Monahan 02 Artificial Intentions (39 page)

“I just spoke with Kelly,” he told me. “He brought me up to speed on what’s happening in Flagstaff. In addition to the smoke inhalation, the doctors report that Mr. Rigley has some severe lacerations on his head. He was most likely knocked out and left to die. The fire chief has confirmed that the fire was deliberately set. Thankfully, there was more smoke damage than anything else.”

We both sat quietly, lost in our thoughts. There wasn’t much to say except the obvious. Cleve appeared to be as weary as I was so I poured both of us another coffee. I was wired with caffeine and adrenaline and it was only ten in the morning.

chapter fifty-five

The caffeine load combined with lack of sleep made me feel like a cat on a hot tin roof. I couldn’t concentrate on any of the work staring at me from the overloaded in-basket on my desk. I had paced out my office and if my mother were here she’d be asking me if I had ants in my pants. Bothered and bitchy best described how I was feeling. And caged in. So I decided to take a walk down to the R and D floor. Have a look at Ben Tucker’s place of work. Michael jumped up from his chair when I opened the door to my office.

“I’m going down to R and D,” I told Carrie and the bodyguard. Michael discreetly followed along behind me, down the hallway and the inner staircase. When I came out through the fire door on the floor, I stood for a moment, getting my bearings. Off to the far right was Nat Scott’s former office, and on the left of the floor were the glass brick enclosed offices, where Kelly and his security team were housed. I headed towards Nat Scott’s area and was happy to see my new best friend Jenn Ludlow at her desk, surrounded with piles of paper and file folders. Her face was intent with concentration and she was humming along to music pulsing through her earphones.

She beamed me one of her gorgeous smiles when she noticed me standing in front of her desk. She pulled out her earphones and stood up.

“Hey Kate. What’s shaking?” She peered around me and looked at Michael and then back at me. “Who’s your shadow?” she asked with a sly smile.

I introduced them. “Jenn this is Michael. Michael, Jenn.” Jenn came out from behind her desk and held out her hand like she was the Pope, expecting him to kiss her ring. She dipped her head slightly and the large swath of hair over the right side of her face swished sexily, revealing both of her eyes. Clearly smitten, Michael was unable to speak. His eighteen inch neck turned bright pink and he let Jenn’s hand rest in the palm of his. I was witnessing love - or lust - at first sight. I cleared my throat trying to interrupt them as they stared at each other, mesmerized.

“Jenn,” I finally said, after about ten seconds.

“Yep.” She broke the eye lock and turned her head towards me.

“Where is Ben Tucker’s office?”

She pointed and said, “Four workstations that a way. But I don’t think he’s here. Haven’t seen him today.”

“Thanks Jenn. I’ll go over anyway.”

I counted off four workstations in the direction that she had indicated and found what was definitely Ben’s place. His was a wheelchair accessible workstation, with a lower than normal work surface and no desk chair. The workstation was neat and organized and everything was in its place, on low shelves, reachable by someone confined to their wheelchair. There was no sign of Ben. But did I really expect to find him sitting at his desk, working away? It took me a minute to realize that there was no computer on the desk.

Michael dutifully trailed behind me as I abruptly left the workstation and headed across the large floor to Kelly’s office, where he was standing in the doorway, clearly waiting for me. He nodded at Michael and wordlessly used his head to point at the office next door, directing him there. Kelly ushered me into his office and quietly closed the door.

I didn’t sit down because the caffeine continued to course through my system and the ants in my pants were still there. Kelly stood in front of his closed door and I faced him, with my hands clasped in front of me.

Kelly spoke first.

“How’re you holding up?”

“Good,” I lied.

Then I sucked in a deep breath and felt my body shudder, just a little. Signs of adrenaline leaving my system. “How about you Kelly? You’re running on less sleep than me.”

“I’m used to it. I only need a couple of hours each night.”

“I was just over at Ben Tucker’s desk.”

“Yeah, I know. Michael’s keeping me informed.”

“There’s no computer at his desk.”

“Yep. We know that too. He has a laptop like most of the R and D staff. He must have it with him. We’re checking his accounts on the network, his email account, things like that. Shipley called saying they wanted to search his workstation area, I told her that would be fine with us. They’ll be over here soon.”

“Can they at least be discreet about it? Can we pack everything up and give it to them? I don’t want to upset the employees any more than we have to.”

Kelly nodded his head. “I’ll see what we can do.” He walked over behind his desk, sat down and took a piece of paper out of a file folder. He slid it across the desk towards me. “The contents of the note,” he offered.

I continued to stand near the door, admittedly a little reluctant to read it, acknowledge it or touch it, even though I knew it wasn’t the original.

“I am in control. I hold your fate in my hands. You have no power over me. You have no power period. Lay your head on this pillow and sleep soundly.”

By lunchtime I was exhausted, frustrated and close to tears. Exhausted because the caffeine was no longer doing its job. Frustrated because there didn’t appear to be anything worthwhile I could do to help Kelly or the police bring an end to this shit-storm. And close to tears because I was exhausted and frustrated. So I decided to do something totally out of character. Exercise. Admittedly the idea was not mine. Frank Sanchez apparently called the office after talking to Jay who informed him of the events of the last couple of days and how the bodyguard contingent was rising exponentially. Frank called Carrie who obligingly cleared my calendar.

The tears finally overflowed as I was telling Frank about finding the envelope on my bed. I was able to do the telling without any accompanying sobs but the tears poured. Frank was a saint. He didn’t do any of the patronizing
there-there it’ll be okay
shit typical of men who don’t know how to deal with a woman in tears. When I was done he artfully took my story and turned it into a lesson in personal security awareness. Then we worked out for over an hour and when we were done I had a new understanding of the meaning of exhausted.

Keeping one’s pulse under control was extremely difficult. But extremely difficult did not mean impossible. Conquering adversity made you stronger. More powerful. Omnipotent. Because there was no challenge that could not be overcome. Oxygen-laced, deep breaths calmed the pulse and focused the mind. The hardest challenge was about to be surmounted. The bitch was about to be conquered.

When Frank called an end to the drills, I thanked him and collapsed on one of the benches up against the wall of the Dojo. With my elbows on my knees, I worked at getting my breathing back in order and watched my sweat drip on the floor. The exhaustion gave me a feeling of powerfulness, as crazy as that sounded to me. I felt powerful and strong even though my knees were weak and my arms were trembling. They say that knowledge is power, and knowing that I had worked out and trained when I was beyond exhausted made me proud of myself. I grinned inwardly and gave myself a mental pat on the back.

Michael was dutifully waiting for me in the small waiting room outside Frank’s Dojo. He gave me a quiet smile and a hardly noticeable nod, acknowledging the sweat which was still beading on my face. With my gym bag slung over my shoulder I followed Michael through the door, onto the landing and then down the steep set of stairs. The hallway and staircase were well lit but the area felt dark because the walls and the stairs were painted a deep chocolate brown. At the bottom of the staircase there was a small lobby and then the door to the street.

I paid no attention to our descent, as I had gone down this stairway many times now. Like a good girl, I held on to the banister, and kept my eyes focused on Michael’s back who was about four steps ahead of me. Michael crossed the small lobby in two giant steps and had the door to the street open while I was still descending the stairs.

I saw him look both ways as he stood in the doorway and then he was on the ground. He just crumpled and silently fell. My foot was on the lobby floor and I dropped my gym bag, readying myself to run the few steps to him. I looked down at the threshold of the doorway, thinking that he must have tripped and fallen, and in that split second the area around the doorway darkened. When I looked up a body was filling the doorway and there was a gun pointed at my chest.

My first thoughts were for Michael.

He must have been shot by this person and I frantically wondered why I hadn’t heard any shot.

Adrenaline coursed through my veins and my breath came in short gasps.

Blood pounded so hard in my ears I could hear nothing and I tried mightily to focus on the person standing in front of me. It felt like I was looking at them through the wrong ends of a pair of binoculars and I realized that I had tunnel vision.

Tunnel vision, tunnel vision
. Frank had drilled into me all the things I could expect if I found myself in a situation where my life was threatened. Tunnel vision was one of them.

And adrenaline.

And blood pounding in my ears obscuring my hearing.

And shortened breath.

I had to focus. Focus.

And be docile.

And non-threatening.

And hyperaware.

I raised my hands in the air and looked at the ground, trying to be as non-threatening as I could.

“Please don’t hurt me,” I whimpered. Just like Frank taught me. “Please,” I repeated.

Still looking at the floor, I was hyperaware of this person’s smell, and it was sour and fearful. Or was that me?

The gunman was standing so close to me I could feel his breath coming out of his mouth in short gasps, just like mine and I peered up at him, keeping my head bowed. The gun was held in both of his hands and his hands were shaking, and the gun was jerking up and down. He had both arms straight out in front of him and his feet were planted about shoulder width apart. I was fucking lucky that he was hesitating. That he didn’t shoot me right away. It felt like a lifetime had passed since Michael had fallen to the ground. In reality it was probably less than thirty seconds.

In one smooth motion, just like I had been taught and Jay and I had drilled for hours, my left hand shot out, grabbing his wrist hard, deflecting the gun barrel away from me. The gun was now pointed at the wall and away from my chest. My right hand came down on top of the gun and I twisted with all my might. Twisted the gun barrel back towards him. Heard the snap of his finger breaking that he’d stupidly held on the trigger. He squealed. The pressure of my left hand on his wrist, and the pressure from my right hand twisting the gun caused him to let go of it.

I backed up a step, aiming his gun at him. I held the gun close to me. Saw him hesitate. Making a decision.

His decision was probably the right one. He guessed that I wouldn’t shoot him because he turned and jack-rabbited over Michael’s prone body and he took off running. I was right behind him, yelling like a fool.

I saw him a few storefronts up where he was dodging between two parked cars to cross the street. I ran into the street after him. My hearing was back and I clearly heard squealing tires, horns honking, and screams. The screams were mine.

chapter fifty-six

The voices were all around me and I only caught snippets of what was being said. None of it made sense.

“Ran right into the street.”

“… lucky she wasn’t killed.”

“Who is she?”

Then hands were touching me. I kicked and mumbled.

“Ma’am, it’s all right.”

“Ma’am, stay still.”

In and out of consciousness. I finally stopped fighting and gave into it.

The bitch’s body was loaded into an ambulance. The useless, goddamn stupid piece of garbage had botched it. The bitch was holding the
idiot’s
gun when she chased him out of the building. Seeing red. Breathing fire. Angry. So angry.

“Kathleen.” The voice was determined to wake me up. And the bright beam of light into my eye helped.

I turned my head away from the light and clamped my eyes shut. It pissed me off when I was woken up from a nap.

“Leave me alone,” I mumbled, and tried to roll over on my side. The movement caused pain to wash over me so swiftly it took my breath away. I couldn’t focus on just one area of pain because it enveloped my whole body. My entire being. As consciousness regained a toe hold on my brain, I took an inventory of myself and my beloved body parts. A head to foot mental inventory quickly confirmed that I must be in one piece because every body part on that inventory hurt. Throbbed. Pounded.

I opened my eyes slowly and the bright lights above me caused me to wince. Someone put their hand on my shoulder and I cried out. And then a wave of nausea that started at my feet hit me and I knew I was going to be sick to my stomach. It wasn’t pretty and I didn’t care. Not sure that it was possible, but I felt worse after throwing up.

By this time I figured out that I was in a hospital. Why I was there was the sixty-four thousand dollar question. I had been at Frank’s Dojo training and the next thing I knew I was lying on a gurney in the most amount of pain I had ever experienced.

“Kate,” someone whispered. “Everything is okay. You’ve got two broken ribs but everything else is fine.” I opened my eyes and Kelly was standing beside me, bent over a little, talking quietly to me.

“What happened?” I asked him. My voice was hoarse and my throat hurt, but I think that was from throwing up.

“You ran into the street and got hit by a car,” he told me. And then I remembered everything that had happened. Oh my Christ. Michael. Someone else to add to the list of souls damaged by me and our godforsaken company.