What the hell are they doing? The “Rest Area 1 mile” sign flashed by, and Cal breathed a term of surpassing, wonder-filled profanity.
Looked as if someone had to empty his bladder. Which gave him a perfect opportunity. He kissed two fingers and rapped the hot dash, a little habit left over from his high school days, and hit his blinker to move into the right-hand lane.
This part of New Mexico was a whole lot of absolutely nothing, even with the smogshimmer of a city in the distance, a diseased heart drawing all the traffic toward it. Low scrub, sagebrush and rolling heat, endless reels of barbwire along the side of the freeway as if anyone would be stupid enough to veer off into the wilderness.
Whoever was driving had to be desperate or insane, because a rest stop that close to Texas wasn’t likely to be maintained with any modicum of bleach or even simple soap. A hole in the ground might be more sanitary, and the smell would lead even a normal to suspect that was what most people chose over the low brick building bearing COWS and BULLS signs on indifferently painted sand-bleached doors that hung dispirited on either side of a concrete walkway swimming with trash.
The parking lot was deserted except for a couple big rigs simmering at the far end, their drivers either napping or cooking up whatever chemical cocktail would get them another few hundred miles down the road. The blue Ford coasted to a stop, the scanner turned all the way off, and Cal opened the door, unfolding himself, seemingly paying only a little attention to the SUV and trailer. His peripheral vision was very good, and he could see the damn thing was padlocked shut.
Christ, it doesn’t have air-conditioning. What if she’s not in there, and I’ve wasted all this time?
It didn’t bear thinking about, so he shelved it and looked at the brick outhouse. Even from here, it reeked. The wind veered, hot and rasping like a cat’s tongue, and from the simmering black-painted trailer came a thin thread of impossibly golden scent.
Holy... The words fell away, because the SUV’s doors were opening, and Cal’s lengthening strides had to get him into the strike zone now.
Two big slabs of beef, both with nicely tailored suits and shiny wingtips, coming out of the SUV. Both of them had shades on, and everything slowed down.
“’Scuse me!” he called, just loud enough. “Hey, I’m wondering if you can help me? My radiator’s a little messed up.”
“Sir.” The man-mountain on the passenger side, his crewcut menaced and Butch-waxed into motionless terror, put one hand up, palm out. “I’m going to have to ask you to step back.”
“It’s my radiator!” Cal said cheerfully. “I thought I was going to have to flag someone down, but here you are! It’s lucky, you know?” That Escalade’s got air-conditioning. An unfamiliar heat in his belly, flaring up like paper tinder. Putting a woman in a closed-up trailer like that and driving her through a Southwest scorcher—were they trying to kill her?
“Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to step back,” the passenger repeated, and Cal’s brain was already clicking through the next few moments.
A slight forward bounce, his hand whipping forward, the strike blurring solidly home into the solar plexus. One more gift from the virus—you got so sick you thought you were going to die, and if you survived, you found out normal people were moving through the world on half speed at best, and that the borders of “physically possible” had been pushed way, way back.
And their limits made more elastic.
Passenger Beef stopped cold, his mouth falling open as shocked heart and lungs struggled to function. Cal was at close quarters then, his hand flicking out and divesting the big guy of his service piece. A .38—he was a traditionalist, and also an idiot, but that ceased to matter because the driver had started to realize something was wrong.
Fortunately, said driver—just as big as Passenger Beef, though with a crewcut not quite as shiny and a pair of bright yellow nylon socks visible because one of his trouser legs had rucked up from being crushed against the seat—had been intent on hurrying across the concrete strip to plunge into the malodorous hell of the BULLS side of the rest station. Which meant Cal was on him before he’d even finished turning around, and the greenstick crack of a neck breaking was lost under the rumble of traffic from the freeway.
He glanced at the semis parked at the other end of the rest stop. One corpse, another soon-to-be-corpse needing to be questioned if possible, both of them needing to be frisked—but the trailer was just sitting there, getting hotter and hotter with each passing moment.
You jackasses. He bent, swiftly feeling for anything like keys. “No way to treat a lady,” he muttered and headed back to the SUV. Passenger Beef, sprawled half in the knife-edged shade, made a short grunting noise as Cal approached, but his face was rapidly purpling. It was almost a mercy, and the drumming of the man’s heels on the concrete as the last nerve impulses fired wildly. This one had a ring of keys, and Cal glanced up again. Nobody here, just those two semis in the distance, dots of sagebrush, the faraway smog-cloud of Cuartova and the dry fine dirt. He might as well have been on the moon, but that could change at any moment if some yahoo decided chancing a rest area out here was necessary. Or if one of the semi drivers had seen anything amiss through the heat ripples over pavement.
You’re not so bad, Tracy whispered in his memory. Her sunny smile, standing at the front of the classroom, a chorus of children’s voices following hers obediently. Not as bad as you think.
“Plenty bad enough,” Cal muttered and glanced over the key ring.
Time to get the lady out of hock.
* * *
Hours of hot, breathless calm, the road going by a few feet below Trinity’s head as she lay wedged on the rumbling metal floor, enough air sliding through to puff against her face and the metal not as hot as it could be. Heartbeat slowed, respiration shallow, metabolic processes dialed as far down as she could get them and still retain a soupy half-consciousness. Hopefully, she would still have some drug-supported clarity when they opened the back door—if they weren’t simply driving in circles waiting for her to mummify in here.
Two percent chance they would choose something so inefficient. The machine inside her head barely hummed, calculating that number. Someone had snatched her from the police. This seemed sloppy for Division, but perhaps they had been forced to move with whatever resources were on-site? That would mean they’d traced her to the supermarket somehow.
The thought of Tengermann being interrogated caused a tickle in her throat, one she suppressed as the trailer slowed. Spread out on the floor, she had maximized friction to keep her from sliding around too badly, and the deceleration was gradual enough that she didn’t move.
Come back online or stay down? This half-conscious state conserved energy and made reasonably sure she would still have some active residue from the pill when she was prodded back into alertness. If she brought herself back now, she would perhaps burn some of that precious clarity for no true benefit.
The trailer bumped to a stop, and the thrumming of the diesel engine died. After so long, it was almost a shock. She inhaled smoothly, rising to three-quarters conscious, slowly, ever so slowly.
Sounds of movement. The faraway hum of traffic. Empty air around the trailer—the temperature began to rise again. She would need fluids soon; dehydration cut physical effectiveness in steadily mounting percentages the longer it was endured. She began to calculate the exact volume of water she would require based on her last weigh-in, and wonder if she should add a salt tablet to the equation, when a scrape of metal brought her up into full singing alertness.
It was the padlock on the back of the trailer clicking open and the bars over the door unlatching. Trinity tensed as her entire body roared into readiness, a flush of sweat all over her, her body realizing she needed all its resources now, fight-or-flight chemicals dumping into her bloodstream in precisely calibrated ticks. Just enough to
sharpen her and ready her for combat, not enough to turn her into a blind mess.
The door was heaved open, late-afternoon sunshine scorching, Trinity’s eyes closed so the sudden light didn’t blind her while her pupils obeyed the imperative to shrink so she could open them more quickly than a normal’s.
She had intended to stay still and sprawled until one of them climbed in to bind and drag her, but someone hopped lightly into the trailer, making the shocks bounce. A familiar smell—male, musky, agent-intense and terrifying—rode the faint whoosh of fresh air into the close confines, and her fight-or-flight chemicals were no longer calibrated. They flooded her, a copper taste filling her mouth.
It was him. It was Eight.
How was irrelevant. The only thing that mattered now was survival.
The feverish flow of calculation boiled away in a nuclear flash of white terror, and she was barely aware of moving as he bent over her, her lips peeled back in a snarl and her leg pistoning out. One boot sole caught him, not in the groin but high up on his thigh, and he huffed out a pained little grunt of surprise.
Get past him, and run. That was the simplest directive. She was past caring if it was the most efficient one.
“Hey! Ow!” He sounded surprised, wasting breath as she scrabbled and thrashed, trying to get her feet under her. He pitched forward, almost landing on her, a sudden deadfall weight. He was going to grab her, snap her neck perhaps—it was the most efficient way, so she kicked again, clawing at him when he tried to trap her in a bear hug. “Hey! Calm down, woman!”
Everything turned red, and Trinity erupted into blurring-fast motion, wriggling in the only direction she had left, toward the front of the trailer and striking out with fists and feet. He slapped the strikes away, freely sweating as well because he had to work to keep her trapped between him and the floor. She clawed a long furrow on his face and scrambled back, away, freeing her legs with a violent twist.
Her back hit the front of the trailer with a hollow boom, and he curled up to his knees, pushing her backpack—she had intended to leave it there while she dealt with whoever opened the door—aside. She had no weapons but body and brain, and now she regretted leaving her gun behind. Acquiring another wouldn’t be difficult—this was America, after all—but it looked as if she wouldn’t get a chance to do so.
She certainly wouldn’t be able to get her hands on one to help during the present situation unless he had one and she could somehow disarm him.
He stayed on his knees, watching her as her legs moved a little, trying to propel her backward through the metal wall. Her breath came in harsh swells, and she tried to analyze his likely next attack. His psych profile didn’t indicate any sadism, but an agent was trained to do the job with whatever tools were required—did he want to talk to her? An admission of guilt?
“Hey.” He spread his hands, as if he wasn’t tense and ready for action, should she attack again. “Calm down. I’m here to help. It’s Trinity, right?”
Her head tilted slightly, taking this in. Her hair fell over her shoulders, an irritant but not a critical distraction. His pulse was up, respiration, too, and it was difficult to think with his smell filling up the trailer. It was a...pleasant...aroma, she decided, even as her hands patted lightly at her pockets, searching for anything likely to help her now.
He was much larger and had the advantage. Trinity was dehydrated, exhausted, even though the virus would be quietly turning fatigue waste into energy, and much smaller, though quicker and coldly determined to survive.
“Hi.” He smiled, a familiar sight from the taped interviews and debriefs she’d analyzed for Bronson. Blue eyes, warm and welcoming, his entire manner calm and easy. A rasp of golden stubble along his cheeks. “Trinity, right? I’m Cal.”
Endless analysis. She knew his file, had read his psych evaluations. What could she use? Emotional noise was a factor here; what was he thinking? She should be able to predict.
Unfortunately, brutally deep, wine-red fear fogged and clogged the machine in her head.
“I know who you are.” Her own throaty whisper surprised her.
“I’m not here to hurt you.” Even and calm. Blond hair longer than it had been while he was in the program, and the navy T-shirt straining his broad shoulders added to well-worn jeans as good camouflage. He didn’t have a hat, though. His smell didn’t alter. Most people knew on some level when they were lying, and their pheromones shouted it, not to mention their respiration and pulse rates. The exceptions, of course, were certain sociopaths—and agents, with their very good control over autonomics. “Okay? I am here to help.”
Help? “Chasing me across a rooftop is helping?”
He looked puzzled for a moment, then shook his golden head. “That wasn’t me.”
Does he think I’m stupid? Also, irrelevant. She edged half a step sideways, testing, and stopped dead when he tensed, his broad shoulders turning hard as iron.
And yet, his tone dropped. Level, soothing. “Look, you know Holly, right? Reese’s girl? She told me you thought I was after you to hurt you. I’m not.”
Trinity absorbed this. She had seen Holly Candless herself not so long ago, down in the sinking stink and filth of Sinaloa. Candless had appeared well and whole, and Agent Six’s emotional noise over her had blossomed into something that seemed...
Trinity couldn’t find the word, even though she knew there was a proper one that fit. Each second that ticked by was a second less of the precious clarity she had from the pill, and it also put her at more of a physical disadvantage. He watched her, blue eyes narrowed but friendly, and she let out a long, shaky breath.
“You can’t possibly expect me to trust you.” She took care to make the words just on the edge between flat and conciliatory.
“Yeah, well, I just liquidated the two idiots who were driving you around in a locked horse trailer. And I’m about to offer you some food, and maybe a cold beer, and transport out of this neck of the redneck woods. Will that earn me a little trust?”
“Why would you do that?” It was not making sense. Analysis shifted inside her head, a whole new, unsettling constellation forming.
His smile widened a little, became lopsided. Trinity watched, fascinated. She’d never seen that expression in person before, only on screens. It was...pleasant...to have it directed at her. Perhaps that was part of what the profile insisted was his “interpersonal charm.”
“You smell good,” he said quietly. “You smell really good.”
The absurdity of it hit her. Trinity shook her head. “I’m not a gemina.”
“A gemiwhatsis? Oh, yeah. That.” The smile, no longer lopsided, crinkled the corners of his eyes, and his stubble was more tawny than gold. He was lion-coloured and had a big cat’s lazy grace. “We’ll figure that out later. For now, though, you think we could get out of here? Sooner or later someone’s going to want to stop, and my transport’s had a hell of a day. Plus, I’ll bet you want some water, right? You’re probably thirsty. All you have to do is come with me.”
Basic interrogation protocol. Offer your target aid, play the good cop. She knew the drill, but was not prepared for how effective it was likely to be in her current state. So she hedged. “Where?”
“Does it really matter? But since you’re asking, we’ll head into that city a few klicks away and find a hide for the night. And that beer. Do you like beer?”
“I don’t know.” Trinity went even more still, calculating options. Then he did something very odd.
Cal reached down, slowly, and picked up her backpack. He zipped it closed and slid it along the floor toward her.
She snatched at it, careful not to overbalance, watching him the entire time, tense and ready in case he struck. “You aren’t with Division?” Would he tell me if he was?
“Nope. Not anymore. I’m a free man, honey, and I’d like to stay that way.
Can we get out of here?”
She had assumed, all this time, that he knew of her involvement with the Moritz woman’s death.
If he did not, he might conceivably be an ally. For the moment, at least. “You’re going to have to back up.”
“Okay. But can you give me your word that you won’t bolt?”
My word? It was a very strange request. It outright assumed a level of trust. “Provisionally, yes.”
He just nodded and moved backward, an awkward toe-and-heel-and-knee shuffle, and she realized he was trying to appear smaller. Less threatening.
Perhaps he thought she was less likely to bolt if he did so.
She edged forward, dried sweat cracking on her skin, crusting in crevices. The trailer’s floor was dusty, and her hair was full of that thin, fine grit. She forced herself to analyze, to consider the problem from every angle as Cal hopped out of the trailer with easy fluidity, landing soundless and gilded in the sudden flood of light. The scratch down his cheek from her nails was already closing up.
His healing factor had accelerated. Just like hers. Interesting.
Trinity eased forward just a little more, and her peripheral vision caught a flash of blue. She glanced—it was the same car that had struck the agent behind her.
Perhaps Eight was being reasonably truthful. Trinity’s shoulders slumped a fraction. She measured distance, probability and her own resources, and arrived at a strange conclusion.
I might as well.
* * *
It was enough to make Cal believe in sheer dumb luck. She was alive. Her hair, not pulled back, was full of golden highlights burning in the westering sun, her dark eyes actually a very deep mossy green, and she was so thin he could almost count her ribs under her button-down and tank top. But she was ambulatory and breathing, and got in the passenger side after he moved his gear, clutching her backpack like a schoolgirl and keeping her knees well clear of the now-silent scanner.