by Michael Todd
“Do you really think I should pick up a car of my own?” he asked as he started the vehicle and put it into drive. He eased slowly back onto the road.
“Well, if your job requires you to be mobile, you should always have a car, but never in your own name,” Anja replied. “You know that. Cars are too easy to track these days, so you’d need to create an alias or something and register it to them. That way, if it’s involved in something that goes wrong, you can always say it was stolen.”
“I know, but I don’t mean for the job,” he replied as he accelerated. “I mean…I have to start a life here now. I lost my home, my car, my life, everything. All my friends think I’m dead, and I think…well, I need to start somewhere so I might as well start with a car. What kind of car do you think I should go with?”
She went silent for a few seconds. Not that he minded. He enjoyed the silence and watched lazily as the sun began to set in the distance.
“Are we really doing this?” she asked. “Do you really think that we should have a normal conversation? We’re not friends, you know.”
“I don’t have any friends,” he said softly and kept his eyes fixed on the road. He tightened his grip on the steering wheel until his knuckles turned white. “You’re the most human contact I’ve had since I’ve started my new life. You’re the closest thing I have to a friend these days. It may not seem that important to you, but it is to me. Feel free not to indulge me, but I’ll keep on asking.”
The Russian sighed softly over their connection. “Well, it depends on what you’re looking for in a car,” she said. “I don’t actually know much about them, so my selections have always leaned toward user-friendly and reliable so I wouldn’t have to take it into the shop too much.”
“God, you sound like you’ve been driving one of those electric cars,” he said. “It’s not so much the cars. I’ve driven one around and it was reasonably…okay. Nothing really replaces the thrum of a powerful engine in my opinion, but still. It’s the people who drive it around that are the problem. They think they’re saving the environment but ignore the fact that to produce all those cars, you need batteries, and the by-products of making those is as bad as all the fun stuff that comes out of regular cars. They’re cheap and easy to run and come with all kinds of fun gadgets, and that’s why you want the car. Don’t try to sell me on marketing bullshit.”
“Wow,” she said with a laugh. “How long have you been holding that one in?”
“Too long, believe me.” He laughed. Andy had an electric car, so maybe his feelings regarding them were conflicted. “How do you feel about muscle cars?”
“It depends,” Anja said. “Are we talking classic or modern?”
Carlson rubbed his temples in what even he now recognized as a habitual gesture and tried to pull himself back into the kind of mind frame he needed to be in. He hadn’t been the same since Andressa had died. The dumb bitch had tried to go into the Zoo herself, and while he normally would have admired that kind of resolve, idiocy was not something he would tolerate in the people who worked for him. Not ever.
And now, she was dead, and he hadn’t had anyone to take his frustration out on. Other than himself, of course. But the grieving process had to come to an end. He needed to come back to reality. All his wallowing had ended with more problems than they’d had before.
His head of security stepped out of the building. From the look on his face, good news wouldn’t be on the menu. Carlson had started to feel guilty about not remembering the man’s name. It all worked out in the end, though. He would be sacked the minute they were finished in this fucking place.
“All the security feeds were wiped,” he said, speaking in a low voice. “I hoped that we could track the intruder’s path through the building by which ones were wiped, but everything was scrambled beyond recognition. I don’t think we’ll get anything off them for a while.”
“Did he take anything?” the executive asked. “Was any of our material here compromised?”
“Nothing physical was taken, no,” he replied and kept his eyes lowered as if he sensed Carlson’s building anger. “The servers were completely wiped, though. We intended to do that anyway, but the IT people haven’t arrived on site yet so it’s safe to assume that it wasn’t them. And, of course, that it was the same people who broke in.”
Carlson scowled. While it was good news that the person hadn’t taken anything, he wasn’t sure how much data had been stored on the servers. Any data falling into the hands of his enemies was too much. He shook his head.
The two men who had been disabled were wheeled out and into an ambulance. The driver and paramedics had been thoroughly vetted before they’d been allowed to take a look at them. Both guards were severely concussed, and one sported a knee injury that he wouldn’t walk off in a hurry. It hadn’t been their fault. A man who had been able to take down four of his private guards wouldn’t pause for two. They would, of course, sue Pegasus for damages, and he was sure that the bleeding hearts would pay out.
“Get out there and get me something that I can use,” Carlson snarled at the man, who almost fell over his own feet to comply. The driver, dressed in a tuxedo and a bow tie, stepped beside him.
“Did you get a good look at him?” Carlson asked.
“I saw him when he stepped out the building,” Linus replied. “I didn’t get a good look at him, but I did think that it was a little odd that someone in your retinue had broken away. He tried to cover it up as a smoking break. I almost believed him until the alarm went up. Brown hair, green eyes, average height and build…” He paused and shook his head. “I can’t think of anything else, really. He was remarkably ordinary-looking. I don’t think I’d even recognize him if I walked past him on the street.”
“Shit. We can’t keep waiting for him to show up. Somehow, we need to find a way to bring him in. Draw him in on our own terms and take him out that way.”
“You don’t want him taken alive, then?” Linus asked.
“You’ve seen what he’s capable of,” he retorted as the two of them walked back toward the limo. “Does he seem like the kind of person who would give up useful information if we were to get our hands on him?”
The ambulance drove away and left the entrance clear for them to leave. The people had continued to work and from the looks of things, were almost finished with the packing. They would be there until deep into the night, but they would get the job done. One way or another. And there wasn’t anything that he could do from this point forward other than let them do their jobs.
Linus opened the limo door for him and once he was inside, shut it and stepped into the driver’s seat.
“No,” the driver replied. “I don’t think he will in the slightest.”
“There you have it, then.” Carlson shook his head disgustedly as the car pulled out onto the road and smoothly picked up speed. “Kill him with the others. We need to clean this city up once and for all.”
Chapter Eighteen
Jeremiah pulled in alongside the pub that he’d punched into the navigator in his car and glanced around quickly to make sure he was in the right place. He tended to avoid Irish pubs, although he didn’t hold them in active dislike. They simply weren’t his kind of scene. He could get behind English pubs which generally had a more subdued environment and a homier look. He even liked the occasional sports bar when he felt raucous.
This place appeared to be reasonably quiet and more upscale than what he was accustomed to. He couldn’t believe he had fallen for this trick—to actually call Jessica Coleman for a date with the express purpose of pumping the good doctor for information. It was a sleazy move and he knew it, but at least he could offer her a pleasant evening while he sucked her brain for corporate secrets like some kind of mind vampire.
“You look uncomfortable, Jer,” Anja said. She sounded like she enjoyed seeing him in that awkward kind of situation. “Do you think you should get a drink to calm your nerves? How long has it been since you’ve been on a
proper date, anyway?”
“Would you be surprised if I said that it’s been years?” he asked. “Wait, no, of course you wouldn’t be shocked. You’ve probably dug into my life so deep that you know me better than I know myself right about now.”
“Yeah, take that tone,” she responded with a laugh. “And no. I can do my research as much as anybody else, but when it comes down to people I have to interact with on a daily basis, I try not to pry. You never know when you might find something that has been hidden deep for a reason, after all.”
Jeremiah nodded, knowing that she could see him from the camera across the street. He knew a thing or two about what she was talking about. Probably not to the extent that she did, of course, and he also knew there was a story hidden in there somewhere that would explain why she felt the way she did. But that was a story for another time. They had bonded over the past couple of days, and the more he got to know her, the more he grew to like her.
He doubted that anything he might find out would change that, but why take the chance?
“So, what were you able to dig up on our Dr. Jessica Coleman?” he asked as he crossed the road to the bar.
“Well, for one thing, she’s already there,” Anja replied. “And she started the party early, from the looks of her drink tab.”
“That, or she’s as nervous as I am,” he said. “I’m play-acting to get something that I need, and I’m good at that. Well, decent enough. I’m okay.”
“Way to feel confident there, tiger.” Anja chuckled.
“My point being that as far as she’s concerned, this is a real date,” he continued and didn’t bother to respond to her barb. “She has a reason to be nervous. What else do you know about her?”
“Ah…” The hacker paused—to pull something up on her screen, he assumed. “Well, she got her PhD from Johns Hopkins. Actually, she got her bachelor’s and master’s there too, all three with a full ride. Her parents are locals and both alums, and she lived with them until she finished her PhD at twenty-five. She’s had offers to work all around the country—and all around the world—but it doesn’t seem like our girl likes straying too far from home.
“Her income is a comfortable six figures a year and while she’s taken vacation days, she hasn’t ever gone on any kind of vacation. Her life is her work. She lives three blocks away and comes to this bar, and this bar only. She has friends, mostly academics like herself, as well as a couple of boyfriends—mostly academics too with the exception of a biker bad boy a couple of years ago. I think she needed to break free from her trend of brainy paramours.”
“And time,” he said as he paused outside the entrance. “Is there anything that you don’t know about her at this point?”
“I don’t know her mother’s shoe size,” Anja said. “And that wasn’t for lack of trying, but she doesn’t do much shoe shopping. It’s annoying, really.”
“Well, you’re terrifying, and I have to go in.” He brushed his hands over his leather jacket. “How do I look?”
“That depends. Do you have your story right?”
“Raymond Burrows, born in Seattle, two brothers, one died.” He recited what he’d committed to memory. “Joined the army after being caught on a couple of B-and-Es back in his teenage years and a judge offered him the choice of serving for the military or serving jail-time. He picked the Army, served his first tour in Iraq and the second all over the place, with the last few months in the Zoo before a couple of runs got him enough money to be honorably discharged at the same rank as he entered, Buck Private. He had a problem with authority. A friend got him a job in a security company. He’s quiet, no wife, no kids that he knows about, and stays away from social media.”
“And all the rest I’ve covered for you if our gal decides to do some research of her own,” she said. “Nice job memorizing all that, by the way.”
“I have a great memory,” he said. “It’s one of the perks of being me, blondie.”
“I’m not blonde,” the hacker protested.
“Worth a shot.” He steeled himself and stepped into the bar. Dance music played loudly, which meant that he had definitely walked into happy hour. It was a common tactic for bars. Mondays and Tuesdays tended to have a lot less traffic than the weekends, which meant they would inevitably lower prices to almost cost price to encourage people to come in. From the crowd that already gathered, he could only surmise that it was working.
That said, it wasn’t long before he found the woman he was looking for seated in a corner booth. She saw him a second later, raised her hand, and waved him over.
“Don’t you clean up well?” she asked, stood, and offered her hand. “Nice to see you out of the uniform and in civilian clothes. Come on. I’m a regular here, so they keep this booth for me.”
He took it and grinned cheekily as he raised her hand to his lips and kissed the back of it. “Well, I have to say, you look a lot better than you did when we first met. I have to imagine that having the stress of the move out of the way should let you relax more.”
“A lot more,” Jessica agreed. “I’m not supposed to tell anyone this, but they handed out pink slips to all the project managers over the weekend. I got mine in the mail this morning and was happy to see the very hefty severance package they gave me. It’s not exactly retirement money, but still.”
Jeremiah chuckled and slid into the seat across from her. “Well, I have to say, you’ve taken being fired with a lot more positivity than anybody else might. You actually seem like you’re relieved.”
“I liked my work with Pegasus, I really did,” she responded with a smile. “I couldn’t stand the bosses, though. They were judgmental and demanding, for one thing. And most of the time, they didn’t understand the science of what they wanted, but they wanted it anyway. I’ve had job offers for the past few hours. Many companies want what Pegasus has and are willing to pay through the nose for it, but I don’t think corporate research is really what I want anymore. I haven’t made my mind up yet, but I’ve considered a job teaching rather than another Pegasus-type scenario.”
“Really?” He regarded her with open curiosity as a waitress came over to their table. “Where would you want to teach?”
“I’ll have another Daquiri, please,” she said to the woman and he wondered if she had a reason to avoid his question aside from the obvious presence of a third party. “And he’ll have…” She turned to him and waited for him to complete the order.
“I’ll start with a boilermaker,” he said with a smile. The waitress nodded and headed back to the bar. They had their drinks on the table in less than a minute later.
“To answer your question…” Jessica sipped her drink through the straw. “I wanted to go back to Johns Hopkins. It’s my alma mater, and I’ve missed the place. I still have a lot of friends there.”
“Huh.” He nodded casually and picked up the shot glass to pour the contents into the beer pint. “I don’t think I could ever see myself as a teacher. Honestly, imparting wisdom isn’t my thing. Don’t get me wrong, I respect the hell out of the people who can, but I don’t think I have the patience for it.”
She shrugged. “Well, it’s not for everybody, but I think I could do it. And if it turns out I’m wrong, they have a significant number of promising research positions at the university. As an Ivy League School, they never lack for funding—or for interesting topics to research. True, they’ll be about six months behind what I did for Pegasus, but that’ll be part of the challenge.”
Jeremiah smiled. She was passionate, but that was what made most people in her line of work do what they did. It was the passion that enabled them to dedicate their lives to the advancement of mankind. There were consequences to that single-mindedness, though—like not even noticing that someone who wasn’t a security guard but had posed as a security guard now sat and enjoyed drinks with her. It was that kind of head-in-the-clouds thinking that changed science to science fiction or nuclear power into atomic bombs. And DNA research into Jurassic
Park.
It wasn’t a bad thing, but the fact that there were people like Carlson out there—people willing to take advantage of their curiosity—made them a danger to the world, whether they knew it or not.
He sipped his drink and savored the mix of the beer’s bitter taste and the smooth burn of the whiskey. It made for an interesting libation and was one of his favorites. Thankfully, it was also the kind that buzzed without shoving him too deep in his cups.
“I’m sorry,” he said and shook his head. “I know I’m not exactly the best company. It’s not like we have that much in common, right?”
Jessica shrugged. “Look, I haven’t been on a proper date in forever. I’m buzzed and plan to be more so as the night goes on. I’ve dated all kinds of men in my time, one of whom actually went on to win a Nobel Prize in biology.”
“Way to make a guy feel insecure,” he said, and his chuckle suggested that he wasn’t insecure at all.
“Well, you should know that the geniuses I’ve dated in the past all had their personal neuroses and complications. Usually, those made it impossible to be around them while they were sober,” she pointed out. “Sometimes, I need someone who isn’t from my little world. A man who’s simple. Some offense meant.”
He smirked. “Some taken.”
His gaze flickered to the entrance of the bar where people constantly came and went. Happy hours were created to exploit the high turnover scenario. People arrived and left again without too much of a break in the flow, and yet a couple of men stood out. He studied them unobtrusively, his instincts keen. Their jeans hung low but not enough to cover the high laces of combat boots. Despite the increased heat inside, they kept their jackets on—heavy and dragging with more weight than the leather they wore.
“Did I lose you?” Jessica asked.
Jeremiah turned his attention back to the woman he was supposed to focus on with a smile. “Sorry, I thought I saw someone I recognized. Wait, so you said your research in Johns Hopkins would be months behind what Pegasus has. What does that mean?”