Flee (20 page)

"That
should do it," I encouraged.

Below
me, Cory groaned.

The
girl froze.

"Hurry,"
I whispered.

The
sound of my voice seemed to snap her out of her paralysis. She slipped the
scissors’ blade under the tie binding my left wrist and cut.

Needles
of pain raced through my fingers. I pulled my arm free of the board and moved
my hand, willing the blood to return. Then I took the scissors from her. My
grip was weak and it took me several seconds to cut my other hand free.

"What
the hell is going on?" Cory's words were sluggish, but the anger behind
them rang loud and clear.

Blood
tingled through my right hand. I clawed at the Velcro straps pinning my head
and shoulders to the backboard.

"Di?"
he bellowed again.

She
stared at me with wide eyes.

I
ripped the straps free and struggled to sit. My neck was still immobilized in
the cervical brace. I hit my head on the overhead cabinet before I could
scramble upright.

"Di?
I'll fucking kill—"

I
swung off the counter and landed on him, straddling his body.

He
tried to bring his hands up, to grip the collar, to fight me off, but he was
still recovering from the stun and his moves were clumsy and pathetic.

I
gripped his skull in my hands. I'd practiced the move many times, and I barely
had to think. I gave a hard twist and felt his neck pop.

He
slumped back against the cabinets. His hands spasmed slightly before falling
limp by his sides.

"Cory!"
Di screamed. "What did you do to him?"

I
climbed off his body and took off the cervical collar encasing my neck. I
tossed it to the floor and started out of the kitchen.

Di
blocked my path. She held the scissors up in front of her, brandishing the
blade like a knife.

"Put
the scissors down, Di."

"You
killed him! You killed Cory!"

"I
just did you the biggest favor or your life. Someday you'll thank me."

"No!"
She flew at me, the scissors leading the way.

I
dodged the blades and answered with a solid right cross to the jaw.

Di
hit the table and crumpled to the floor beside Kaufmann. I hesitated for only a
second, and then walked from the kitchen without looking back.

"Drugs are tools," The Instructor said. "Like any
tool, they can be beneficial, or deadly. To know the effects these tools will
have on your body, your training will require you to sample a wide variety of
them. So get ready to get high with your Uncle Sam."

My
thoughts were scrambled eggs, my fragile emotional state further degraded by
pain, exhaustion, and an insurmountable list of things I had to do. Add in the
norepinephrine I'd been injected with, and I was a nervous breakdown waiting to
happen.

Or
perhaps it already had.

Not
that it mattered. I couldn't let grief and helplessness overwhelm me again.
When I'd lost Kaufmann, I wanted to die. Cory's girl had made me realize I
couldn't allow myself that luxury. Things needed to be set right, and I was the
only one who could do it.

It
didn't take long to find one of Hammett's bras tucked in the back of Victor's
drawer. I pulled it on, along with a long-sleeved tee, and added the jacket I'd
worn to meet The Instructor. The yellow bag of cash was still tucked in the
back of the closet. I shouldered it and wiped down everything in the apartment
that I or Hammett might have touched, then called 911 to report a multiple
murder and left.

I
took the stairs to the parking garage. The Instructor's car was just where I'd
left it, but the man himself was gone. I'd given him a big enough dose of
amobarbital to still be asleep, so either Hammett had taken him, or he'd had
back-up that I'd missed.

The
underground garage was dank and cool, chilling my damp hair and the new sheen
of drug-sweat that was covering my body like an oily shroud. After checking the
car over, I opened the door and slid behind the wheel. I reached under the
seat. The Instructor's computer was still there, so I fished it out it and woke
it from sleep.

Blips
flickered to life on the touch screen. This time, an additional speck of light
moved up Lake Shore Drive on her way to the John Hancock Center.

Hammett
was smart. It would take her a while to discover my hiding place, but
eventually she'd find the transceiver. The same thing that had hamstringed me
could work both ways: we both had trackers implanted in us. If she did get my
cell phone, I'd still have a chance to figure out what she was planning to do
with it and stop her.

I
focused on the blip north of Chicago in the ritzy suburb of Lake Forest. I'd
lost Kaufmann, been set up by Victor and had misplaced The Instructor. The only
other person I had ties to in this world was Jacob.

Jacob,
who was under siege.

I
needed a weapon.

Though
there were more
Stretchers
health clubs in the area with guns stashed in
the lockers, I was thinking of something with a little more oomph. And I knew
just where to get it. But before I could get anything, I needed to get my head
straight. And the only way to do that was to neutralize the shit in my system.

I
started the car and headed south. Like many large cities, the line between
affluence and poverty was often just a block. I followed West Cermak to South
Martin Luther King Drive, drove past Washington Park and the adjacent
University of Chicago, and then left onto 63rd. It took five minutes of
circling the area before I found my first dealer.

A
black teen, in a 4XXXX white tee, wearing baggy jeans that would be around his
ankles if he didn't keep holding them up with his free hand. He had that
thousand mile stare of someone who had seen combat, and perhaps this kid had. I
parked ahead of him, grabbed some bills from my bag, got out of the car, and
approached slowly with my hands at my sides. He probably had eyes on the street,
covering him, and sure enough I spotted a shorty—a child no more than eight
years old and dressed the same way. He was on his cell phone, no doubt talking
about the white woman approaching.

Though
I'd never bought drugs in this neighborhood before, I was shaky, and no doubt
looked strung out, which meant I shouldn't arouse suspicion.

"Coke,"
I said, stopping two feet away from him. "Blow or crack, I don't care."

"Well,
what we got here?" He made a show of looking me up and down while he
whistled through his teeth, showing me a gold grill. "You lost, little
girl?"

I
blew a stiff breath out of my nostrils. This should be a simple transaction. I
had money. He had product. Let's make a deal. "You deaf, little boy? I
want to buy cocaine. That's the reason you stand here all day, right?"

In
a life undoubtedly plagued by bad choices, this dealer added one more. He
decided to mess with me.

"You
look like you need it bad, ho. Maybe I make you suck my cock for it."

"Sorry,
I already blew a sociopath today. One's my limit."

"Then
maybe you don' get no rock."

"I
have money," I said, fighting the tremor in my voice. "Sell me
something."

"Then
get on yo knees, bitch."

"I
have a better idea."

My
palm hit him right in the upper lip, breaking both his nose and his 14k dental
appliance. As he staggered back I whipped a leg around, caught him on the side
of the head, and dropped him to the street. His skull bounced on the asphalt in
a way that didn't look healthy. The shorty watching took off in a run, and I
squatted and searched the dealer's pockets, patting him down, rifling through
nickel bags of weed, balloons of heroin, and finally a vial of crack and a
glass cigarette pipe. Even bleeding like a stuck pig and with a lump on his
head big enough to rappel off, homeboy made a half-assed attempt to grab my
wrist. He received a broken arm for his efforts.

"Got
a lighter?" I asked him.

"B...back...
p...p...pocket."

I
dug it out, tossed a crumpled twenty dollar bill onto his crying face, and
hurried back to my car. When I was a good ten blocks away I pulled into a
shopping center and prepared my fix.

During
training, I'd sampled a wide variety of drugs. The human body was a complicated
machine and could be made to run better, or worse, with the right combination
of substances. I tapped the crack rocks out of the vial and into the end of the
glass tube. Then I used the lighter to heat them to the melting point and
quickly sucked in the vapor they emitted.

The
effect was instantaneous. But rather than the euphoria normally associated with
narcotics, instead I got quick relief from the norepinephrine that was causing
havoc in my system. Cocaine blocked neurotransmitter receptors, preventing the
reuptake of catecholamine. As a result, the shakes stopped, and I was able to concentrate
for the first time in what felt like hours.

I
needed one hundred percent of my focus for what I had to do next.

"Everyone is the enemy. You can put your trust in your handler,
and in God, and that's it. You may need to make allies to complete a mission,
but these relationships should be abandoned as soon as the mission ends. Trust
no one."

I
circled the block where my apartment building was located two times, the first
in the car, and the second on foot after parking next to a fire hydrant. I didn't
see any signs of cops or enemy combatants. My tablet showed no blinking dots in
the vicinity.

Maybe
I'd get lucky for the first time today and be able to get what I needed from my
place without having to fight for my life.

As
the sun dipped into the west, it had grown cooler. My senses weren't
functioning at peak level, due to all the crap still in my system, but the
familiar smells of my neighborhood were somewhat reassuring. I did a brisk
reconnoiter of my building, then ducked into the alley and discreetly counted
bricks in the wall until I reached twenty-five across and six up. The mortar
there was actually a loose mixture of sand and clay, and hidden between bricks
was a spare key. I used this to open the back door and paused before entering.

The
building felt normal. No unusual sounds or scents. Not the hotbed of activity
it must have been earlier. I padded in softly, making sure the door didn't slam,
stopping every few steps to listen. The elevator was out of service, yellow
police tape stretched across it. I slipped into the stairwell and climbed
quickly, staying on the balls of my feet. When I reached my floor I was slightly
winded, and had broken out in a good, healthy sweat. So far so good.

More
police tape across the elevator, the doors still bent outward from the
explosion. The spot where I'd killed the hitman had been cleaned. No chalk
outline. That only happened in old movies. I thought back to the DoD report on
him. Former KGB. Victor spoke flawless Russian with a native-born Pomor dialect,
so I guessed there was probably a connection. This operation may have been too
big for Hammett, and she brought in some hired help. Or worse, she sided with
the enemy. I didn't want to know what she promised those assholes in return for
their cooperation. Those ex-KGB goons were bad news.

My
apartment door was closed, the wall next to it still pocked with bullet holes.
I crept up silently, placed an ear to the door, and when I heard nothing out of
the ordinary I slipped the key in and entered.

I
closed the door behind me, took two steps into my living room, and immediately
all the hair stood up on my forearms. It was my proximity sense telling me I
wasn't alone in the apartment.

I
spun, raising my fists, falling into a fighting stance, and found myself
staring at a woman with a gun.

But
this one, surprisingly, didn't look like me. She was older, mid-forties, my
size, long brown hair, a strong chin. Although her clothes were designer and
her shoes expensive, I immediately made her as a cop, and a good cop at that.
Calm and in control, with an assured, professional aura about her. As usual my
mouth went dry, as it did whenever someone pointed a firearm at me, and I had
to force myself to stand still.

"Relax,"
she said. "I'm one of the good guys."

I
didn't relax. Instead I found myself studying her posture, looking for an
opening. 

"You're
calling yourself Carmen Sawyer," the cop continued. "I'm Lieutenant
Daniels, Homicide. Are you armed?"

Not yet
, I thought, eyeing her weapon.
It was old school, a .38 Colt Detective Special.

"I
don't want to shoot you, Carmen. But you're making me uncomfortable the way you're
sizing me up, and I wouldn't want to get nervous and accidentally pull the
trigger, which, as you see, is fully cocked. So please answer me. Are you
armed?"

"No."