I smiled a little, really not knowing what to say, and thanking God David wasn’t here to walk in on us.
“Um, I kind of got the hint that David’s your boyfriend. And, I, um, also got the hint that he knows about you and me.”
“Did he say anything?” I immediately asked.
Randy didn’t answer me at first, and then his face slowly curved into a sad smile. “He means a lot to you.”
Swallowing, I nodded, feeling like in some way I was hurting Randy’s feelings.
He lowered his gaze to his hands clasped on top the table. “Kelly, the last thing I want to do is come between you and your friends, you and your boyfriend.” He brought his gaze up to mine. “It matters to me what people think. I don’t want to come in and mess things up. And I’m not going to lie to you. I think you’re great. But you and David are together, and there you go.”
Randy got up from the table. “And even if you and David weren’t together, it’s not a good idea for people who work together to date. So,” he held his hand out to me, “friends?”
I didn’t know what to say. David and I weren’t together. Or at least we’d never really broken up. And why did it feel like Randy was breaking up with me when we weren’t even dating?
Inwardly, I sighed. Life was a lot easier when only computers rocked my world.
I reached out and did the only thing I could. I smiled and took his hand. “Friends.”
***
Two days later we had just finished up a PT session and were walking out of the barn. Mystic, TL, and David pulled up. The car doors opened, they climbed out, and walked straight into the house without a glance in our direction.
TL and David disappeared into TL’s office and shut the door, making it more than obvious that no one was to disturb them. Mystic went straight to his bedroom, and we all followed.
“What’s going on?” Wirenut asked him.
Mystic didn’t look at any of us, just shook his head.
Bruiser and I exchanged a glance.
“Are you okay?” she asked. “Did you get hurt?”
“I’m fine,” Mystic mumbled.
Beaker stepped into the room. “Is everything done? Is the mission over?”
Mystic grabbed a purple bag off his dresser. “I really need to be alone.” With that, he slipped past all of us and out the door.
Cat turned to Wirenut. “What’s in that purple bag?”
“His mojo stuff,” Wirenut answered. “Ya know, crystals and herbs and whatever else he needs to become one with the universe.”
None of us spoke for a few seconds.
Beaker heaved a sigh. “Well, I guess I’m going to go,” she shrugged, “do whatever.”
Bruiser looked at Parrot. “Wanna go for a ride?” she asked, referring to the horses, and Parrot nodded.
Wirenut grabbed his iPod and he and Cat stretched out on his bed to listen to music, which left me standing in the boy’s room with nothing to do.
“Well,” I headed toward the door, “guess I’ll see you guys later.”
Wirenut and Cat waved bye. I headed down the hall to the hidden elevator and descended to Sub Floor Four. I punched in my code to the computer lab and went on in. As usual, Chapling sat bent over his station clicking away.
I walked up behind him and saw that he was updating our video monitoring software. I glanced at all the black and white images stacked on his screen. They showed where everyone was and what everyone was doing. I saw Jonathan, our PT instructor, go into TL’s office.
I saw an image of TL’s office with him on the phone, David looking through a file, and Jonathan listening to TL’s conversation. All three of them looked incredibly concentrated and definitely stressed.
I was dying, dying, to know what was going on.
Then I saw an image of Mystic up on the hill meditating. He’d placed some different colored crystals in front of him, and I found myself curious what each crystal was for.
I touched Chapling on the shoulder, and he jumped.
“Ohmygod. Ohmygodohmygod.” He grabbed the sides of his fuzzy head. “Don’t scare me like that.”
I smiled. “You didn’t hear me come in?” Stupid question, of course he didn’t hear me. I was completely oblivious, too, when I was working.
“Nooo, I didn’t hear you.” Chapling clicked a few keys. “What’s up?”
I pointed to the image of TL’s office. “Any idea what’s going on?”
Chapling shook his head. “Not yet.” He pointed to my station. “I sent you code. We’ve been hired to review it for infections.”
With a nod, I stepped over to my station and sat down. Taped to the side of my flat screen was a picture of me and David as little kids, taken right here at the ranch. I smiled as I looked at the image of him and I holding hands, grinning for the camera.
I missed him.
With a sigh, I keyed in my password, brought up the code, and got down to work. Hours zoomed by as I lost myself in thousands of lines of data. I tagged the deprecations, ascribed the client agents to depiction, and formatted the cipher for essentials. I repeated that process over and over again with each subsection of records and then partitioned the intervals.
“GiGi?”
I focused on the elements and continued—
“GIGI?”
I jerked my head up. “What?”
Chapling stood at the door. “Let’s go. TL wants us.”
“Oh.” I blinked my eyes a few times. As quick as I could, I secured my station and followed Chapling out the lab and down the hall to the conference room.
Around the table sat TL, David, Jonathan, Mystic, Bruiser, and . . . Nalani? What was TL’s wife doing here? I looked straight at her and gave her a huge smile that she did not return.
Something was wrong. Something was really wrong.
I pulled a leather chair out beside Bruiser and sat down. “What are you doing here?” I whispered to Bruiser, and she shrugged.
Chapling closed the door and sat beside David.
No one said a word as we stared at TL, waiting.
Seconds later, he closed a file he’d been studying and stood. “For those of you who do not know, this is Nalani Kai, my wife.”
I blinked, taken aback that he’d just said that. Nalani being his wife was a big time secret I had accidentally found out and TL had sworn me to secrecy.
TL didn’t say anything for a few seconds, and I got the distinct impression he was trying extremely hard to control his emotions. “Someone . . .” he inhaled and released a quick breath. “Someone has kidnapped our daughter.”
What?
Oh.
My.
God.
What? TL had a daughter?
I looked at Nalani. TL and Nalani had a daughter?
I put my hands over my mouth. Oh, no.
TL pointed his remote at the wall mounted flat screen, and an image of a little girl flashed into view. With huge brown eyes, tiny glasses, and curly black hair, she stared back into the camera with a big toothless grin.
Happy was the first word to pop into my mind.
“This is Zandra,” TL monotoned, completely void of any emotion. “She’s seven years old.”
Zandra was beautiful. Absolutely gorgeous. An incredible mix of Nalani and TL’s best physical qualities.
“She was taken three days ago,” TL continued, “from the back yard of her maternal grandmother’s home. No one saw anything. A note was attached to the ball she was playing with.” TL clicked the remote and a piece of yellow paper flashed onto the screen.
I squinted and made out the one and only typed sentence.
TRY TO FIND HER OR SHE DIES.
My heart paused a beat as I read the last word. DIES.
“Try to find her or she dies,” TL read. “That is all we have received. No ransom, no phone calls, just this one-sentence note. We have no idea who the kidnappers are or what they want in exchange. Through our work with the IPNC, Nalani and I have made a lot of enemies o
ver the years. The kidnapper could be anybody from anywhere in the world.”
I looked between the two of them, puzzling at their stoic, blank expressions. Their daughter had been kidnapped and yet they maintained that ever present control. How? How was that even possible?
I glanced over to Nalani, hoping to send her an encouraging look, but she didn’t return my glance. As I stared at her, I saw her jaw flex and realized she was doing everything possible to keep it in control.
“Of course,” TL continued, “we have no intentions of standing peacefully by waiting to be contacted by the kidnappers.” TL put the remote down on the table. “This is where all of you come in.” TL nodded to Mystic. “Unbeknownst to everyone here at the ranch, Mystic is considered a very precious asset to the government.”
Bruiser and I exchanged a curious glance.
“Before Mystic came to us,” TL continued, “he anonymously submitted information to Lost America, our nation’s missing person’s foundation. When I recruited him, he had successfully helped find two hundred and twenty three people. Since he’s been living here at the ranch, he’s been working behind the scenes, providing information that has led to the rescue of sixteen more missing people.”
What?
Bruiser and I exchanged another surprised look. From her perplexed expression, I gathered she didn’t know about this either.
Mystic had been working for TL this whole time? Behind the scenes? I hadn’t known. Why hadn’t Mystic said anything?
Stupid question. Mystic hadn’t said anything because TL didn’t want any of us to know.
And—a thought occurred to me—when I’d first met Mystic, he’d said he was taken in for operating a 1-900 psychic scam. It was probably a cover TL had given him.
TL rolled his chair out and took his seat. “Needless to say, we have kept Mystic’s identity closely guarded.”
I smiled to myself as he answered my unspoken question.
“Only myself, David, Chapling, and a few high up people in the government know of Mystic’s ability.” TL turned to Mystic. “Tell everyone how your specialty works.”
“I need to see into a person’s eyes to understand what they’re feeling,” Mystic explained. “Unfortunately I see mostly their pain, not their happiness. It can be a picture of them or an image on T.V. Normally that’s all I need to feel them, hear them, to see them.”
No one responded as those words floated in the air. I could only imagine the things Mystic must see on a daily basis just by looking into someone’s eyes.
That thought sent a chill racing up my arms. I didn’t think I could handle looking into a person’s eyes and seeing only pain.
What a burdening ability to have. I wondered if Mystic could block it somehow. And—I suddenly realized—what had he seen in me?
“Tell them,” TL prompted Mystic, “what you saw with Zandra?”
“I saw fighting. But fighting like I’ve never seen before. It was organized, but not like boxing. There was an octagon, but no cage, and no gloves. Just raw fighting. I heard different languages being spoken. There was a medium sized crowd of people sitting around the octagon. I’d say about fifty people. And the men, the fighters, they were very bloody. I heard the snap of a bone . . .” Mystic closed his eyes. “That’s a sound I never want to hear again.”
He took a breath and opened his eyes. “I also got the sense that this fighting is rooted in one place here in the States and has been for years. That people come from all around for this gruesome fighting where money is exchanged.”
Mystic looked across the table at Bruiser. “I also got the distinct feeling that many men have died during these fights. That it’s almost preferred for a man to perish. It’s why people bet such big money. In hopes that someone will die . . .” Mystic’s voice trailed off as he slowly shook his head.
“I don’t have anything else,” he continued a few seconds later. “But I know without a doubt in my mind that I need to be around these fights if I’m going to locate Zandra.”
“Okay, Bruiser,” David cut in. “Tell us what your thoughts are after hearing this description.”
For the first time ever, I saw Bruiser in a serious mode. Gone was her perpetual grin and silliness. She was focused as she began speaking. “The type of fighting that Mystic is describing is found more commonly overseas in less regulated countries. You can, however, find underground clubs throughout America. But death of a fighter most certainly is not part of the equation, unless, of course, an accident occurs.”
She scooted up in her seat. “But here in America there is one very exclusive, underground club where fighters get paid bonuses if they kill their competition. I’ve never been to this club, but I’ve heard all about it. The club is called Demise Chain, and it’s located in the Pacific Northwest in the little town of Teacup, Washington.”
Teacup? What an innocent sounding city for such a horrible thing going on.
“The worst part of this,” Bruiser continued, “is that less skilled fighters are brought over from other countries with a promise of American citizenship if they compete in Demise Chain. Little do they know that they are the ones that will die during the match.”
“Die?” I gasped, and Bruiser nodded.
It was amazing to me how just a year and a half ago I was in my own little world, completely oblivious to this world. Since joining The Specialists I’d found out way too many disturbing things about the human race.
Bruiser nodded. “Like I said, I’ve never seen one of these fights. But the man who raised me competed in one. He barely made it out alive.” She paused for a second. “We’re talking MMA, here. Everything goes.”
“MMA?” Mystic asked.
Good question. I had no clue either.
“Mixed martial arts,” she answered. “It was made popular by UFC in the early nineties. But it’s been going on a lot longer than that.”
I raised my hand. “UFC?”
“Ultimate Fighting Championship,” Bruiser answered. “You can see it on T.V. now, it’s so popular. MMA. A combination of karate, judo, Wing Chun, and whatever else, all in one fight. Striking, grappling. Basically whatever it takes to win.”
“You all should know,” TL inputted, “that Bruiser was raised and trained by one of the world’s elite fighters. She knows more about martial arts than anybody I’ve ever met, and I’ve been in this business a long time. She is, hands down, the most talented fighter I have ever seen. Her input into this mission is imperative.”
I glanced over at Bruiser to see her shyly look down. Her embarrassment was very out of character for her. TL’s kudos had brought a side out in her I’d never seen.
“It is our goal,” David carried on the conversation, “to get Mystic in the room where these fights are going on and—”
Bruiser huffed out a humorless laugh, cutting David off. “Good luck on that one. Demise Chain is closely monitored. It’s like the mafia, or for that matter, the White House. You don’t just walk in the front door. You have to earn your way in.”
“Precisely,” TL agreed.
Bruiser frowned. “And so how is Mystic going to get in?”
I smiled to myself. I didn’t bother informing her that TL could do just about anything. Bruiser would figure that out soon enough.
“As David said,” TL continued, “we need to get Mystic in that room. We’ve looked at it from all angles, and hands down our best bet is to have him be a competitive fighter. That is our objective. From there and what he discovers, we will move onto the next phase of things—finding Zandra.”
“Did you say I’m going to be a competitive fighter?” Mystic asked.
“Him, a competitive fighter?” Bruiser balked.
I listened closely, wondering how I factored into all of this.
Ignoring Mystic and Bruiser’s outbursts, TL pointed the remote at the screen. A gray haired gentleman popped up. Wearing a coat and tie, he grinned for the camera, coming across adorable and sweet. He looked like what I imagined ev
eryone’s grandpa should look like.
“This is Harry Noor.” TL announced. “He is the owner of the Demise Chain.”
“Him?” Bruiser laughed.
“Harry Noor,” TL went on, “has his own set of fighters called Warriors. Recently, he put the word out he’s looking for some new Warriors. He also put the word out he’s looking for a computer specialist. He wants a program designed exclusively for him that can identify top notch fighters. A program than can also advise competitors during a fight what they should and should not be doing differently.”
“Um, that’s called a coach,” Bruiser identified the obvious. “And how in the world does he expect a program to advise a fighter?”
TL glanced at me. “That’s for the computer specialist to figure out.”
“Harry Noor,” David explained, “is quite the gadget man. He’s got to have the latest and greatest of everything—the first of a kind. He’s also tight with his money and doesn’t want to dish out the dollars needed to hire top notch trainers. And he’s all about having things computerized. He wants a program that will identify his new Warriors. And that is what we’re going to give him.”
“David and Mystic,” TL picked up on the conversation, “are going to be those new Warriors.”
“Wait a minute. I’m not fighting?” Bruiser asked.
“Warrior?” Mystic shook his head. “I’m not fighting.”
I didn’t like the idea of anybody fighting, not after the way Bruiser had described it. Wait a minute; did TL just say David’s fighting, too? My heart skipped a beat as I glanced over at David. No.
“As of right now,” TL continued, not answering Bruiser or Mystic, “Harry Noor allows each of his Warriors to have a trainer. Jonathan will be David’s trainer, and I will be Mystic’s.” TL looked at his wife. “Nalani has already secured a job as the new hostess of the Demise Chain. She’s in charge, basically, of greeting people when they come in.” TL turned his attention to Bruiser. “And you will be Mystic’s girlfriend.”
“His girlfriend?” she nearly squeaked.
“I can’t fight,” Mystic repeated himself. “It’s against everything I believe in.”
Fight to the Finish Page 4