CHAPTER 14
“LOOK AT THE TIME!” Grabbed Len and my purse, which I’d left in my office earlier in the day, and started to head toward the nearest gate, which happened to be in the bathroom connected to my offices. “We need to get moving.”
“Oh my God, more aliens are invading?” Melville didn’t sound freaked. Well, not too freaked. He sounded kind of excited. Hoped he was going to represent the reactions of the majority of the public, but sincerely doubted it. Our luck so rarely ran that way.
“Cool,” Officer Larry said as I stopped my escape attempt and let go of Len. Put my purse over my neck, though, because it was always a good idea to live by the Scout Motto and Be Prepared.
Officer Curly nodded. “Especially if they look like the A-Cs.”
“Ah, per what little I know, they do not. No idea if they’re better or worse, by the way. Now that I’ve already breached Jeff’s latest security directive, can we go while you guys shut up and share this with no one?”
Vance sighed. “I think I have to take them into custody, Kitty. Based on what Chuck said.”
“It’s cool.” Len was looking at his phone. “I already advised Mister Reynolds of what’s going on. He feels that we can trust the K-Nine unit, these three officers in particular, to protect national and international security.”
“You can,” Melville said. “But it’s nice to know that the CIA actually trusts us.”
“No,” Kyle said strongly. “The CIA trusts no one. Mister Reynolds is trusting you, which is, frankly, a huge honor. And Kitty is, as well.”
The three officers looked at each other. “You can trust us,” Officer Curly said. “I don’t think we’ve ever done anything against you.”
“Yeah,” Officer Larry said. “We’re on your side and have been since well before you knew it.”
Melville nodded. “Kitty, you know we’ve got your back, just like you’ve got ours. Huge honor of trust or no.”
Prince, Duke, and Riley, meanwhile shared with me that they were, of course, going to keep this news to themselves and would, also of course, take down anyone who tried to share it without authorization.
“Super-duper. Believe me—Chuckie trusting you is indeed a big deal. Let’s not share this with the rest of your squad, though, please and thank you. You three I know I can trust. The rest of your gang I have the utmost faith in. But since no one’s supposed to know yet . . .”
“Agreed,” Melville said briskly. “So, are we advising the President of what you’re doing or not?”
“I didn’t share why the K-Nines were here,” Len said. His phone beeped. “However, Mister Reynolds has guessed at least somewhat accurately. He says that as long as you’re taking me, Kyle, at least two A-Cs, and some Secret Service with you, it’s okay to do, and I quote, ‘whatever the hell they want from her this time.’ So we seem cleared.”
Chose not to ask if Len had really only shared part of what was going on with Chuckie. Also wondered if the person Kyle was texting was Buchanan. Assumed it was. Actively chose not to complain about the boys doing what they felt was right. Was well aware that they got private tongue-lashings I wasn’t privy to and saw no reason to try to ensure they had another.
Decided I was heading to the main police precinct in a clandestine manner and so didn’t need to change clothes. Did wash the dog slobber off my face and hands while Manfred calibrated the gate. The K-9 teams went through first, each human officer holding their canine teammate. Then Kyle, Evalyne, and Phoebe stepped through to verify that all was well wherever we were landing.
Colette and Len received a go-ahead text from Kyle, so she went next, leaving me, Manfred, and Len. But before we could step through, Mrs. Maurer stuck her head in. “You have an additional teammate coming.” She backed out and said addition joined us in the bathroom. A very handsome, human addition.
“Jeff, Chuck, Buchanan, and your mother want me going along, Kitty,” Kevin Lewis said, flashing me a grin. He was a former pro football player who my mother had recruited into the P.T.C.U. early on in his career. He was tall, with dark black skin, twinkling dark brown eyes, fantastic teeth, and literally bags and bags of charisma. “I’m the most expendable right now in terms of what’s coming. No offense meant toward you,” he added to Len.
Kevin was married to Denise, who, besides being blonde and fair skinned, matched him in everything. They both had the best smiles and charisma to spare. Their children, Raymond and Rachel, were beautiful blends of their parents. Basically the Lewises were representing in the Humans Can Be As Hot As A-Cs department.
Kevin was also Mom’s right hand in the P.T.C.U., so if Mom wanted him along on this trip, then along Kevin would be.
“I never argue when I’m forced to travel with extra hot guys, Kevin.”
“Frankly, I’m flattered that Mister Buchanan sent you instead of coming himself,” Len said.
“I’m flattered, Kitty. And Len, I’ll try not to take that as an insult.”
Len laughed. “Never, sir.”
“Oh, stop the sir stuff with me. Like Kitty, I prefer informality, and you know it.”
“Let’s get this goat rodeo rolling, though. The faster we go over, the faster we get back.” That was me, Ms. Expedient. Len put his arm around me then stepped us through. I squeezed my eyes shut. It didn’t help.
As always, the feeling of the world rushing past me, visible out of the corners of my eyes if I was trying to be macho, and felt even with my eyes closed when I wasn’t, played havoc with my stomach. Happily, the journey was incredibly brief, and Len holding me helped considerably.
Opened my eyes to find out that, sure enough, we were in a bathroom. Nice of the police to keep to the A-Cs’ theme. Len moved us out of the way as Kevin stepped out behind us, Manfred bringing up our rear. No one looked surprised at our location. Yeah, we’d all been with Centaurion long enough—most gates were in the bathrooms of every airport, train station and, these days, bus station or any other potential transport hub we could think of.
This bathroom turned out to be in the basement level, near the holding cells. So nicely convenient for us to pass the least amount of people who might recognize that the FLOTUS was around down here, too. So far, so very good.
“Remember,” Melville said quietly, “the Chief didn’t want to bother you with this, Kitty. So we want to stay as low-key as possible. I only want to let him know you’re here if this turns out to be legit.”
“Word. And we’re all with you.”
Evalyne nodded. “Phoebe will stay with Kitty. I’ll go with the officers to secure the area.” I’d managed to get those agents assigned to my detail to accept that when it was just us, or we were with those in my inner circle, or we needed to be cool, they should use my first name, not my title. Thankfully, Evalyne and Phoebe were quick studies and had seen the wisdom of this early on. Chummy first names for others, however, weren’t necessarily on their docket.
So, Evalyne and the K-9 team headed off. Manfred nudged me. “I’ll go make doubly sure that we’re all okay in here.” He zipped off at hyperspeed, presumably to check out the entire building, not just this floor.
Looked around, for lack of anything else to do. It was a unisex bathroom with five stalls and five sinks and not much else, other than décor that didn’t seem necessary. Whoever had sent the weird turtle statue to me, though, had either sent the same to the D.C.P.D. or else the gift had been from the K-9 squad and they hadn’t shared—perhaps I hadn’t seemed enthused enough or something. But there were three rather large turtle statues in here, two of them on either side of the sinks, one near the back of the room.
All looked similar to the one I’d gotten. In fact they looked enough alike that they could have all been the same—the only difference was that they were each posed a little differently. Why anyone wanted turtle statues in here I had no idea, let alone ones about three feet tall. Of course, why I would want one was just as much of a mystery. However, right now, this wasn’t my circus and, therefore, these weren’t my monkeys. Or turtles.
Unsurprisingly, Manfred was back first to distract me from the D.C.P.D.’s odd decorating and possibly gift-giving choices. Hyperspeed rocked as always. “They’re ready. No one’s down here but those who came with us.” He shook his head. “I looked at all the prisoners. None of them are familiar to me.”
“Well, you haven’t spent as much time up close and personal with most of our enemies as I have. Let’s go see what’s what and who’s on first.”
“We’ll go at hyperspeed,” Phoebe said. “That way no one other than the one prisoner we want to see will get a glimpse of Kitty.”
This plan made sense, so we hooked up and did the Hyperspeed Daisy Chain. Meaning we were with the others in an instant. Only, as I looked around, Phoebe’s plan wasn’t actually going to work because while the cells were metal and sturdily made they weren’t exactly private. The design was sort of doubled-up chain link, but there was enough visibility for the prisoners to see who was in the other cells.
There were five cells down here—two were large and had people in them, women in one, men in the other. There were three smaller cells in between the two larger ones. Two were empty, but the middle one had someone in it. We stopped in front of the middle one.
Looked into the cell. There was definitely a woman in here but, as Manfred had said, she didn’t look familiar. Casey had been a stewardess, and she was an attractive brunette who was around my age. The woman in this cell had scraggly gray hair and looked like she’d chain smoked 24/7 since grade school.
She knew me, though, because her eyes widened and she came closer. And as she did, I realized that I did know her and it was indeed Casey Jones—at least as I’d expect her to look about sixty years in the future and, you know, after smoking all the cigarettes in the world.
“Casey, what the hell happened to you?”
“Cliff Goodman’s insanity happened to me,” she rasped out. “You have to stop him.”