Steve shrugged. “You got me, dude,” he whispered. “Honestly, I’m not sure I want to—”
Carolyn poked him again, and Steve shut up. On TV, one of the reporters asked about an upcoming arms summit with the Russians. The president said that the location wasn’t fixed yet, but that both he and the Russian liked the idea of doing it in Reykjavik, “if nothing else, for auld lang syne.” All the reporter people laughed.
Steve didn’t get the joke. That’s the president, though, for really real. He felt dazed. Mrs. McGillicutty got all the cable channels, and the press conference was covered live on two of them. When it had started, he’d flipped back and forth between C-SPAN and Fox News, thinking maybe it was some sort of elaborate hoax, that they’d just gotten an actor who…
Carolyn was looking at him.
“OK,” Steve said. “Let’s say I believe that you can get the president to sign a pardon for me.” He was surprised to realize he actually did believe that. “We still have a problem.”
“Which is?”
“I have no reason at all to think that you will. You may remember, the last time I agreed to run an errand for you I ended up in jail. The day before yesterday my asshole lawyer said, and I quote, I was ‘on a fast track to death row.’ ”
Carolyn’s brow furrowed. She brushed her hair back with her fingers. “I’m sorry about that. Really. It was unavoidable. If you do this for me, I can and will make it better.” She reached behind the couch and tossed him the duffel bag full of money she had brought to the bar. “Here’s your cash, by the way.”
Steve looked down at the bag, then back up at her. The way she tossed it to him suggested a couple of possibilities. One was that she didn’t give a fuck about $327,000. Another was that she knew Steve wasn’t going to be around long enough to spend it. Still, he told himself, it’s not like you have a lot of choices.
They’d been watching the news for an hour or so. Prior to the surprise press conference, one of the big stories had been his “escape”—Steve thought “kidnapping” would be more accurate, but no one asked him—from jail. Apparently the body count was up in the thirties. CNN was speculating that Steve might be the head of some hitherto unsuspected drug cartel. Fox thought he was probably part of a terrorist organization. Everybody seemed to agree that he was really, really dangerous. They flashed his mug shot about every ten minutes.
The big guy came back out of the room again. He wasn’t grinning anymore. As he walked past, he glowered in a way that made Steve distinctly uneasy. He grabbed a couple of candles off the dining-room table and disappeared again, muttering under his breath.
When he was gone, Steve turned to Carolyn. “What did he say?”
“Hmm? Who?”
“Tutu Guy. He keeps grabbing stuff. I’m just curious—what did he say?”
“Oh.” Distracted, she searched her memory for a moment. “He said, ‘I just can’t reach her. Not anymore. I just can’t.’ ”
“Huh.” Steve, baffled, meditated on this for a moment. “Any idea what he means by—”
“Would you like a brownie?” Mrs. McGillicutty asked.
Steve opened his mouth to say No, thanks, but what came out was “Don’t mind if I do!” Three weeks of jail food had left him with an appetite. Plus, the brownies were ridiculously good. Mrs. McGillicutty brought him some milk as well. When he was done he turned to Carolyn. “I don’t suppose you’ve got a cigarette?”
“Sure.” She rooted around in her sweater and fished out a pack of Marlboros with some matches tucked into the cellophane. “Can you pay attention now? Pretty please?”
“Yeah, all right.” They glared at each other as they lit up. “So, what exactly is it that you want?”
“How good of you to ask. Finally. The reason we broke you out of jail is that we want you to go for a jog.”
Steve blinked, thumped his cigarette. “Say again?”
“You’re a jogger, right?” He did vaguely remember mentioning something of the sort when they talked at the bar. “We’d like for you to go for a jog.”
“That’s it?”
“And pick something up.”
Here it comes, he thought. “What sort of something?”
“We don’t know, exactly. We know with a very high degree of precision where it is, but it could look like anything.”
“OK…” Steve said. “But it will in fact be…what? Drugs? High explosives?” A horrible thought occurred to him. “Not some sort of nuclear shit?”
Carolyn rolled her eyes, a don’t-be-an-idiot look, and fluttered her hand. “No, no. Of course not. Nothing like that. It’s—how can I put this?—think of it as a very advanced system of perimeter defense.”
“You want me to go get you a land mine? No. Actually, hell no. I’ll take my chances in jail.”
“It’s not a ‘land mine,’ ” Carolyn said. “It’s absolutely nothing at all like a land mine. What it is, is a kind of, um…do you know what a gravity well is? It’s kind of like that, except in reverse, and it only works on certain people.”
“I have no idea what that’s supposed to mean.”
“Hmm. OK, think of it this way. Do you know how microwaves work?”
“No.”
“It’s based on microwaves.”
“Oh, wait. I just remembered. I do know how microwaves work, and what you’re saying is bullshit.”
“Fine. It isn’t microwaves. But how it works really doesn’t matter.”
“If it doesn’t matter, then why don’t you tell me?”
“Because it’s very advanced. You don’t have the background. Trust me, please?”
“Fuck no. So, you’re…what? Some sort of weapons researcher?” That, he could almost believe. “Weird professor type” covered a lot of ground. “Look, I’m not going to even consider this until you tell me what it is I’m picking up.”
“You wouldn’t—”
“Try me.”
She sighed. “It’s called a reissak ayrial. Its essence is a mathematical construct, a self-referencing tautology, consecrated in the plane of regret. The reissak works because the target has the trigger because the reissak works. The physical token that you’ll be picking up is the reissak’s projection into normal space. Do you see?”
Steve stared at her. “You invented this thing?”
“Not me. I’m more of a linguist. Can we get back to the point now?”
Steve grimaced. “Sure.” Thwarted by technobabble.
“The token that serves as the reissak’s nexus is just sitting somewhere, probably out in the open. It could be a Coke can, a McDonald’s bag, a mailbox, anything. And for most people—almost certainly including you, Steve—that’s all that it actually is.”
“But?”
“But not everyone. For some people, it’s like poison. The closer you get to it, the worse it hurts, the more damage it does. If you get close enough, it kills you.”
“So, it’s radioactive? I’m not picking up any radioactive crap.”
“No. It’s not radioactive.”
“What if I don’t believe you?”
“Then I guess you’re going back to jail, aren’t you?” she said brightly.
Steve gritted his teeth.
“It isn’t radioactive. I promise.” She sniffed, a little offended. “Nothing so crude as that.”
“How do you know this thing, whatever it is, won’t work on me?”
“Well…we don’t. Not for sure. But the only ones it does seem to work on are the people connected to Father. Regular people, people like you—FedEx drivers, pizza delivery guys, regular Americans—come and go all the time. It doesn’t seem to have any effect on them.”
“That’s why you did all this to me? You just picked me at random? Because I’m a regular guy?”
Carolyn nodded. “That’s about it, yeah.”
“Bullshit.”
She raised an eyebrow. “I’m not sure that I unders—”
“I mean,” Steve said, smiling, “that
you are fucking lying to me, you lying-ass liar.”
“Steve, I can assure you that—”
“Save it.”
“Beg pardon?”
“Don’t bother. I’m sure they’re very nice lies but, really, don’t bother. I’ll do it.”
She raised an eyebrow again.
“Discounting that duffel bag full of cash, which I seriously doubt you’d let me walk out of here with, I’ve got no money, no car, no ID, and no one I’m even close to close enough to go to for help. I figure I’d last twenty-four hours on my own, tops. Then I’d either be back in jail or, more likely, shot resisting arrest.” And if I say no, you’ll probably have that big guy cut my throat, or whatever. I don’t think he’d mind at all.
“Well,” she said, “I guess that’s good news.”
“I’m sure you can see the joy in my eyes. I have some questions, though.”
“Of course.”
“What’s the deal with the jogging? Why don’t I just drive in? It’d be quicker, and if this whatever-it-is turns out to be too heavy to carry, then I can—”
“Welllll…it’s kind of a safety precaution.”
“Oh?” He leaned forward, smiling ferociously. “Do tell.”
“If”—she held up a finger—“if you did turn out to be susceptible to the effects, of the, ah, perimeter defense, then you wouldn’t want to be in a car. At the speeds they move, you could hit a fatal depth before you really knew what was happening. On foot, you can just turn around if you start feeling sick.”
“Sick how?”
“It’s different for everybody. David got a brutal headache. My face started bleeding. Peter caught on fire. Basically, if you’re moving along feeling fine and you all of a sudden start feeling pain, turn back before it gets any worse.”
“What if I do turn out to be susceptible? Do I still get the pardon and the cash?” He wouldn’t believe her answer, but he was curious to hear what it was.
“As to the pardon, sure. All we ask is that you try. And, like I said, the money is already yours.”
“That was very convincing.”
She rubbed her forehead. “Steve, I don’t know what to say to—”
“Save it. You said you know where this thing is, but not what it is? Can you explain that to me?”
“Sure. Because of the way the perimeter-defense system works, the area that is affected is in the shape of a sphere. Basically we got a map and walked the perimeter of the circle. It has to be in the center of that.”
He thought this over. “What if it’s in a tree or buried or something? It doesn’t have to be at ground level.”
“Fair point, but we tested for that, as well.”
“How?”
“Very carefully. Look, we can go into the methods if you want, but I promise you, the object is at 222 Garrison Drive, fifty-seven feet back from the curb of the street, sitting about two feet off the ground.”
“Two feet off the ground? Is it floating?”
“It’s on the porch.”
“And you have no idea what the object is?”
She shook her head. “It could be anything. Probably it will be something small, innocuous. That porch is usually empty.”
“How do you know?”
She scrunched up her face, considering how to answer. “Because it’s my house.”
“Your house?”
“Why does that surprise you?”
“From the way you dress I figured you were homeless.”
She frowned. “Well, I’m not. The house belongs to our Father, but we all live there.”
“All who?”
She gestured at the room behind her. “My family.”
“Yeah…you keep calling these guys your family. You don’t look much alike.”
“We’re adopted.”
“All of you?”
“Yes. Father took us in when our parents died.”
“Sounds like a real prince.”
“That’s why we’re so anxious to be sure he’s OK,” she said dryly.
“So…you think, what? Somebody is trying to keep you out of your own house?”
“It appears that way, yes.”
“Any idea why?”
“Father is a more important person than he lets on. He’s…something of a kingmaker. He has powerful friends.”
That, Steve decided, might be true as well. Certainly the president had jumped when the man’s daughter said “frog.”
“And powerful enemies?” She nodded. “Yes. Some of them might like to inspect things he kept in the house. Books.”
So…what? Mob accountant? A Meyer Lansky type? “What sort of people are we talking about here? If it’s drug cartels, I think I’d just as soon take my—”
Carolyn snorted laughter.
“What’s funny?”
“I’m trying to imagine Father involved in a drug deal. No. That isn’t it.”
“Who, then?”
“I’m really not at liberty to say.” She offered a frosty smile.
“Right.” Steve sighed. “So you think one of these enemies of your dad snuck in and set your perimeter-defense system?”
“Possibly. Somebody had to put it there. The porch was empty when I left that morning. I’m sure of it. All we really know is that Father hasn’t been seen since the perimeter-defense system was set.” She fished a crooked Marlboro out of the pack and popped a wooden match alight against her lacquered thumbnail. The flame flickered a little as she held it under the end of the cigarette, amplifying a nearly imperceptible tremble.
“Maybe he was the one who set it. Did you ever think of that?”
She frowned. “That is conceivable. I really can’t imagine why he’d do something like that, but…maybe. If so, we’d like to go to him and very politely ask him why. Basically we need to get into the Library and look around. There are also reference materials there that may be of use. If you can help us with that, I absolutely guarantee you’ll walk away unharmed, wealthy, and free of criminal entanglements.”
“We’ll pretend for the moment that I believe you. Anything else?”
She bent over and unzipped the duffel bag. There was a holstered pistol inside. “You might need this.”
“Oh.”
“Is that a problem?”
“No. It’s actually sort of weirdly reassuring. Up until now this was sounding way too good to be true. Who might I be shooting, do you think?”
“Well…again, very probably no one. But as I said, Father is a powerful man. He has…bodyguards. It is possible—not likely, but possible—that they might see you jogging and take it as a threat. In that case,” she shrugged, “better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it.”
He glanced at the case. It was an HK 9mm semiautomatic. “Three magazines? That’s a lot of bullets.”
“You might be a lousy shot.”
“It so happens that I am. Which means I’m less than enthusiastic about shooting it out with professional bodyguards.”
She opened her mouth, hesitated, then shut it.
“What?”
She shook her head.
“What, Carolyn?”
“If it came down to a…an open conflict with the sentinels…you would not be alone.”
“Oh? And who, pray tell, would be helping me?”
“Friends of my brother. They’re very skilled, I promise. If it comes to that they can and will protect you. You would be safe.”
“I don’t doubt they’re very good.” And probably weird as hell. “Do you mind if I look at the gun?”
She slid the duffel bag across the table. He took the pistol out of the holster and examined it. He slipped a magazine in, cocked it, pointed it at her. “What if I just shoot you and take the money?”
She gave him a bright smile. “Then I’d be out of this nightmare, I suppose. And my brother David would kill you. He’d probably take his time about it. And we’d find someone else to do the job instead.”
She didn’t
seem even a little nervous. The sounds of sex emanating from the back room stopped. A moment later the big guy, David, peeped around the corner. He smiled at Steve. He said something to Carolyn in that birdsong language of theirs. She answered in kind.
Steve smiled back, wide and reassuring. “Just asking.” He lowered the pistol. David watched him for a moment, then grabbed another brownie and went away again. “Anything else?”
“No…no.”
“What?”
“I just…I wish there was a way to keep in touch with you while you’re out there. Doing the run. I just can’t think of anything we could…” She trailed off. “What?”
Steve was staring at her. He was thinking, This woman is…not insane, exactly…something else? What he said was, “Have you not heard of cell phones?”
“Oh,” she said. She nodded, wide-eyed and, to Steve’s increasingly practiced eye, completely full of shit. “Yeah. Sure. Lots of times.”
PART II
THE ANATOMY OF LIONS
Chapter 7
Garrison Oaks
I
About ten the next morning Steve jogged into the weeds on the shoulder of Highway 78 and slowed to a stop. Acutely aware of his mug shot on CNN, he pretended to be really interested in something in the woods until the car coming up behind him passed. It was a cool, gray morning, just right for a run.
Garrison Oaks came into view as he rounded this last bend, half a mile away and a little downhill. It didn’t look like anything special. A couple dozen houses flanked the main drive in neat rows. Three secondary roads branched off it, terminating in culs-de-sac. Some guy was out mowing his lawn. Yawn.
Steve’s burglar instincts reared up momentarily. The houses were OK, if a trifle on the modest side, but most of the cars out front were fading relics—a 1977 Cutlass Supreme, a blue Datsun, even a station wagon. Do they even make those anymore? A good rule of thumb, he’d found, was that if a dude has enough cash to drop on a new car, he’s also got enough to drop on electronic gizmos, jewelry for the wife, and other pawnable stuff. The converse, he’d found, was also true. Nah, he thought. This place isn’t worth robbing.