Honor (27 page)

Someone, not Lee, finally walked him over to the X-Ultra department. Melvin Brody put down a sloppy sandwich to greet him. He invited Linc into his office for a spiel that could have been prerecorded on the merits of the new fiber in the vests.

Linc didn’t like the guy. His shirt had mayonnaise on it, but that wasn’t the reason. Brody was rude to the girl who’d replaced Christine. Kenzie had mentioned her. Brenda White. She kept her head down, too, involved with paperwork.

He happened to glance at the names in an appointment book on her desk, at first not recognizing the one at the top.

Dana Scott. That was him.

Brody took a call and said yes several times to whoever was on the other end. Linc waited, hands in the pockets of his fabulous suit, rocking back a little on the heels of his expensive shoes.

“Let’s go. The big boss says he has a treat for you.”

More corridors, more employees. Brody brought him to a different area, not where he’d started. Ground level. Industrial-looking. Steel beams and reinforced concrete.

He wondered if he was going to be handed a hard hat. But Slattery came out, still talking a mile a minute to an underling, who gave Linc a thankful look as he disappeared.

“Ready?” the older man asked.

“Sure.”

Slattery steered him around a double set of riveted beams toward a golf cart.

Linc half expected to see clubs in bags stashed in the back, but there weren’t any.

The cart was new, with roomy seats. He and Slattery headed off to their next destination, with Slattery at the wheel. Whistling, the CEO negotiated through a gigantic warehouse with practiced ease for several minutes. It seemed to be all one structure, and Linc wasn’t sure where it ended. Dangling from a ceiling of corrugated metal, wire-caged lights provided spots of illumination in corridors that were on the dark side.

There were catwalks way up high. And a structure that appeared to be a construction crane. Tall though it was, it still cleared the top of the enormous space. Linc glimpsed an occasional worker in coveralls here and there, checking shelved cardboard boxes with a handheld monitor, and guessed that the warehouse staff was mostly men, because they were all on the big side. The blue glow from the handheld monitors illuminated faces, but only for a few seconds at a time—and Lee Slattery was driving quickly.

He slowed and pulled the golf cart over near a wall, stopping in a pool of yellow light that made everything around them seem darker than before. He switched off the cart and turned to Linc. “Here we are.”

Linc got out, seeing the same shadowy corridors stretching away on all sides. Puzzled, he kept his expression neutral and said nothing as he watched Slattery walk over to a bank of electrical switches, flipping several in succession.

Linc’s eyes narrowed, momentarily blinded by what seemed to be brilliant outdoor sunshine. No shelves here. No workers either. He took in a dusty path that wound between high mud walls. Low houses built of the same material stood to one side of the path, opposite a ditch on the other that was filled with jumbled stones.

It was a good replica of a Middle Eastern village street, right down to the
wadi
—the dry watercourse filled with stones. Nice touch.

The path ended some distance away in a wall of jagged rock that vanished into gloom as he looked up, noticing the handholds built into it. A climbing wall. He brought his gaze down to the spindly trees arching over the walls, too stiff and green to be real. He blinked.

“We’re still inside,” Slattery chuckled. “And yes, it’s all fake. Like it? We use it for testing gear. And to demonstrate the goods, show off design upgrades, that kind of thing.”

“Very impressive.”

“Gotta stay ahead in this business,” Slattery said, clasping his hands behind his back and rocking a little in place. “The enemy keeps coming up with new IEDs—Improvised Explosive Devices, that is. I’m sure you’re familiar with the term.”

“Yes, I am. But tell me more.”

“Oh, there’s not much to it. We bring the client here, show him the path, a warehouse guy slings a bulletproof vest and groin cup over his coveralls and goes for a stroll. Then—kaboom! Mock explosion. No shrapnel, no harm done. The gear gets peppered with dye pellets. Memorable visual, don’t you think?”

“I bet it is.” Linc was wondering if he was about to see it happen. But he and Slattery were alone—Linc didn’t see or hear any of the warehouse workers.

“Beats the hell out of our competition. They use animated films and illustrated brochures. But we can stage our own little war games right here in the warehouse.”

“I’m impressed.”

“This is only one reason why we’re outselling them right and left. Clients get a huge kick out of it. My second-in-command, Vic Kehoe, came up with the idea and rigged the whole thing after the walls and path were done.”

“So what explodes?”

Lee Slattery waved vaguely. “I’m not sure. It’s really no big deal. You’d have to ask Vic. He’s the munitions man.”

His casual tone didn’t fit the setting. Fake though it was, the empty path was faintly menacing. Tiny particles of dust hung in the artificial light, stirred up by the golf cart’s sudden arrival—or someone who had stepped out of sight. Someone who could be watching them.

Linc felt the back of his neck prickle and turned his head around, seeing nothing in the other direction but endless, shadowy tiers of shelves, mostly empty.

He looked back at the path, remembering a similar setup but much larger, built for the army. He’d stayed there for six weeks, breathing in dust just like this along with the acrid smell of explosives.

Located in a remote part of the southwest, the mock village was a training center for bomb-disposal specialists. It was riddled with hidden devices—in doorways, in the crisscrossing streets, and inside false-front houses within walled compounds.

Linc had helped to engineer the electronics that controlled the exercises. The soldiers he’d worked with joked around a lot, but they all knew the training was deadly serious. Not like this playpen.

“Did I scare you?” Slattery’s question interrupted his thoughts.

Linc shook his head. “No. But the path looks authentic. Good work.”

Slattery smiled proudly. “You would know. And hey, I didn’t really mean it about taking a walk. I’m not sure if Vic has any booby traps set at the moment. Doesn’t look like it.”

He indicated the path and Linc noticed that there were no footprints in it. Or any other marks. Slattery chuckled again. “He’s good at covering his tracks.”

Talking further with Lee Slattery’s second-in-command oughta be interesting, Linc thought. The guy could be good at covering up a lot of things, including the threads that Linc had followed to Slattery Inc. So far, he had a feeling that the silver-haired CEO was in the game for the glory, not the money.

He’d read up on him, spending a scant hour on Google, and then going to an agency blacknet for in-depth corroboration that hadn’t been supplied by an SKC publicist.

Lee Slattery didn’t have to earn another dime as long as he lived, not with the fortune he’d inherited ten years ago. He’d signed on as CEO of SKC to have something to do—and rub shoulders with the brass.

Linc had run into the type several times in his own work for the military: successful men who had never served but liked people to think that they had. A toy soldier, displaying a flag that never waved in his paneled office.

Linc drove back along the George Washington Parkway. His favorite highway, if you could call it that. Built in the 1930s, it was too narrow and swooped into unexpected curves through parkland that had reverted to wilderness. You had to be alert. Especially at night, because there were no road lights on it. Low stone walls bridged certain sections over hidden gorges in the ridge. He caught glimpses of the river below, shimmering in twilight, flowing fast from the mighty falls several miles to the west.

The trees were losing their leaves rapidly, but there were a few diehards. One lifted a scarlet crown above the bare branches, defiantly red. It looked like a torch, standing sentinel over this remnant of wild land.

In another few minutes he would be in Arlington. He was meeting a friend from Langley for a beer and a platter of wings.

They had nothing serious to talk about, just a mutual interest in sports TV and maybe a game of pool. He needed to stop thinking.

SKC was somewhere out there, beyond the treetops of Rosslyn. The tall new buildings springing up were screwing up the rest of the view. He’d seen no reason to stay late. He didn’t want to get asked to have dinner with the customer Lee Slattery was dragging around and subjecting to an all-out snowjob.

Must be someone rich, he thought idly. Slattery didn’t turn on the charm otherwise.

He looked out at the skyline, surveying the new construction. It seemed to him that a building started up every week. The demand was there. Temporary types. His neighborhood was new and anonymous. He liked it that way.

He leaned on the penthouse railing, looking straight down at the clean sidewalks and puny trees.

A car sped down the street, weaving around others. There were always one or two cars that went too fast with drivers hidden behind tinted windows. He didn’t wonder why some didn’t get stopped, even when they ran a red. The cops knew who was who.

Cyclists in spandex rolled over the Key Bridge between rows of antique lampposts, just coming on. Many would turn left for their evening ride at the liquor store, now closed, where the university students used to get their kegs and drink themselves into oblivion. The cyclists maneuvered around pedestrians and joggers and dog owners. He scarcely noticed the men.

He preferred to look at women.

Walking together. Walking alone.

He watched them come and go. The weaker sex always attracted his attention, even from on high.

Up close, the look in their eyes when they first saw him was like an electrical charge. He needed it. Craved it.

They always made it so easy.

He was nice at first, especially at work. Women employees liked the little things. A sincere hello without getting the once-over. A note of appreciation for all the work they did that didn’t usually get noticed.

He didn’t bother with the older ones or bored wives looking for a fling. Younger was better, but not too young. He had no respect for men who hung around playgrounds. He prided himself on fighting fair.

He did like it when his prey fought hard.

The extensive offices were an ideal stalking ground. He kept in practice. Taking them home was problematic. But he liked to think that what he needed was boxed to go in tidy cubicles. They perched on swivel chairs, stared into screens. All he had to do was stop and wait for them to look up.

They made him wait, but he enjoyed that part of the game. He liked to see how they sat. Primly, with ankles crossed tight. Hiding it. Or casually, a high heel propped on the chair support with one leg bent and the other stretched under the desk. More open.

Sometimes they were silent, attending to busywork in a tapping frenzy of fingernails. Sometimes they talked incessantly on the phone. Eventually they all decided to notice him.

He knew when they did that they were sizing him up, ranking him instantly on a female scale. One. Marriage material. Two. Single but spoken for. Three. Good only for weekend laughs and a few drinks.

Four. None of the above.

Be a gentleman—he’d been taught that, very strictly. He believed in it. But when the need grew too strong, he went elsewhere. He didn’t have to be gentle where he wasn’t known.

They couldn’t seem to figure him out. But the reverse wasn’t true. He could read their lives in their eyes. When, in due time, he sparked fear there, he was happy. Their fear made him stronger.

They were always impressed by his penthouse.

It was a duplex with an extensive terrace. From there, even with the new buildings, he could still see the river, suddenly flat and slow, a dull silver ribbon pouring into the vast bay to the south.

To the east were the white buildings and the dome that defined the nation’s capital. At twilight they glowed faintly purple—the inevitable backdrop for evening news shows, a stock image for a thousand thrillers.

His mind supplied the overlay of crosshairs in a circle.

He would never go that crazy. The city fed him.

The carillon in the memorial park near the river rang out, a melancholy reminder of battlefield casualties.

The sound was annoying. War had made him millions, more money than he would ever need. The world might be running out of oil, but it was never going to run out of wars to fight for it. Wars required equipment and expertise like his.

Before he’d returned to the States to take advantage of his connections, he’d run a black op for another government.

Efficiently.

The prisoners were invariably male. They got put in boxes until they were ready to talk. They seldom did, though he got paid either way. Their silence got them carried out in smaller boxes. Other prisoners soon replaced them.

It was routine and lucrative, for such boring work.

Until the woman with dark hair was brought to the prison.

She gave up fast. But he’d had fun while she’d lived. Invented some new moves that he’d used again on those two from the motel a year ago. They made too much noise and that was that. Couldn’t have the cops show up when the neighbors complained about noise.

Below him a siren screamed. Red lights revolved on the top of an emergency vehicle speeding through the streets.

Nothing to do with him. He went back inside and thought about Kenzie.

C
HAPTER
12

L
inc returned to the shooting range in the sleek car, but wearing his usual jeans and an ordinary shirt. The gate was open and the parking lot was full. Kenzie came out of the shop, carrying a large gun case and a squarish bag made of heavy-duty nylon. She had two pairs of goggles pushed back on her head and wore padded ear protectors on each wrist.