Chapter Forty - James
Harper is breathing deeply, completely exhausted.
I’m exhausted too, but sleep seems to be very far away right now. What a motherfucking day. How does all this shit happen in one day? That kidnapping was this morning. That murder was this morning. I still don’t know what that was about. One thing is clear about that—it wasn’t us. It wasn’t us as in the job the Admiral has me doing. And it wasn’t us as in the job I have going with Merc. And it wasn’t us as in the job I have keeping Harper safe.
So Jesus Christ, James, Tet says in my head. What other job do you have going?
It’s a good question.
You know what would be cool? If fucking Tet would take over when those blackouts occurred. Right? That’d be awesome, even if it meant I was certifiable. Because at least I’d have answers.
But reality, James, I tell myself. Stick to reality. Who else is involved?
Sasha, obviously. A lot of this shit today was about Sasha. And just what the fuck? It’s like this kid was dropped in my lap to…
No. That can’t be it.
I laugh to myself. But how fucking perfect would it be to send her? Especially after that meeting with the Admiral. Eliminate her, he said.
What if he told Sasha the same thing?
I mean, it’s crazy. That little Smurf against me? I laugh. She’s good, for a kid. But not good enough. Not even close. Harper is pretty good too. But she can’t shoot. Hell, she can’t even drive.
I sit up in bed and look over at her. Sleeping so soundly, oblivious to all that’s happening behind the scenes. Must be nice.
I get up out of bed and pull out a clean pair of jeans and t-shirt I brought in from the Hummer after our shower, and then I grab my gun and go looking for my new target.
I’m barefoot, so I stalk down the hallway and out into the living room. It’s totally quiet. The moon lights up the room well enough to see, but not much more than that. There are way too many shadows in here for my comfort level. Any one of them could be the kid. I stalk down the hallway and check the first room. Nothing. The door is closed to the second room at the end of the hall. I walk quietly up to the door, lean in to listen, then knock softly. “Sasha?” I turn the handle and peek in. “Sasha?”
There’s a strong breeze coming in from somewhere, like the window is wide open, but all the windows in this house are long and skinny, up near the ceiling. Or skylights. I look up, and for half a second I think this is it, the little fucking Smurf is hiding up on the ceiling like some Company version of Spiderman.
She’s not up there.
But there is a skylight up there. And it’s open. That’s where the breeze is coming from. There’s a ladder leaning up against the wall, slanted at a severe angle. I stand underneath the skylight and call up. “Sasha! You up there?”
A shadow appears over the entrance to the roof. “Yes.”
“Can I come up?”
She peeks cautiously over the side. “I guess.”
I stuff my gun in my pants and climb. She’s on the other side of the roof when I step out of the hole. “What are you doing?” I ask, walking over towards her. She’s got a hand behind her back so I figure she’s been having the same doubts about me as I’ve been having about her.
“Looking for something.”
“Oh.” Hmmm. “Like what?” I sorta laugh. “It’s a roof.”
She nods up at the sky with her head, never taking her eyes off me. “Did you know today is the summer solstice? The longest day of the year.”
“Fuck, well, it certainly felt like the longest day of my life.”
“Right?” she asks, smiling a little. And then her smile drops into a frown so fast my heart skips.
“What?” That question is all it takes for her tears to start. “What? What’s wrong?”
She walks over to the short adobe ledge around the roof and takes a seat. Her gun comes out from behind her back and she wipes her face with the back of her other hand. “We had plans today.”
“Who?” Fuck, what’s she talking about? Plans? To kill me? Does she have a partner? Who is her partner? All this shoots through my mind as she pulls herself together.
“My dad and me,” she finally manages through her tears. “We had plans to go to some secret place where ancient Indians marked the solstices using stones lined up like a wheel on the ground. And I used to know the name of it, but…” She sniffs and shakes her head. “I’ve forgotten what it’s called. And you know what?” Her eyes are all teary with sadness as she looks over at me.
I kneel down where I am so even though we are a good twenty feet apart, we’re at least eye level. “What?”
“I forgot about him too. I forgot all about him until I went to bed and then saw the date on the digital clock on the nightstand.”
Fuck. She’s thinking about her father.
“And I know you said to try not to think about things, but it’s really hard.” She lets a little sob loose. “And my body hurts from this morning. I’m not a complainer, James, I swear. But I don’t feel so good.” She drops the gun on the ground now and then wipes both hands across her face. “My head hurts. And my shoulder hurts. I don’t even think I can shoot that gun. You were right earlier. It’s got a lot of kick to it.”
I don’t know what to say. Is she playing me? Is she really sad? Is she really hurt? What the fuck am I supposed to say?
The silence goes on for too long and she takes a deep breath and lets it out. “Merc was right, I guess. I’m a crybaby. And you hate me, don’t you?”
“I don’t hate you,” I reply, a little defensively, blowing out my own long breath. “I just don’t know what to do with you. I don’t know why you’re here.”
She shrugs, then winces as her hand goes to her shoulder.
Well, pain I can deal with. So I start there. “I have a med kit in the pull-out drawers in the back of the Hummer. Take one of the tablets called Motrin before you hit the sack.” I don’t know what to say about the father thing. I’m no good at this shit. I’m the last guy to look to for sympathy. All I know is business. Death is my business. I walk over to her and kneel down so I can see her Glock. And then I pull out my Five-SeveN, pop out the magazine, pull the barrel back, and empty the chamber, letting the cartridge fall out into my palm. “Here,” I say, handing it over to her grip first. “You wanna trade guns, Smurf? This thing’s nice and light. Almost no kick at all. Just a .22 round, but you know, the shape of the bullet gives it velocity.”
She takes the gun, then the mag. Every few seconds she sniffs as quietly as she can, trying not to call attention to the fact that she’s crying. “Cop killer,” she says as she pops the magazine in.
“Yup, that’s what they call them. Cop killers. You know why, right?”
She nods. “Because the cartridge goes through Kevlar.”
“Yeah, that’s why.” She knows her shit. “Load it up. You wanna shoot it?”
She sniffs again. “Where?”
I smile and pan my arms wide. “Here. There’s no houses for miles. No one’s gonna care. Pick a target. Shoot something.”
She scans the area, making a little circle as she does it. Then she points off in the distance. “How about that sign at the edge of the property?”
“Wow. You’re cocky, huh?” She smiles at me and I smile back. “I tell you what. If you hit that target in this light, I’ll let you keep that gun forever. We can trade, huh? I’ll take that Glock off your hands and you can have this Five-SeveN.”
She gets a wide grin but tries to hide it. “I can hit that target.”
“Show me. Pretend your dad is watching you. Right now. He’s looking down on you and he sees you with me, and maybe he’s a little worried.” My voice drops and she looks up at me, her face a mess of grief, but at the same time I know she’s listening. She wants to hear something real from me. She needs something real from me. “He’s probably a little suspicious of my motives. And maybe he’s worried that I’m a bad guy. So show your dad you can handle me just fine. Shoot that target and take my gun.”
She stares at me for a moment. “Are you a bad guy, James?”
I nod slowly. “Yes.”
“I’m a bad guy too.”
“So I guess we’re even,” I say back.
“Maybe,” she says as she takes aim. She draws in a long steadying breath, then breathes out and squeezes the trigger. The Five-SeveN is loud, but the ping of a bullet going through a metal sign echoes for a second after the gun blast dies away. That’s all we need to confirm her aim was true. “If we’re even,” she says, turning back to me, “then what do we do?”
“Well”—I reach down and pick up her Glock, check the magazine, finger the thread on the barrel where a suppressor would fit, then stuff it in my pants—“I guess we need a plan.”
“I guess we do.”
I nod as I stand. “I’ll let you know when I get one.”
And then I walk back over to the open skylight, half expecting to hear the crack of a high-velocity round being fired before crashing straight through my head.
But I hear a long, sad sigh instead.
I guess her trust—even if it’s conditional, temporary, and precarious—is the best I can hope for at the moment.