Sleight of Hand (40 page)

“Bian, Amber is leaving,” Diana said. “Would you ensure that the guards are informed, please?”

We walked together to the front door. Bian went out with a glance back and began to stride to the gate. Diana tucked a piece of paper into my jacket pocket.

“I almost forgot. That is the contact information for the Weres in Denver.” She smiled secretively.

“Thank you for that,” I said, “and for the loan of your coat last time. I’ve got it in the car.”

“I have to go and speak to Skylur now. Give it to Bian, please.” She was still smiling as she turned away. “She will make you pay for that little joke, you know.”

I drove to the gate, got out and passed Diana’s coat wordlessly to Bian while the gates started their slow, silent opening.

The guards had changed, and at her shoulder, I recognized one of them. It was Fang 3, from our little battle in LoDo. He had been the one who had been beating me with his Kung Fu technique until he got too showy. I wondered how this would go, but there was no way I couldn’t say something.

“Feeling better?”

He grinned. “All fine, except my pride.” His smile was unforced and I found myself smiling back and enjoying it.

“Tell me it wasn’t your idea—the black suits?” I said.

“Nah. That was—” he stopped himself, his eyes not quite flicking towards Bian. I got it. No names, no background, as Diana had said. “That was the dork you sent down the stairs,” he went on. “He takes everything too seriously.”

“The rest of the posse okay too?”

“Getting so. We heal easily. Shame we don’t get any smarter.”

I laughed at that. “Well, can’t help with that, but what about a return match? Maybe we could do some sparring sometime?”

His eyes lit up. “Ma’am, yes ma’am.”

No one says that any more, even in training, but there was a sense about this man that I thought I recognized from my days in Ops 4-10. I would lay good odds that he was a former Marine.

“Semper Fi?”

I saw his lips shaping to answer with the marine cheer of ‘ooh-rah’ when Bian leaned forwards slightly, all five-five of her coming up on the balls of her feet. Despite her lack of height, she still managed to loom. His eyes swiveled to her and then back to the front and he stiffened to attention, the smile gone. When they said no information, they meant it.

I turned to Bian. “You know, it’s true what Diana said about you.”

She leaped into my trap. “What’s that?”

“You are
no
fun at all.” I climbed back into my car. Fang 3’s eyes were bulging as if he had just seen something he admired, but had no wish to do himself, like dragging a leopard by its tail. Pussy.

The gates had completed their silent opening and I started my engine.

Bian’s face appeared at my window, and I lowered it. She rested her elbows on the sill.

“I am
so
looking forward to introducing you to Athanate rules and customs,” she said, and her tongue ran slowly along her upper lip, pushing it back to show her fangs, pale in the lights. “Diana didn’t say anything about fun, but what she did say was true…I
will
make you pay.”

I drove out, laughing. Damn, but I was starting to like this girl.

SUNDAY

Chapter 49

On Sunday morning, Jen went into the office to strip Verdoon of any position of responsibility in the company.

I drove away from the hotel to check calls on my cell. I still wasn’t sure whether I was being tracked through the cell or not, but I wasn’t going to take a chance. I had my burn phone, which was probably okay for a couple more days if I needed to make outgoing calls. I used it to call Tullah and warn her away from work until I cleared it.

There was nothing in my usual cell’s call logs I needed to deal with until Monday. But there was one text message from last night:
Mike 6 call Bravo 5
and a cell number.

I had parked on the road while I was checking. I was next to the Capitol and I managed to walk around the building to sit down. My hands were shaking. I’d turned the cell off, but the words kept rolling around in my head. Mike 6 was my call sign on the mission in South America. My last mission.

I sat down heavily on the steps to the Capitol.

It’s nighttime. Rising above the jungle and blocking out the stars in front of me is the darkness of Hacha Del Diablo, the Devil’s Axe. I’m dizzy. Angry. I touch my neck and know again I am going to die, arterial blood pulsing over my hand. The fetid stench of death assaults my nose. My fist cramps with the grip I have on his hair, but I’m not going to let his head go, and the blood drips from the severed neck over my boots. There’s blood over my face, down my chest...

“Missy, no call to be sitting on them cold steps.”

I blinked. An old man, hunched over a walking stick, shuffled by and gave a smile, weak as winter sun.

Denver. Here and now. I got up and walked. No one outside of 4-10 knew the call sign. Bravo 5 was from the backup team: Sergeant Alverson. Keith. Oh God. Keith. I called the number on my burn phone.

“Keith? You in town?”

“Amber. Yes. I—”

“Keith, it’s dangerous. Meet me at the Longhorn Bar on 16
^th
. Take time to check for a tail. Thirty minutes?”

“Will do.”

I put the car out of sight in a parking garage. Then I made my way down to the bar, circling around and looking out.

Almost exactly on the half hour, I spotted him. He hadn’t changed a bit, but I guess it was only a couple of years. I watched him check around, double back and slip into the bar as if it was an afterthought. I watched the street for another five minutes before following him in.

He was sitting in the corner. I bought a coffee and walked across to sit beside him, so I could see the door as well.

It was strange. We just sat there looking at each other for a minute.

“You haven’t changed,” I said.

“You have.” He took a sip of his coffee and sighed. “Amber, it’s about Top.”

I didn’t trust my voice, so I nodded. I thought it had to be something like that.

“Yesterday morning,” Keith went on. “I was there on Friday and he was going fast. He felt he’d straightened everything out as best he could, and the rest was just hanging around. Not his style.”

“No, it wasn’t,” I managed to say and swallowed hard. “Thanks for coming to tell me.”

“He said to tell you he enjoyed your visit. He couldn’t have gone without talking to you. But I didn’t come just to tell you. Amber, he asked me to put together some things for you. For emergencies, he said. It’s in the storage facility where Mrs. Welchester has a unit.”

I sighed. “I guess it was stupid to think that name wouldn’t come up on 4-10’s radar.”

Keith shrugged. “No one looked until Top told me to. No one else knows, and I’m not saying.” He passed me a key. “Unit 438. It’s prepaid for a year.”

“Thank you, Keith.” I closed my hand over the key. “I don’t know if I can make the funeral. There’s an agreement I had to sign—”

Keith cut across me. “We know about it. I think Colonel Laine will have it torn up in a week or so, but maybe it would be better to stay away.”

I raised my eyebrows in question.

“Petersen isn’t a major any more, and he’s making a big move to take over the section. Not just 4-10, but Obs and a couple of others as well.” Keith paused and looked at me, his mouth twisted. “He’s got a very simple attitude toward vamps. Kill them. Not much better than his attitude towards women in 4-10.”

I got a cold feeling in my stomach. “Can’t someone kick this upstairs?”

Keith shook his head. “4-10 isn’t the regular army, Amber. There’s no general sitting there with direct responsibility, no official recognition. It’s the ultimate, deniable, operational unit. The entire budget is overspill, and the rule seems to be to work out problems on the base.”

I nodded. “Thanks again, Keith.” If Petersen had that attitude, Keith would need to be out of here and away. It also seemed that Colonel Laine had a difficult job, to work out a route for Diana to speak to more senior officers. I might need to think of a second option for that.

Keith didn’t seem to be in a hurry. He just sat and looked at his cup, his hands curled around it. I’d spotted the ring, of course.

“Who’s the lucky girl?” I said brightly.

“We thought you were dead, Amber. Then, you know, changed.” He didn’t meet my eyes. Didn’t answer my question either, but I guess I didn’t really need to know.

“Yeah,” I said.

“What’s it like, Amber? Are you a vampire?”

I took a long breath. “Not yet, but I guess it’s one way traffic on this road. Most times, I don’t feel different. I’m faster than I was, stronger. I see better in the dark.” I looked at him. “I don’t drink blood.”

“Can you be a vampire and not drink blood?”

“No. From what I hear, when the change is complete, then it’s drink or die. It doesn’t mean killing people though. Vampires that kill people to feed are outlaws in their community and their law is pretty terminal in that sort of case.”

He nodded. “What’ll you do?”

“I don’t know, Keith. I’m still me. I’m just playing the hand I was dealt.” I cast my eyes around the bar. “You think Petersen will send someone after me?”

“It wouldn’t be anyone from your time, but we’ve had replacements. It’s possible he’ll use them, or another unit he’s got.”

He needed to be well clear of me. I got up and leaned on the table, putting my hand over his. He’d always had such beautiful hands, even when they were callused and scarred from work. They were strong and gentle, and I’d taken comfort from them, many times. They felt achingly familiar and strange at the same time, the hard, smooth edge of the ring alien to my touch. You can’t step in the same river twice.

“Keith, if I’m still me, and I need killing, then anyone he sends will be far too late.” I stopped and waited till he nodded to show he understood that I would kill myself rather than go rogue or step outside my boundaries. “In any other situation, whoever comes had better know what they’re doing and why.”

I walked out and took a position across the street where I could watch the door without being seen. Keith came out alone. I wanted to run back and hug him one last time. My old life that I’d kidded myself I could return to, somehow, some when, was finally slipping through my fingers and away. It was time to acknowledge we’d all moved on. The wind blew a bit of dust in my eyes and his figure blurred. He turned away without seeing me and walked off. If he was being followed, I couldn’t see them. That didn’t mean a lot, and I was careful making my way to my car.

I hadn’t thought through what I’d said to Keith before I’d said it, but sometimes you only realize the decision you’ve arrived at when you’re on the spot. I meant it. I’d kill myself rather than become Basilikos Athanate. But I was changing. My body was giving me lots of information about how different it was going to be as an Athanate. How could I be sure that my mind wasn’t changing as well? Top was gone and with that, I’d lost my absolute, my reference and my measure. I was adrift, liable to take any direction.

∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞

Mrs. Welchester made a visit to her new storage unit.

Top had managed to get me issued with standard mission gear, and then some. Whatever I had told him about the situation here, he expected me to need some serious firepower at some point. I now had the MP5 submachine gun partner to my HK automatic and a number of grenades—flash bombs as well as the lethal variety. Which third world army did Top think I had to take out?

The real prize was in the back. Top hadn’t forgotten my favorite weapon. Officially, it was the Variable Choke Tactical Assault Weapon. In essence, it was an oversized, overpowered, short-barreled, custom shotgun. In the unit, we just called it the BFG. It kicked like a cannon and sounded like the devil himself knocking on your door, but it could clear a room or punch through steel plate. Not a subtle weapon. I loved it.

Also hidden in the back was my batsuit and brake, I guess in case I wanted to go base jumping again. Totally against the Ops 4-10 rules, I had personalized it with a label on the slick chest—TaJ.
Trust and jump.
My eyes misted up again. Happy times.

Tucked into the webbing was a letter, addressed to me in Top’s handwriting. I pocketed it. There was no way I would be able to read it now.

I transferred the Glocks, ordinary shotgun and my specialist surveillance equipment from my old storage unit into the new one, leaving the old one for my uniforms.

∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞

I drove down to Jen’s house. Despite moving away for the moment, Jen had left guards on the gate. I wanted to check that everything was okay, and run through any emails and messages without having to talk to anyone.

I’d barely started on the emails when they buzzed me from the gate. Apparently my sister was there, wanting to see me. I went to the main door and switched on the video feed. It was Kath in her car. I called them on the intercom to let her in and opened the door.

Kath drove up to the entrance. Even inside the car, I could tell she looked like hell. It was barely lunchtime. Had she been drinking already?

“Kath, hi, what’s up? Are you okay?”

She got out of the car with a folder, her face pinched with anger. “We need to talk,” she said.

I led her to the study and tried to get her to sit down. She wouldn’t. She threw the folder on the desk. Clipped to the top was a formal letter saying she withdrew from handling the case.

“Kath, what’s happened?” If Carter had been threatening her, I would kill him.

“You’ve happened! Again. Every time I think I’ve got my life straight, you do something and ruin it.” She balled her hands into fists and hit the desk. “What did I ask on Friday? Don’t ruin it for me. What did you do? Danced with that Kingslund woman when everyone would see. Had a scene with that Mexican businessman. Then you worked your way through every trade delegate. And to cap it all, you leave with Kingslund and cause another scene at the door.”