Strange Robby (50 page)

Laura watched them play ball as she hung the laundry. Funny, she had complained about being bored one too many times, and now they had found her something to do.

To watch them play, you wouldn't guess that they weren't just a normal group of people on a camping trip. Or for that matter that they had a care in the world.

She still couldn't believe that Spider was a mother.

The prisoner, unhandcuffed and unwatched, was wandering around, seemingly looking at rocks. She knew what these people were capable of, and she wasn't stupid enough to think she had any chance of escape. But to be on the safe side, Spider had put a push on her. Whatever the hell that was. Apparently, it made the woman believe that rocks were absolutely the most entertaining things on earth, because she kept picking them up, spinning them round and round in her hand, and then oo-ing and aw-ing.

Spider jumped up for a catch, caught it, and then lost her balance and fell. She jumped up, took the glove off, slung it to the ground and stomped towards the woods.

"Spider!" Tommy called after her. "It's all right! Come on . . . " He ran, picked up the ball, threw it to Robby, and then ran after Spider.

Spider stared into the woods. Tommy stood at her shoulder. "What's wrong?"

She didn't turn around. "You know what's wrong, Tommy. I don't have any sense of balance. I'm not getting better; I'm getting worse."

"You're better every day. Just give it some time . . . "

"Maybe I don't have any time. They're getting desperate. They've got to be. We're free, we have one of their scientists, and they can't find us. Carrie is absolutely the only leverage that they have right now. Worse than that, you gave the disk to her."

"If I hadn't, the whole world would know right now," Tommy defended.

Spider nodded. "And right now I can't tell you whether that would be better or worse. Even if they don't find out about the disk, it's only a matter of time till they decide that we're more of a risk to them loose than kidnapping a prominent big city DA would be—if they haven't already. If they think she knows too much, they might just kill her outright. Up here I don't have a clue what's happening. I need to go get her before they do, but I can't walk, much less think straight."

Tommy took her gently by the shoulders and turned her around to face him. "But I can," Tommy said. "I can think and move just fine. I'll take Robby with me. No one really knows what he looks like, and me . . . " He pointed at the mustache he was growing. "Slip on some dark glasses, and who would know me? I can get her and get out, and if I do it right, I might even be able to make everyone think the SWTF did it."

Spider seemed to be thinking. Tommy put his hands on her shoulders. "Listen to me, partner, and listen good. We have trusted each other, relied on each other, for fifteen years. Is it really so hard for you to trust me now? I can get her for you. With Robby, who could stop us?"

Spider nodded. There was no choice. She couldn't do it, and she would only get in the way. "Please . . . "

"I won't let anything happen to her, and I won't come back without her," Tommy promised.

Spider nodded. "Then get the hell out of here already."

 
"For to him that is joined to all the living there is
hope: For a living dog is better than a dead lion."
Ecclesiastes 9:4

 

Carrie could feel them putting the squeeze on. Every day there were more of them than there had been the day before. Everywhere she looked there were fucking SWTF. Maybe she was just being paranoid, but she didn't think so. They were either sure that Spider was on her way and were preparing a trap with Carrie as the bait, or they knew what Carrie had been doing and were closing in for the kill.

Either way, it made Carrie feel like she was standing on shaky ground at the edge of a cliff. One wrong move and she would plunge into the abyss.

She ran her hands through her hair, and continued what she was doing. She had to cover as many bases as she could think of to cover. She took the micro disk out of the machine, deposited the other disks in the evidence box, and called her new legal assistant to come and cart it away. Then she stuck the micro disk in a case and stuffed it into her bra. She still didn't know what to do with the information on the disk.

She could make it public. If she did, she exposed the SWTF and all that they were doing. This disk was proof that aliens were a fact, which would no doubt cause world-wide panic and expose Spider and people like her to the worse kind of scrutiny.

Her second choice was to not make it public. But if she didn't, there was nothing to stop the SWTF from continuing to do what they had been doing all along, manipulating and destroying lives. Using people like guinea pigs as if they had no feelings and no souls.

There didn't seem to be any real answer. Even when she selfishly thought only of herself, she realized that exposing the SWTF meant exposing Spider. Spider might be able to run and hide from the SWTF, but how could she ever run from the masses? There would be nowhere that she could go and be safe ever again.

She thought about her favorite bumper sticker of all times and smiled. Mean People Suck. That said it all.

She pressed the button on the intercom. "Agnes, send George in here, please."

"Yes Sir."

A few minutes later George walked in. "Carrie?"

"Sit down, George," Carrie said. She took a deep breath. "Have you noticed . . . "

"Strange people everywhere? Yes, I have."

"Suddenly this building needs all kinds of work. The road outside my house has suddenly sprung a leak. Don't ask me how that happened, or why it's taking them three days to fix it. I want you . . . no matter what happens . . . to forget everything that we have talked about. Forget about everything, do you understand?"

"But, Carrie . . . "

"Just listen, George. Please. Jackson Harris would make a damn good assistant DA . . . "

"Carrie, what the hell are you saying?" George said.

"I'm saying I don't know what the hell is going to happen!" she said hotly. She forced herself to calm down. George didn't deserve her wrath. "There is no reason for them to believe that you are part of anything that I have done. None of it can be traced back to you. If I come up missing . . . "

"Carrie, for God's sake . . . "

"Please shut up, George. This isn't easy for me. I don't know if it's the right thing to do, but it may be the only thing." She paused and took a deep breath. "If I come up missing, I don't want you to say a word about the SWTF or anything that I've been doing. Play dumb. Say it was one of the homophobes who phone this building daily with threats. If you don't hear from me in," she thought for a minute, " . . . four weeks—one month, or I turn up dead, then take the disks and give them to the press."

George nodded silently, then said, "Carrie . . . isn't there something we can do to stop them, to protect you?"

"No. I don't think so." She forced a laugh then. "Who knows? Maybe I'm just being paranoid, and nothing at all will happen."

Robby drove, and Tommy rode shotgun. He had to think, and think clearly. Spider was counting on him to bring Carrie back in one piece. Laura was counting on him to come back in one piece. He couldn't afford even one fuck up.

He'd had a chance to talk to Robby on this trip and he now understood—at least in part—why Spider had gone to such lengths to protect him.

Robby talked about the siblings he had raised and the grandmother he had helped to support without any bitterness and with such love. Here was a man who had never had a chance to be a boy, who had never had a chance to get an education or even go on a date, and was currently being hunted like a wild animal. Yet he wasn't bitter. He wasn't even unhappy.

He talked about the girl he had fallen in love with in such glowing terms that you'd think the woman had a gold-plated pussy.

Robby was sharp and friendly. In short, he was the nicest motherfucker Tommy had ever met, and he couldn't think of one reason not to like the guy. Yet he had probably personally killed more men than any other single man in history.

It just really did not compute.

"Is she going to get better?" Robby asked, talking about Spider.

"I hope so," Tommy said. "You've never really seen her at the top of her game. There's no stopping her."

"If she's not operating at the top now, she must be hell on wheels. I've seen her do things . . . " He told Tommy about her dropping down the stairwell. "She seemed to have her balance then. Maybe it was that last sleeping dart."

Tommy shrugged. "When I got hit in the head the doctor kept talking about something called post concussion syndrome. Laura said it can take days to manifest. Apparently swelling in the brain causes short-term memory loss, loss of balance, and irritability. I'll bet it's nothing a little time and some attention from Carrie can't cure. Pull in here."

Robby pulled into the parking lot of the bar without question.

"Come on. It's show time."

Sherry and a woman Tommy didn't know were sitting at the corner table. Sherry wasn't a very big woman. Average height, thin, nice build—a real looker. At first glance, one might dismiss her as an airhead, a lightweight. Tommy knew better. He started making his way across the room, and Robby followed.

"Hey, Sherry," the girl at the table said. "You know some pretty sleazy people. What if I wanted to have someone killed?"

"Linda, I know people who'd ice a guy for a twelve pack and a joint," Sherry said. She looked up at the two strangers as they approached. "Take these two for instance . . . Can I help you guys, or are you just here for the view?"

"Need to talk to you, Sherry," Tommy said. Linda didn't have to be asked to leave—she just made tracks. Tommy sat down and Robby followed his lead.

"Tommy Chan, is that you?" Sherry asked in a whisper.

Tommy nodded.

"Hell, boy! We thought you were long dead. Word on the street had it you got in trouble with some mob thing."

"The mob I could have handled, but we're talking government. Listen, Sherry, you know that favor you owe me?"

"I knew that was going to come back and bite me on the ass some day." Sherry leaned forward with a sigh and rested her chin on her hands. "Well, get on with it."

"I need you to make a diversion."

"Is that all? I thought you were going to ask me to hand over my first-born or some other goddamn horrible thing. You want a diversion . . . " She snapped her fingers in a Z. "Sherry can make a diversion."

Sherry's gum popping was starting to get on his nerves. "Do you have to do that?" Tommy asked in a whisper.

"What?" Sherry asked with a shrug.

"That popping, smacking shit," Tommy said.

"What are you waiting around for, anyway? Are we just going to sit here all damn night?"

That was a good question. Tommy wondered where the hell Carrie was. She should have been home an hour ago. He hoped he wasn't too damn late. But if he was, why were the damned SWTF guys there? He was sure that was what the road crew was.

Suddenly he saw what he was sure was Carrie's car turn around the corner of the street. "OK, Sherry. Do your thing." He handed her a hundred dollar bill and she looked at him. "For cab fare."

She nodded, stuffed the bill in her bra and got out of the car. She pulled her skirt up as high as it would go and headed for the "construction workers."

"Hey boys!" She sauntered up to them. "Pity to be working on such a nice night." She purposely dropped her purse, and then bent down slowly to retrieve it, flashing her ass for them.

"We ain't looking for no hooker, lady. Just doing our job. Now move along."

Sherry smiled before she stood up. All she had to do was create a diversion, and he had just given her a hell of an opening.

"What the hell did you call me!" she screamed. "I ain't no fucking hooker!"

"I'm sorry . . . "

"Sorry! Why you pencil-dicked, geek! Why, you couldn't get laid in a monkey whorehouse with a sack full of bananas. I wouldn't fuck you if you had the last dick on earth!"

"Hey, now . . . " he started to protest.

"Hey now, my ass!" Sherry screamed. "You think you can call me anything you like and get away with it?"

The other three men were obviously very amused by the fourth one's predicament.

"What are you bunch of cackling hens laughing about, there ain't a rooster in the whole damn bunch of ya! If any of you were real men, you wouldn't let him talk to a lady like that . . . "

Carrie pulled into her driveway with the police close behind her. They got out and one stood with her while the other went inside to do the regular check of the house.