by Rachel Caine
Pharmadene had always had oppressive, intrusive security, but it ought to have been turned off by now, or at least be under the FBI’s control.
That it wasn’t was a sign that things were still very, very dangerous.
So of course, they throw me right in the middle of it, Bryn thought. She slipped Zaragosa’s card in her pocket. The temptation to read what he’d put on the back of it was very, very strong, but she didn’t dare. High-definition cameras everywhere. She’d be sharing the contents of the note with anyone who cared to look.
McCallister wasn’t going to be any happier about all this intrigue than she was. That was somehow a little heartening.
Jeremy was about as chatty as Ms. Harris had been. He had a nicer suit than his boss, and there was something about his subtle, expensive aftershave that irritated Bryn; he seemed more like Old Guard than New FBI. She wanted out of the elevator, out of the building, out of the clinging slime of Pharmadene, but she had to patiently wait through the long drop to the ground floor, sign out, turn in her badge, fingerprint out, get in her car, fingerprint out again at the gate, before she finally achieved some kind of freedom. Nobody searched the folder during her exit interview, which she found curious until she saw the stamp on the outside. It had Zaragosa’s personal signature on it, and it said EYES ONLY, with her name listed.
She drove off the Pharmadene campus and five miles along the winding road until she felt it was safe, and then turned off into a large park and made sure to pull into the shade of a big, spreading tree. The place was mostly deserted. She opened the windows, turned off the engine, and first checked the folder over very, very carefully—not the contents, but the structure of the paper.
That was how she found the device, tiny as it was, embedded in the thick folder itself. It was certainly a tracker; it might do more than that, too. She couldn’t take the chance. She separated the contents of the file from the folder, then looked through each page, holding it up to the light for any telltale shadows. All she found were standard watermarks.
Bryn took the folder to the nearest recycling station and added it to a bin destined for shredding. Then she turned his business card over and read the back of it.
It read: Do not trust Riley Block.
The address he’d written out in longhand she kept in her pocket, along with the business card—which she also checked for a tracker. The rest of the paperwork would go into her safe at the office until she had time later to study the thick, dense information.
If they’re listening in right now, she thought, it’ll be silent as the grave.
It was only a little funny, once she considered it.
“You are absolutely not going alone,” Pat said, beating Joe Fideli to the punch by about one second.
They were sitting in Joe Fideli’s workshop, located behind his house. It was nine p.m., postdinner. Kylie, Joe’s wife, had seemed happy to have them as guests, though Bryn guessed she’d never be completely comfortable with Joe bringing his work home with him. For Bryn, it had been a delightfully relaxing experience, being back in a house that featured well-worn, comfortable furniture, chaos, and noisy children. Mr. French loved it, and she knew that leaving him to play fetch with the Fideli children would be good for everyone.
As nice as the dinner was, there was a great deal of relief being in the soundproofed, security-hardened workshop, too. For one thing, Joe had fine single malt scotch stockpiled here. Cask-conditioned sixteen-year-old Laphroaig. It lingered like sunlight in her veins, though the nanites in her bloodstream took care of any intoxication pretty fast, which sucked.
Together, the three of them had gone through her meeting with Zaragosa, the written notes, and the official paperwork.
And the two men were united in their opposition to her running the FBI’s errands.
“You’re seriously trying to tell me what I can and can’t do?” she asked Patrick, watching his face with full concentration. “Because I’m pretty sure you can’t, Pat. And neither can you, Joe.”
“Okay,” Joe immediately said, holding up both hands in surrender. “No arguments from me—you can do whatever you want. But I think what Pat meant was that it isn’t smart for you to go without backup. Right, Pat?”
Pat was staring her down, a frown deepening between his brows. “Maybe.” She reached over for the scotch and poured him another dram. “You could be walking into another meeting with Jonathan Mercer; he’s got his fingers in everything. And we all know how splendidly that’s gone so far.”
He wasn’t pulling punches, but he wasn’t wrong, either. Her first face-to-face with Mercer, one of the two inventors of Returné and an all-around madman, had resulted in a gunfight. Her second had gotten Joe Fideli put into the hospital with a punctured lung.
Her third time hadn’t been the charm. She’d gotten her brains mashed with a frying pan at the hands of her own sister while Mercer laughed. That sort of thing wasn’t necessarily fatal to her anymore, but it was damn sure one of the memories she could have done without.
“Neither one of you is quite as durable as I am,” Bryn said. “And if it is Mercer, it’s better if I get him myself without putting more people I care about at risk. It’s bad enough he’s got Annie. I can’t let you two go walking in there to end up the same way. He’d love to recruit the two of you to his army of the walking dead, with all your ninja combat skills.”
“I’m not a ninja,” Pat said.
“Speak for yourself, man.” That earned Joe a poisonously angry glance from Pat, and he toasted the two of them, drained his glass, and stood up. “Right. You two work this out between you and let me know when I’m needed. I’m going back to wash dishes before my wife kicks me out to sleep here. Feel free to not mess with anything. And lock up when you leave.”
“Good night,” Bryn said as he left, and then looked at Pat, eyebrows raised. “I didn’t think he trusted anybody enough to leave them here with all his toys.”
For answer, Pat pointed to the corners of the room, and Bryn saw the discreet glinting eyes of cameras. “He trusts us,” he said, “but that doesn’t mean he won’t rewind the video. Just in case.”
“Trust but verify?”
“Exactly.”
Joe had good reason to have such high security in his workshop—workshop being a euphemism for something between a well-stocked panic room and an arsenal that would give the ATF nightmares, if they had any inkling it existed. Joe Fideli had a past with some branch of the military, but he’d been working on his own for a long time, and that work involved serious and varied weaponry…neatly stored on racks, hung on boards, and packed in crates. The gleam of black metal and the smell of gun oil permeated the place. Bryn had asked him, straight out, if he was a mercenary; Joe had replied, without even a flicker of concern, that he was a military contractor. Which was probably a yes.
And in this, he had a lot in common with Pat McCallister, who’d also moved in the same circles in the military and afterward. Bryn still didn’t have a good inventory of his skills, except that they were wide, varied, and expert. He was probably checked out on all the weapons stored around here, for instance; she knew he was a deadly good shot, and had good hand-to-hand combat experience. More than that, though, he had contacts. Lots of them. Enough to solve problems that guns wouldn’t.
Pat’s smile faded back into seriousness, and he leaned forward, hands clasped between his knees. “Bryn, you cannot go into this alone. I’m serious about this. It isn’t safe.”
She mirrored his posture, just as intent, and said, “I’m serious when I say that as much as I appreciate your…concern, I can take care of myself. And I will. Clear?” The hiccup of a pause before she said the word concern was telling, and she knew it. The warmth didn’t leave him, but it banked itself down to a low simmer, and Pat leaned back in the chair, watching her with suddenly guarded eyes.
“Are we back to this?” he asked. “All of a sudden it’s just that I’m concerned? Are we just friends now?”
S
he didn’t want to have this discussion, not now, not here…not with the video evidence of it left behind on Joe Fideli’s cameras. She and Joe were tight, and he was trustworthy, but this was deeply personal business.
“I don’t know,” she said very evenly, although what was going on inside her was full of sharp edges and sudden drops. “Aren’t we?”
Pat shook his head, not to answer her, but just to indicate he was done with the conversation. She set her unfinished glass of scotch aside and stood up. “I’ll meet you back at the house,” she said. “We can talk there.”
He wanted to push it, she could tell, but he was just as private as she was about their relationship, whatever it was. “I’ll be up late.” He meant, Don’t go to bed without talking to me. She didn’t acknowledge that at all, just offered him a cool kiss on the cheek and left without another word.
Outside, the night air felt damp and heavy with mist. She went into Joe’s house through the back door—keypad lock, to which she had a code—and found Joe and Kylie in the kitchen finishing up the dishes. Without a word, Kylie handed her a towel, and she helped wipe down the damp china and put it away.
“So,” Joe said. “That was a short conversation.”
“Yeah.”
“Something you need to share?”
“I didn’t know this was an AA meeting, Joe.”
Kylie shot her husband a warning look. She was exactly the kind of woman Bryn would have expected to attract Joe, actually. Lovely, strong, intelligent, and sensitive. She reached over with a soapy hand and picked up the half-full wineglass sitting by the sink, which she finished off. “Cheers,” she said. “It’s not, so ignore my nosy-old-lady husband. Thanks for coming over. The kids love seeing you and Mr. French.”
“Mostly Mr. French,” Bryn said, but she smiled anyway. Right on cue, her bulldog wandered into the kitchen, panting. He flopped down next to Bryn’s feet, clearly exhausted, and gave her a piteous long-suffering groan, complete with puppy-dog eyes. “I think he’s ready to go.” She wiped the last plate and put it away.
Kylie dried her hands and hugged Bryn close, kissed her cheek, and whispered, “Be careful.”
“I will,” Bryn whispered back, then let go and hugged Joe, too. He didn’t bother warning her, and there was no cheek-smooching from him. It was like hugging a block of concrete. It always surprised her how densely muscled he was; he carried himself so casually that it was easy to miss. “See you tomorrow.”
“I’ll wear my best gun,” he said without a trace of irony.
Mr. French groaned again, heaved himself back to his feet, and followed her out to the car, where he jumped up on the passenger seat, turned around three times, and flopped down with a sigh that said, more clearly than anything, how run out he was. He didn’t even beg for the window to be down. By the time she’d driven to the end of the block and made the first turn out of Joe’s neighborhood, her dog was completely, utterly asleep. And snoring like a little old man.
Bryn rested one hand on his warm, short fur. He woke up long enough to twist around and give her fingers a sleepy lick, then fell right back to sleep. “Everything’s all right, dog,” she told him. He snored. “We’re going to be okay. I promise.”
She wasn’t talking to the dog, of course, not really. Apart from being asleep, Mr. French had total faith in her ability to make everything right. In his doggy universe, that was her job—to make him happy and safe, to keep the food and water coming, and to toss the ball.
Simple.
There were times Bryn ached to have that simplicity for herself, though she knew full well she’d hate it if it came. Life was never simple, and it wasn’t meant to be.
She took the long way home. She stopped at the beach to walk on the sand, shoes off, breathing in the mist and listening to the timeless, steady hiss of the surf. She wasn’t alone out there, but she could pretend she was; that was what all the other shadowy figures—sometimes entwined—were doing, pretending they were invisible, locked in their own private universe. Nobody bothered her, or even spoke to her, and after ten minutes she was chilled to the bone but only a little soothed.
The drive home was uneventful until her phone rang. Bryn hit the hands-free button on her steering wheel and said, “I’m on my way,” because she knew it would be Pat, checking on her slow progress.
But the voice that came out of the speakers wasn’t Pat’s. It was her sister, Annalie’s. “Bryn?”
Bryn steered hastily to the curb, put the car in park, and said, “Annie? Annie, where are you?”
“Bryn, I need you to come get me. Please come get me.…” She sounded desperately scared and lost. “I need to see Mom. I need to get home.…” In a much softer voice, her sister said, “I don’t know what’s happening to me.”
“Sweetie, where are you?”
“I—I don’t know. I think I’m dying. Please come get me.…” Annie was crying Bryn realized with a wrench; she sounded disoriented. “A boat, I think I’m on a boat. I can’t get out. I need help. Please—” Annie sucked in a sudden breath that sounded almost like a scream—it was so drenched with alarm—and then there was a soft click, and the call died.
“No,” Bryn whispered, and fumbled for her phone in her purse. “No, no, no, Annie, no…” She checked the number: CALL BLOCKED. She dialed Pat McCallister’s number. Her mind was clear, cold, and running very, very fast. When he picked up, she said, “I need you to pull my cell phone records and trace the call I got right before this. It was Annie, Pat. Annie called me. She said she thought she was on a boat.”
He was silent for maybe a second, and then said, “I’ll have the intel ready before you get here.” She didn’t doubt for a moment that he would have someone, somewhere, who owed him enough of a favor to make it happen.
“Pat—” The line was already dead. He hadn’t said good-bye.
Mr. French, who’d been woken up by the sudden stop and the emotion radiating out of her, whined in concern and licked her arm. She leaned over and hugged him, and said, “We’re going to find her, baby. We’re going to find my sister.”
He barked as if he agreed and settled down in the seat as she put the car in gear and headed home with absolute disregard for speed limits. God, if he’s decided she’s of no further value to him…Mercer was not a nice man. If he decided that Annie wasn’t useful, he’d dump her like a bad date. In Annie’s case, that meant no more shots, and no more shots of Returné meant a slow, agonizing, and gruesome death. She could already be far along the path.
He’s luring you, the cooler part of her brain warned her. That wasn’t just Annie being resourceful and getting her hands on a cell phone. He wanted her to call. He wants you to go rushing in to save her.
Maybe. But honestly, Bryn couldn’t see how else to play it. Annalie was her sister, and she’d been innocent in all this, a victim. There was no way Bryn could play it safe if there was even the remotest chance that Annie could be rescued and out of Mercer’s hands.
She also knew what Pat was going to say. She just didn’t want to hear it.
Chapter 5
The first words McCallister said to her as she and Mr. French rushed inside the mansion’s big entry hall were “This way.”
“Do you have the information?” Bryn asked, dumping everything but her phone next to the door.
“Yes. Come with me.” He’d taken off his suit jacket and tie, and his pale blue shirt was wrinkled, the first two buttons opened—he looked unexpectedly vulnerable to her, somehow. She was so used to seeing him completely together. As she followed him, he said, “Bryn, you have to expect that this may be—”
“A trap,” she said, well aware of the tension in her voice. “I know. Just help me find her, Pat. I need to find her. Please, don’t tell me the dangers, just…help.”
He said, “I will,” in a soft, flat voice, and closed the door behind her. She hadn’t paid attention to where they were going, but in the sudden rush of stillness, she realized that they were in Patrick’s perso
nal office…a place she’d rarely gone, simply because the door was always shut, whether he was inside or not. It was a warm, book-lined room of dark woods and maroon fabrics, with soft gold light fixtures that lit but didn’t dazzle. The desk was massive and heavily carved, and the chairs matched. It was all very masculine and Victorian, except for the gleaming, ultramodern laptop sitting on the tooled leather desktop.
Pat lifted his gaze to hers and said, “Info’s on the laptop screen. I printed a copy for you to take. But make no mistake, Bryn: I might be willing to accept letting you go alone on Pharmadene’s black flag op, but not on this. No way in hell. So I’m coming, too. I’m not entertaining any arguments. If you tell me no, I’ll just take another car and beat you there.”
“I wasn’t planning on trying to shut you out,” Bryn replied. “I’m scared. I’m scared for Annie.”
“And I’m scared for you. You’re too desperate to find her, and that’s a liability. Slow and careful. That’s how we’re going to find her, and how we’re going to get her back safely, without losing anyone else. Agreed?”
“Agreed,” she said, but her heart wasn’t in it. “Do you think he ordered her to make that call?” Jonathan Mercer’s moral compass—if he’d ever had one in the first place—had shattered into a million sharp pieces when he’d helped create Returné. What was left was something Bryn didn’t really understand at all. Mercer was capable of anything…of luring them in to be killed, most obviously, but he was utterly unpredictable. He might just be screwing with her to entertain himself. Or to let Annie go…If Annie was still under his control, she’d be a perfect Trojan horse.
Or maybe, just maybe, her sister had somehow won her freedom and needed, desperately, to find safety.
Pat sank down in the desk chair, holding both her hands in his. “I think if Mercer wants to have a chat with you, he’d think using Annie to arrange it was just good business,” he said. “So until we find out differently, we have to assume that he knew she was calling, at the very least. It wouldn’t be safe to do anything else.”