune article. Still there. Great.

  Spy Diary is the most recent, ridiculous load of crap to come out of Hollywood. The producers expect us to believe that this was a true story. That this really happened. Please. I know when I'm being conned.

  Hey! It did really happen!

  And if it did really go down like they portrayed—then the spy in this movie was the worst in the history of spying.

  Are you kidding me? It all happened! And I received commendations for my work!

  Max Steele is the only standout, and even he falls flat as the foolish spy who makes one mistake after another over the course of the film. The writers should be shot and the producers arrested. Don't waste your money on this clunker.

  For a moment I toyed with driving straight to Chicago and showing this moron just how true this story was. But then I remembered that I was trying to lay low. Besides, if anyone outside of the Agency did put two and two together to equal me, killing the critic might stand out as a tad unwise.

  I waited for the website to disappear, but it didn't. Either Langley liked the review, thinking it was proof that this story was all made up, or they hadn't seen it yet. But they had entire rooms full of analysts who wouldn't have missed something like that, so that theory seemed unlikely.

  For ten more minutes I tried to find more intel on the movie, but the CIA had obviously cleared the more damning evidence out. Did they know who the screenwriter was? Would they go after him or her? What about the producers? Were they about to be kidnapped off the streets and taken to a dripping (they were always dripping) and abandoned warehouse to undergo trial by pliers?

  I figured Max Steele was pretty safe. He was just an idiot. Too bad that this was probably his last film. Actors probably don't get more work from a film no one has ever seen.

  "Merry!" Rex shouted from the back of the house, downstairs.

  I made my way down with the laptop under my arm. The food was already plated, and there were two glasses of wine on the table. I set the computer on the sideboard and joined him for the Chinese feast he'd picked up.

  While we ate, I filled him in on what I'd discovered.

  "Sounds like they're closing in." Rex frowned.

  "Well, duh!" I said as I stuffed more sweet-and-sour chicken into my mouth. "What did you think was going on?"

  "I just thought you were orchestrating the whole thing so you could move in with me." Rex spoke as if he were asking me to pass the salt.

  I stared at him. "You're joking."

  He gave me a look I couldn't decipher. "Yes, I'm joking…about the orchestration bit."

  "Isn't that the whole thing?"

  He shrugged. "It just seems like this is a good time to talk about taking our relationship to the next level."

  If you'd dropped a piano on me, I would never have guessed that this was something Rex wanted to discuss.

  "Really?"

  He nodded. "Yes. Re
ally."

  We stared at each other for a moment. Was he saying what I thought he was saying? And what did I think he'd said?

  "Um, okay. Let's talk," I finally said.

  Philby and Martini trotted into the room. They seemed to be upset that they hadn't been invited to dinner. Rex got up and brought them each a little plate of tuna before sitting down again. That seemed to placate them. For the moment at least.

  He looked at me with those stunning eyes. I loved those eyes. I loved everything about him. In fact, we'd only recently started saying the L-word. And why was I calling it the L-word?

  "Okay," Rex said before taking a sip of his wine. "Well, where do we want this relationship to go?"

  Ugh. He was asking the wrong person. I'd had only one other relationship—and that had been with my former boss, Riley. The man I was hallucinating everywhere. The man who, I'd learned just a few months ago, hadn't actually cheated on me. I'd left him for the wrong reasons. We'd never talked about it since then. As far as relationships went, I wasn't very good at this talking thing.

  "I love our weekends together. Renting movies and making dinner. We could maybe do that during the week too?"

  Argh! I'm an idiot! This was harder than trigonometry. I was screwing it up, and I knew it.

  "Is that all you want from me? A few more dates a week?" Rex studied me.

  "Um, yes?" I had a feeling the minute those words left my mouth that they'd been the wrong ones. "I mean, no?"

  "What do you want, Merry?"

  "What do you want, Rex?" I figured turning the question on him was only fair. Why should I do all the heavy thinking?

  "Okay." He nodded. "That's fair. I'd like to see us move to the next level."

  The words hung in the air like smog in Beijing. This was a big step.

  "You want me to move in with you?" I asked, recalling his words from earlier.

  "Yes," he said after a very long pause. Did that mean he wasn't sure?

  "I don't know what to say?" I stuffed more food in my mouth.

  "Why not?"

  "Because I haven't really thought about it." It suddenly seemed like that might've been the wrong answer.

  "Why haven't you thought about it?" Rex looked at me intently.

  Why haven't I thought about it? We'd been together almost a year now. Did I think we'd just have weekend dates until we died of old age?

  "I guess I've just been distracted. There's always some corpse showing up in my yard, or my troop getting into trouble, or my cats…"

  He pointed his fork at me. "I think you're ignoring the subject on purpose."

  "What? Why? Why would I do that?" I was starting to panic. Because he was right, I had been ignoring the subject.

  But why? I loved Rex. I'd told him that. My cats were pretty much his cats. Was I afraid to move on to the next step?

  "What exactly," I said as I squirmed in my seat, "is the next step?"

  Rex didn't say anything for a few moments, which made me think he didn't know either. That was good. He didn't have a plan in place, and I didn't look like an idiot for not having a plan in place.

  Finally, he just gave me a blank look. "You know what? You're right. Forget I said anything."

  I swallowed hard. "Okay."

  That sounded worse. Either we were putting it off or we were now on the downward slide to breakup land. I didn't want to lose Rex. On the other hand, I wasn't sure what I wanted from our relationship. Was I ready to become a formal couple? And what did that entail exactly? I needed to talk to Kelly. She and Robert had been married forever. Maybe she could interpret what Rex was asking me to do, because it seemed to be more than just moving in together.

  How did I end up in this situation? I was just walking along, minding my own business, stepping over all the corpses that seemed to surround me lately, and trying to keep my Scouts from becoming mercenaries. Now my boyfriend wanted more. And worse than that, he wanted me to know what that more was.

  We spent the rest of the night in a vague and uneasy silence. The movie was alright, but I couldn't focus. My mind was all over the place wondering what I'd done wrong and how it happened that way.

  "Look." Rex turned to me once the movie was over. "I don't want this to be weird. Technically, you're my guest. So I'll make up the guest room for you."

  My jaw dropped, but I nodded. We hadn't had many overnight sleepovers. I liked sleeping in my own bed. So using the guest room would be okay. It just left this weirdness between us, and I didn't like that.

  As I climbed into bed that night, I cut myself some slack. Tomorrow I'd talk to Kelly. She'd know what to do. And tomorrow I'd start putting this case together. That made me feel a little better.

  Now where were Philby and Martini? I heard a pair of mews in the next room and realized they'd abandoned me to sleep with Rex. Great. At least someone was getting a little attention.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Kelly rolled her eyes for like the fifth time during our fifteen minutes together so far—which was like one eye roll for every three minutes—an amount I found a bit excessive. Rex had left for the office in the morning, so I called Kelly and invited her to lunch. The deli on Main Street was empty, so I tried not to be loud. These people didn't need to know my problems.

  "I can't believe you!" my best friend finally said. "Rex is a great guy! You are so lucky! Why are you driving him off?"

  "I'm not!" I then stalled by stuffing some chips in my mouth so that I didn't have to explain how I wasn't. Because I wasn't entirely sure I knew the answer to that.

  "What is the next step?" I asked.

  Kelly shrugged. "I think it's pretty clear. He said he wants you to move in with him."

  My gut twisted. "I don't know if I want to do that."

  "Why not?"

  "I love my house. I don't want to give it up. What if it doesn't work out between Rex and me? Then some stranger is living in my house, and I'll have to kill him to get him out."

  Kelly ignored me. "It's the only thing I can think of that might be the next step. He didn't ask you to marry him. So what else could it be?"

  I wasn't sure I had heard her. "What did you say?"

  "He didn't ask you to marry him."

  "I don't want to get married. Why can't things just continue on like they have been? What's wrong with that?"

  In the back of my mind, I was still worried about the bigger danger of getting kidnapped off the street by CIA agents in a black van. But once again, I was distracting myself from dealing with that.

  Kelly pointed a pickle at me. "You need to figure out what Rex means to you. And you need to grow up."

  "I am grown up!"

  "Right. That's why you cheated at the laser tag game." In spite of her words, she couldn't help but smile.

  "The odds were stacked against us one hundred times over. Those boys had it coming."

  She nodded. "Yes they did. And what about their leader? So weird!"

  I laughed, mostly because I was happy the heat was off of me for now. "I thought maybe he was a robot. No one acts like that."

  We talked for a few minutes about other ways we could get ready for the mud run. Which would've been great if we'd had any ideas. Kelly promised she'd look into it. Time was running out.

  "What about the dead pizza delivery kid?" Kelly asked. Okay, so she was interested after all.

  I brought her up to speed on how the case, which formerly looked bad for Rex, now looked bad for me.

  "I can't win!" I grumbled. "I don't know who he is. I don't know how he's connected to the movie or how that's connected to me. All I do know is that someone turned my life story into a bad movie."

  "Yeah." Kelly nodded. "That is strange. And the Agency thinks you're in on it?"

  I nodded. "To be honest, how could they not? There's stuff in there that only Riley and I should know about, and I didn't even get to see the whole thing!"

  "Well." Kelly smiled. "You do talk in your sleep. Maybe some screenwriter has your bedroom bugged." />
  I glared at her. "I don't talk in my sleep!"

  "Yes, you do. The last sleepover—you were talking about some chicken in Chechnya."

  The blood drained from my face. "What did I say?"

  Kelly shrugged. "No idea. You don't make sense most of the time, and it's worse when you're asleep."

  I thought about this. No, I doubted that somehow I'd talked about my entire career while asleep.

  "Riley could've told someone," I said at last.

  "You don't really believe that!" Kelly protested. She looked shocked. She was definitely Team Riley.

  "He's always been my handler, and as far as I know, he's the only other person who knows this stuff."

  "You don't really think Riley would sell you out, do you?" She looked mad.

  "Hey! You and I have been friends way longer than you've known Riley! How could you take his side?"

  "I just don't think he'd do that to you," Kelly said as she went back to eating her sandwich.

  "You never can tell." I picked at my chips. My appetite was gone. "Some spies just snap. Others would sell their own mothers for enough money to retire. We're just government employees. We don't make that much."

  "Riley did say he was thinking of retiring," Kelly mused. "He thought he'd move here and start a private investigation company."

  I shook my head. "When I told you he was thinking of doing that, I should've made you realize that Riley would never retire."

  "What people say and what people do is often a mystery to themselves and others."

  I threw my hands up in the air. "Whatever. I just don't know if he would sell me out."

  Would he? Riley's visited many times over the last year. Was he serious about retiring? Leaving the CIA was kind of a big deal. You had a skill set that wasn't quite transferrable to the non-spying world. I had no choice because the former vice president had outed me. I'd had to leave after that.

  "I need to figure this out on my own," I said. "I'll use Rex's computer. I doubt the Company has tapped it."

  "How will you do that?" Kelly asked.

  I smiled. "Actually, I do have a couple of favors I can call in." Some spies do use their skill set to start their own companies, and that gave me an idea.