The upload finishes with a satisfying ping and I close Alice’s laptop, leaving it exactly as I found it. This is followed by a satisfying pop from the toaster. I follow the intoxicating aroma of burning high fructose corn syrup and enriched flour through the living room.
As I turn into the kitchen, I find the barrel of a gun in my face.
My eyes rack focus from the gun barrel to the pointer of said gun—like a camera in a Hitchcock film—and I see Alice staring back at me.
“Slowly drop to your knees with your hands behind your back.”
Fuck fuck fuck fuck, I am thinking and mentally slap myself hard because I know I can’t let the fact that it’s Alice holding the gun influence me to react in any other way than that of a cornered predator. Then I start to think this is a potentially hot sex scenario and have to slap myself mentally again, this time a bit harder. Which kind of makes it even more of a sex scenario. Fuck!
So many questions. What’s she doing here? Why did she lie about D.C.? Does she know it’s me? No fucking way. Even if her people are watching me, those goons couldn’t possibly have tracked me across the rooftops on a moonless, cloudy night in a black, completely nonreflective ninja suit! So, she lied. She needed to buy a little time away from me with the bullshit uncle story. Or maybe she just forgot something?
“Are you deaf asshole? Get down now!”
Glock 22. Five-pound trigger. She’s about a nanosecond from double tapping my face with a couple of hollow point nines. Looking at her face in this moment, I get a glimpse of the real Alice—whatever her name is—and her raw power sends a chill down my spine. But I need to make a move, pretty much now, or she is going to kill me. I do as she says and drop to my knees. This makes it possible for me to fall to my side and sweep her legs out from under her. As she falls hard, hitting her head and losing her gun, I’m thinking that people in law enforcement are just at too much of a disadvantage. They have to try to bring you in first. They can’t just shoot you, which is what she should have done if she expected to survive this. Right now she’s kicking herself for not shooting me and working out some story with her superiors later. After all, a ninja strapped with all manner of weaponry invading your home is pretty much automatic grounds for lethal self-defense.
But I’m thinking too much because she is now off the ground and on her feet as fast as me. We square off. Her war face is so funny I want to laugh out loud, until she slams her foot in my guts and knocks most of my wind out. I say most because the Kevlar lessens the impact of body blows by distributing force to a wider surface area. It still hurts like hell, but that small advantage allows me to counterattack instead of doubling over and fighting for air. I don’t care how tough you are, a shot to the breadbasket puts you into instant survival mode, trying to draw the life-giving breath that just got violently pushed out of you like a burst balloon. Why do you think boxers and MMA fighters do thousands of sit-ups? That muscle armor keeps you from going into the perfect position to receive a knee to the nose that could put your lights out for good.
To counter, I pretend to start to double over and catch her knee in my hands on the upswing. I hook the knee under my arm and do a hard vertical clean and jerk. She flips backward. Her knees land on the kitchen counter and send her torso pitching forward. One of the hands that shoots out to defend her head from hitting the floor makes a snap sound. Her finger is broken and she yelps from the pain. I instantly feel terrible and hate myself for it.
I know in that moment I cannot kill her—which would be the best tactical decision I could make for so many reasons—but my purity is dead with her. I can’t do it, and now I need to get the fuck out of here without inflicting too much damage. But the one thing standing in the way of that goal is Alice. She uses her good hand to flip herself onto her feet and set her broken finger in one smooth move. She’s pissed. Not so pissed that her judgment is affected. Pissed that she allowed things to get this far, a feeling that is clearly new for her.
She puts her hands up. Fucking Keysi Fighting Method. If she’s any good, this is going to suck. It employs a 360-degree rotational attack zone and the use of any and all available objects. As I am choosing fight styles in my head to best counter her, she smashes the top off a saltshaker and expertly whips the salt into my eyes. There you have it. I’m completely blind and my eyes are in searing pain. I want to yell out “The old salt in the eyes trick, eh?” but don’t have a chance because she is coming at me with everything in the kitchen—Jackie Chan style. She uses a stool to buckle my knees and breaks a heavy pot over my back. I feel her slacks as she goes to finish me with a KitchenAid mixer and use the fabric to literally climb up her body with my gloves. The mixer falls away harmlessly as I get her into an Eagle Claw grappling hold, swiveling her in front of me and encircling her neck with my free arm. To avoid her stomping feet, I leap backward with her in my arms and land on the kitchen counter. I wrap my legs around her chest and pull her in like a sea otter pulls in an oyster it is about to crack.
But I don’t crack her. Instead of shutting off her windpipe, I use my legs to constrict her chest cavity—like a boa constrictor. This actually forces blood to her head and heart while making it impossible for her to breathe. She passes out, but only due to increased pressure in the brain transmitted through the veins returning to the chest. This is common in crush injury patients. I do it this way because I don’t want her to suffer irreparable brain damage from oxygen deprivation.
If that’s not love, I don’t know what is.
I check her vitals as I lay her on the floor. Strong heartbeat. Autonomic nervous system has kicked in and she is breathing steadily. She looks and sounds like when we are in bed together and it makes me a little sad. But there is no room for sadness in this business. And there is no room for what I think I am feeling right now. It’s what saved Alice’s life tonight, and it’s what I now know will be the end of me.
As I sit there by the kitchen window, trying to catch my breath, I look back at Alice and she’s gone. Seconds later, she opens fire. I jump through the serving window that separates the kitchen from her minuscule dining room and slide across the table. I sprint for the bedroom window as she fires expertly through the wall at what she believes is my path. But I am very low to the ground. If I had been standing straight, she would have killed me for sure. As I lunge to dodge bullets, I’m hoping that I remember correctly that there’s a Dumpster in the alley below Alice’s bathroom window.
I know what you’re thinking because you’ve been reading this handbook and heeding my words about life imitating art:
That only works in the movies.
True. But it is an option in real life, just not a very pleasant one. Let’s get one thing straight: garbage is not soft. It’s like jumping into a Burmese tiger trap full of punji sticks with all the glass bottles, wire hangers, and broken plastic. Hell, a cardboard milk carton feels like a cinder block when you fall on it at terminal velocity. But the air that’s in the trash bags is what I’m counting on. Even though I will be shredded by what’s in them, that split second wherein I push the air to the edges of the bag and force it to pop creates a measure of stopping power that impedes my rapid progress toward the iron hard Dumpster bottom. Having said all that, I’m not even sure the motherfucker is down there. And in order to keep from getting shot, I will be diving through the window, hoping to narrowly miss the fire escape on either side. Basically, I’m going to attempt something similar to what Trinity did in The Matrix. Spoiler alert!
I focus, sprint, and leap like Superman, my fists leading the way. No time to turn my body and go feet first. Alice rounds the corner as I am in midair and empties her clip. Bullets zip past with that horrible air-ripping sound that you hear just before it becomes a flesh-ripping or bone-crunching sound. As I smash through the glass, I feel a bullet tear through my shoe and take out a healthy chunk of my heel. Then I somersault like a Mexican cliff diver and point my feet toward the ground.
The only thing below me is a hot dog
cart.
27
* * *
A MOMENT OF CLARITY
Just kidding. There is a Dumpster below and it’s full. Thank God it isn’t garbage day. I feel like I am falling forever, windmilling my arms to maintain orientation and target trajectory. My feet slam into the first few bags and I hear and feel a ton of glass breaking. Why don’t motherfuckers in Manhattan recycle! I feel the shards biting at my suit as I plunge into the plastic pillow of edges, filth, and stink. I finally hit bottom and the pain from my wounded heel shoots into my brain like a 10,000-volt electric shock. That, and the smell of hundreds of putrescent baby diapers make me puke immediately. A bullet rips through the bags and ricochets around the garbage can. I look up. Alice is coming down the fire escape, trying to get a good shot. I jump and take off down the alley. By the time she hits pavement I am long gone.
As I nurse my wounds in my apartment, I start going through the data I uploaded from Alice’s laptop. I’m ecstatic to see that the FBI still considers Bendini their prime suspect in the stolen witness protection data case. The longer they stay off Locke, the better. I find myself feeling a little disappointed in Alice’s detective skills but remember that she doesn’t have the resources I have at my disposal. Her people have to gather intel legally. Mine by any means necessary. The most interesting thing is that, at one point, her superiors recommended that I be treated as a person of interest! Holy shit. Their reasoning was never stated in their e-mail communications. Eventually she told them she disagreed with their assessment, and then they dropped it. Alice, you little minx. What did I tell you? Love trumps all. Alice was protecting me! Who knows what they would have found if she had agreed to dig into my life.
So now let’s talk about the elephant in the room: Alice lied about her so-called uncle and about leaving town. Why would she do that? The scenarios are buzzing in my head like noisome flies when my phone rings—not the Bob phone, but the one assigned to my persona. I look at the display. It’s Alice. Shit. Shit. Shit. I send it to voice mail so I have time to think while she figures it was just a bad connection and moves to a better spot to dial again. Her bedroom has the best coverage so she’s probably walking there from the kitchen while attempting to clean up with her broken finger before her sweep team arrives to dust for prints and search for other evidence of my presence that they will never find.
The phone rings again. I answer.
“Hey, how’s D.C.?”
“I need to see you. Now. Where are you?”
She sounds desperate and afraid.
“Waiting for a table at Morton’s. Where are you?”
“Home.”
“Alice, what’s going on?”
“Just get over here quickly please.”
She hangs up.
Fantastic. No idea what’s going to happen now. Asking her more questions will just arouse her suspicion. Not showing up will solidify said suspicion. If she confronts me because she believes it was me in her apartment tonight, then she has a team there and they’re going to try to take me down. No way she’ll confront me about it if she isn’t ready to go all OK Corral on me. Bob is not going to like this. Not one bit. My concealment of Alice as a federal agent is already enough to get me killed. Potentially blowing the operation by getting into a ruckus with a team of federal agents who consider me a prime suspect and who believe I assaulted one of their own is enough to get me burned alive. I have no choice but to go cowboy on this. I will go to her apartment hoping for the best and preparing for the worst.
I attempt to survey the area as I walk up to her building. I don’t see the telltale signs of men with lots of guns waiting to pounce. There are no undercover dipshits trying to look natural. There are no black cars or SUVs parked in strange places. Seriously, the feds need to just buy normal cars that look like everyone else’s cars. Crown Vics and Tahoes are a dead giveaway. I also wear a tiny scanner in my ear with a supersensitive antenna. I keep switching all around the channels to find their chatter. Those guys never shut the fuck up. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve made the feds because of their incessant radio chatter. It’s like listening to a bunch of coked-up auctioneers at a strip club salad bar.
I knock on Alice’s door. In my left jacket pocket I’m holding a flash grenade. In my right, a full auto Glock 18 machine pistol with a seventeen-round magazine. That kind of firepower will at least give me a fighting chance to get out of the building. If shit goes down, Alice becomes my human shield, I pop anyone standing between me and the door, and Alice gets a pill under the chin before I get my ass out of there. I’ve been nervy waiting for a lot of bad things to pop off, but never like this. I can feel the sweat dripping down my sides.
She opens the door and looks at me for a beat. Then she wraps her arms around me and starts to cry.
“What the hell is going on?”
She pulls me into her apartment and stands under the lamp. I see the awful cuts and bruises all over her and I feel like I might puke again. This makes it easier for me to act convincingly surprised to see what has happened to her and I use that to my advantage.
“Oh my God. WHAT HAPPENED?”
“Someone broke in. John, he tried to kill me.”
“When? I thought you were leaving tonight.”
“A few hours ago. I felt bad about missing dinner with you so I booked a later flight. I was going to change and surprise you. When I came home, he was here.”
I hate myself. Even more than usual.
“What happened?” I say as I look at the bullet holes in the wall.
“We fought. I have a gun, so . . .”
“You have a gun?”
“A lot of women have guns in New York, John.”
“Sorry. I’m just in shock. Did you call the cops?”
“Yeah, they were here.”
That’s when I notice the mess left behind by her sweep team—latex gloves, fingerprint dust, paper packets for swabs and whatever. Fucking slobs, those guys.
“What did they say?”
“I filed a report. They’ll never catch him. He was wearing a mask, so I couldn’t even give them a description.”
“A mask? Jesus.”
“Can you just hold me? I don’t want to talk about it right now.”
“Yes. I’m so sorry.”
We embrace. It’s a very strong embrace. Feels like she’s afraid she’ll fall and never stop if she lets go.
“Sorry about your steak.”
“Forget it. I’m just glad you’re all right.”
“Let’s go to bed.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah. I’m going to explode if we don’t.”
She laughs. Her split lip cracks and bleeds. I feel sick again. I kiss her and taste the blood. She starts to undress me. I start to do the same, but then I remember my heel. If I take off my sock I’m finished. She will see the bloody bandage and she will know. If you don’t think she knows what she hits with that gun, think again. I found all of her spent targets in a shoebox when I was snooping around one night. She obviously prides herself on her marksmanship. I guarantee you she remembers hitting her assailant in the foot less than three hours ago. Not to mention the fact that I’m covered in bruises and scrapes from my little Dumpster dive.
Then it hits me. All of this is irrelevant anyway. Alice is no longer an asset to me, so keeping up this charade of boyfriend-girlfriend is unnecessary. I’ve gotten what I needed from her. She doesn’t suspect I was the one in her apartment. I’m free and clear with her, and this is no longer about the job, so there’s no point in continuing to risk everything with Bob.
Part of what I was feeling when I came over here was a sense of responsibility. I was feeling protective and I wanted to comfort her. These are not feelings associated with an asset. And they are potentially lethal. Not only to me but also to her. Bottle flies. Another gray, bloated corpse goes unnoticed in Gotham until the smell gets to be too much for Mrs. Shavitz on the third floor. The dirty amber film of death over her l
ifeless eyes. This grim diorama is only going to be filled with more hideous things if I continue with Alice. I think about the assignment and my own welfare and I realize I simply don’t give a fuck about myself or HR, Inc. I give a fuck about Alice. My feeling of responsibility for her, the very thing driving me to stay with her tonight, is also the very thing that’s going to make me walk out that door. She’ll be hurt, but hurt is better than dead.
This is my moment of clarity.
I stop kissing her and pull away. I know exactly what will turn her against me, what will poison the well. Just like I know how to kill people, I know how to kill this.
“What’s wrong?” she asks.
“I just . . . don’t think this is a good idea. After what happened.”
“But I’m the person it happened to and I think it is a good idea.”
“You’re not really in a great frame of mind right now.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“You think sex will make it all go away, but it won’t.”
“I don’t think sex will make it go away. I think it will make me feel better, safer, comforted, and supported. I know you’re a fucking robot, but try to understand things from the human perspective for once.”
“Why do you have to attack me when you don’t get what you want?” I’m really laying it on thick. “You’re like a child having a temper tantrum.”
“Yeah because I get what I want. It’s called having balls. You should try a pair on for size sometime.”
“Maybe I should go.”
“Perfect. As soon as you have to feel anything the only thing you can think to do is run out the fucking door. Look at me! You get this too, asshole. Not just the fun and games. I’m hurting and scared and I need you right now. Look me in the eye and tell me you’re going to walk out that fucking door.”