The Rasner Effect (37 page)

“Yeah, I’m coming, let’s go get ’em.”

He turned away from Sanaga and followed the soldiers out.

Chapter Forty-One

Clara stared at herself in the bathroom mirror. She had washed her hands several times, yet traces of blood remained in the cracks of her palms as well as her fingernails. The evening stayed clear in her mind. She could still feel the resistance against her wrist as she jammed the knife through her half-sister’s throat. Could still see the blood gushing down the little girl’s neck with each breath she tried to take. Still hear the sound of her mother’s screams. Clara vividly remembered her mother lunging for her in an attempt to either save or avenge her precious three-year-old daughter. Her precious Kimberly. That was just moments before the tone of her mother’s screams changed, from outrage and shock to pain as Jen shot her in the back to halt her attack.

Clara once again examined the bloodstains on her hands. Would it ever come out?
Ever
? Clara now wore a black T-shirt she found on a hanger in the vestibule closet. The shirt was stylish and feminine enough she figured it was probably Jen’s. Then again, it could have been Derrick’s. On the floor in a heap lay her blue happy-face shirt. She’d really liked that shirt, with the happy, smiley face, but—she kicked at it, sending it up in the air. It fluttered down to drape over the shower curtain rod—she’d never wear it again. Never wanted to look at it again.

Then again, maybe she should keep it as her killing shirt. She could wear it on every mission. She wouldn’t wash it—ever. It would bear the memories of each job. Right shoulder stain, her mother. The spot over the left breast—their next target.

Clara flopped on the toilet seat. The shirt stared down at her, one of the smiling eyes and the mouth. She couldn’t help grinning. Sad really. All she could think about was the shirt and not the fact she’d killed someone. Half her flesh and blood.

I should feel guilty, shouldn’t I?

For several moments, Clara sat and stared at the bloodstained shirt, trying to dredge up the proper emotion. Nothing. No, she did feel something. Powerful. In control. Perhaps for the first time in her life. No, she hadn’t enjoyed the experience; she could never like the act of killing. What was it then? She thought for a very long time, getting up and putting her elbows on the windowsill. The sun came up, spreading yellow and pink darts through the trees. Pine trees maybe. Clara didn’t know. Damn, she was from the city. City kids didn’t know trees. They knew crowded sidewalks and integrated schools.

Now Jen, she enjoyed killing. Clara shivered recalling her maniacal laugh as they scampered down those apartment building steps.

As Jen predicted, no police arrived. All the screaming her mother had done and not a soul had phoned for help. At some point, though, the cops would arrive, they’d have to. Would anybody recognize her? She visited her mom only like two or three times in that building a few years ago. She’d changed a lot in that period of time. But was it enough? Damn, she didn’t want to go to jail.

Clara went to the mirror and examined her reflection. Nope. No sorrow. No regret. Nothing.

“The bitch deserved it,” she whispered at the stone cold face staring back at her. “They both did.”

Downstairs, the front door slammed. The sound was quickly followed by shouting and heavy footsteps heading to the kitchen. Clara exited the bathroom, leaving the shirt dangling on the rod—a blue badge of courage—and ran downstairs.

In the kitchen, Derrick sat in his rolling chair, his face chalk white. Rick paced around and around the table, like a merry-go-round. He wore a mask of rage and something else. Clara thought she recognized it as confusion, but that couldn’t be, not Mr. Rasner, one of the smartest people she knew. He always had the answers. Sometimes knew the questions before they were asked. Jen wore a bit of confusion too as Rick strode around the room. Jen planted her hands on her hips and watched his journey.

She’d wait for just the right time to break in and ask questions. What could’ve happened? Rick had left with Derrick, Sanaga and Jorge, but came back with just Derrick.

Who’d done the shouting? She hadn’t been able to tell with the bathroom door shut.

Derrick wheeled the chair up to the table, forcing Rick to alter his path. He pressed the ON button to boot up his laptop. Moments later, he typed something. Soon after that, he shook his head in frustration.

What the hell?

“I take it the mission did not go well?” Jen asked with a sarcastic smile.

Rick’s answer was to smack the digital clock radio off the counter as he passed. The radio hit the floor with a crack. The glass in front of the digital numbers broke. The plastic case split open like a boil. Its innards gaped the same way Clara’s half-sister’s had on that daybed.

“I see,” Jen quipped.

Rick stopped only long enough to roar, “It was a set-up! Straker wasn’t even fucking there. That fucking merc was waiting for us!”

Jen’s smirk died. “Scarberry.”

“Right,” Derrick said, looking up from the computer only briefly. His words were clipped, tense. “We had to leave Jun and Jorge there. Chances are they’re dead.”

“What happened?”

Derrick threw an accusatory glare at Rick. “We sort of abandoned them.”

Rick clenched his fists and looked at the refrigerator, then the stove, and countertop. He seemed to be looking for something to punch. His eyes rested on Clara, standing in the doorway. He pulled his fist back and dropped it at his side. Then he took a step toward her.

“
What
?” Rick demanded with a rage she had never seen from him before. Clara stumbled backward, trying to get out of the room. She’d been on the receiving end of punches before and wasn’t in a hurry to do so again.

Rick unclenched his fists and turned his head away. He leaned forward and placed his hands across the table. His cheeks were red, his eyes bloodshot. “I don’t get it, how could they have known?” Rick slammed his palms. This time Derrick steadied the computer before it could move. Rick looked at Jen, still angry and more than a little embarrassed.

“What is there not to get?” Derrick muttered still eyeing his computer screen. There was an awkward silence that made him glance up.

“You have something to say?”

“Not like it would matter. You never listened to what I had to say back then, I doubt seven years of humility would change that.”

Rick rolled his eyes and turned back to Jen who now leaned against the refrigerator with her arms folded across her chest.

“Straker wasn’t even there, Jennifer,” Rick continued. “It was all one huge set-up! It was like they knew what we were up to before we even got there.”

“Go figure,” Derrick said.

Rick clenched his fists again; his eyes narrowed on Derrick. The intensity was such that Clara took another step back, more in the hallway than the kitchen now.

“Oh sure, maybe it was me,” Derrick shrugged. “Maybe I’m sitting here e-mailing Straker and Scarberry every single plan you come up with just to fuck you up and get you captured once again. Maybe with my ass sitting in the van I allowed…”

Derrick flinched as though he expected Rick to strike him. He pushed the computer away and looked up. His head jerked back when he realized Rick’s left hand rested on the pistol butt. “You have got to be kidding me.”

“You know, now that I think about it, you could have done just that.” Rick bent forward leaning his weight on the table. “None of us would have known. We know nothing about what you do on that god damned thing.”

“Are you out of your mind?” Derrick waved his hands in the air and then placed them against the sides of his head. “What am I asking? Yes, you are out of your mind.”

“You’re looking very nervous sitting there.” Rick brought his weapon out from its holster and pointed it at Derrick.

“I don’t believe this! You’re holding a gun at
me
?
Again
?”

Again? Clara wondered when the last time had been. Rick obviously hadn’t shot the guy, or they wouldn’t be working together now. Was he mad enough, or suspicious enough, to shoot Derrick now? Clara couldn’t imagine Derrick screwing them that way. He was the one responsible for getting the crew back together.

“If you have any answers at all, I want them.” Rick held the gun steady, aimed right at Derrick’s forehead.

“Jennie, would you please talk to this…”

Derrick stopped mid-sentence when Jen turned her back to him.
Damn
. She believed he’d fucked them too! Either that or she just didn’t care if he got shot.

Derrick watched Jen march out of the kitchen, banging elbows with Clara, who couldn’t duck out of the way quickly enough. What would Rick do now? Even novice Clara felt the power shift in the room. Surely, Rick wouldn’t let it continue. His nostrils flared, his brows dipped into a V between his eyes.

“Well fine!” Derrick rocketed out of the chair, slamming the chair off the windowsill beneath the picture window. “You want answers, Rick? You think I’m the problem? That I’m the reason you almost got caught again tonight?” He took a breath. “Well, I’m not the problem, buddy. It’s
you
!”

Uh-oh
. This wouldn’t end well. Clara nearly turned and followed in Jen’s footsteps. She moved around upstairs, it sounded like she was slamming doors.

Rick’s eyes widened, first with anger, then bewilderment. He opened his mouth, but Derrick raised his voice. “You jump into situations without a bit of goddamned thought, planning, or care whatsoever. I mean, come on, you were back for twenty-four hours and immediately target the general’s home? And you wonder how they knew? Did anyone really need to tell them?”

Rick’s expression changed, from pissed off parent to scolded child.

“It was stupid, Rick, and you were stupid to go out in the field so fast, after such an obvious target. Worse yet, you dragged us with you.” Derrick’s voice rose, losing its anger and gaining confidence and assurance. “It was the same non-thinking stupidity you showed all those years ago on that bridge, Rick. All the clues were there. Hell, I warned you! I said you were getting overconfident and sloppy, but did you listen? Of course not, you were too concerned about your fucking rep and the goddamned hiring price!”

Rick lowered the gun, laying it on the table.

“There was a huge target on your back. You knew it and you decided to finish the mission anyway. We almost all got caught that night.”

“Yeah, and you all escaped because I…”

“Yeah, you sacrificed yourself so we could all escape a situation
you
put us in! You’re lucky they didn’t kill you, Rick, but you lost…well, everything. You lost everything and they made sure you wouldn’t even know it! You shouldn’t have even been there, Rick. We shouldn’t have been there. We could have let that one go, but you wouldn’t hear of it, now would you?”

Derrick wagged his right hand, first at the doorway where Jen had disappeared, and then at his own chest. “It’s because of us you are you again. Actually, it’s mostly because of
me
. I found you. And you have to be all stupid and reckless again. And for what? So you could…”

“Derrick!” Rick interrupted. “I know they screwed up my head, turned me into a pussy, but do you want to know the one good thing about that whole fucking awful experience?”

Jen appeared at Clara’s elbow. Clara looked up at her with a relieved smile. It seemed as though the emergency was over.

At Rick’s words, Derrick’s look of self-confidence changed to one of confusion. He responded with a shrug. Rick looked first at Jen, then Clara. Seemingly satisfied that they too, hadn’t ganged up on him, he continued his defense to Derrick, “At least in all that time, I didn’t have to deal with your constant insistence…on
calling me stupid
!”

“Rick, for god sakes, what are you talking…”

Before he could finish, Rick snatched up the pistol, pointed it, and squeezed the trigger. A loud bang filled the room. The bullet shot out—to Clara it seemed like slow motion—with a little burst of smoke, it whizzed on a straight path and slammed into Derrick’s chest. The momentum shoved him backward into the windowsill.

“I…” Rick stepped forward. “…am
not
…” Rick fired another shot into Derrick’s chest. “…
Stupid
!”

He squeezed the trigger a third time.

Derrick’s body crashed through the picture window and disappeared. Shards of window sprinkled down like fine rain. Derrick hit the ground with such force that the sound of impact carried all the way to the kitchen.

The room fell eerily silent.

Rick set the gun back on the table. He walked to the window, glass crunching like popcorn under his boots. He leaned out and looked down. Only a lump of blue was visible in the dawn light. Derrick sprawled, his legs spread, one arm folded underneath him. No movement. Rick’s stomach gurgled. “I-I did not mean to d-do that. I just…I lost it.”

His lower lip trembled, a tear dripped from his right eye. He didn’t stop its downward descent along his cheek. He rubbed the scar on his forehead.

Rick faced Jen and Clara who hadn’t moved from the doorway. Four eyes focused on him. Clara seemed nervous but wore a curious smile. Jen’s brows raised, but that was the only sign of emotion she showed.

“I didn’t mean to do that!” Rage clutched his stomach. Bile bubbled into his throat. Within seconds, the rage emoted to sorrow. And then confusion. What had he done? Oh God, what had he done?

He made a fist and held it in front of his face, pressing his fingers tight. Tighter, digging his fingernails into his palm. Tighter, feeling the knuckles protest. Tighter, until his entire arm began to shake. He turned back to the window, rubbing the lump on his forehead with his thumb.

“I don’t feel…I don’t feel right. I-I think I want to be alone right now.”

“That is a good idea,” Jen responded, authority returning to her voice. She placed her arm over Clara’s shoulders. “I promised you a new wardrobe. I think now would be a good time to get it. Let’s go shopping.”

“Now?” Clara asked. “The stores are closed, no?”

“That’s the best time to shop.” Jen placed her hands on Clara’s shoulders, turned her around, and nudged her toward the door. “No crowds. Deal with this, Rick. We’ll be back later. Then we’ll figure out where we go from here.”