Cease and Desist (The IMA Book 4) (6 page)

If Christina Parker can become embittered, the rest of the world hasn't got a goddamn hope.

Silence bored through the room with the subtlety of a high-powered drill. The lights hummed angrily, like a wasps' nest, and I resolved right then and there to get the damn things replaced as soon as possible.

“Does your silence mean tacit approval?” I looked each member in the eyes, challenging them to voice their dissent. To stop sitting there looking at me like children who'd been told recess was canceled. “Should I take that as permission to proceed?”

“That might be difficult.” Cliff spoke carefully. “There will be many obstacles going that route.”

“What route?” I wanted him to say it.

He grimaced. “Human trafficking.”

I maintained eye contact just long enough to make him want to shift in his seat. The muscles in his arms tensed as he checked the impulse.

I was actually interested in hearing his feedback, but I couldn't afford to look too accommodating, either. I needed these men and women to listen to me without questioning my orders. They would not grant that to a passive man.

“All right,” I said. “Elaborate.”

“We don't exactly fade into the woodwork. The IMA is a stealth organization. They specialize in military and paramilitary ops.”

“So do we.”

He made an impatient gesture. “We don't have his resources. And you can assume Callaghan has trained his men to know you — us — on sight. There's no way in hell we can just waltz in there.”

So he didn't oppose the solution, just what he perceived as poor execution. Good to know. I'd expected as much from him. Working with Callaghan as long as he had, he would be well acquainted with missions far more unpalatable than this.

Cliff also raised a very good point. The IMA was intimately acquainted with us. We were the dregs of the various organizations they had tried to destroy. And as long as we continued to elude death, we were making them look very bad.

In my heyday, I had come close to taking down the IMA single-handedly. Of course the odds had been stacked in my favor; I had been the catalyst Callaghan needed to set his coup in motion.

The chaos I stirred up on Target Island had created enough of a distraction that Callaghan was able to quietly assassinate Richardson and get me out of the way. My escape had been quick and painless —and why wouldn't it be? It had been engineered for maximum efficiency, and in my arrogance I had been blind to what was so obviously a trap in hindsight, chalking it up to my own prowess.

The bastard had taken everything into account, save for one glaring oversight. That daring escape elevated me to near legendary status among his men. Callaghan must have assumed that he could bring me to heel or find an excuse to kill me before I became a problem, but he hadn't, and as I continued to make trouble, I chipped away at his authority.

So did Cliff, and Suraya, and Christina. He didn't know about Angelica, but there would be no lost love there, either. She worked for me, after all.

This would be a difficult mission. Perhaps the most difficult I had ever faced. Target Island had been no picnic, and neither had the reeducation facility in Scotland, but Callaghan hadn't wanted me dead those times. This could be the bullet that broke my back.

“It's not going to be easy,” I said. “We're going to feel every inch of resistance as we push forward. But there are ways around the obstacles Mr. Cordova mentioned. Non-surgical cosmetic alterations. Hair dye. Colored contact lenses.” I ticked the items off on my fingers. “Makeup artists can render celebrities unrecognizable with over-the-counter products, and we have much better materials at our disposal. Our collective contacts include some of the most progressive and innovative people in the world, including the ones who aren't supposed to exist. You think we can't manage to fool a few fucking pimps and IMA blowhards? Because I think we can.”

Men who thought of themselves as gods fell the farthest, and the hardest.

“I certainly know some people who may be of use,” Angelica said. “But this … mission you are proposing, it is very dangerous, and not just because your operative might die.” She folded her arms on the table. “He or she could contract a sexually transmitted disease, or suffer a number of other physical or sexual injuries that are an everyday hazard of that work.”

“What's your point?” I asked her, point-blank.

“Who would you have go?” She spoke bluntly, her accent adding emphasis to each word. I watched her glance over each member of AMI, her eyes lingering on Christina. I bristled, and when she faced me again, her expression was ironic. “Who would you have walk into the lion's den in the name of revenge, Mr. Boutilier? Who is the sacrificial lamb?”

Since Angelica had assembled the files, she had been privy to its contents and had the luxury of tempering her reaction to the news. It was starting to look like she planned on using her wiles to throw me under the fucking bus in front of my subordinates.

“I haven't decided, yet,” I told her coldly. “As you know very well.”

Angelica bowed under the reproof, but her expression was unrepentant. Like Cliff, she was a mercenary, with a mercenary's instincts, and a mercenary's drive to get the job done; but she was also a woman, and women tend to get their panties in a twist over the plights of their gender. I couldn't be sure of her exact motives, but one thing was clear: Angelica didn't approve of my decision, and she had no problem suggesting that favoritism might play a role in who I did or didn't choose to send.

Fuck. I raked my hand through my hair, looking at Christina. She was watching me, visibly upset. I didn't care for the expression on her face, or the bitter tang of accusation in it. She blamed me, too.

I'd have to talk to her later, tell her to reign herself in and keep whatever problems she had with me locked inside until we could deal with them privately — right after I talked to Angelica about undermining me during briefing sessions. I mean, Jesus fucking Christ. Angelica was acting like I was going to send
her
on this God-forsaken mission.

And if Angelica had considered the possibility, Christina, with her imagination and her tendency to jump to conclusions, was probably worrying on it like a dog with a bone.

Suddenly, their behavior made a lot more sense.

Christina was the obvious choice: she was the youngest, attractive, shapely. She also knew the least; she didn't have the extensive list of contacts Angelica and — I assumed — Suraya had. If Christina ended up blowing her cover, hundreds of other people wouldn't fall like a chain of dominoes in her wake.

Yes. To anyone else, she was the obvious choice. The best choice. But sending Christina had never crossed my mind for the precise reason that she was such good bait. Callaghan was obsessed with her. He had tried to kill her, to break her, and then, later on, to buy her. The sick fuck would play with her like a cat with a mouse, and she would not be able to endure him: it would destroy her.

That was why Angelica had given me that look. She knew where my biases lay, and that it meant either she or Suraya would be forced to draw the short stick by proxy — and she resented it.

I looked at the other members of AMI, still waiting for my response. I pinched the bridge of my nose and sighed. Who was I fucking fooling, calling myself impartial? We were playing at cloak-and-dagger bullshit like a bunch of shitheel kids playing capture the flag. The consequences were real, imminent —

And I was a goddamn fool.

“A decision like this will take time.”

And many shots of liquor, to drown out the stub of a conscience I've grown since then.

Somebody cleared their throat. Suraya. Surprise. There was still color left over in her face from the previous outburst and now it looked like she was gearing up for another one.

I had Angelica to thank for that. She'd as good as cleared the floor for more challenges to my authority.

“Yes?” I beat Suraya to the punch, before she could interrupt me again. Keeping my voice firm, I said, “You got something to add?”

“I'll do it.”

“What?”

“I'll do it.” Her words echoed with finality, or a damned good impression of it. I wasn't sure since I didn't know what the hell she was talking about. “I'll get you the information you need to destroy Adrian Callaghan. I will go undercover.”

There were not enough people assembled to make the silence striking, but it was enough to make the considerable tension in the room spike.

So much for calling the fucking shots.

Christina was chewing on her lip, looking like she wanted to say something but didn't trust herself enough to speak. Angelica, damn her, looked amused. Cliff had schooled his expression, but the slight widening of his eyes betrayed his shock.

With three sentences, Suraya had managed to turn the tables on us all, and I didn't like that.

“Are you sure you know what you're volunteering for? What might be expected?”

“Yes.”

I could have left it at that. But I didn't.

“If you are going to pose as a trafficked human being, you are going to be expected to perform in that capacity. To have sex. Possibly unprotected sex.” I shot a look at Angelica. “You may be hurt, or killed — or worse. It will not be … pleasant.”

“I wasn't expecting it to be pleasant, Mr. Boutilier,” she said, which, all things considered, was a pretty nice way of saying “understatement of the fucking century.”

“Your life won't be the only one affected, if you fail. You are a part of this group. You have contacts. Dependents. People you'll be leaving behind.” I paused, to let that sink in. “Think of your sister.”

“I am.”

“Are you sure?” I sounded like I was trying to discourage her. And maybe I was. If she hadn't thought this through, and later came to regret what she was doing, she would be worse than useless. She would be a liability. I wanted her to think of it in those terms, black and white. No euphemisms. No sugar-coating. Just the hard, bitter kernel of truth. “It doesn't sound to me like you've thought this through.”

“Adrian Callaghan is a monster. I'll do whatever it takes to bring him down.”

I'd seen the fervor in her eyes before. I'd seen it in the eyes of religious fanatics, media moguls, seasoned killers; it was harbored by the rich and the desolate, the old and the young, the moralistic and the sociopathic. It was the look of purpose turned to madness, and it was deadly because it could not be reasoned with.

Still, I had to try.

“You might be required to fuck a member of the IMA.”

There was no imagining it. Christina flinched. I knew who she was thinking of. He was who I was thinking of, too.

Without tearing her gaze away from mine, Suraya said, “I understand that. Tell me what I need to do and I will do it. Any further discussion is just a waste of time.”

Well
, I thought,
it's hard to argue with that.

“In that case,” I said, “consider the meeting fucking adjourned. You're dismissed.”

Christina caught my eye and started to head over in my direction. I shook my head.

“All of you.”

I hated that flinch. That startled blink.

But I hated what I was about to do even more.

Chapter Four

Compunction

Michael

You can tell a lot about a person, based on how they react in a crisis. Some fight. Some run. Cliff was a little chickenshit: the first to leave after I'd dismissed the group, eager to be out of the line of fire.

I caught up to him in the hallway outside. He was already halfway to his room. “Wait,” I said. It was the only warning he got before I grabbed him. His shoulder tensed when I clasped his arm, and for a  moment I thought he might swing at me.

I tightened my fingers, not quite hurting him, I knew, but it wasn't comfortable, either. If he hit me, I'd hit him back twice as hard. Ally or no.

“What?” His voice was tight. But not hostile.

Slowly, and only when he relaxed his stance, I let my arm fall to my side.

“I need to speak with you.”

“Shouldn't I get back to what I was doing?” Cliff gestured towards the door leading back to the computers. “I just needed to sort through some — ”

“No.” I needed to prepare what needed to be said in silence, and the buzzing lights and humming computers provided too much distraction. “Head to your private office. I'll be there shortly.”

Looking grim, Cliff nodded and walked off.

I watched him.
That could have gone better.

But it also could have gone much worse.

Flickers of motion in my periphery made me turn. Through the open door in the hall, I could see the computer Christina had been using earlier continue to blink as her cryptograms scrolled across the screen.

Christina.

I clenched my teeth.

That was a conversation I didn't look forward to having.

Seemed I'd be having a lot of those today.

I closed the door, and walked the rest of the way to Cliff's office. He was expecting me, but I rapped on the door. The thinnest courtesy. It often worked.

“Come in.” His voice came muted.

I pushed lightly, letting the door swing open with a quiet creak of the hinges.
I need to oil those
. His office was completely bare, save for what he needed to do his work. Very impersonal. Very professional.

You could almost forget he was a chickenshit.

Cliff shut his laptop as I stepped over the threshold into his room, angling it away from me. Because he didn't want me to see what he was doing? Or because such stealth was ingrained by habit?

I made a note to have Christina check out the network. Maybe monitor his activity.

Gesturing towards the only other chair in the room, I said, “May I?”

His Adam's apple bobbed. “Go ahead.”

As I sat down, Cliff leaned forward, hands on his thighs. Not the guarded posture of someone who is doing something illicit and afraid of being caught, but we all of us were liars, who had made a profession out of fooling the righteous and bringing them to their knees. You can lie in any language on earth, and body language is no exception.

Cliff frowned. “What do you want?”

“I need someone who can ensure Suraya falls into the hands of the right people.”

He stared at me expressionlessly. “You mean sell her.”

The fact that he didn't swallow sugar-coated bullshit pleased me. Men who are too cowardly to own up to the things they do aren't worth keeping.

“Yes,” I said. “Someone who will sell her.”

Cliff relaxed a little. “What kind of profile are you looking for?”

Probing for information without making any firm commitments. Admirable. Whoever trained him, they had trained him well. I decided to play along.

“I'm thinking someone who was involved with drugs at some point, and might want a bigger score. He — and it would be a male, since men are more common in this trade, and women more likely to have second thoughts as well as draw suspicion —would have to be cowardly. The type to prey on the weak but submit readily to the strong. And greedy,” I added. “Very, very greedy. Greedy enough to overcome his reservations, whatever they may be.”

Cliff's eyebrows furrowed as he consulted a mental roster. “I may know someone who fits that description,” he allowed.

“Who?”

“An associate three times removed.”

“He can't be connected to Callaghan or the IMA in any way,” I warned.

Cliff gave a sharp jerk of his chin. “I understand that,” he said. “He isn't.”

“Good. You have sixty minutes to draw up a list of five other acceptable candidates, in addition to your top choice. I'll expect it in my hand on the hour.”

Cliff didn't ask what would happen if he didn't meet my deadline. “It shouldn't take that long.”

I nodded my approval and left his room, carefully closing the door behind me. I leaned against it for a moment —
fuck —
and headed back down the hall for Suraya's room. My next task of the evening.

She and her sister were both inside, their voices melding as they conversed.
About what?
I wondered idly. Was she explaining to her sister what the bad man, Michael Boutilier, was making her do?

The voices fell silent as I approached.

Probably
.

It was redundant courtesy at this point, but I rapped on her door. I heard Suraya say something in Hindi before opening it. My Hindi was limited, but it sounded like
be quiet
.

“I was expecting you,” she said.

“Were you?” I studied her face, looking for traces of anxiety. I found none. Only conviction. “I'd half-expected to find that you'd changed your mind.”

“I haven't.”

Jatinder looked at me with an expression that bordered on hatred. It was clear who she blamed for that.

“Let's walk,” I suggested, “unless you want to have this conversation in front of the girl.”

Suraya spoke a sharp word to her sister.

Jatinder uttered a defiant curse and slammed the door hard enough to rattle the walls.

“Is there a problem?” I asked dryly.

“She isn't happy about this decision.”

“Outbursts like that are unacceptable.” I nodded at the closed door. “This isn't a fucking daycare.”

“It won't happen again.” Her voice was cold.

“Good.”

I didn't apologize to her, because I wasn't sorry. I didn't ask her if she was certain, because I had no way of gauging whether she told the truth. If Suraya believed she was qualified, I had to take her at her word and hope to the fucking gods that she hadn't overestimated her skill set.

“This is your last chance to back out, you know.”

“I am many things, Mr. Boutilier,” she said. “But I am not a coward.”

“It isn't cowardly to back out of a job you aren't qualified for.”

Her eyebrows and mouth tilted down, cinching the lines of her face tight. “You don't think I'm qualified?” she demanded. “How can you even think to question me?”

“It's my job to question you,” I said. “You want to play in the sandbox with the big boys? Prove me wrong.”

“I will.” Her voice was prim, as though she'd wrapped her anger in frills.

“We'll see.”

We were back in the conference room, now empty. There was some coffee percolating with a determinedly cheerful sound and I wondered who had made the pot. Angelica, possibly, although it was more than likely Christina.

I sniffed and made a face. It was the cheap shit, and had been left to scorch. Suraya watched me, and I made an effort at civility. “Can I get you anything?”

Her eyes flicked to the coffee pot in distaste.

“No.”

“Are you sure? It's real Colombian charcoal.”

“If I didn't know better, Mr. Boutilier, I'd say you were stalling.”

Like Angelica — and me — Suraya's accent could come and go. She had worked hard to eradicate all traces of it, speaking with the Midwestern American accent so popular with newscasters and spies.

I knew she was an FOB, fresh off the boat. She had to be — her sister didn't speak much English at all, and both spoke Hindi fluently and frequently. I just bet there was an interesting story there.

Not that she'd tell me. Not willingly.

“Stalling, huh?” I sat down on the edge of a table. It creaked under my weight but I didn't get up. “Well, you go right ahead and believe whatever gets you to sleep at night, sweetheart.”

Suraya shook her head, her eyes on the drawn blinds. “This isn't quite what you envisioned when we first met, is it, Mr. Boutilier?”

“Not in a million fucking years.”

She smiled thinly. “Me, either.”

That was as good an opening as any.

“How did he get you?” I asked her bluntly.

The smile, along with all other outward signs of emotion, disappeared, leaving the hardened shell of dissociation that only one who has survived the truly horrific knows how to create.

“Who?” Like she didn't know perfectly well
who
.

“Don't be cute. You know who. Callaghan. Why did you start working for him?”

What does he have on you?

There was a long pause. So long that I began to wonder if she wasn't going to tell me. But she would.

Why wouldn't she?

Maybe she has something to hide
.

“I did a lot of odd jobs in India.”

“What kinds of jobs?” Her willingness to prostitute herself for AMI made me wonder.

She gave me a sharp look. Like she could read my mind. “Most of them paid under the table.”

“So illegal shit, then.”

“The legalities … may have been circumspect.”

Did you fuck for money?

“I'm not judging you, sweetheart. All lines are gray in the dark.”

She gave an unwilling smile. “True.”

“So you weren't a factory girl, then?”

Her face was having trouble keeping up with her various tics as she worked to maintain that stoic facade. “No,” she snapped.

“Why not?”

“Because I saw too many women maimed or killed for doing nothing more than an honest day's work.”

Now we were getting somewhere. I kept my face impassive, non-judgmental. “How do you mean?”

“Well, let me see. A Sikh woman getting scalped by one of the machines when her hair got caught in a turbine. A child losing all the fingers of her dominant hand in a factory accident due to sub-par safety standards that nobody compensates her for, because nobody is willing to take ownership for the damage. People breathing in noxious fumes, day in and day out, and then getting cancer, or lung disease. People dying in the streets, mugged for their meager earnings. Women getting raped as they walk home at night in the dark, and then being told by law enforcement officials that the loose clothing they wear in the factories provoked the attack. If they survive. We were all born to die, Mr. Boutilier. Some of us sooner than others. Many of us, a lot sooner. That wasn't what I wanted for myself.”

“No,” I said slowly. “I imagine not.”

“Can you really, though?”

I thought of my gang in Louisiana. I thought about how it felt to be invincible. To be feared. My world had consisted of a few run-down buildings in the French Quarter and a couple of shady back alleys, but it had been mine. I didn't have to pay taxes or fill out forms. I could wake up when I fucking felt like it, and answered only to the gang leader and myself.

And why had I turned to the gangs in the first place? Because the government doesn't have two shits to rub together for the poor, dissolute children who slip through the cracks of the litigation system. I'd seen what happened to kids like me, kids who tried to play by the rules and ended up bent over scrubbing toilets while Uncle Sam fucked them up the ass — if their foster father hadn't already beaten him to it.

I continued to meet Suraya's gaze. At first, working in the IMA had seemed like the answer. Power. Money. Women were harder to get; for them I had to pretend to be someone other than who I actually was. It was ugly work, but had a lot of pretty perks. Until one day, I was forced to look at the life I'd built and realized it wasn't worth it. I'd almost been killed before having that epiphany.

Had Suraya had a similar epiphany? Her story was tragic, but it's easy enough to spin a convincing sob story: hundreds of fiction writers do so every day.

No, the pressing question was, could Suraya be counted on? I knew Christina didn't trust her, and while I had blown off her doubts — publicly, at least, trying not to appeal to any outward sense of favoritism in spite of what Angelica believed — I considered her to be a fair judge of character.

“So,” I said. “You got involved with the IMA.”

“One of my bosses had dealings with them, yes.”

“How did you get involved?”

“I went with him on one occasion — he was illiterate … although his vanity spurred him to go to great lengths to hide it. I was a secretary of sorts, and part of the deception.”