Chapter Fourteen

The drive out of Washington was quiet after Ronald got rid of the phone. He turned the sim card around in his fingers. William focused on the road behind him more than he watched the traffic ahead. The trouble with DC was the traffic CCTV. Almost every intersection had cameras. He had to get out of the metropolis to avoid the cameras. They needed to switch cars. He hoped the laptop wasn’t compromised. Ronald was diligent about the computer. Considering it was turned on when he thought it was off meant either he’d forgotten, or they got to the laptop and might be using it to track them.

The road narrowed from the highway to the side streets. William liked staying off the highway. It was harder for people to follow on back roads. He paid more attention to the roads than his passenger. He had a lot to say and hoped by the time they reached a random destination; he’d formulate how to go about explaining his absence from Ronald’s life.

“You work for the government as a spy?” Ronald asked. His voice was distant. When William glanced at him after watching the road behind them, Ronald stared out the passenger window at the passing cornfields. September was harvest time in rural Virginia. But the farmers weren’t in a hurry to collect the corn until the end of the month. The road ahead and behind them was free of vehicles. If they were tracking William and Ronald, they were using drones or satellites.

“Not really a spy,” William clarified. But he didn’t have a real definition for his collective skill set. “I think if I had to define what I do; it would be more like a thief, or burglar.”

“Really?” Ronald asked. And William realized the idea piqued his interest enough to start looking at him instead of staring out the window.

“I’m deployed to areas where there is access to people who move money around. Once the government tracks them, and we’re sure it’s the right target, I can get into some places that others can’t, and I just do my thing.”

“And when you say that, you mean the potential to kill people?” Ronald asked.

William swallowed but didn’t answer immediately. “I don’t know how to justify my answer.” It came out like an unfiltered verbal thought. “Are there people who die because they walk a tightrope between good and evil? Then the answer is yes. But I’m better at just getting in and out of places without having to kill anyone.”

“What happened at the apartment?”

“I took care of a problem before they took care of you.”

“But why am I suddenly so important?” Ronald had a look that made him distant. His face was gaunt, and he did his best to squeeze far enough from the driver’s side of the car, which suggested he wasn’t interested in getting too close to William.

“I honestly don’t know. I can tell you that your report on Goldberg got on my radar and not just because I read your articles. His name comes up from time to time among some of the bad guys that I’ve had contact with over the years. They have a few people like him, and it’s not easy to get through the inner circle with a lot of these guys. If they don’t know you, if they don’t understand people who know you, you can forget about getting close enough to do any real damage.

“I think that’s what a lot of solutions are, and they hope it’s enough to stop the infection. The trouble with that is the fact the money is still out there, and if enough people know about it, they can get at it from other areas.

“Goldberg got greedy. He was likely a loose end, and they might have just decided to finish him off when you finally broke a cover story on him.” William continued to watch the road behind them. He had no set destination. And as the miles wore on, as the way thinned out more, the paved roads in deep Virginia wooded lands lost the lines to the sides of the streets, snaked under heavy leafy canopies, and sometimes had no lines separating oncoming traffic. William didn’t know where they were. He didn’t have a good knowledge of the mile markers or the VDOT labeling system when it came to rural byways.

“We should stop soon,” Ronald said. The sun had set, and they were heading west, chasing the light before it finally submerged below the mountains.

“If you see a motel, we can stop.” William rubbed his eyes. He felt the weight of the day pressing on his shoulders. But there was something he’d left out about the man who was assigned to kill Ronald. It gnawed at him.

The focus was crucial for getting a job done. He’d learned to suppress his pain. Compartmentalizing his feelings was easy once he learned to concentrate on tasks instead of worrying about life and choices, and his love for Ronald; all that had to wait until he completed the project. Once the mission was over, William had time to regroup, to unpack the material possessions he had stored in his brain and remember his feelings.

It was the same for the pain. He learned to store it somewhere in the back of his head until he could deal with it. Unfortunately, after six hours of sitting upright in the car, driving had caused his brain to recalibrate.

The realization he couldn’t maintain consciousness happened when his vision narrowed. At first, William thought it was the vegetation and thick trees on either side of the road. But the more he looked, the less he saw. Then the intense sensation of spinning happened in his head.

“I think,” he started. His throat went dry. His foot slipped off the accelerator. “I think I’m going to—” And the world closed up before his eyes.