Armed and Dangerous (The IMA) (10 page)

Better already.

I unpacked the gun from my suitcase, removing it from the special holster. The holster was made of lead and special computer cloaking technology that scrambled the readings of the x-ray and scanner software. The gun went beneath my pillow in the space between headboard and mattress. To my left, where it would be in easy reach. My knife went into the nightstand drawer, right on top of the fabric-bound bible.

When I bent to shut the drawer my shirt-collar cinched tight around my neck like a noose. I untied my tie and unfastened the collar, letting out the first unconstrained breath I'd had since I'd put the suit on this morning. I undid the buttons and tossed the shirt on an upholstered chair. The slacks followed.

Just like that, exhaustion slammed into me like a battering ram. I kicked the suitcase to the floor and leaned back against the slippery coverlet. As soon as my eyes closed I found myself recalling that dream. Still so vivid, I could almost feel her skin against my naked chest.

My breathing changed, my body's willingness to sleep disappearing as it was jolted into ready awareness, and I cursed. I had a fucking standing ovation going on in my goddamn pants, and it was demanding an encore.

But the leading lady, she was nowhere in sight.

Chapter Nine

Messenger

Christina:

I awoke with the dulled sense of malaise that comes from a night of sleep plagued by nightmares. For the last couple days, it had been like this. Sleep had taken some of the edge off my fears, but none of the logistics behind them. I was right to feel frightened; I no longer felt safe. It was hard to argue with that. So I didn't.

Fear could be a useful emotion. It could keep you alert, and ready to deal with whatever problem happened your way. Panic was detrimental. I would not panic.

I yanked on a pair of denim shorts and a billowy peasant top that hid some of my butt. Right before tromping down the steps I gulped down some of the orange juice I'd opened yesterday, while cramming my books into my backpack with my other hand. The bus was coming in fifteen minutes. It took five to walk down to the stop and my watch told me I was running the wrong side of late.

Today was my first day of college.

“Shoot.” I grabbed my lanyard and my photoless ID.

Sunlight speared into my eyes when I opened the door. I squinted into the dazzling brightness of it, everything gilded, golden, sparkling, lit up like desert sand. It was warm but still a few degrees shy from hot. Across the
street, an older man was getting into his car.

The five minute walk felt closer to ten minutes than five. I only just made it to the bus on time. All the seats were full, except for one at the back behind an intimidating-looking goth guy with headphones.

Outside the window was the black car I'd seen the old guy get into. It was trailing slowly after the bus. There was plenty of room for him to pass, but he wasn't taking it.

Following the bus? Following me?

No. I couldn't let fear get the better of me. But I wondered; oh, I wondered. The timing was too great to be mere coincidence, and I'd long suspected that there was no such thing. Everything was connected, just like the circuits in a motherboard. You only had to look closely enough.

I tried to put the incident out of mind as I headed for Medieval Literature. It wasn't difficult. The air-conditioner in Howard Hall was broken, and with its large, spacious skylights, the building was as hot and humid as a sauna. I parted with some of my pocket-change for two over-priced but ice-chilled drinks for the vending machines. One of them was already empty.

Our “professor” for the class was a graduate student in the process of obtaining his doctorate in Chivalric Romance. Despite the heat he was wearing a tweed suit about ten years out of date that looked as if it had been purchased at a thrift store. I couldn't tell if it was meant to be ironic or not. He had to be boiling in it because there were damp circles under both his armpits. I hoped mine didn't look like that.

“
Medieval Literature may seem like an oxymoron,” said Professor Ross-Ross-being-my-first-name-not-my-last-name. “The Dark Age was notorious for its backpedaling in arts and sciences alike. However, there were still creative works being published at this time, though many of them focused on religion, and especially the crusades.”

He went on to talk about courtly love and the idealization of purity and honor; the overpowering presence of God looking down on everyone, all the time; the importance of avoiding sin and temptation; the crusades and their glittering triad of gold, God, and glory.

Sounds like Mamá when she gets worked up
.

I thought about the Sniper and the man I saw
outside my apartment early that morning. Had I seen that car before? I might have, but that also might be the paranoia talking. If the man was following me, he had to be under the employ of the IMA: somebody posted to keep an eye on me until the Big Guns arrived.

Professor Ross's lecture was interesting, but I floated through the whole lesson. I kept thinking a van was going to pull up behind me as I walked away from the bus station. That I would feel a gloved hand clamp over my mouth, taste the biting leather and the chemical sting of chloroform, when I went to the SU to get a coffee—

But nothing happened.

Nothing happened
yet
.

I was worried about my 6 p.m. Psychology class. That got out at 8, and by that time it was plenty dark enough for someone to creep about, unseen. After about 5 o' clock p.m., the college pretty much looked like a ghost town.

Luckily, I had remembered to bring my key-ring pepper-spray. I was considering bringing the knife, too, even though the campus had a zero-tolerance weapons policy. It all came down to one simple question: which would be worse? Possible expulsion, or getting abducted by people who didn't care one way or the other?

Exactly.

Michael:

There's an old quote that soldiering is 99% boredom and 1% sheer terror. That old axiom holds true in my line of work as well.

When I finished napping I did a brief work-out. Push-ups. Crunches. A round of jujitsu. Then I did some reading. I didn't relax. I never relaxed. I was perpetually on, whether I wanted to be or not.

The room's telephone rang. I snatched it up. “Hello?”

“
Mr. Agnew?”

“
Yes?”

“
There is a message for you at the front desk.”

I changed into business casual and shoved the gun into its holster beneath my coat.

The chandeliers in the lobby were turned up high. Their aggressive glare made my eyes water. I flashed my ID at the concierge. He handed me an envelope. How very old-fashioned. It was like something out of an old black and white spy movie. I shouldn't have been surprised. The BN were romantic dreamers; the saw themselves as heroes setting out to change the world. Most people do, just as most people lie to themselves about who they really are.

I wondered who the messenger had been, whether the concierge would tell me if I asked. Probably not. His silence had, in all likelihood, been bought for a generous price. I could outbid them, easily, but it wouldn't be worth the vague description I would undoubtedly receive from him.

I flexed the envelope, testing the quality of the paper. Firm, unyielding. Expensive. Risky, making the drop-off at a big place like this. These people liked their teatime chatter.

Perhaps that was why Callaghan wanted them out of the way. He didn't play well with others, didn't like to share his toys. If the BN were strutting around his playground, it made perfect sense why he'd want them gone.

I tipped the concierge, then turned away to open the envelope. Instead of a letter it contained a small card. A business card. The word
Annie's
was written on it in large block letters, along with the phone number and store hours. On the back, scrawled in a messy hand, was some additional information:

6:30 a.m. Ask for Charles
.

Christina:

That evening's psychology lecture consisted of a brief overview of the course and an in-depth analysis of the syllabus that had several people in the back snoring. Bored as I was there was no danger of
that
happening. I had not been able to let my guard down in public since my kidnapping.

I was happy the walk between the psychology building and the bus stop was a short one. Not only had I been lucky enough to find an apartment for rent on the busline, but I'd also somehow managed to pick classes that did, as well. I couldn't have done it better if I had planned it.

I
was
concerned about how dark it was tonight, though. That hadn't factored into my plans. The labyrinthine sprawl of classrooms was shadowy and foreboding beneath the moonless Arizona sky.

I took notes without paying attention, jotting down keywords that were overtaken by a sea of
doodles and random scribbles. My notebook looked like a wall of graffiti. It was an accurate portrayal of my own frenetic thoughts. If only there were someone I could contact, somebody I could go to for help and talk to without being judged. But I was pretty sure they didn't have “Help!-I-Was-Kidnapped-and-Can't-Get-Over-It” support groups. My God, it sounded like the punchline to a bad joke.

Besides, that wasn't the kind of thing you could “get over.“ I was beginning to understand that victims have three choices: they can try to make themselves forget, they can let the past haunt them, or they can make the experience a part of themselves and try to grow over it, like scar tissue on a wound.

Life doesn't come with an eraser. Experiences leave their mark, for better or for worse. Anyone who tells you otherwise has never been hurt.

The professor dismissed the class early. I yanked the sweatshirt that I had brought over my head to hide my bust and long hair. One of the girls at Holy Trinity had taught me that trick; she worked at a restaurant and occasionally got some creeps who would try to follow her home on the way back from the late-shift.

I was tall and had been taking self-defense, but some men didn't need an excuse to bother women. Because, in all honesty, there
are
no excuses. Not for people like that. Even so, I wasn't about to give them one. Hence the pepper-spray—and the knife.

The talk of my departing classmates seemed to get sucked straight into the void of darkness, like an aural black hole. I could hear the nervous chattering of crickets coming from the scrub. Their high-pitched warbling mirrored my own sense of unease perfectly.

Calm down, Christina
.

I tried to stay my breathing and unclench my muscles.
I remembered reading somewhere, probably in one of those pamphlets from the YWCA, that attackers can read fear in body posture. That's what they look for in a victim.

I am nobody's victim
, I thought to myself.
Nobody is going to fuck with me tonight
.

If only I could believe it.

I passed the doughnut-shaped science building, keeping my head high and my shoulders back. A few lights were still on in some of the labs. Coswell wasn't a research university so the equipment they had was pretty low-tech. Strictly high school-level stuff, though the hollowed-out center housed our acclaimed botanical garden. Accredited research universities had a lot of interest in our botany department and its large collection of desert flowers. I caught a whiff of pollen as I circled around, which meant somebody had left the door to the inner-garden open.

Sand and grit crunched under my sneakers as I stumbled down the steps and into the courtyard separating the drama and computer departments. Here was a small grove of jade plants, artfully surrounded by jagged, saw-like blades of cacti that looked like shadowy teeth in the night. A sweet, tangy scent suggested jasmine. The crickets hiding in the plants halted their chirruping as I passed, startled into silence. In that heartbeat of stillness I heard a crunch. It was the sound of rock and sand beneath a heavy-soled shoe that wasn't mine.

I went cold, just like that, straining to listen to the silence that now seemed as taut as a cord ready to snap—and when it did, what would happen? The sound did not happen again. This only served to reinforce my conviction that I was being followed.

Shit
.

My first instinct was to run, but running would only alert whoever was following that I suspected something. They would drop all pretenses of subtlety and chase me, regardless of the well-lit walkway and its security cameras overhead. I made myself continue at a steady pace. I jumped over one of the cactus plants: a jovial, carefree gesture meant to disguise my quickening pace as I ducked around the corner of the drama building and temporarily out of sight.

Whoever was following me was keeping well behind. If it hadn't been so silent, I wouldn't have heard that telltale crack. I had bought several seconds to make a decision. To my right was a crosswalk, too far for me to reach in time. To the left was the student theater. I ducked behind one of the freshly painted sceneries I'd watched the art students working on early. It was for our school's rendition of
Midsummer Night's Dream
. The plywood backdrops had been left to dry overnight, painted sides facing inward so students wouldn't try to touch. From the side facing the street, in the dark, I suspected they would look like a solid fence or wall. It was my only shot.