The Price of Disrespect (Gray Spear Society Book 6) (20 page)

"Then help her."

"I don't want to," Wesley said. "I would have to use my gift."

"You're being very selfish. Helping her wouldn't cost you anything, and it would improve her life dramatically."

The boy ran out of the store. Smythe followed him to the sidewalk outside.

"It's my gift!" Wesley said. "I should decide when to use it. I don't like to be forced."

"Nobody is forcing you," Smythe said.

"Destiny has me on a leash like a pet dog. It's trying to drag me back into the store right now. I can't get away from it no matter what I do. It's even worse than my protection team."

There were tears on Wesley's cheeks. Smythe knelt down and gave him an awkward hug.

"I still don't see what's so bad about helping that girl," Smythe said softly.

"I've heard thousands of stories of sadness and pain. I don't want to hear another one."

"Maybe her story is happy."

Wesley shook his head. "It's not."

Smythe gave him another hug.

Odelia stepped out of the store with an elaborate tiara on her head. Red glass beads were strung across her forehead and hung around her ears. The design included golden flowers of all shapes. It made her look like a Chinese princess except for the white hair.

"Do you like it? I think it's cute." She looked down at Smythe and Wesley. "What's wrong?"

"The kid is having a hard time," Smythe said. "It seems that girl at the counter is in pain, and he's supposed to help her. He doesn't want to."

She frowned and looked back. "Maybe I can talk to her."

"No!" Wesley said. "You'll make it worse. Can we go, please? I need to get away."

"Sure."

Odelia quickly paid for the tiara with cash. The small team headed down the street at a brisk walk with Wesley in the lead. He was almost jogging.

Smythe noticed a small grocery store and ushered everybody inside. Foreign spices tickled his nose as soon as he stepped through the door. He saw the foods he expected along with some that surprised him. The meat counter sold whole raw ducks, squids, and containers of fresh cow blood. The pasta section had noodles made from rice instead of wheat. There were jars of chili mixed with bamboo shoots.

He and Odelia went shopping. They focused on fresh foods that were vulnerable to contamination. They weren't picky, and it took only a few minutes to fill up a cart. They paid and left the store with shopping bags in hand.

The team wandered around for a while, looking for a place where they could work privately. They found a spot between some dumpsters that was out of public view.

Smythe and Odelia opened their coolers. They contained latex gloves, ice, and many small plastic bags. Wearing gloves, the two scientists took samples of food and stored each in a separate bag. These were labeled with permanent markers to indicate their contents. The leftover food went into a dumpster.

"Do you think we have enough?" Odelia said.

Smythe considered his sample collection. The team had already made several stops during their long tour of the south side of Chicago. He had hundreds of samples, enough to almost fill the large cooler.

"Let's turn back towards the car," he said. "Maybe we'll do one more stop on the way if we see a good one."

"Hurry. My arm is about to fall off from carrying this cooler."

He kissed her. "I'll carry both. My arms are fine."

"They sure are." She caressed his biceps.

* * *

Aaron sighted through the scope of his Walther P22 Target Pistol. The little gun felt like a toy in his big hands. He pulled the trigger. There was hardly any kick, and the gunshot was politely quiet. A tiny hole appeared in the center of a paper target at the far end of the range. At this distance it looked like a pinprick.

It was a strange choice of weapon for him. Normally, he went for big bullets with ample stopping power. His strong arms allowed him to handle any caliber easily, and he enjoyed tearing sizable chunks of flesh from his enemies. Recently, he had started to rethink that approach. Ethel had used the humble Walther P22 as her primary gun for decades, and clearly, it had worked very well for her. He wanted to understand why.

Aaron fired again. The second hole appeared an inch from the first. He pulled the trigger rapidly until the magazine was empty. When he was done, the holes in the target formed a smiley face three inches across.

The .22 caliber bullets were so light, they were barely lethal. To get a quick kill, he would have to put a round through an eye socket. With a scope or a laser sight, he could do that easily. A suppressor would make the gunshots silent.

Interesting,
he thought.

He put the gun back in its place on the shelf.

He headed towards his office. With most of the team out collecting samples, headquarters was depressingly quiet. One of the unfortunate aspects of being a commander was that he was often stuck at home while everybody else was having fun.

As he passed the computer room, he glanced through the door. The twins were nestled in the stretchy webbing of their workstations. Out of curiosity, he wandered over for a closer look.

Bethany was staring at a display full of alien symbols. Aaron recognized the writing as "divine mathematics," and it was likely a message from God. Aaron wished he could read the smallest part of it.

He was irritated that Bethany wasn't working on the riots investigation. In his mind, that task had precedence. People were dying on the streets of Chicago right now, and she was effectively ignoring the problem. Her special project with God could wait until the mission was over.

Aaron walked around to Leanna's side. It appeared she was doing the same thing as her sister.

He fumed as he contemplated what to do. He couldn't exactly tell the twins to stop doing God's work. On the other hand, he was their commander and had the right to set their priorities. There was no obvious answer.

He went into his office. He configured the video conference system for San Francisco, turned it on, and sat on his stool to wait. Marina wasn't expecting him to call. He was prepared to sit a while if she were too busy to come right away.

She appeared in the video display a few minutes later. Her face was flushed and sweat dotted her forehead. She was wearing a gray track suit with damp spots under the arms. She still looked beautiful to him, even like this. The green in her eyes was spectacular on the high resolution monitor. He missed sparring with her.

"I'm sorry I interrupted your workout," he said.

"It's OK," she said. "I was working with Hanley, and he was just about ready to collapse. He needed a break."

"How is he doing?"

"Quite well. He's a real soldier. I'm certainly having better luck with him than the guy I recruited a couple of weeks ago. Maybe you can give me some advice."

"Sure," he said, "but then it's your turn. I'm having my own management issues. Tell me about your new guy."

She smiled. "A great fighter. A master of mixed martial arts and pretty handy with a gun. He's also polite, respectful, smart, hard working, and generally very nice. I really like him as a person."

"What's the problem?"

"He's a wimp. When we're just training, he's a star pupil, but when faced with physical danger, he folds up. He spent his whole life in the burbs. The closest he ever got to real combat was video games. I'm very frustrated. If he could just find some courage, he'd be a real asset to me. Right now, I can't trust him on a mission."

"Hmm." Aaron pursed his lips. "I suppose the best way to acquire courage is by practicing. It's like any skill. Put your guy into stressful, frightening situations until he learns how to deal with them. Make him climb a tall building at night, or walk through a bad neighborhood dressed like a clown."

Marina nodded. "I like it. That kind of training might be good for the whole team. Thanks. What's your problem? Is it Wesley?"

"He's certainly a problem, but that's not who I want to talk about. My issue is with a woman named Tawni. She's been on my team for just two days, and I've already had to threaten her several times. She's rude to everybody, including me."

"It sounds like she doesn't understand how close to death she is."

"I've tried to be explicit," he said.

"Be even more explicit. If she still doesn't get it, she deserves to die for being an idiot. That's how Ethel would handle it."

"Did she ever retire a recruit for failing to meet expectations?"

"I saw it happen once." Marina looked down with a sad expression.

Aaron hated the idea of killing Tawni. He desperately hoped he could avoid that outcome, but if it reached that point, he wouldn't hesitate. A strong commander didn't let problems fester. He certainly couldn't allow a disruptive team member to stick around for long.

"I really miss you," he said. "As soon as I can get away from here, I'm coming to San Francisco."

She smiled. "Or I'll come to you. Either way, we will definitely get together this month. That's a guarantee. I love you."

"I love you, too."

He got up and turned off the video camera.

* * *

Tawni was strolling through her old neighborhood, swinging a red plastic cooler with one hand. She passed a familiar beauty supply store on her right. She had purchased hair products from there several times. The two-story homes on the left had chiseled stone fronts. The sides were made of bricks which were crumbling in spots. The houses had been built back when this part of Chicago had been a desirable place to live.

Even though she had spent the better part of her life on these streets, they didn't feel like home anymore. The same dealers still stood on the street corners. The same cops cruised the avenues without getting out of their cars. The same loose garbage was still caught in the fences. The neighborhood hadn't changed at all.

Tawni had. She had met impossible people and seen impossible things. She could feel the change in her gut. Whether she liked it or not, she was a Spear now.

Norbert was walking beside her with his own cooler in hand. He was wearing a leather jacket, blue jeans, and soft hiking boots. Sunglasses with steel frames were a stylish touch.

It was getting dark, and they would head back to headquarters soon. He hadn't talked much during their walking tour of the west side of Chicago. She was grateful. He seemed to understand she had a lot on her mind. She was still carrying a heavy load of grief from the death of her mother.

Tawni decided to break the silence. "What is being a Spear like?"

"A lot of intensive training," Norbert said. "Real missions don't come along that often, but when they do, we have to be ready."

"How did you get sucked in?"

"Wesley was the cause, actually. I was leading an organization called the Brotherhood of the Luciferian Child. It was a Catholic order dedicated to killing the Antichrist. We believed Wesley was him."

Tawni stared at Norbert. "You thought that brat was the Antichrist? That's stupid."

"You haven't seen him use his gift."

"What happened next?"

"The Society wiped out the Brotherhood," he said. "I was the only survivor. Wesley decided I was worth keeping and made me a member on the spot. I had to kill my former boss to prove my loyalty."

She shook her head in disbelief. Her own story was starting to sound tame compared to the rest of the team.

"Why did Wesley save you?"

"I'm not sure," he said. "Later, God appointed me to be the twins' guardian. That may be part of it."

"God talked to you? Did He look like an old man with robes? What color was His skin?"

"He was just a ball of light and mist. No skin."

She contemplated his statement. Until recently, she would've assumed he had hallucinated the meeting with God. Now, she had to give him the benefit of the doubt.

"There might be one other reason," Norbert said. "When I first met Wesley, he told me I would save his life. That hasn't happened yet."

"The kid can tell the future, too?"

"Not really. He can't predict the score of a football game. He just knows certain things are supposed to happen according to God's plan. He knows what
should
be. Except the plan isn't always followed perfectly. The Gray Spear Society was created to deal with unplanned events."

"I thought God was omnipotent," Tawni said.

He shrugged. "I've given up trying to resolve that dilemma. One of the things Aaron taught me was to focus on questions that can be answered. It's a good lesson."

"You obviously like him."

"He's a great man."

"He's an asshole," she said.

"He does what is necessary, not what is nice. That's another good lesson."

She frowned. She didn't like being taught lessons all the time.

"Hey, Tawni!" a new voice yelled. "Who is that cracker? You eatin' white meat these days?"

She turned and recognized the speaker as an ex-boyfriend named Denzel. Even though the weather was breezy and cool, he wore no shirt. He had always been very proud of his pectorals. Old blue jeans hung low on his hips, exposing the tops of his plaid underwear. Three other men with him were dressed similarly.

"You know him?" Norbert whispered.

"We had sex," Tawni said. "We fought. It wasn't good."

Denzel and his friends crossed the street without bothering to check for traffic. He walked up to Norbert.

"We don't see a lot of your kind around here," Denzel said. "You lost, honky?"

Norbert offered his hand and smiled. "I'm Peter. It's a pleasure to meet one of Tawni's old friends."

Denzel glared at the hand. "Maybe you didn't hear me, mayonnaise. Are you lost?"

Norbert turned to Tawni and said, "How do you want me to handle this? It's your decision." He didn't appear nervous at all.

She saw that something was wrong with Denzel. Smythe had described it perfectly at the meeting. Denzel's eyes didn't move naturally. His skin color and breathing indicated extreme anxiety. He wouldn't leave peacefully.

She realized the confrontation could turn deadly. Norbert was carrying at least three guns under his jacket. With his fighting skills, he probably didn't even need a gun to kill. If it came to it, she had concealed weapons of her own. After seeing her mother die, Tawni had sworn she would never be caught poorly armed again.