Grant glowered while toting their equipment from the car and standing at Charlie’s left. A man didn’t have to be able to run and fight and shoot to be worthwhile, and if he’d ever felt the slightest interest in learning to pick a lock, he’d have studied it on the Internet.
He grimaced, recalling standing to the side while she fought her brother, recalling his ignominious descent while escaping last night. Falling once was understandable. Falling twice, no, make that three times, counting the time in the alley when his knee had given out on him, suggested a serious lack of athletic ability. Four, counting his abortive flight to the lawn when she’d dismissed him as being of any significance, taking on Brandon while forgetting Grant was even there.
Was that what it took to impress Fiona, running, fighting, shooting, and picking locks? Would it help his case any if she knew he lifted weights when he was working through a difficult scene, that he could bench press 250? Was that what she sought in a man?
No. She sought nothing in a man because she needed no man. Three years ago, she’d cowered beneath a desk while her brother and her lover stripped her of the ability to love, to trust, to need.
Grant felt mired down in pessimism, his spirits weighed down in a morass of gloom. He was tired. He hadn’t been able to sleep last night. Brandon had loaned him a Soma Tome, but even that hadn’t helped. His thoughts had been of Fiona, of loving her, of trusting her, of needing her, and, finally, of realizing he could never have her.
He’d been bested by the rubber tree plant, and his high hopes had fled with the coming of the dawn. He’d risen this morning with the realization his role in Fiona’s life could be as nothing more than the good friend to whom she waved farewell without regrets. They’d call, text, exchange emails and Christmas cards, but that was as far as their relationship would ever go.
He’d always love her; he had no choice. He’d love no other. He’d continue to be there for her, as he was today, but she’d never turn to him for help, because an admission of need was, to her, an admission of weakness and she’d vowed to never again be weak.
Thanks to Whitley Delaney, he’d never stood a chance.
Charlie straightened, turning the knob and walking in, and Grant followed him inside, narrowing his eyes to improve his vision in the dimly lit interior. It had been a small auto repair shop, probably family owned, definitely not one of the dozen-bay franchises he usually patronized.
Three flat-pan hydraulic lifts, their corrugated ramps on both ends dull with rust, were evenly spaced along the length of the empty building. Suggesting the place had been abandoned mid-repairs, the one in the center was raised to waist-level, revealing a deep, rectangular-cut cavern beneath. Lighting was minimal, consisting of a row of flyspecked windows running high along the length of the back wall. To his left was an enclosed room with the letters “ffice” inscribed beneath its bubble-glass window. Grant lowered his gaze to the oil-splotched floor in front of the door, seeking the missing O, but to no avail. It had likely been missing before the building’s owners had jumped ship, an advance indicator of the disrepair of both building and finances.
Charlie walked past him to the raised hydraulic lift. “This is perfect. The door opens between this lift and the one nearest the office. We’ll use this. Start setting up the laptops and powering them on while I open the door leading to the front. We don’t have much time.”
Grant strode to the lift and began staggering the laptops across it, opening each and powering it on. Charlie joined him a minute later, leaning over the first one, clicking several keys and manipulating the cursor.
Kevin’s face filled the screen. “Good. You’re on. Things are already happening. Load the surveillance.”
Charlie went to the second laptop and opened a screen overlooking a blue convertible. Grant watched Brandon lean over the side and, after several seconds, look up with a scowl before giving a thumbs up to the camera.
“It’s there,” Kevin said. “I’m calling the police now. Load Claire and get ready. Fiona’s almost there.”
Charlie clicked on the third program, revealing a frontal view of an office building with “Delaney.com” written in white letters on the glass front doors. “You there, Claire?”
“I am. So is Fortney. He’s working the front desk today, making himself visible. Once you give me the word, I’ll enter.”
“I’ll let you know. Soon.” Charlie turned to Grant. “We’ll stand back about ten feet from the door. You take that side, the one by the monitors, and I’ll take this one. When she runs in, we’ll close ranks between her and Delaney. Ready?”
“Ready.”
They didn’t have long to wait. Less than a minute later, Fiona burst through the door, running past them. Delaney was right on her heels, too close, and Grant flung himself at the man, broadsiding him and sending him careering, arms outstretched, into Charlie.
* * *
Sliding to a stop, Fiona whirled at the sound of multiple thuds, three distinct grunts, and a muttered oath. The three men lay in a tangle of writhing legs and arms, Charlie at the bottom of the man pile, Grant on the top, and Whitley sandwiched between. Rushing over, she grabbed Grant’s arm, attempting to haul him backward and earning herself a glare. “Get back!” he snapped.
Dismayed by his angry expression, she stepped back. There wasn’t much else she could do if he refused her help.
Charlie squirmed to the side, extricating himself from Whitley while pulling a set of handcuffs from a back pocket. He moved in, kneeling on the back of Whitley’s neck while snapping the cuffs around first one wrist and then the other before stepping back. “Okay, Grant. You can get off him.”
Grant rolled off the man and stood, taking a step back when Whitley bounded to his feet, his face enraged. Wild-eyed, he glanced around the room until his eyes lighted on Fiona. “Bitch.” He lunged for her and fell forward when Grant stuck out a foot and tripped him.
Grant turned to Fiona. “Are you all right?”
“I’m better than him. Took a little tumble there, did you, Whitley?”
Rolling onto his back, her brother sat up, a long streak of oil tracing a path from eyebrow to jaw on one side of his face. He glanced at both men before shifting toward Fiona and erupting in a stream of filth.
“That’s a lady you’re addressing,” Grant commented.
“She’s no lady!” Whitley struggled to his knees and then, with impaired dignity, again rose to his feet with his hands bound behind him. “She’s a whore.”
Charlie turned to the laptop. “You’re taping this, right?”
Kevin laughed. “Yes. All of it. It’ll make for fun viewing later. Brandon especially will want to see this. Grant, that was some flying tackle you made. Sacked your own quarterback, though.”
Grant glared at him, and Fiona wondered what had gotten into him. As had been the case last night, Grant’s easygoing temperament appeared to be on the wane, leaving a testy man in its place. “He was too close to Fiona. I had no choice.”
“There’s always a choice,” Charlie commented, “But I’ll admit you achieved the desired results, so we’ll let it go at that.”
“You clowns have no idea what you’ve done, no idea at all,” Whitley stated, lifting his chin and assuming what he probably believed to be a superior look but had more the appearance of a sulky child.
“Really? Do you hear those sirens? Check out the second monitor, the one in the middle.”
Her brother stiffened while shifting his gaze to the monitor and watching patrol cars form a perimeter around his vehicle. He swore again before turning blazing eyes on Fiona. “You think that will end it? This is only one of two planned for this week. You’ve stopped one. Bully for you. Can you stop them both?”
Kevin spoke. “You mean the one in San Diego, too? Show him the USB drive, Charlie.”
Charlie plucked the flash drive from his pocket, smiling in response to the stiffening of Whitley’s face. “Yes, I do believe we can stop both of them, as well as the o
nes planned for next week and the week after and so on.” He froze briefly while glancing at the door and then relaxed at the sight of Brandon strolling in.
Brandon hesitated while taking in the scene. “You all look like the tail end of a camel race. What happened?”
Kevin spoke. “Grant took out everyone, singlehanded. I’ve got video.”
Brandon turned to the monitor. “No kidding?”
“I don’t joke.”
“Well done, Hester,” Brandon remarked before turning to Charlie. “I left when I heard the sirens. I didn’t want to be the only black man next to a bomb about to go off.”
Now Whitley did manage to pull off a superior expression. “Typical spade, can’t do math. It doesn’t go off for at least thirty more minutes.”
Brandon smiled, displaying a perfect set of white teeth against his ebony skin. “You haven’t told him yet?”
“Not yet,” Fiona responded.
“Told me what?” Whitley addressed his question to Grant, which at first puzzled Fiona. Then it occurred to her that, of the four of them, Grant was the only white person in the room.
Apparently recognizing the deliberate slight, Grant looked down, studying his nails and deigning to respond, so Fiona stated, “That bomb was set to go off at 8:30, Whitley. You were scheduled to go up with it.”
“Bullshit. Fortney was going to pick it up at 8:30. Your information’s wrong.”
“Claire, you’re on,” Charlie announced. “Watch the monitor on the far end, genius. That’s one of our operatives walking through the door of Delaney.com. See who’s standing behind reception?”
“That’s a lie. You pre-filmed that.”
“Claire, did you hear that?”
“I did.” The camera moved in on the reception desk. “Andrew Fortney?”
The uniformed man behind the desk stepped forward, his eyes narrowed in either suspicion or aversion at having to converse with an African American female. “Yes. Who’s asking?”
“Whitley Delaney. He said to tell you he decided to bring the package to you instead of waiting. He’s outside in the parking lot right now.”
Fear and then horror crossed the man’s face. Sidestepping her, Fortney raced out the door. Claire chuckled. “I’m done here.” The screen view moved toward the door, outside, and down the sidewalk.
“Well, Whitley?” Fiona asked. “How’s that information of ours looking now?”
They were getting through to him. Her brother looked confused. “That doesn’t make any sense. They need me. They wouldn’t kill me.”
“Of course they would. Who inherits Delaney.com if you die right now?”
“No. He wouldn’t do that. He’s my friend.”
“If you want further verification,” Kevin stated, “check out the center monitor again. I just heard over the police band there’s not enough time to dismantle it. They’re bringing out a disposal unit.”
Fiona turned to the monitor, watching two police officers heft a large metal bin from the back of a police van and set it in the center of the street. Covered from head to foot in protective gear and looking more like a primate than a human, a bomb disposal expert lifted a black duffel bag from the back seat of Whitley’s convertible, carrying it to the bin, setting it in, securing the latch, and backing away, every movement soft and calculated. Once he was far enough away, he made a high sign before hopping into the backseat of a patrol car. All vehicles within range pulled out, leaving the street empty.
The five of them didn’t speak for a full minute. Then the bin bounced into the air and settled. “Time?” Fiona asked.
Charlie glanced at his watch. “8:30, as scheduled.” He turned to Whitley. “That’d be you if Fiona hadn’t distracted you. Now do you believe he wanted you dead?”
Whitley’s face was pale, and his eyes wide, but he rallied, the eyes filling with hatred. He whirled toward Fiona. “This is your fault!” The words emerged on a spray of spittle, and Charlie stepped back, a look of distaste on his face.
Fiona smiled. “How is this my fault, Whitley?”
“If you hadn’t lived, they wouldn’t have wanted to kill me!”
“That makes no sense.” She turned to Charlie. “Does that make sense to you?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “I’m not seeing the logic. Maybe Whitley would like to explain.”
“Shut up, Injun! This is between me and my mongrel sister!”
Charlie smiled. She’d never seen him smile before. It wasn’t a friendly smile, and she hoped she didn’t see him smile again.
Whitley addressed Fiona. “If you’d died like you were supposed to, my actions wouldn’t have come under scrutiny. Because of you, I failed. This is the price of failure.”
Fiona frowned. Her brother was crazy. “That still doesn’t make sense. You’re the only one who thought I didn’t die.” She gestured toward Charlie. “His cousin, the woman you knew as Valencia McDermott, died in my place, but everyone else thought I was dead. If they thought I was dead, how could they have thought you failed?”
“Because we’re members of a superior race, people who don’t make mistakes. They must have learned you were still alive. That’s why they set up my termination.”
“But they made a mistake, Mr. Superior Race. They killed the wrong damned woman. And, really, termination? Is that what you call it? I call it murder. With your help, they murdered six people that day, Whitley, including our father and Charlie’s cousin. You consider that a termination?”
“The deaths were done in the interests of Zeitgeist, a new world, a brave world, a clean world. No more inferior races, no more non-believers, no more promiscuity. You wouldn’t last a day, with your Indian blood, your Hindu mother, and your slutty behavior.”
Grant decked him, surprising all of them. One minute Fiona’s stalker was studying his nails, deliberately distancing himself from the discussion, and in the next, the nails were tucked into a fist rocketing into Whitley’s face. Her brother went flying backward, blood spurting from his nose and his head hitting the concrete with a hollow thud. Fiona gaped at her brother and then turned to Grant. “We’re not finished with him.”
“I am,” he said, rubbing his fist with his other hand.
“Way to go,” Brandon said, his voice mirroring the surprise on his face.
Fiona could hear Kevin laughing in the background. “If I’m offended by his words, I’ll punch him myself. I don’t need you to punch people for me.”
Grant glared at her. “I didn’t punch him for you.”
“He’s not dead,” Charlie commented, his tone suggesting boredom. “See? He’s starting to crawl toward the door.”
“We should probably stop him,” Brandon mused.
Charlie shook his head. “I think I’ll wait until he gets all the way there. Then I can drag him back and watch him crawl again. Like one of those toy trucks I used to have. You can make it go all kinds of places, and then you bring it back and start all over again. It’s fun.”
Whitley fought his way to his feet once again, this time with a twin streams of blood framing his tight lips. He turned to Fiona. “Slut.”
Brandon folded his arms across his chest and shook his head in disgust. “Damn, he’s stupid.”
“Too stupid to realize he’s going to jail,” Charlie said.
“You can’t prove anything.” Whitley’s lips curved into a smug smile.
“We have everything we need, including audio recordings of your conversation with your friend last night,” Fiona stated, hoping he’d said more after they’d left.
Whitley did a double-take. “Thorpe?”
All three men swiveled their heads to look at Fiona, and she shook her head at them. The name Thorpe meant nothing to her. “What’s his first name, Whitley?”
A look of native cunning crossed his face. “You don’t know?”
“I’ll find out. You can make things easier on me by letting me know.”
“Why in hell would I want to make things easier on
you?”
“Whoever he is, he’s at work right now. Reinhardt told him to be in place to ask questions about your actions. They hid a file in your safe, a manifesto supposedly written by you, taking responsibility for your actions. In it, you claimed to be a follower of Islam.”
“You’re lying.”
“I’m not. Grant and I heard it all while hiding in your special room downstairs.”
“Such a lovely place,” Grant added inexplicably, his first contribution since punching Whitley.
She hadn’t thought Whitley could become any paler, but he did, in particular, the flesh around his eyes, which tightened and turned paper-white. “You’re really sick, Whitley. Really, really sick, and your friends know it. You became a liability, not because I didn’t die, but because you’re unbalanced. That’s what they said while we were listening. ‘That Whitley’s sicker than a rabid dog,’ Reinhardt said. ‘We need to put him down,’ Thorpe said. ‘He’s outlived his usefulness, and we want Delaney.com for ourselves.’ That’s what they said, Whitley. You don’t matter. The company does.”
Whitley didn’t respond. A confused frown rose to his face, and the pale blue eyes clouded.
“You can get back at them,” Charlie stated. “You can write or record a confession implicating both of them in the plane explosion and whatever else they’ve done. They’ll go to prison for a long time. That’ll fix them good.”
After staring at Charlie for several long seconds, Whitley turned his back on all of them, facing the office door.
“We’ll need those recordings,” Charlie said with a sigh. “Can you two go fetch them and bring them back here? When we deliver him to the police, I want all our i’s dotted and our t’s crossed. I want him convicted, finally, for the murder of my cousin.”
“And my father.” Fiona turned to Brandon. “Did you bring your car?”
He tossed her the keys.
She heard Grant follow her out the door.
Zeitgeist Page 24