Let Slip the Pups of War: Spot and Smudge - Book Three

by Robert Udulutch

  “Counselor,” a round man in a suit called out from the dark as she stepped carefully down from the cab, “I didn’t think I’d ever be seeing you again. You’re pretty as ever, but I can’t say it’s a pleasure.”

  “I’d be lying if I said it was nice to see you as well,” she said as she joined him at a metal railing. Her voice, along with every other detail she projected, had morphed from pot-lovin-kinda-trampy to live-in-Connecticut-work-in-Manhattan.

  They shook hands.

  “My uncle says this little favor makes us even,” he said as he let her hand go and turned up his palm, “Why am I skeptical?”

  She dropped the truck keys into his waiting hand and said, “You have my word, which we both know is worth a hell of a lot more than yours.”

  He laughed, and waved over a man who was wearing dirty coveralls and a hard hat.

  “Back this up to number two,” he said to the man as he tossed him the keys. He turned back to her and said, “Come, I understand part of the deal is you witnessing this.”

  As the truck drove away into the large building he led her through a maze of dirty catwalks. They climbed a set of stairs and came out onto a walkway above a cavernous processing plant. She saw her truck enter through a far door and move towards them as it passed scores of huge bins filled with scrap metal. Her truck turned and moved past a row of massive shredders. A few of them were running and their screaming almost drowned out the cacophony of alarms from the conveyors and the beeping of the forklifts and reversing trucks. An overhead claw swung past them and dropped a large knot of metal into one of the shredders. It sounded like a bomb had gone off, and she saw a cloud of tiny pieces drop from the bottom into a bin.

  He leaned in close to her and she smelled his boozy man-fume and the garlic he’d had for dinner.

  “This is as far as our guests usually get…in one piece,” he said with a smile.

  Her truck rounded the end of the shredders and continued on through another set of overhead doors.

  He waved for her to follow and he pulled open a heavy door and held it for her. The noise from the shredding room stopped as soon as he closed the door behind them. The room they entered was a stark contrast to the rest of the building. It had light, pristine walls and the floor was clean enough to eat from. Sunk into the center of the room were two bus-sized stainless steel tanks. They had heavy doors and their many seams were held together with huge bolts. Behind each of them were gray metal boxes equally as big as the tanks. Based on the complex ducting sprouting from their tops she guessed they were industrial furnaces. Scores of pipes and electrical conduits snaked around the room and wove through the equipment.

  Her truck entered the far end of the room and beeped as it backed up to the first tank. The driver hopped out, waved over a fork truck, and the workers quickly unloaded her four pallets of little white drums. Hydraulics hissed, the heavy door of the tank slowly opened, and the men drove the pallets inside.

  He leaned in close to her again and whispered, “We do sometimes show very special guests these babies. Any material put inside our pressurized autoclaving incinerators comes out as harmless, untraceable carbon soot on the other end. It’s handled more than a few noxious anti-union selectmen and uncooperative councilwomen, so I’m sure it can safely dispose of whatever’s in your nasty little concoction.”

  She cocked an eyebrow at him.

  “Seriously Counselor,” he said as he raised his hands and dropped his slimy smile, “all bullshit aside, they’re the real deal. There’s only three of these facilities in the country and we process all of the seriously toxic shit from the upper east coast. We got contracts with all the big players…Dow, DuPont, Bayer…even the DOD boys come here. The EPA loves us, go figure.”

  “How long will it take?” she asked.

  “About an hour, and it’s fully automated,” he said proudly. He nodded up at a row of windows looking down on the room, “You want a drink while we wait?”

  She nodded and followed him up a flight of stairs.

  An hour and five minutes later they watched as the workers swept the remnants of Othus’ entire stockpile of accelerator compound into a small pile of harmless ashes. She nodded, and he led her to a loading dock where a long black car was idling.

  “He’ll take you anywhere you want to go,” he said as he opened the rear car door for her, “and we’ll take care of the truck.” He held out his hand, smiled, and added, “Take care, Counselor, I hope to never see you again real fucking soon.”

  “Keep your nose clean and you won’t,” she said as she laughed and shook his hand, “Please give my regards to your uncle.”

  He closed the car door with a nod.

  “Penn Station,” she said to the driver.

  “Yes ma’am,” he said before closing the partition between them.

  Comina pulled off the elastic band holding her bun and shook out her hair.

  She dug into her clutch and removed a set of keys, and one of four cell phones. The small key ring contained a car key, an apartment key, a few smaller keys, a weathered brass cross pendant, and a sleek door-access fob. The fob and the cross still had a little red staining from Meg’s blood on them.

  Comina slid the cross pendant off the key ring. As they crossed the bridge back into New York she lowered her window and tossed the rest of the keys out over the railing. They jingled as they disappeared into the darkness and the black river below.

  “Thanks Meg,” she said to the cross pendant before slipping it back into her clutch.

  The accelerator storage room had been exactly where Meg said it was, and getting a truck into the building using her fob had been just as simple as the nurse had described with her last breaths. It turns out Comina didn’t even really need her biker escorts, but it was good the see the boys again. Having them watching over her had also been comforting, especially without VB there to cover her back.

  Comina scrolled down to a number on the phone, hit connect, and a man answered on the first ring by asking, “How did you get this number?”

  “The same way I let myself into your headquarters and walked off with your shit,” Comina said as she removed a second phone from her purse, “Do you want to dance or do you want to listen?”

  “Go ahead,” the man said.

  Comina said, “If you don’t want the EPA, the FBI, and the Attorney General at your door you will do exactly as I ask.”

  “I understand,” he said.

  “Have you read my note?” Comina said as she brought up an app on the other phone.

  “Yes, and we haven’t touched the storage room, or the case,” he said.

  “Good,” Comina said. She watched a video feed on her other phone, and moved her thumb to swing the remote camera around in a full circle. The storage room did indeed look to be clear, and the big metal case and hissing oxygen tank she’d left on the floor hadn’t been moved.

  “Have you evacuated the building?” Comina asked.

  “Yes,” the man said.

  “Uh-huh. Well the case contains a magnesium nanofuel thermobaric bomb,” Comina said, “I know you got kicked out of Northrup’s skunk works before taking the security gig at Orthus so you know what a hellfire’s MAC charge can do in an oxygen-rich environment, yes?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  “I’ve got two of them in that case,” Comina said, “and my intention is to use them to dismantle your company’s accelerator program. My best guess is the blast will take out your labs and offices on the two subfloors above the storage room, and maybe some of the lobby, so you’d better be telling me the truth. We wouldn’t want anyone getting hurt, would we?”

  There was a pause before the man said, “I need two minutes to clear my team from the hallway outside the storage area.”

  “You have one,” Comina said as she removed a third phone from her purse, “Sixty, fifty-nine, fifty-eight, fifty-seven…”

  Chapter 106

  “Thank you,” Johann said as he picked up the pape
r coffee cup and smiled at the young woman behind the kiosk’s counter.

  He lingered to inspect her cleavage as he dropped his change into her tip cup. He turned to cross Penn Station’s gleaming marble floor, and looked up to find the track number for Amtrak’s Acela on the big board. As he hurried towards the platform he juggled his coffee, metal briefcase, and newspaper while fishing his cell phone from his jacket pocket. He thumbed down to a number and hit the icon to connect.

  The phone rang and a courteous young man picked up and asked how he could be helped.

  Johann said, “Tell her this is Doctor Johann Cori.”

  A moment later a woman with a deep, permanently hoarse voice came on the line. Johann assumed she was still in the habit of having that second glass of single malt while enjoying her nightly double corona.

  “Well shit on my chest and call it pudding,” she rasped, “If it isn’t the world’s least respected genetic scumbag. What rock did you crawl out from under?”

  “It’s good to hear your voice too, Ruthy,” Johann said, “I have something you guys are going to be very interested in.”

  “That right?” Ruthy said, “What have you gone and done, Jo, modified kittens with freakin’ lasers on their heads? Last I heard you were slumming it with that crazy Russian baby killer and his slut daughter.”

  “I did it,” Johann said.

  There was a pause. Johann heard Ruthy’s chair creak loudly.

  She cleared her throat as best she could and said, “You did it?”

  “Yep,” Johann said, “I did it. It only works on canines, but I told you I would do it and I fucking did it. Who’s the talentless asshole now?”

  “Where are you?” Ruthy asked.

  “I’ll be in DC in four hours,” Johann said.

  “You presumptuous prick,” she said, “You have a sample with you?”

  “I have all of it with me, and the related data core,” Johann said.

  “Fine,” Ruthy said, “I’ll have the team ready.” She disconnected their call.

  An hour and a half later the Acela pulled into Philadelphia and Johann was jerked awake by a bash in the face. A man in the aisle with an oversized duffle bag kept backing it into Johann while tugging to remove an equally oversized bag from the overhead compartment.

  The man turned, apologized with a tight lipped smile and bashed Johann again as his overhead bag pulled free. The man tossed it over his shoulder, again hitting Johann before he squeezed down the aisle towards the front of the train car.

  A leggy, pretty woman smiled at him from the window seat across the aisle. She shook her head and watched the man who had just vacated the seat next to her leave. “I should have flown,” the woman said quietly as she leaned over the center arm of her seat and exposed a hint of lace cleavage. She pinched her nose and waved her hand in front of her face. She laughed, and smiled again as she held Johann’s eyes for a moment.

  The woman turned back to her newspaper and several minutes later an announcer called out that their train to Washington would be departing in four minutes.

  The train began to fill up again and a large woman waddled into the front of the car.

  Johann and the pretty woman exchanged a look again, and she nodded at the empty seat next to her as the rotund woman closed on them.

  Johann gathered his things and slid across the aisle as the large woman approached and shot him a dirty look.

  The man in the row Johann had just abandoned also gave him a dirty look until the woman’s bulk obscured him from view.

  “Thank you,” the woman next to Johann whispered as she leaned against his arm, “Apparently first class only applies to the price of the ticket, not the passengers.”

  Johann laughed. He pushed his glasses up onto the bridge of his nose with the palm of his hand and introduced himself. They shook, and after some small talk she took note of his unique metal briefcase.

  “I’m in pharma, so I get the best shit,” Johann said as he wagged his bushy eyebrows and patted the case. He said, “So what is it you do to pay the rent, Holly?”

  As she reached into her clutch and pulled out two nips of vodka she smiled a big, pretty smile and said, “I’m a ghost writer for politicians, Johann, so I guess I hear the best shit. It’s not too early for a drink, is it?”

  Chapter 107

  Brother Sacarius’ office door swung open and he held out his hand, inviting the tall woman to enter in front of him. As he followed her through the threshold he finally got a good look at her shoes. He had suspected her stunning bespoke high heeled ankle boots were Terry Moore’s work over at Foster and Son’s, but he couldn’t be sure until he saw the signature overlap stitching on the lower heel. Peeking out from the soles he saw hints of the same subtle ridges he added to his own female student’s tactical dress shoes. His girls could run flat out in his custom designed heels, and he suspected this talented woman could in hers as well.

  The tall woman also made absolutely no sound when she walked.

  Brother Sacarius was indeed impressed.

  “Can I tempt you with another cup of tea, Doctor Comina?” he asked.

  “Please, it’s just Loyal,” Comina said, “and you could, but I have taken up enough of your time and I do need to get settled into my hotel.”

  He nodded, and motioned for her to take a seat as he said, “So what do you think of our little academy?”

  “I think it’s a lovely place that I could certainly call home,” she said, “I am also confident I could make a real difference here for you and your students, in several key areas.”

  “Splendid, and agreed,” the priest said as he walked to the office’s ornate windows. He clasped his hands behind his back and watched a pair of students studying on a sunny patch of grass in the courtyard.

  “Please forgive me,” he said, “But I do have to ask one uncomfortable question. Purely in the interest of being completely transparent with one another, and we can never speak of it again. Agreed?”

  “Certainly,” Comina said with a nod, “It would be suspect if you didn’t ask.”

  “Indeed it would,” the priest said as he turned to face her, “Loyal, your pedigree and credentials are impeccable, as is your service record and field experience. I couldn’t ask for a better addition to our team. But as our line of work is a bit, unique, I need to know what happened to drive you underground. My associates were able to confirm you are persona non-grata with your former agency, and are suspected of several unsavory acts involving unnamed corporate entities. There are even some whisperings you’ve been implicated in your previous boss’s disappearance.”

  “All of your sources are correct,” Comina said.

  He moved to the front of his desk and leaned against it.

  She crossed her ankles and held his eyes as she said, “Speaking frankly, just between us, I was working a case and the murderous blowhard corporate scumbag asshole really pissed me off. I pushed on him harder than my superiors were comfortable with. As it turns out, they weren’t comfortable with my pushing because they were on his payroll. When he took a run at my family my corrupted agency left me hanging in the wind. I took matters into my own hands. I had all responsible parties killed, or in some cases killed them myself.”

  She noted Brother Sacarius’ raised brow and added, “If I had it to do all over again?…well that would be just fine because killing them once wasn’t nearly satisfying enough.”

  The brother thought for a moment and then said, “Wait until you see the fees associated with our pension scheme. Maybe I’ll let you handle the next negotiation with those corporate scumbag assholes.”

  Comina laughed, and said, “I’d be delighted.”

  He returned her smile and said, “Loyal, this is the part where I’m supposed to find out the lowest possible compensation that will still entice you to join us, but truth be told I’m horrible at such negotiations and we’re in a bit of a bind. You may have noticed our barracks are a little skint. I have orders for assets going
unfilled which is starting to affect my credibility with our clientele. Thanks to both of our countries continued operations overseas, I have more disenfranchised talented young killers on my list of applicants than I can shake a loafer at but I can’t enroll them here without teachers. I need more qualified instructors to hone their raw little minds into the world class machines of mayhem we are famous, or rather infamous, for.”

  “So,” he said, “You can pretty much name your salary.”

  Comina rose from her seat and extended her hand. She said, “Excellent. I’ll have something to you by the end of the day. Rest assured it will be something that will satisfy the both of us.”

  Three minutes later Brother Sacarius watched from his window as Comina walked away from his rectory through the courtyard. As the tall woman stopped and bent slightly to chat with the pair of students the priest again marveled at her footwear. While the students stood and shook her hand, the priest said to himself, “God bless a woman who knows how to wear a proper heel.”

  As if she could hear him, Loyal turned to look up at the carved glass windows of his rectory office. The students trotted off behind her as she took her hands from her pockets and waved to Brother Sacarius.

  He waved back, and noticed she wasn’t carrying the slim leather briefcase she had brought into his office at the start of her visit. It was still there, next to his desk.

  He had forgotten all about it as he had been staring at her fabulous shoes when she left.

  When he motioned for her to wait a moment he noticed she held something in her hand.

  Her briefcase beeped, once.

  Chapter 108

  “Your bum’s out the window,” Mimi said as she spun the oven’s dial to bake, “There’s no place for crocodile anywhere in my mince and totties recipe.”