DEADLY SECRET

By GSc

Part One

Knight’s Bridge, VA

Tuesday Afternoon

“I don’t know,” Cassie Harrell poured a cup of coffee. “All I can say is that as far as getting around goes, she’s covered more ground than Amtrak.”

“Maria,” Carmen Herrera sipped her coffee with a smile. “I think Michael is the only man she hasn’t slept with.”

“Who hasn’t slept with Michael?” Leticia Wilkins and Marella Hounsou glided in noiselessly.

“Gabby.” Cassie handed Marella a cup of coffee. “That woman has serviced more guys than the Hair Club for Men.”

“For real,” Leticia’s dark brown face lit up with a dazzling smile.

Marella smiled as she sat. “And she wondered why her tag was ‘Village Bicycle’.”

The women all laughed.

“My God,” Leticia sat down at the blue table. “My god, that bitch logged more mileage than a set of Good Year tires.”

“Still, it sucked what happened to her,” Cassie sat down next to Leticia. “But as bad as I know this is going to sound, I don’t miss her.”

“Neither do I,” Marella idly stirred her coffee.

“Well, duh,” Cassie flipped her long hair behind her shoulder. “You like, took her job.” She looked at the other women. “What?”

“Did you take lessons, or does that just come naturally?” Marella asked calmly.

“Does what come naturally?”

“The whole blonde-bimbo act you did just now.”

“Oh, that?” Cassie smiled. “That’s just a front. I used to be like that, though. Oh, my god. I was the classic dumb blonde in high school. You want to talk stereotypes? I was the poster child for valley girls everywhere.”

The other women all smiled.

“I’m like- so serious, okay?” Cassie flipped her pale gold hair behind her shoulder and put on her best irritated ‘Daddy’s Little Princess’ act. “Like, I was just this, like, total blonde. I mean, like, oh, my God. Like it was just, like way normal for me to like, be like this.”

Michael smiled slightly from his vantage point in the doorway. “Now I know why people think blonds are airheads.”

Cassie tried not to laugh. “Sorry, sir.”

“No big,” Michael shrugged and went to get coffee. “I’ve heard all the jokes.”

“Did you hear the one about the blonde who got fired from the M&M factory?” Cassie set her coffee down.

“Yeah. She was throwing out all the ‘W’s. Did you hear the one about the blonds on the freeway?”

“No what happened?”

“Two blondes were driving down the freeway on their way to Disneyland. When they saw a sign that said ‘Disneyland left’, they turned around and went home.”

Cassie smiled. “What do you call two blondes in Iceland?”

Michael thought for a minute. This was a new one. He shook his head. “No idea.”

“Frosted flakes.”

“A blonde was drying her hair when her sister walked in. Her sister looks at her says: ‘refueling?’”

“A blonde and a brunette jumped off a building,” Cassie replied. “Why did the brunette land first?”

“The blonde had to stop and ask for directions,” Michael answered. “How do you drown a blonde?”

“Beats me.”

“Put a mirror at the bottom of the pool.”

Cassie smiled. “I’ll have to remember that one.”

“My sister told me that one.” Michael set his coffee mug on the counter.

“I guess you get a lot of blond jokes,” Leticia noted.

Michael nodded. “That’s what happens when you’re the only blond in a family of brunettes.”

“How’d that happen?”

“Same way I got my eyes when the rest of my family has brown eyes, I guess. Genetic lottery.”

“Hey, is it true?” Cassie asked.

Michael waited for the rest of the question. When Cassie didn’t speak, he decided to take matters into his own hands. “Is what true?”

“You requested a different secretary?”

“Yeah.” Michael nodded.

“Why?” Marella asked. “I mean, I don’t care. I’m glad Carmen’s up there. I just want to know why you got Gabriella transferred?”

“I wanted to stop any rumors before they got started.”

“Rumors about you and Gabrielle Ademur?” Carmen, the eternally quiet one finally spoke up. But when she did, she was hardly ever heard.

“Carmen, honey,” Leticia smiled warmly. “Go to Supply, get a voice, and then sound like you have one.”

Carmen looked down at her brown hands. She had worked long and hard to get a job and get off welfare after her husband left her and their three children. She still considered herself lucky that she was able to land a secretarial job instead of becoming a maid like her sisters and mother. But despite her accomplishments, she was still as shy and nervous as she had been the day she left her family in Mexico to find a better life in America.

She kept her eyes down. She liked her job and didn’t want to give her boss any reason to fire her. She knew he didn’t like loud noises and hated it when people shouted. As a result, she seldom spoke and when she did, it wasn’t very loud.

“It’s okay,” Michael smiled slightly. “I heard her. And yeah, but you have the wrong one. I’m talking about Gabriella Martin. Wherever Gabriella went, rumors tended to follow. And rumors about me and Gabriella were not something I needed… or wanted.”

Michael watched Carmen for a minute. He had no idea why she was so quiet, but it wasn’t any of his business, so there was no need to ask. “Anyhow, why are you guys in here chattering like a bunch of geese? I thought you only did that sort of thing in the ladies’ room.”

Marella smiled. “Girl talk can happen anywhere.”

Michael nodded. “Okay. Well, don’t mind me. I’m just getting coffee.” He picked up his mug and walked out.

“Do you think he’s angry?” Carmen watched the door close.

“Why would he be?” Leticia asked. “If he wasn’t so busy today, I’m sure he’d be right out there in the hall bonding with the guys.”

Marella shook her head slightly. “Actually, he’d be in here gossiping with us.”

“Excuse me?” Cassie’s eyebrows went up. “El, guys don’t gossip.”

“Yeah they do. They just call it ‘male bonding’. And yes, he would be in here.”

“Why? Is he like, gay?” Cassie giggled.

Marella raised her left eyebrow slightly. It was the closest she ever came to an actual shrug. “You know, I’m beginning to wonder that myself.”

“God, that’d be such a waste,” Leticia shook her head. “Men like him don’t come along every day. And let’s face it, girls, when a guy is that nice, he’s uglier than a dirty dog’s ass.”

“Yeah, but if he’s good looking,” Marella countered, “Odds are he’ll be a first-rate asshole.”

“So he has to be gay,” Cassie concluded. “No straight man can look that good and be that sweet. They’re either ass-ugly sweethearts, or good-looking assholes.”

Leticia smiled. “Just between us, I think he’s confused.”

The women laughed.

Marella shook her head and stood up. “Well, bi-curious or not, he’s still a sweet guy. And no matter which side of the road he’s on, he’s okay by me.” She left the room and headed for her desk.

The note on her desk confirmed her suspicions.

It was a completely innocuous note, but she knew what it really meant. On the paper was a drawing that resembled something a child might draw while trying to make up a maze for one of their friends to solve.

Not even Michael would know what the slip of paper was unless she told him. She folded it and put it in her purse. She had a call to make as soon as she got home.

Michael walked by on his way to the locker room and gave her a slightly searching look.

Marella looked up. She knew Michael was almost as intuitive as most women, if not more so and that he could read people’s tones and actions like books if he wanted to. Very little about anyone escaped his notice and few people were ever able to deceive him.

She wondered if he knew.

His cobalt-green eyes regarded her without any emotion. They simply looked at her. No motion, no roving, no once-over that he’d normally give someone, just a simple look.

“Got some bad news from an old friend,” Marella shrugged slightly. She knew better than to even attempt to lie to the man in front of her. He could hear a lie before it was even said.

Michael nodded slightly. He suspected it was something more than just bad news, but it wasn’t his place to pry. If it was any of his business, she’d tell him. “If there’s anything I can do, let me know.”

“Thanks. Want me to have Carmen lock up?”

“Would you? I locked my keys in my locker.”

Marella couldn’t help a smile. Michael was living proof that above-average intelligence and absent-mindedness usually went together like eggs and bacon. “Sure.”

“Thanks.” Michael walked down the hall. He wasn’t sure, but he had a bad feeling that something was wrong. He wasn’t sure what, but it was there at the back of his mind right where he couldn’t seem to pin it down or identify it. He went to the locker room and changed into his street clothes after getting lock cutters from security and cutting the lock off his locker.

He was tying the laces on his flight deck boots and mentally reviewing the scene when something occurred to him. There was a piece of paper on Marella’s desk.

He closed his eyes for a moment and focused on the paper.

The image was as clear as if it were a photograph.

White paper.

Probably from a copier or printer.

Black, circular design on the paper. Looks like a child’s version of a maze. The pattern is slightly oval in shape. Irregular lines in the middle and around the edges resemble some kind of pictograph or hieroglyphic writing.

He opened his eyes and looked down at the scuffed toe of his left boot.

Something about that paper didn’t seem right and it somehow reminded him of something that he couldn’t quite place.

He tied his shoes and put on his black jacket.

From the top shelf, he took his helmet, gloves, and reflective vest.

As he walked down the hall, the image of the paper kept coming to the front of his mind and an eerie sense of déjà vu followed on its heels.

“Thanks, Thompson.” He handed the bolt cutters back to the Marine at the security desk.

“Yes, sir.”

Michael heard the smile in the Marine’s voice. He had long ago made a point of getting to know all of his people. He was able to match faces to names and places with such ease that he could tell right away if someone was out of place, missing, or where they shouldn’t be. It also boosted morale.

Among the Marines, competition to be the best was fierce because only the best were promoted. If the boss knew who you were and that you did your job well, it gave you that much more of an edge on your competition.

Michael knew all of the Marines by sight no matter what they wore and even had a basic knowledge of their backgrounds. Who was married, who was dating, who was divorced, who were new parents, who had a child on the way, who got promoted, and who were the best at what were all things he made a point of knowing. And it made a real difference to the Marines when they found out he knew.

They didn’t know how he knew, but he knew and that was the important thing. The Sailors on the other hand, had to be handled a little differently. He knew as much about them as he did the Marines, but he dealt with them a little differently. Sailors were team-oriented and helped each other succeed instead of trying to outdo one another.

Sailors were acknowledged as a team. When they got in trouble, the reprimand was quiet and in private as opposed to the Marines who, for some reason, preferred to be yelled at in public, preferably before an audience of their peers.

He stopped by the front door when an Air Force officer walked in.

He had never had much respect for the Air Force, and tolerated them only because the military needed something to laugh at. Every business had to have a running gag. The United States Government had the Republican Party, Europe had France, and the Armed Forces got the Air Force or Air Farce, as some called it. They were almost as big a joke as reservists the National Guard.

The General of the Air Force walked up to the Marine at the front desk and said something.

“Sir, he left for the day, sir,” Howden replied.

Michael winced slightly. The acoustics in the lobby were enough to shame the best symphony halls and his hearing was slightly better than average. It occurred to him to wonder why Marines were incapable of speaking at anything less than a shout. He looked back at the desk.

Everyone looked at the desk.

The lobby was dead quiet despite the twenty people in it.

“There’s no need to shout, Lance Corporal,” Michael replied. He didn’t raise his voice. There was no need to with the way this place was designed. It was just an odd by-product of the building’s design that the lobby was the only place in the building where two people could whisper at one end of the room, and be heard clearly at the far end without any help. On top of that, like most former military, he had no trouble making himself heard over any amount of noise without resorting to shouting.

“Yes, sir. Sorry sir.” Howden’s reply was immediate and crisp.

Michael wondered if Marines came with a volume control knob, though he’d prefer a ‘mute’ button any day of the week. “No big, just don’t shout. Especially not in the lobby.”

“Yes sir.”

Michael left the building. He hated it when new Marines came to the FIRM. They were good soldiers, but they needed to be retrained. They needed to be taught how to lower their voices or, in a rare few cases, speak up.

He got to his bike and looked at Marella’s bike.

Why she preferred a Kawasaki Ninja to a regular street bike or car, he could only wonder. He had never liked what were commonly called ‘crotch rockets’ or ‘rice burners’. He’d take his Honda Valkyrie any day of the week. The Valkyrie was big enough and fast enough to be taken seriously as a bike, but not so big or fast that it became an insurance nightmare.

He still couldn’t quite picture her on her bike. He had always imagined she’d have something fun like a Corvette or a Porsche. Apparently her idea of fun was a bit different.

He guessed that was what he liked about her. She wasn’t afraid to be like one of the guys. She was every bit one of the guys, but at the same time, she was incredibly feminine and no less a woman. She was just as comfortable in a skirt on a lawn swing as she would be in faded jeans getting bounced around and splattered with mud on an ATV.

She could and did do almost anything the guys did. She climbed rocks, went hiking, and had no trouble cleaning fish. She was just as handy with tools as she was with a computer and could fix nearly anything on wheels. She didn’t mind getting dirty and ‘squeamish’ was the last word anyone could use to describe her.

He guessed he shouldn’t be too surprised that she preferred a fast bike to something most people would consider a bit more sensible. Somehow, he couldn’t see her in a four-door Civic. That would be like Santini eating Chinese food. He put his helmet and gloves on and started his bike. Something about that picture still nagged him, but he had no idea what. He set it aside until he got home. Riding a motorcycle was dangerous enough without being preoccupied.

He was almost home when he stopped at an intersection and another motorcycle pulled up next to him. It was all he could do not to tell the guy to get a real motorcycle. The hulking bike next to him was huge and clearly designed for long hauls with lots of cargo. A touring bike. As it pulled away to turn left, Michael found himself looking for a trailer hitch on the back of it. It was certainly big enough to have one. He hoped the day never came when he settled for any of Honda’s Goldwing motorcycles.

Jessica was the kitchen table doing homework when he arrived. But then, he knew that that was exactly what the girl would be doing.

Jessica’s mother had died less than a year ago and her father didn’t seem too inclined to start dating again. She sometimes wondered why. He wasn’t gay, but if he was, she wouldn’t have cared. She had a couple of friends who were raised by two mothers or two fathers. She sometimes found herself envying them and almost anyone else who had two parents. When her father was away at work, she had a mother there. Now she didn’t have that.

Jessica didn’t look up as her father walked in. She was too busy trying to figure out her Latin homework. She didn’t speak much Latin, but she what she did speak was nearly fluent except for her grammar. Now she was just trying to build her vocabulary and correct her grammar.

“Hey, you.” Michael tousled his daughter’s hair as he walked by.

Jessica felt a flash of indignation then remembered who was doing it. It wasn’t her spazola brother, Zack.

Zachary was three years older than she was and like all older brothers, he enjoyed tormenting his younger sister. He had stopped as soon as he began to up his martial arts training. He was a third-degree black belt in Ken-po karate, and was making quite a name for himself in the sixteen-to-eighteen middle-weight division of the North American Youth Kickboxing Association.

She almost envied her over-achieving brother whom the tribe called White Bear. Zack played first chair violin in the district orchestra and was a straight-A student on the principal’s high-honor roll.

She couldn’t really complain since she was in the district vocal ensemble, an elite group of the best twenty singers in the entire school district. She was also the captain of the Freshman-Sophomore volleyball team as well as a good student.

Jessica went down the hall to get out of her school uniform.

“Oh, Dad, there was a really creepy guy at the gas station,” Jessica’s voice drifted out of her room and down the hall.

“Say again?” Michael went back to the kitchen to get his root beer. Benson looked up at him and gave him a goofy dog-grin. “Hey, Ben, how are you, mutt?”

Jessica walked out of her room in faded jeans and a Van Halen concert shirt. Like her father, she had left her shoes on the tile by the front door. “I said there was this really creepy guy at the gas station. He was an older guy and he kept looking at Courtney and me as if we were nude models in provocative poses.”

Michael gave her a concerned look. “I want you to stop using that station.”

“But it’s the closest to school.”

“I don’t care. Don’t go there any more.”

“Don’t go where anymore?” Zack slid in with a soft rustle of vinyl/satin blend boxing shorts and the soft slap and tap of his sandals and metal-tipped white cane on the floor. “Hey, Dad.”

“Hey, kid.” Michael looked at Zack’s boxing gloves and foot pads. “Your gear, Zack.”

Zack took them off the counter with a slightly embarrassed smile. “Don’t go where anymore?”

“The gas station on the corner of Fifth and Birch.”

Zack made a face. “Is that freaky-ass pervert there again?”

“Watch your mouth, young man.”

“Sorry.” Zack helped himself to a pouch of Capri Sun.

“You know him?” Jessica sat down on one of the bar stools at the counter.

“Tall, kinda pudgy, missing teeth?” Zack stabbed the straw in perfectly despite not being able to see it.

“Yeah. He wears thick glasses and tight jeans with a plaid shirt.”

“That’s him. Don’t go there anymore,” Zack cautioned.

“Why? Is he dangerous?”

“He’s convicted sex offender. He just got out of prison and he’s not allowed within fifty yards of anyone under the age of eighteen.”

“Eew,” Jessica frowned. “That’s disgusting.”

“Well, people like him are out there and I don’t want either of you near him.” Michael took his briefcase off the counter. He couldn’t very well leave it there and not allow Zack to put his boxing gloves on the counter. “Did Dr. Griffin tell you that?”

Zack nodded.

“Rodger that,” Jessica reached for the phone. “Okay if I tell my friends about him?”

“I wish you would. I’ll put the word out at tonight’s Neighborhood Watch meeting.”

“So, Dad, are they sending you off somewhere?” Zack looked concerned.

“God, I hope not,” Michael replied.

Jessica smiled and went back to her phone call. “Hey, Kell… You know that creepy dude at the gas station today? Well, my dad says he’s a sex offender and that he’s not allowed near minors.”

“Isn’t that gross?” Kelly replied.

“Oh, my God, Kell, they guy is a total pervert. You should have seen the way he was leering at Courtney and me earlier. It was gross. I felt like I was naked. Hey, call me on my phone. My dad just got beeped.”

“Sure. Gimme a few. My lame-oid brother’s on mine.”

“Can’t that spaz get his own line?” Jessica gave her brother a mischievous smile. “Mine has one.”

Zack rolled his pale, ice-blue eyes and mimed a backyard gossip talking to one of her friends as Jessica talked on the phone.

“As long as the little creep stays out of my room, he’s safe,” Kelly answered.

Jessica giggled. “Call me.”

“Will do.”

Jessica hung up. “Sorry. Now you know why I wanted my own line.”

“Yeah. Hey, put your clothes away.” Michael dialed a number. “You too, Zack.”

“Will do,” Jessica went to the laundry room to get her clothes.

“Rodger that,” Zack headed for the laundry room to get his things.

“Hey, what’s up?” Michael leaned against the counter. “Thanks, Ben.”

Santini picked up the dry tone in Michael’s voice. “What happened?”

“Benson just drooled all over my feet. I swear… I’m fixing to put a bib on that dog.”

Santini laughed. “You know, you sound just like Caitlin.”

“Can’t help it. I spent the better part of my early years in hillbilly, Alabama.” Michael dried his feet off with a dishtowel and set the towel on the counter behind him. “God, that’s disgusting. You beeped me. What’s up?”

“You busy?” Santini sounded a little worried.

“I was, but it can wait.”

“Can we meet somewhere, this isn’t something I can talk about over the phone.”

“Sure. I’m on call today, so I have to stay local. Why don’t you come over?”

“You sure? I can meet you at the gas station.”

“I stay away from that one.”

“Why?”

“Dan Harker just got out and he was leering at Jess and her friend earlier this afternoon.”

“He’s bad news, Mike,” Santini looked up as Caitlin walked in. “Hang on.” “Sure.”

Santini looked at the note Caitlin handed him. She hated writing notes, but she didn’t know who Dom was talking to and she didn’t want this overheard. Santini read the note and nodded. He pointed to the phone.

Caitlin wrote something down and held the note up.

Santini nodded.

Caitlin’s face said: Oh. Okay. She went back into the hangar to finish leaning the choppers. She had a bad feeling about this.

Santini had a bad feeling as well and the sooner it got resolved the better. “What time would be good for you?”

“Whenever’s fine,” Michael answered. “I’ll be here all night.”

Santini nodded. He had a feeling that the shit was about to hit the fan. “Okay. I’ll get out of here as soon as possible.”

“Okay. See you when you get here.”

“Thanks.”

Intermission

Crystal City, Virginia
Tuesday

He looked at the slip of paper with the address on it and smiled. The tall, slim woman across from him smiled as well.

D’jolou smiled. He was glad to know that the bitch hadn’t escaped him after all. His ex-girlfriend had slipped out of the country before he could stop her and by the time he had found out where she had gone, she had already left there and gone somewhere else.

He had followed her from Port-au-Prince, Haiti, to Havana, Cuba, to Miami, Florida, and had lost her in the swarm of Blacks and Latinos that lived there. It had taken a while, but he had finally traced her to Quantico, Virginia and then to Langley. To his disgust, she had disappeared again.

It had been ten years since she had slipped out of Langley and vanished. But now that he knew where she was, he was going to give her no option other than to marry him.

Well, she’d have an option, but marrying him willingly would be the better choice by far.

“What now, D’jolou?”

The tall Haitian smiled up at the young thug. D’jolou wasn’t his real name. It was just the proper way to address a priest of his sect. “Well done. Did you leave the message?”

“Yes, D’jolou. I left it on her desk as you said”

D’jolou nodded. “You have no need to worry about Jackson’s curse. It will have no effect on you.”

“You are certain?”

“Do you doubt me? Is her medicine stronger than mine?”

“Not at all, D’jolou.”

“Then why did you ask if I was certain?”

“I’m sorry, D’jolou. I shouldn’t have doubted you.”

D’jolou nodded and waved the man away. He sat back and smiled. The message had been delivered so she would know he was here. He decided to toy with her for a while before making his move. He would show her just how powerful he was so she would know just how lucky she was that he was giving her a second chance when he could just as easily kill her with a thought.

He knew it would take a lot more than a thought to kill her, but if she believed he could, he wouldn’t need to worry about her betraying him or running off again.

He looked at the paper again. He had just the way to get her right where he wanted her. He had no idea who Archangel was, but if he was as powerful as his name implied, he would have to be removed. A man with magic that strong would be a real threat to him. And if she went to Archangel for protection, then he would never have her back without a serious fight.

Archangel would have to be removed.

D’jolou had never had many rivals, and those that did challenge his power had all met tragic, terrible, and frightening ends as the victims of D’jolou’s power.

He didn’t want to sully his hands with Archangel’s blood. That would surely bring down the wrath of the other gods.

A smile crossed his ebony face. He would have her do it as testament to her faith in his power.

By having her kill Archangel, he would not only prove to the others that he was indeed all-powerful, he would remove a dangerous rival in the process. It didn’t get any better than that.

He sat back and began to work out the best way to have her kill this rival priest before she could go to him for protection.

What kind of curse could he hold over her head?

What did she fear most?

A smile curled the corners of his mouth as he watched the fish swimming lazily in the tank on the other side of the room.

Perfect.

Part Two

Georgetown, Virginia
Wednesday morning

Her hands shook as she locked the door to her apartment.

She knew she should report it to security, but there was no telling where D’jolou might have spies.

Just like in Haiti, he seemed to know her every move. And if she made one wrong move, he would be ready to step in and kill her in any way he pleased. She forced herself to calm down as she walked toward her car. She couldn’t let anyone know what was going on. Doing so would only endanger them as well as anger D’jolou.

Once she got to the building, she felt a little safer.

The best and thus far only good thing about the Committee imposing an all-white dress code on Michael’s department was the fact that she stood out by virtue of her clothes. When in public, she was all the more obvious because everyone else was in any color but white. If anything happened to her, it would be immediately noticed. But inside any of the FIRM’s offices, she was just another white suit.

She walked into the lobby and surveyed the open room the way Michael had taught her.

She had never understood why he had her do what he called ‘people watching’. It wasn’t until she had spotted an assassin before the man had a chance to strike that she understood.

People watching taught her to observe people in any given area, recognize who and what was normal and how to spot the small things that marked the troublemaker or cause of danger before it could do much damage. Once she knew what was normal, she could easily spot what wasn’t normal and take the appropriate action.

She paused just long enough to get her ID out of her purse.

During that brief pause, she took a glance around the room. She hoped to spot Michael.

It was one of the few games they played.

If she could pick him out of a crowd, she got to leave early on Friday. If not, she left at the normal time. Thus far, she had never left early.

Two Marines in civilian clothes are by the elevators. They’re easy to pick out. They have ‘high and tight’ haircuts that earn them the nickname ‘jar head’.

Faulkner is at the counter. There’s no mistaking that piece of carpet anywhere. Hell, even Stevie Wonder can tell it’s a toupee.

Miller is going into elevator one. She’s with her daughter today. Penny is wearing a really cute Rainbow Bright outfit.

Beth “Beehive” Hartman is going through the metal detector. Amazing her hair can fit under the top of the machine. God, her hair’s right out of ‘Bride of Frankenstein’.

Two women are talking by the hanging fern near the far doors. They’re plain-clothes agents. The one on the left is a lesbian. The freedom rings give it away.

Three men walked over to the elevator. No one she knows.

The man in the center is Asian, middle-aged, slightly overweight. The one on the left is Black, too tall to be Michael and way too buff. The man on the right is a red head. His face is too fair, his eyes too shallow and he’s about a foot too small to be Michael while being about the same build.

A motorcyclist is walking over to the check in. Not him. Michael can blend into any crowd with any disguise, but he can’t pull off Hispanic female by any means.

She walked up to the check in and put her gun on the counter.

Milli Vargas checked the ID against the computer and the person holding it and waved the tall woman through.

Marella picked up her gun and walked toward the elevator. She gave Hawke a quick once-over.

No fashion sense.

“Like what you see?” Hawke’s tone was light and slightly teasing.

“Don’t flatter yourself,” Marella answered coolly.

Dominic Santini smiled. Marella was getting good at the sharp, yet subtle retorts that were Michael’s primary means subtly goading someone into revealing information out of sheer irritation at the constant needling.

“Admit it, you like me.”

Marella rolled her eyes slightly. “I’m single, Hawke, not desperate.”

A tallish blond stepped out of the elevator at the next floor. He didn’t look any different than anyone else, so she didn’t really pay much attention to him. But still, he was about the right height and build.

As he turned a corner, she could tell it wasn’t Michael. The skin was too fair and his face was almost perfectly round.

She left the elevator on the fourth floor and went the office at the end of the hall. She was very aware of the daggers Stringfellow Hawke was looking into her back. Apparently he didn’t like it when women shot him down.

She idly wondered if he’d slept with Gabrielle. After all, rumor had it that she’d slept with damned near every other guy and had her eyes on Michael. Fortunately, he’d requested that she be transferred out of his division.

A few minutes later Michael walked down the hall.

Marella noticed that his leg was hurting more than normal today. She wondered of she was the only one that noticed the faintly uneven gait. “Carmen’s daughter got hurt, so I’m subbing.”

Michael gave her a slightly indifferent shrug. “Okay.”

“You giving her lessons?” Hawke asked sharply.

Michael glanced at Hawke without really turning around. His body language sent a very clear, unmistakable message that warned Hawke to be careful how he spoke.

Marella considered telling Hawke to watch his mouth when Michael shook his head and unlocked the door to his office.

“In.” Michael opened the door and waited for them to go into his office before addressing what some jokingly referred to as his ‘better half’. “Are you okay?”

“Fine,” Marella managed a faint smile. She looked up when she felt the cobalt-green eyes looking into her.

“Really,” Michael was silent for a moment.

“I’m good, sir. Really.”

Michael nodded. He didn’t believe her, but he wasn’t going to pry as long as whatever it was didn’t interfere with her work. He went into his office and gave Hawke a look that could easily have frozen the core of a nuclear reactor. Hawke tried not to bend under the gaze, but the feeling that he was being looked at the way a dog would eye an interesting chew toy was slowly gaining ground. After a moment, he bent.

Santini didn’t say anything. As much as he liked the young pilot, it was, in a weird way, good to see him cut down to size by someone who seemed not to have a conscience or anything remotely resembling sympathy for his victims. He watched Michael. He had known the man for nearly fifteen years and still knew next to nothing about him. All he really knew was that Michael wasn’t the kind of man you wanted to face in battle; he was the man you wanted beside you or, if at all possible, either ahead of you or above you with a sniper rifle. The man didn’t seem to have anything akin to a conscience when it came to killing and didn’t give a second thought to what his targets were feeling when he killed them with all the remorse of an exterminator removing a nest of termites.

But that was just for show.

The real Michael Coldsmith-Briggs III…


The boy had been illegitimate for a whole twenty minutes. The boy had died within minutes of birth and his name and all vital information had been stored away somewhere until it was given to a spy in need of a public profile. At least, that was the rumor.

The man in the white suit was- Santini didn’t know just who the man was, but he had an idea of what he was like.

Michael was the kind of man who took in horses that no one wanted because he didn’t have the heart to have them put down. He had come to have Benson because he couldn’t bear to see a puppy struggling to escape a rapidly-flooding storm drain. Baxter, his calico Manx, had been rescued from euthanasia because she was the last and smallest kitten in the litter and no one wanted her even when she was labeled “free snake food”.

The spy worked at homeless shelters and soup kitchens and always gave change to the older homeless people on the street. The younger ones could work therefore they were ignored or given irritated glances when they asked for handouts. For a while, he had been a foster parent, and still allowed Girl Scout and Boy Scout troops to spend time on his ranch in Wyoming.

Michael was a fantastic cook who had a knack for Southern cooking and he liked a good who-dunnit. He was especially fond of Jessica Fletcher’s books. He liked a good joke and had a razor-sharp wit.

Yet despite it all, he had absolutely no patience for racism, sexism, or any other kinds of discrimination regardless of who the victim was or why they had been singled out. He was just as willing to lynch a member of the Ku Klux Klan as they were to lynch African Americans. He wasn’t allowed in interrogation rooms if the subject was known to be an outspoken racist or homophobe. The two-inch-deep crack that Garth Knight’s head had left in the wall had set that precedent.

Garth hadn’t done anything more than refer to Hassan al Rais, the other agent present, as a ‘carpet-kissing camel jockey’.

Rais had gone to pound Garth, but Michael was faster and Garth had nearly died from the force of impact when his head hit the wall. He had already sustained moderate internal injuries when Michael pulled him out of the chair and shoved him forward and down into the table before slamming him back into the wall behind him.

The speed and economy with which Michael moved was rivaled only by his complete control. No sooner had Garth Knight collided with the table then he was on his way into the wall. From there, he was put back in his seat and released.

Michael had stepped back and folded his arms as calmly as if he had only just walked in. He pushed his glasses up and watched the subject as if nothing had happened.

Al Rais had watched Michael and immediately backed away. He had never seen anything like what had just happened. And at the speed at which it occurred, he wasn’t even sure it had even happened until he saw the blood and the dent in the wall.

After that, no agent came within striking distance of the spy.

Santini had heard about the incident from Devon Miles and had seen a copy of the report. The deed had shocked him as much as the name of the agent responsible. He glanced at Michael. When would it be Hawke’s turn? When would Michael unleash his temper and live up to his codename? What would he do if he was ever in a locked room with String?


“I say we hire a coupla Sailors to go up there an’ beat the shit outta him,” Caitlin suggested.

“Why pay?” Marella stubbed out her cigarette. “I know some Irishmen who’ll do it for the asking.”

“Why ask?” Devon shrugged. “I know a few lads who’ll pay to do it.”

Santini just shook his head. “Why don’t we just lock him in a room with Michael?”

“You do mean Michael Knight, right?” Marella looked faintly concerned.

“What’s wrong with our Michael?” Hawke asked.

“The last man to be locked in a room with Michael spent three months in traction and has permanent brain damage,” Marella answered levelly.

Everyone stared.

“How long did he pound the guy?” Caitlin looked like a kid at her first horror movie.

“Less than ten seconds,” Marella sighed. “The guy was out of the chair, smashed into the table, up against a wall, and thrown through a window.”

“Just like that?” Bonnie Barstow looked worried.

“Just like that,” Marella nodded slightly. “That was when I started working for Michael.”

“If he’s violent…” Devon began.

“Only when provoked. And he had good reason.”

“There is no reason for that,” Santini shot back.

“Really? How would you feel if you confronted the man who’d raped and murdered your eight-year-old daughter? And then the guy has the balls to say that she was ‘a first-rate screw that he’d gladly do again just to hear her scream’?”


Michael sat down at his desk. He was in no mood to deal with Hawke today. “Is there anyone else you’d like to know about Airwolf? I can arrange an air show if you’d like.”

Hawke felt the steel in the man’s voice.

“It was an accident.”

“An accident,” Michael’s eyebrows went up. He shook his head slightly. “Your parents having you was an accident, Hawke. Letting Michael Long know that Airwolf isn’t in a million pieces in Libya was just fucking careless.”

Santini was honestly shocked as was Hawke. It was so rare for the spy to use vulgarity that it had a real impact when he did.

Hawke wished he could move the chair back a few inches. While he was nearly four feet away from Michael, when the spy was angry, the only place that was guaranteed to be safe was another dimension.

Santini was immediately on guard. Michael and Hawke had never been on the best of terms, and of late, things had been rapidly going from bad to worse. But what Hawke didn’t know was that if he chose to declare war on Michael, he would vanish as if he’d never existed and he’d never be seen or heard from again. Moreover, Michael was a kind of guardian angel to Hawke. It was Michael who kept the Committee at bay and kept Hawke safe. Michael was keeping the Committee from having any reason to kill Hawke as it was well-known that they’d do as soon as they had the helicopter back.

Michael sat back in his chair. “Get out of here.”

Hawke looked more than a little irritated. “Excuse me?”

“There is no excuse for you,” Michael shot back. “Now get lost before I do something I won’t regret later.”

Santini decided that now would be a good time to intervene. He considered calling Marella in, but he knew what she would do. She’d stay out of it. It wasn’t her business, so she wasn’t going to get involved. A quick glance at Michael told him all he needed to know. “String, why don’t you get some tea?”

“I don’t like tea,” Hawke answered tightly.

“Then get coffee,” Santini’s tone killed any argument.

Hawke stormed out and slammed the door.

“He does that again…” Michael left the rest of the sentence unsaid. He hated loud noises and slamming doors was definitely one of the fastest ways to get under his collar.

Santini watched Michael. He had a feeling that sending Hawke out of the room was the best thing to do under the circumstances.

Michael sat back in his chair and stared at the ceiling. He didn’t know what it was about the ceiling that disturbed him so much, but for some reason, ceilings gave him a creeping, scary feeling that sometimes came very close to becoming an outright anxiety attack.

Santini looked up at the ceiling. He had no idea what Michael found so interesting up there. “You know, I always wondered what it would be like to walk around on the ceiling.”

Michael shook his head. “You don’t want to.”

“Why? Have you done it recently?”

“God, I hope not. All I know is that I don’t want to be up there,” Michael forced the fear to retreat. There was no excuse for him to be afraid of ceilings. Spiders, fire, and high places were all understandable fears. They all had some logical reason, but ceilings? If that wasn’t a bizarre phobia, he couldn’t name one. It was such a weird fear that he didn’t even think it had a name.

“What,” Santini smiled. “Are you afraid of ceilings?”

Michael looked at the Italian. “I’m not really afraid of much of anything, now that I think about it.”

Santini had to agree. Michael didn’t seem to fear anything. But then, he was a Navy SEAL and SAR- Search and Rescue- swimmer. On top of that, he was one of the FIRM’s top field agents. He wasn’t afraid of anything any more. Or was he? “Me? I hate spiders.”

“I’m not too keen on snakes, myself. Spiders I can deal with, snakes…” Michael shook his head. “I’m sorry, if it moves across the floor without legs, it is not coming into my house.”

Santini smiled. “What’s so bad about snakes?”

“Ever wake up with a snake coiled up on your face?”

“Mama Mia.”

“Oh, I said a hell of a lot more than that. Okay, it was just a foot-long gopher snake, but still. Not on my face.”

Santini tried not to shiver at the thought of a snake in his bed. He couldn’t imagine one on his face. “So what’s with you and String?”

“I don’t like being called in after hours because of this.” Michael tossed a newspaper on his desk. “That is not the kind of publicity we need. And then there are these.” He handed Santini a set of pictures. “They were taken by the Knight Industries Two-Thousand. On top of that, I’ve had Michael Long coming around and trying to get information about Airwolf. I’m going to make it very clear to his boss that if he can’t keep his rat in its cage, I’m going to make it disappear.”

“You’d kill him?”

“I won’t make him go away, just disappear.”

There was something about the way Michael said ‘disappear’ that sent a chill up Santini’s spine.

Marella walked in a moment later. “Jessie’s on line one and Devon Miles is here.” She put a folder on his desk. “And you’re not supposed to be here today, sir. Dr. Beeks has you on med hold.”

“I know.”

“So why are you here? She’s going to ask.”

Michael nodded. “You’ll find the reason sulking in the Confessional.”

Marella nodded. “Interesting.”

“No, just incredibly immature.”

Santini couldn’t argue that. “I’ll get String.”

“I’ll be out of here in a bit if you want to hang out later,” Michael answered absently.

“Sure. You cooking?”

“You think I’d let Jessie?” Michael picked up his phone.

“Well, you were planning on redoing the kitchen,” Santini smiled and followed Marella out. He wasn’t about to give the man a chance to reply. He looked at Marella. “She still trying to get him to let her have a snake?”

“As always,” Marella smiled. “Leslie’s a good pet, but he tends to slip out of his tank from time to time.”

“Oh, no.”

“Yeah. I don’t know what his problem is, either. Is he afraid of them?”

“No. He’s not scared of them, he just doesn’t like them.”

Michael shook his head and picked up the phone. “Yes.”

“Dad, Missy’s mom won’t let her have Leslie, so I was-”

“No.”

“But Dad,” Jessie looked at the phone as if she could see him. “Leslie’s a garter snake. He’s not poisonous.”

“It’s still a snake.”

“But you let me keep Mozart.”

“That was different.”

“How?”

“Mozart had legs.”

“I know, he had eight,” Jessie tossed a lock of dark blonde hair behind her shoulder. “If you let me have a scorpion, why can’t I have a snake? It’s only for the weekend.”

“Not a chance, Jess.”

“But Dad-”

“Look, Jess, I can deal with scorpions, geese, frogs, and tarantulas, but I draw the line at snakes.”

“But Dad-”

“No. End of discussion. No snakes. Not now, not ever.”

Jessie nodded. “Okay.”

Michael shook his head. “I’ll be home in a bit.”

“Okay. Are you mad at me?”

“Do you want me to be?”

“No.”

“Okay then. I’ll see you in a bit.”

“Okay.”

Michael hung up and looked up as Devon walked in. It was once again time to play annoyed pit bull.

Part Three

Crystal City, Virginia
Wednesday

D’jolou looked at the picture painted on the door in chicken blood and smiled.

She would get the message loud and clear and if she didn’t answer him, he would be free to do as he liked.

No one defied D’jolou.

He walked back to the car and got in.

M’Banni drove off. He didn’t ask the priest what was happening or what the woman who lived there had done. It was none of his business and if he wanted to keep he gods’ wrath at bay, it had better remain as much a mystery as Jimmy Hoffa’s whereabouts.

Marella stopped in her tracks when she saw the door. There was no hiding the situation now. Michael was going to find out for sure.

“Oh, my god.” Bonnie Barstow stared at the strange circular pattern. “Who did that?”

Marella shook her head. “I have to make a call.”

“Don’t go inside,” Bonnie grabbed her friend’s arm.

“There’s no one in there,” Marella unlocked the door.

“Are you sure?”

“I know the man who did this. This is a message… a threat.” She went into the kitchen and picked up the phone. She could barely keep her hand from shaking as she dialed a number.

Jessica answered on the second ring. “Hello?”

“Hey, Jess, it’s me. Is your father lurking around there?”

“Yeah, hang on.”

Marella heard Benson start to sniff the phone. She tried not to smile. Only Benson would be curious about a phone.

“Benson, no.” Michael took the phone off the chair before the dog could drool on it. “Do you have to drool on my feet?”

“I got him.” Jessica led Benson away from the phone.

“Thanks. Can you reach the towels while you’re over there?”

Marella couldn’t help but smile.

“What’s up?” Michael took the paper towels his daughter handed him and dried his feet. “Thanks.”

“There’s something on my front door.”

“So take it off.”

“I can’t. Well I can, but I’d rather you have a look at it first.”

Michael immediately picked up on the worry in her voice. “What’s wrong?”

“It was painted on the door in chicken blood.”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m a little scared.”

“I’m on my way.”

“You don’t have to. I can take pictures.”

“If something is bothering you that much, I wanna see it. Are you alone?”

“No, I have a friend over.”

“Lock the door and don’t open it or go near the windows until I get there. If anyone calls, let the machine get it.”

“Yes, sir. I’m sorry to call you at home.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“It’s probably nothing at all. Just a joke.”

“If it’s bothering you, it’s no joke. Sit tight. I’ll be right over.” Marella hung up and moved away from the window. She suddenly wished she hadn’t dragged him into it. She knew D’jolou and knew what he could do to anyone who crossed him. “He’s coming over.”

Bonnie nodded. “Do you want me to call the police?”

Marella shook her head. “We take care of our own.”

“I’m going to call Devon and let him know where I am and that I’m going to be late.”

“Don’t. He said to stay away from windows and the door and not to use the phone. It’s called a ‘lockdown’. Nothing goes in or out until the coast is clear.”

Bonnie nodded. That made perfect sense. She sat down on the couch next to her friend. “It’ll be okay. I’m sure it’s just someone’s twisted idea of a joke.”

Marella nodded. She knew it was no joke. D’jolou had found her and wanted her back. The picture on the door was no random scrawl, either. It was a message. And that it had been done in chicken blood meant that it carried a curse for any who understood it other than the one it was meant for. Suddenly, she wasn’t so sure telling Michael was such a good idea. But she had no choice. This went beyond slips of paper left on her desk. This was an actual command from the priest to contact him. If she didn’t, the consequences would be severe and far-reaching.

A knock on the door shattered the silence.

After the initial shock wore off, Marella took her gun from her belt clip and approached the door. She was willing and able to shoot anything that might be on the other side. She knew not to look through the spy hole. The last time someone had done that, they had gotten a knife in the head via their left eye courtesy of the Russian Mafia.

“It’s me,” Michael answered.

Even though she recognized the voice, she had a feeling that it might not be who she hoped it was. D’jolou could do anything, so what was to stop him from impersonating someone? She decided to ask a question that only Michael would know. No one, not even other agents knew his badge number. “What’s your badge number?”

Michael smiled. Badge numbers were the most effective way of identifying agents. The number was four digits and one letter and no two agents had the same or even similar numbers. And the badge numbers were as closely guarded a secret as a social security number because your badge was about the only way to establish your identity in the even that you lost your ID. “J3291.”

After lowering her gun and clicking on the safety, she unlocked the door. “Sorry about that.”

“That’s cool.” Michael looked at the door. “That, on the other hand, has got to go. Red is an autumn color and this is early summer.”

Marella smiled despite her anxiety.

“Are you okay?”

She nodded.

“I already called a forensics team. Do you have any idea who did this?” Marella nodded. She knew exactly who did it.

“Any chance of telling me?”

“My ex-boyfriend. He’s been following me ever since I left Haiti.”

“Damn. And people say I’m persistent.” Michael looked around the front door and porch for any other information about the crime and perpetrator.

“He’s not persistent,” Marella said lightly. “Just obsessed.”

“Well, in that case,” Michael watched a van and jeep pull into the parking lot. “There’s nothing to worry about. He’ll just hunt you down and possibly kill you.”

“That’s it?” Marella feigned surprise. “He followed me all the way from Haiti for that? Talk about ambition.”

“Maybe he just has too much time on his hands and needed a new hobby.”

Bonnie watched the exchange in surprise. It hit her a moment later that that was probably the way they dealt with things like this. When the situation was too tense to handle, make fun of it. There was nothing like good, old-fashioned comic relief to ease the strain of a terrifying moment. After all, how many jokes had she and Devon made about the damage Goliath had done to KITT?

Michael stepped aside to let a photographer start taking pictures of the gore. He put his blue and white motorcycle jacket around her shoulders and led her inside. “They’re gonna ask you come questions. You feeling up to it?”

Marella nodded and pulled the jacket a little closer. It was way too big for her, but it was warm and the reinforced plastic padding gave her some sense of security. She braced herself for the interrogation.

Michael stayed on the far side of the room as was protocol. He wasn’t in on the investigation, so he stayed out of the way.

A tall man who looked like he could bench press a tank sat down on the couch facing her. He stayed close enough to talk, but not too close. His pen and notebook looked ridiculously small in his hands.

“Is he on the S.W.A.T. team?” Bonnie asked.

“He is the S.W.A.T. team,” another agent commented.

“How ‘bout I SWAT your ass back to Langley?” The bald agent asked tartly. The other agent immediately backed down. No one in their right mind messed with Special Agent Walter Skinner.

“Sorry about that.” Skinner pushed his glasses up.

Marella immediately liked the man. She knew a Marine when she saw one, having served nine years in the Corps herself.

“I’m Agent Skinner.”

“Marella Hounsou.”

“Hounsou… Dominican Republic?” Skinner looked up.

“Right island, wrong side. I’m from Haiti.”

Skinner nodded. “Okay. When’d you see the picture on the door?”

“I had just come home from work. I was about ten feet from the door when I looked up from getting my keys and saw it.”

“Did you see anyone around your apartment?”

Marella shook her head. “No.”

“Was there anyone with you when you saw that?” Skinner glanced at the door.

“Just my friend, Bonnie Barstow. She’s right there.”

Skinner looked at the other woman and nodded slightly. “Is there anyone who’d want to scare you?”

“My ex-boyfriend.”

“Has he been threatening you?”

“No. I haven’t seen or heard from him since I left Haiti.”

“Have there been any other markings like this anywhere?”

“Just this one.” Marella handed the agent a slip of paper. “That was on my desk the other day. I didn’t think anything of it.”

“Does he have access to your workplace?”

“I don’t think so. We’re pretty anal about security.”

Michael watched the interview and focused on the picture that had been left on Marella’s desk and compared it to the one on her door. They had a quite a few similarities, but a series of drastic differences as well. The more he compared them, the more he began to suspect that they were a form of communication.


“Just because it is not in words that you can recognize, doesn’t mean it is not a language,” Kalaf ibn al Sharid had explained.

“I don’t get it.”

Al Sharid smiled. He drew a few words in Arabic in the fine sand that was everywhere in Boroud Siddiq, Saudi Arabia. “This reads ‘in the name of God Most High’.”

Michael nodded. He had mastered Arabic and spoke it better than most Arabs and had a flawless Eastern Egyptian accent, but he was completely illiterate in the language.


It occurred to him that the pictures weren’t simply pictures, but pictographs.

Who would use them and why nagged at him, but he understood what he was looking at and was already tracking down all possible leads.

Marella glanced at Michael. He was looking down at his feet the way he always did when he had something on his mind. She imagined what was going through his mind, but all she could come up with was an image of a computer’s lines of code streaming up the screen at a pace too fast for the human eye to comprehend.

Michael was very much like Sherlock Holmes in his methods of reasoning and deduction and was just as observant and intuitive.

It was that intuition that had enabled him to become one of the best agents in the field. He had a knack for getting out of trouble by avoiding it altogether before it ever happened. It was almost as if he had a kind of sixth sense or precognition that enabled him to react to things before they happened. She had asked him about it once, but he just shrugged and said that it was just coincidence. And that if he had to call it anything, he would say it was just observation.

Dr. Beeks called it heightened awareness. It was a primal instinct that very few people ever developed since it was no longer needed to warn them of impending danger. But given Michael’s background, it was entirely possible that his knack for almost predicting danger was due to his heightened sensitivity to any and all changes in his environment. He was unaware of it because it happened on a subconscious level, but he was far more observant than most and a bit more than he knew.

Most agents called intuition, but people like Hawke and Santini and anyone else who had been around him when he had a bad feeling just called it creepy. She had gotten home alive because of that intuition one day. She was just about to start her motorcycle when Michael stopped by and offered her a ride. She hadn’t noticed the quick once over that he gave her bike and she wasn’t sure he knew he’d done it. He just said he had a bad feeling about her bike and that she should have it looked at before riding it.

She had taken the chance and had gotten her bike looked at by a professional mechanic. Michael’s intuition had saved her from a fiery death when the engine exploded because of a worn fuel line that was too close to the engine. Had she ridden her bike that day, the engine would have melted the fuel line and the leak would have been ignited by the sparkplugs.

As much as she tried to ignore it, she couldn’t dismiss the fact that Michael knew something was wrong with her bike. He had known something was wrong that only an experienced, trained mechanic would have known to look for in a part of the engine that was too far out of the way for anyone to tamper with no matter how good they were. And the rusted clasp and partially melted rubber hose spoke for themselves.

How he had known, she wasn’t sure. She doubted he knew how he’d known. Santini had been in a similar situation and was about to walk right into an ambush when Michael had grabbed him by the jacket and pulled him back. Afterward, Michael had pointed out several things that warned him of a potential threat. Once pointed out, the clues were as obvious as the spy’s white suit. At the time, though, they were a complete mystery to everyone, including Michael.

Marella watched him for a moment while Skinner questioned Bonnie. She walked over to him and touched his right arm. She knew not to approach from the left. Not seeing someone coming toward him made him edgy. “Sir?”

Michael looked at her. “Yeah. You okay?”

“Fine. I’m just wondering if you’re okay. You seem a little distracted.”

“I am. Those pictures…” Michael’s brown eyebrows drew together over the top of his glasses. “Are they common in Haiti?”

“In some parts, yes. You could almost call it the native language.”

“I thought that was Creole?”

“Creole is a bastardized mix of French and Haitian. Those pictographs are native Haitian.”

“Are they used in Voodoo?”

Marella looked up at him. He was a good three inches taller than she, but tall enough to intimidate her if he wanted to. She nodded. “Almost exclusively.” Michael nodded. He had the beginnings of a picture. “I want to talk to you about this later.”

“You think I’m involved in it?”

“No. You’re clearly a victim in this case, but there’s something you’re not telling me. I want to know what it is and why.”

“I can’t tell you, sir.”

“Why?”

“He’ll kill me. I know what he can do. I’ve seen it. His juju is… you can’t stand against him.”

“What’s juju?”

Marella shook her head. “I can’t tell you, sir. No offense, but I’ve already said too much. When he finds out that I got you involved, he’ll come after you with all he has.”

“I’m not afraid of him.”

Marella shook her head. “You don’t understand, sir. You don’t make him mad."

“Who?” Michael asked icily. “If he’s threatening you, I will personally take him down.”

“You can’t protect me from him, sir. No one can. You can’t run from him and there’s nowhere you can hide that he won’t find you or his juju won’t reach you.”

Michael looked at his aide. She was clearly shaken and scared. Whoever was leaving the pictographs had her scared more than she would admit to anyone. But what angered him the most was that he couldn’t do anything to help her if she wouldn’t let him. “Look, I- You don’t have to listen, but least look at me when I talk to you.”

Marella looked up. His pale green-gray eyes scared her almost as much as D’jolou. The priest’s eyes were the exact same color, but all the more startling because his skin was so dark. She took an involuntary step back. Michael didn’t move. There was no need to scare her any more than she already was. “Listen, I won’t let him hurt you. If he tries-”

“You can’t stop him,” Marella shot back. “No one can. Not even another priest can stop him. He’s going to do whatever he wants and when he finds out I told you, he’ll go after you as well.”

“I will stop him,” Michael’s tone was as cold and hard as his gaze.

Marella watched him talk to the FBI agent. She knew that this was the one fight that Michael was going to lose. No one beat D’jolou. No one.

She pulled the jacket a little closer and tried not to think about what curses were going to come her way. D’jolou was anything but forgiving or gentle. When he cursed someone, he really slammed them. And if half the stories she had heard were true, she knew she could expect a slow horrific death and God-only-knew-what fate was in store for Michael.

“It’ll be okay.” Bonnie put an arm around her friend’s shoulders. She had seen someone do something like this to Devon once, so she knew just how strong cultural beliefs could be despite how ‘modern and civilized’ one was.

Marella stared at the gloves that Michael had stuffed in the pocket of his jacket. “D’jolou will kill him because of me.”

“I doubt it. Michael’s too damned mean to die. Look, if you’re that scared, come out to California with me and Devon. We’ll protect you there.”

“I don’t want you and Devon getting hurt because of me.”

“Look, if Devon can out-stubborn a banshee, he can hold off anything.”

Marella shook her head. “No, thanks.”

Bonnie nodded and guided her friend to the couch.

“I have to get home,” Michael knelt to look Marella in the eye. If he was in any pain, he hid it well. “Are you going to be okay?”

Marella nodded.

“You have my number. Call me if you need me. Anytime. Day or night, call me. If you want, I’ll bring Benson over. Okay, he drools a lot, but guard dogs don’t get any better.”

“You’ll need your jacket.”

“Just my gloves,” Michael smiled. “I have an extra jacket in my saddlebag. I want you to be careful, okay? I’ll pick you up tomorrow morning. Until then, don’t go outside, stay clear of windows, don’t answer the phone, and don’t open the door. I have your extra key, so I’ll open the door to get you.”

Marella nodded silently. She was terrified, but determined not to let it show. “Here. Your tickets to the book signing.”

“Thanks, but they can wait.” Michael put the tickets in his shirt pocket and stood up stiffly. “Yeah, I’d love to meet Jessica Fletcher, but you’re more important than any book. Take care of you.”

Marella nodded. “Thanks.”

“Don’t worry about this.” Michael picked his helmet up and walked toward the door. “It’ll be off your door by morning.”

Marella nodded. She didn’t care much what was on her door anymore. She had just gotten herself and Michael cursed. Bonnie too, in all likelihood.

Michael put his helmet and gloves on and did and end-to-end inspection of his bike. He had made it a habit to inspect his motorcycle any time he was away from it for more than a few minutes. He looked up when he felt eyes on his back. He used the bike’s left rear-view mirror to see who was staring at him. A pair of dark eyes were watching him from some shrubs. Rodger that.

He stood up casually and walked toward the rear of his bike to close the saddlebag. Instead, he whipped around with lightning speed and grabbed the man by the front of his shirt and dragged him out of the shrubs. “Need something, Asshole?” He slammed the man against the cement wall and held him until Skinner walked over. “Here’s the artist. Or at least, one of his accomplices.”

Skinner smiled. “Well, well. Kino Jabute, how’d I know?”

Jabute’s eyes widened at the sight of the huge federal agent. “I had to. I had to. He kill me if I no see who she talk to.”

Michael took his helmet off and set it on the seat of his motorcycle. “How about I haul you in and kill you?”

“I no scared of you,” Jabute’s tone was defiant, but Michael heard the tremor in the man’s voice.

“You should be,” Michael said flatly with a touch of menace. “Do you know who I am?”

“A white man.”

“Yeah, but most people call me ‘Archangel’.”

The crotch of Jabute’s pants became dark as his large eyes widened. He had run afoul of Archangel, the voodoo priest D’jolou warned him about. Archangel had immense power and could kill a man in another country with a thought. He could, D’jolou warned him, ‘melt your brains with his words and turn you into stone with his eyes’.

Skinner held Jabute while Michael handcuffed the man.

“You’re coming with us, Jabute. And if you anger me, not even your gods will be able to protect you from me.”

Tears streamed down Jabute’s angular face. He knew that coming to America had been a bad idea, but his family needed the money. Haiti was such an impoverished country that what little he could send home every month was a major relief to his family who usually subsisted on a dollar a day, sometimes less. “No kill me. Please. I do anything. Anything.”

“You can start by shutting up,” Michael snapped.

Jabute fell silent and not even the worst torture could elicit a sound from him.

“Get in the car.” Michael opened the door to what the police called ‘The Paddy Wagon’.

Jabute complied eagerly and sat perfectly still and silent the entire way to Knight’s Bridge.

Once there, he had no objections to being searched and escorted to the showers.

After that, he sat at the table in the interrogation room in a prison uniform. Once Michael was done with him, he would be handed over to the FBI for drug-running.

Michael stayed out of the room until one of the men from the Zebra squad walked in.

Jabute looked at the giant soldier, then at Michael.

“He’s here to make sure I don’t hurt you,” Michael had no trouble admitting that fact if it kept the subject in line.

Jabute would have run for his life if he was able.

“Now,” Michael walked over to the table, but didn’t touch it. He wasn’t allowed to touch the table or any other furniture when a detainee was in the room. “Who put that picture on Miss Hounsou’s door?”

“D’jolou. D’jolou did it.”

“Why?”

“He wants her to go to him.”

“Why?”

“He wants her. D’jolou gets what D’jolou wants. D’jolou wants Marella Hounsou.”

“What does he want with her?”

“I do not know. I know only what D’jolou tells me.”

“Why were you in the bushes?”

“I am to see what she does. I am to tell D’jolou what she does and who goes and comes. I tell D’jolou everything. If not, he curses me.”

Michael folded his arms and regarded Jabute calmly. “And what exactly does this D’jolou guy do?”

“He is voodoo priest.”

Michael nodded slightly. That explained it. Voodoo was the unofficial religion of Haiti and, despite the strong Catholic presence, was still practiced to a degree by everyone. D’jolou, being a voodoo priest, was probably considered an authority as powerful, if not more so, than the ruling junta of the day.

Marella, being Haitian, had probably been raised around voodoo and it was as ingrained into her ethnic and cultural background as horseback riding was in his. She more than likely still feared voodoo and revered the priests the same way he feared and respected the Kachina dancers on the reservation.

Voodoo was a powerful faith based on superstition and mysticism and usually had incredibly powerful holds on the people who believed in it.

He shook his head. It all made sense now. She was afraid of D’jolou because she had been raised believing that the priests had power over every aspect of her life and the world around her. They were a special breed of men who had a better understanding of the natural forces than others and were believed to be able to harness those powers and bend them to their will.

Followers of voodoo could be just as fanatic and dangerous as the Jesuits were during the Spanish Inquisition.

This case was going to need special care.

“Do you know Marella Hounsou?” Michael began working on a plan of attack. He had to be careful with this case because of cultural and religious boundaries and differences.

“Yes. She is from my village.”

“Does she know D’jolou?”

“She was to marry him. Then she left. D’jolou got mad. He swear he get her back. She shamed him.”

Michael nodded. “Why did she leave?”

Jabute shook his head. “She just left.”

“I see. Does D’jolou want to hurt her?”

“He will if she not marry him.”

Michael was silent. “Really?”

“Yes. Is truth.”

“I’m sure it is, Jabute.” Michael clasped his hands behind his back. “Where is D’jolou?”

“Where he is.”

“Where is he?”

“He is where he wants. He not say to me. He goes where he wants.”

“Is he a strong voodoo priest?”

“Yes. Most strong in all of Haiti. No priest stand in front of him. He is most strong.”

Michael looked at the door. He wanted nothing more than to strangle the man at the table, but that wouldn’t accomplish anything. Fear never did anything but cause problems. While detainees should fear him or at least be intimidated, he knew that terrorizing them would be the fastest way to shut them up. “What will-” He shook his head. He wasn’t going to get anywhere with this guy. “Have you told me everything you know?”

“Yes.”

Michael looked at Jabute and narrowed his eyes. Two could play the fear game that D’jolou was using. “I can see right through you, Kino Jabute. If I see that you are lying, or that you haven’t told me everything, I will get very angry.”

Jabute blanched. He’d heard about Archangel’s temper and what he could do if he was angered. “I do not know where D’jolou is. He say to me, he- he say I am to watch Hounsou and say to him all she does and where she goes. He say if I not do this, then my family will be dying in a flood. He say that if she not go to him, he take her and make her his. He did. He say that he will kill her if he must. He say he will kill all she tells. He- he is most strong priest in all world. He is strong and his juju is more than all.”

“What is juju?”

“Juju is magic. Is strong magic. D’jolou has big juju. Most in all Haiti. He- he will to use it.”

Michael nodded. “Well, I don’t fear his medicine. And those whom I protect won’t be harmed by it.”

“You cannot stop his juju.”

“I can,” Michael said crisply. “I don’t fear him or his medicine. And if you want, I will protect you and your family from it.”

“You can do this?” Jabute looked up, hope written all over his face.

“If you do as I say. If you don’t, I won’t protect you or your family.”

“I do as you say. I know your juju is most strong than D’jolou.”

Michael nodded. “I want you to stay away from Marella Hounsou. Don’t look at her, don’t go near her, don’t say her name, and don’t even think about her. If you do, I will know and you will be very sorry.”

Jabute nodded. “I will forget her. She is not in my head.”

“Good. Now, the law says that I have to hand you over to the FBI. But no matter where you go, I will see you and I will know what you do and say and think. If I see you doing something I told you not to, I will be very angry.” Jabute swallowed hard.

“You and your family are safe as long as you obey me.”

Jabute nodded.

“Remember, Kino Jabute, I am watching you.”

Jabute nodded slowly.

Michael took a business card out of his shirt pocket. “The FBI will give this to you when you go to their prison. This is my card. It has my name on it and it will protect you as long as you obey me and do as the guards tell you. If you lose this, I will not protect you.”

Jabute nodded.

“Good. Now, they’re going to take you to their prison. I will tell them that I am protecting you and that they are to protect you as well.”

“Will you set your face against them if they anger you?”

“Yes. And my anger will be very strong. I will set my face against you as well if you cause any trouble or disobey me or them.”

Jabute was silent.

“He’s all yours,” Michael let Skinner handcuff Jabute and lead him out. “You know what to do with him?”

Skinner nodded.

Michael smiled slightly. If anyone could protect a material witness, it was Walter Skinner. “Thanks.”

“Yes sir.” Skinner led Jabute out.

Intermission

Baltimore, Maryland
Saturday

D’jolou was outraged. The bitch had gone to Archangel for protection and now his right hand was under Archangel’s protection as well.

He glared at the chicken as it clucked and scratched in it its cage. He didn’t yet have enough power to overcome Archangel’s juju, so the two were beyond his reach for the time being.

He paced the room like a caged animal and stopped when he saw the chicken. Chicken blood was powerful magic, but not powerful enough to keep his people faithful. If they believed that Archangel was the more powerful d’jolou, they would flock to him instead of staying where they were.

D’jolou’s eyes narrowed. The last curse he’d placed on Archangel hadn’t had any more effect than a dirty look. This man required a more powerful approach. There had to be a way to show his followers that he, not Archangel, was the more powerful. What could he do? Curses and spells had no effect, and the man didn’t fear anything. And if the man had no fear, he couldn’t be controlled. He sat down and watched the chicken in its cage. The bird wanted to run loose and be free, but it wasn’t allowed. He controlled the chicken’s fate as surely as he controlled the fates of his followers. He alone had the power of life and death over them.

He smiled.

He had power over the lives of his people and he could kill any of them at his whim. He knew what to do. He would show his followers that his juju was the more powerful by making an example out of Kino Jabute. He would show them that Kino Jabute’s life was still in his hand even though the man’s body was in Archangel’s hands.

Jabute was sure to be closely guarded, so the means had to be violent enough to be noticed by all of the faithful, yet completely untraceable. He picked up the phone and dialed a number. He knew just what to use. The only challenge would be getting it to Kino Jabute.

Part Four

Knight’s Bridge, Virginia
Monday

Walter Skinner stood at attention in front of Michael’s desk and waited for the gates of Hell to open.

Michael sat back in his chair and regarded the agent calmly. He looked down at the folder on his desk. In it were the warden’s report, the medical examiner’s report, and a copy of the autopsy report as well as eyewitness accounts from at least a dozen inmates.

He took his glasses off and rubbed his left temple absently. He didn’t mind the dull ache of the prosthetic eye. He knew that it would take some time for him to get used to it, so he ignored it. What he couldn’t ignore, however, was the slowly increasing throb of a tension headache that had decided to center itself behind his left eye. “Let me get this straight, he freaked out and dropped dead.”

“Yes sir.” Like Michael, Walter Skinner always seemed to wear a look of mild, perpetual anger. But while it just left people with the impression of thoughtfulness when Michael wore it, when it was on Skinner’s face, it gave him the beetle-browed look that most people associated with gorillas. On top of that, the FBI agent spoke as though his jaw was wired shut.

Michael looked up at Skinner. The agent was the human equivalent of Bigfoot. However, appearances were deceiving. Behind the beetle-browed, brutish exterior was a mind that could rival most academics. “What exactly happened?” Skinner’s shoulders tensed.

“I have the reports here,” Michael watched the agent and read the body language like a newspaper. “But I’d like the information from a reliable source.” Bingo. He’s a Marine, all right. Amazing that something so big, mean, and tough can have such a fragile ego.

“He was found in his cell.”

“What happened before that?” Michael waved Skinner to a seat and could almost touch the envy the other Marines in the room wouldn’t admit to feeling. He also had a good idea what they were thinking. Oh, my god. He got to sit down! How does he rate? What did he do? How can I earn a chair too?

Skinner pushed his glasses up. They felt so odd to him now that they weren’t the heavy, brown, thick-framed, rectangular monsters that everyone was issued in boot camp. Boot Camp glasses, often referred to as ‘Birth Controls’, had to be the ugliest design ever imagined for glasses. “He was freaking out, sir. Witnesses say that he was flailing around in his cell and screaming about the demons that were attacking him and that your juju was bigger than D’jolou’s and that you would rescue him. He was waving your business card around like it was some kind of sacred talisman.”

“The report said he was hallucinating. What’s your take?” Michael glanced at the Marines in the doorway. PFC Dykes and LCpl Howden were almost as green as their uniforms.

“I think he was, sir. He looked like he was fighting something that only he could see and hear and he kept going on and on about how you were going to show D’jolou just how much juju you had and that it was bigger than his. Then he just collapsed.”

“And when did you get there?”

“I got there just after the Corporal of the Watch called for a medic.”

“Why were you there?”

“I was there to check on him. I checked on him every night before I leave and every morning as soon as I get in.”

"Who was on the watch?”

“Lance Corporal Howden.”

“Was there anyone else on watch?”

“Private First Class Dykes.”

“Was he in the building when this happened?”

“Yes sir. He was escorting me into the wing because it was after hours.”

“Did he have any visitors that you know of?”

“No sir.”

Michael looked at the two Marines in the doorway. “Lance Corporal Howden.”

Howden snapped to attention. “Sir.”

Michael flinched slightly. “Marine, if you yell in here again, I swear to God you will not live long enough to regret it.”

“Yes sir.”

“Did Jabute have any visitors while you were on watch?”

“No sir.”

“Were you on watch all day?”

“No sir.”

“Who was on watch before you?”

“AT3 Miclat, sir.”

Michael turned his gaze to Skinner. “Is he in the building now?”

“Yes sir.”

“Get Miclat in here, Howden.”

“Yes sir.” Howden immediately left the office.

“PFC Dykes. While you were on watch, did you go through the East wing?”

Dykes snapped to attention. He didn’t look old enough to shave, let alone be a Marine. “Sir. No sir.”

“Did you see anyone suspicious?”

“Sir. No sir.”

Michael looked out the window at the gathering storm. He had a feeling that he knew what had killed Kino Jabute, but how the man had gotten it was a complete mystery. Ci’apii was usually smoked, and Jabute wouldn’t be allowed cigarettes in his cell.

The Haitian hadn’t left his cell, no one went in, and no one had any access to him, so how he had been killed was anyone’s guess. If it was ci’apii, the biggest question was how he got it in a large enough dose to kill him. Even stranger was how it had gotten from Sedona, Arizona to Langley, Virginia in the first place.

“Any ideas what killed him, sir?” Skinner ventured.

“It almost sounds like he OD’d on ci’apii.”

“Keep a what?”

“Kay a pee,” Michael corrected. “It’s a mild hallucinogen along the lines of mescaline. But if that’s what he died of, how’d he get it?”

"I'll find out, sir.”

“Does the ME still have his body?”

“Yes sir.”

“Have them test for this.” Michael wrote a few chemical formulas down on a sheet of paper.

Skinner looked at the odd arrangement of letters and numbers. He aced chemistry in high school, but this baffled him. “It almost looks like a plant enzyme.”

“It is. The first is what to look for if it was inhaled or smoked, the second if it was put into a liquid, and the third if it’s ingested. Its chemical structure changes depending on how it’s consumed, but the effects are always the same.”

“And you think this is what killed him?”

Michael nodded. “And if I’m right, my next questions will be how he got it and where it came from. Come in.”

“Remember, don’t talk too loud,” Howden cautioned the Sailor as they walked in.

Petty Officer Romualdo Miclat crossed the room and stood at attention in front of Michael’s desk. “AT3 Miclat reporting as ordered, sir.”

“Petty Officer Miclat,” Michael gave the short Filipino a quick once over. “Your gig line is in three time zones and you need a haircut.”

“Yes sir.” Miclat felt his face warm as he straightened his belt and shirt so they lined up perfectly with the flap that covered the zipper in his pants.

“You had the watch before Lance Corporal Howden?”

“Yes sir.”

“Did anyone visit Kino Jabute in cell four while you were on watch?”

“No sir.”

“Did anyone stop by the cell?”

“Yes sir.”

Michael leaned forward a little. “Who?”

“The warden sir.”

“What did he do?”

“He brought the inmate lunch, sir.”

“Lance Corporal Howden,” Michael looked at the Marine.

“Sir.” Howden snapped to attention.

“Did the warden bring Kino Jabute dinner?”

“Yes sir.”

“Do you know who the warden was?”

“MA1 Hillcrest, sir.”

“Did he bring the lunch as well, Petty Officer?”

“Yes sir.”

Michael made a vital connection. He looked at Skinner. “Have them check Jabute for that enzyme. He’ll have to have eaten it. It’s not as potent in its liquid form.”

“Could he have gotten it in two doses?”

“Not if he drank it, no. It would hit his system too fast and be gone within three hours.”

“Fast acting.”

“Yes, but very potent. If he drank it, it’d be like a toker smoking two joints. It’s nowhere near enough to kill him.”

“Toker, sir?”

“A regular marijuana user. It’d knock his socks off, but it wouldn’t cause hallucinations or death. He didn’t smoke it and he didn’t drink it, so he had to have eaten it.”

“Is it stronger that way?”

Michael nodded slowly. “You have no idea. One ci’apii leaf is taken, cut into pieces as long as a staple and as wide as a paper clip, and dried. It’s usually ground up, sprinkled on tobacco, and smoked. That little bit is just as strong as a top-quality doobie.”

Skinner nodded. “Nice.”

“Yeah. And it’s undetectable after eight hours and that’s if they know what to look for in the first place.”

Skinner nodded.

“And while you’re at it, question the warden and anyone who handles food for the inmates there. I want to know how Jabute got that shit if that is in fact what killed him.”

“Yes sir.”

Michael dismissed the group with a wave and sat back in his chair.

Once he was alone, he closed his eyes and took a couple of deep breaths to take his mind off the pain in his leg and arm.

He folded his arms on his desk and put his head down.

A rush of memories came at him as soon as he closed his eyes.

He didn’t force them away; that would only make things worse. He just tried to relax and let them happen as if he were watching the climax of a horror movie.


The glass shatters and explodes so slowly it’s as if time has slowed to a crawl.

Next to him, Marella is shaking slightly. She’s scared. And while he won’t admit it, he is too. He’s terrified.

He feels the glass strike him like so many hot bullets.

The floor rumbles and bucks beneath him, and for a moment, he’s reminded of a rollercoaster.

He hears the explosions and more impacts and feels Marella’s hand on his wrist. She’s holding on as tight as she can. He can hear her rapid breathing, but she doesn’t make a sound.

Oh, shit.

The floor groans and part of it falls into the floor below only to vanish into flames.

“It’s okay,” his voice is surprisingly calm and reassuring. He isn’t sure if she can hear him, but it’s worth the effort.

The smell of burning wires and detonated ordinance fill the air.

An eerie silence is followed by a loud crumbling sound as yet another section of the floor gives way under the fire and a large portion of the ceiling falls down.

Without warning, another explosion rips the floor upward, throwing him against the ceiling and then to the floor.

He can’t get his hands up fast enough to stop the glass that’s flying at him.

A searing pain turns the world red, then black as a piece of glass hits his face.

The darkness is silent now except for the intermittent, hollow foosht of fire extinguishers and the sounds of rescue workers searching through the rubble. He hopes Marella is alive.

Darkness.

Lights flash from his head toward his feet as people talk over him in calm, yet quick voices.

Darkness.

A bright light shines in his face and a gentle, feminine voice tells him it’s okay. He’ll be fine. He just needs to stay still.

He doesn’t like what they’re doing to him. He doesn’t like people touching his face.

Darkness.

He can taste something plastic in the back of his mouth. He looks up at the covered faces as they move the light, talk to one another, and look down at him.

Something is put on his face.

The air smells strange…


Marella looked at Michael. He had fallen asleep at his desk. She considered waking him up, but he needed the sleep.

She watched him for a minute. So much had happened to him so fast that he wasn’t able to work any of it out and get it all into discrete compartments the way he normally did. He was, in his own words, a mess.

Physically, he was fine. He looked a little tired, but after the weekend he’d had, it was no wonder.

She smiled and went back to work. She’d wake him in a while. There was nothing for him to do today, so she saw no need to disturb him if he wanted to catch up on some desperately-needed sleep.

Her smile faded when she saw the slip of paper that someone had put under her coffee cup.

The note was from D’jolou. He wanted her to know that his juju was as far-reaching as the sun and that if she didn’t see him, she would be next.

She looked at the picture of Kino Jabute’s body. She had read the report and had no doubt that D’jolou had had done it. How, she didn’t know. All she knew was that he was behind it. Jabute’s death was a message.

She put the paper in her purse and looked at the door to Michael’s office. She had to tell him, but she didn’t want to wake him up. Was this the kind of situation he was always in? Was this why, at forty-one, his sandy brown hair was starting to go gray?

He had told her to tell him as soon as she discovered any more notes or if anyone bothered her or made her uncomfortable. That was a direct order. But as a doctor, she couldn’t bring herself to interrupt his rest. Even as a clinical psychiatrist, she knew that he needed rest. But there was this new note.

She put it in her purse. She’d show him later.

A noon, she went into his office and gently touched his shoulder.

He looked up at her.

“Go home.”

“Can’t. It’s Monday.”

“So? You’re in no shape to do anything.” Marella put her hand on his shoulder.

“It’s his birthday today,” Michael said quietly.

Marella nodded. She knew who he was talking about and how it had to hurt him.

About three days ago, his brother had died at the hands of a drunk driver. Michelle Denise Voruskaya was a sweet, funny, athletic young woman who had finally bowed to the inevitable and accepted what she had to do to be at peace with herself. She had undergone a sex-reassignment procedure and had begun her life over as Mitchell Dennis.

It had been awkward for Michael at first, but once he and Mitchell had had their meeting, he was fine with it. He was even helping Mitchell adjust to his new life and teaching him the things every guy should have learned by age ten.


“Okay, so… what do I call you?” Michael looked at the youthful young man across from him. “I mean, yeah, you’re name is Mitchell, but what does that make you?”

“I’m a guy, Mike.”

“I know. I can see that. But what I want to know is what do I call you? How do I relate to you? Are you my sister or brother? How do I- what- what do I tell people? What should I say when they ask if I have any brothers or sisters?”

“I’m your brother.”

Michael pushed his glasses up. “And I’m really confused.”

Mitchell had laughed. “Mike, if you want to know, I always preferred to be called your brother. But now I am one. I’m an actual brother, not a girl in boy’s clothing.”

“Okay. So… what? How- what- this is just weird for me.”

“Weird for you? Mike, I’m the one who jumped the line, not you.”

“But you’re not the one who’s sister just became a brother, okay? This is weird for me, kid. Really fucking weird.”


Michelle had always been his favorite sister and then she had become his brother. And to lose someone that close so suddenly and needlessly had to hurt. He was taking it well, but Marella knew him better. He might appear to be taking it all in stride as if it was just part for the course, but inside, he was a disaster.

“Pull chocks. If there’s an emergency I’ll handle it.”

“I’m good.”

“The hell you are.” Marella knelt beside him. “You don’t normally fall asleep at your desk, but you were out cold when I came in. That’s not normal for you and it’s not a good sign. Get going. I’ll have Jessie pick you up or ask Tater Tot to take you home. It’s your call.”

“Don’t bother Jessie. She’s in school right now.”

“I’ll call Tater Tot. Go get into normal clothes while you still have the chance.”

Michael smiled slightly.

Marella watched him leave the office and picked up the phone.

Special Agent Elias “Tater Tot” Griffin answered the phone on the second ring. “Forensics, this is Griffin.”

“Hey, Tater Tot, it’s me. I need you to do something for me.”

“Like what?”

Marella smiled. Tater Tot might be one of the FBI’s top forensic pathologists and criminal profilers, but he looked and sometimes sounded like a kid.

It was his ability to easily and completely pass for a ten-year-old boy that had earned him a place on the task force. He had been instrumental in bringing down one of the nation’s biggest child pornography rings and had helped catch numerous serial kidnappers and pedophiles by using his cute, innocent, little boy looks. He volunteered to use himself as bait when it came time to meet the perverts face-to-face.

He was forty-one, but looked like he was ten and could do all the things a boy that age could do including some spectacular stunts on his BMX dirt bike and any skateboard he could get his hands on.

Marella smiled. She could almost see the bright-eyed, innocent face looking up at her with all the trust that only a child could have. “I need you take Michael home.”

“Sure,” Tater Tot was suddenly all business. He knew about Michael and had been friends with the man for years. They’d even worked together on several occasions when he needed a taller, looks-his/her-age agent to pose as a parent or older relative. “I’ll be right over.”

“Thanks.”

Tater Tot smiled. “No big. It just might cause a scene seeing a child driving a car.”

“I used to do it all the time.”

“You did?”

“Yeah. I dated a guy who worked in a chop shop in Havana. I’d boost the cars and drive them in and he’d cut them up.”

“You little vixen.”

Marella smiled. “See you in a bit.”

“You got it.” Tater Tot hung up and grabbed his jacket. He took his keys off the hook by the door and walked out.

Michael was staring blankly at the floor when Tater Tot walked in.

“Hey, Mike.”

“Hey.”

“Ready to roll?”

Michael nodded slightly.

“You look like hell. Are you okay?”

“I’ve had a bad week.”

“You have a lot of those,” Tater Tot held the door open. He led Michael to his bright green Volkswagon Beetle and smiled. The car was very distinctly his. It was electric green with black racing stripes and a light teal interior. A pair of giant sunglasses hung from the rear-view mirror. “In.”

Michael got into the passenger side of the car and closed his eyes. He could feel the change in the weather. “Can you keep an eye on her for me?”

“Why?”

“Someone’s stalking her and I have reason to believe she’s in danger.”

“Sure. I can’t, but I know someone who can.”

“Who?”

“I don’t know his name, but the guys call him Magneto.”

“Oh. That’s Sion Macsen. He’ll do.”

“Yeah. If ever there was a bodyguard, he’s it.”

Michael nodded. He’d known Sion Macsen since he had first joined the FIRM. The man was called Magneto because of his resemblance to the Marvel Comics character by that name.

Tater Tot didn’t speak much while he drove. He had a feeling that Michael wasn’t in the mood for chat. He pulled into the parking spot and killed the engine.

A moment later, he was walking toward the front door to the apartment that Michael and his two kids shared. There was nothing wrong with the place, but he still used extreme caution while approaching.

A young woman from the local college had been found raped and brutally murdered nearby.

He, like everyone else in the small neighborhood kept a sharp eye out for trouble.

He checked out the apartment before letting Michael go in. If something was going to happen, he was in better shape to deal with it than his friend was. “Okay.”

Michael nodded and walked in.

Benson walked over to the spy and pressed his cold nose against his person’s left hand.

“Hey, Ben.” Michael gave Benson a light pat on the head.

Benson followed him down the hall and sat down just inside the doorway.

“I’m gonna hang here for a bit,” Tater Tot flopped down on the couch and picked up a book. He knew that it was the latest murder mystery book by Jessica Fletcher, but he couldn’t read a word of it. He looked at the bookmark and decided that it was probably Jessie’s. Jessie liked to read books in Russian to keep her skills sharp. Besides, cute baby rabbits nestled in a bright pink basket wouldn’t be Michael’s first choice in bookmarks.

“Knock yourself out,” Michael answered. He didn’t mind if fellow agents hung out at his place. All of his neighbors worked for the same organization and they all knew each other. On top of that, there was safety in numbers. While he kept his gun loaded and ready on his bedside table and Benson was a top-notch guard dog, there was no substitute for having someone else around.

Tater Tot smiled and picked up a copy of Horse Sense. After a few articles, he decided that he wasn’t terribly interested in horses. He set that down and picked up Hockey Monthly.

He had never been a fan of any kind of hockey, so the magazine didn’t hold his interest for long.

National Geographic had an interesting piece on Ancient Maya civilizations and a thought-provoking article on the formation of undersea volcanoes and how they affected the oceans and marine life around them.

After a while, he checked on Michael. The spy was sound asleep in denim jeans, a Journey t-shirt, and white gym socks. He nodded slightly and closed the door just enough for privacy, but not all the way.

He looked at his watch. It was almost time for Looney Tunes followed by the best three hours of cartoons ever aired. He didn’t pay much attention to the Daffy Duck cartoon about Duck Dodgers in the 24th-and-a-half Century. He was just waiting for Transformers to come on. Today was the season finale, followed by the season finale of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe. After that on another channel was the season finale of Thunder Cats, G.I. Joe, and then Defenders of the Earth.

After cartoons, it was time for Buck Rogers, Battlestar Galactica, and Wizards and Warriors.

After the opening theme of He-Man, he found himself asking why Adam could go around a corner, do the whole “By the Power of Grayskull” bit and the associated lightshow, but no one saw or heard anything. He sat back with a can of root beer and had just taken his shoes off when the phone rang.

Rather than let it wake Michael, he answered it, knowing full well that person on the other end might very well think they were talking to a child. “Hello?”

“Is Archangel in?”

Tater Tot frowned. He didn’t recognize the voice. “Yes. Whom shall I say is calling?”

“Sandra Martinez. I’m Marella Hounsou’s room mate.”

“Oh. Hi. I’m Eli.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Eli, but I really need to speak to your father. Can you get him for me?” Sandra couldn’t believe that Michael would allow his son to answer the phone. That wasn’t a smart thing to do in a neighborhood where a young lady had been raped and murdered.

“Um, okay. Just a sec.” He wondered what Miss Martinez would think if she knew that she was talking to an adult instead of a kid. He went to get Michael. “Cool. You’re awake. Sandra Martinez is on the phone. I didn’t wake you up, did I?”

Michael shook his head. “No. My shoulder did that.”

“Okay.” Tater Tot went back the living room to resume his cartoon watching.

Michael picked up the phone. “Yeah.”

“I didn’t know you had a son.”

“He’s not mine. I’m just keeping an eye on him.” Michael decided that Martinez didn’t need to know about Elias Griffin. The fewer people who knew how old Tater Tot really was, the safer the agent would be. “What’s up?”

“Have you seen El?”

“Not since I left earlier, why?”

“We were supposed to go to Home Depot today, but she hasn’t come by and she’s not in the office.”

Michael suddenly went to full alert. Benson sensed the change and moved closer to his person. “When was she supposed to meet you?” Michael pushed the dog’s head away before the Rottweiler could drool on him.

“About an hour ago. I figured maybe you might have seen her.”

Michael shook his head. “No. Like I said, I haven’t seen her since I left. Is her bike still there?”

“Yeah, that’s why I called the office. They said she left to meet me.”

A chill ran up Michael’s spine. He had a really bad feeling about this. “Stay there. I’m on my way.” He hung up. “Tater, can you run me in?”

“Crisis?”

“Maybe.” Michael went to his room for a sweatshirt.

Tater Tot turned the TV off and pulled his sneakers on. He was pulling his jacket on when the phone rang again. “Hello?”

“Where is she?” A coarse voice demanded.

“Where is who?” Tater Tot asked politely.

“Hounsou. Where is she?”

“I think you have the wrong number.” Tater Tot put on his best ten-year-old boy act.

“Tell me where she is.”

Tater Tot looked at the phone as if it had just taken it upon itself to resist being used. “Who are you?”

“That is not your concern, boy. Where is Hounsou?”

“I dunno.” Tater Tot listened to the caller and made note of all the important facts.

A train horn blared in the background, but the echo said it was underground. The person on the phone was male, adult, and from somewhere in the vicinity of Jamaica.

“Where is she boy?”

“I dunno. Why don’t you ask a grown up?” Tater Tot motioned for Michael to take the phone.

“Yes?” Michael took the phone.

“Where is Hounsou?”

“Who is this?”

The line went dead.

Michael looked at the phone. “Eli, get your keys.”

Part Five

Knight’s Bridge, Virginia

Tuesday

Michael looked at the yellow tape that marked the off-limits area.

Normally, he didn’t bother with yellow and black tape. The only time ever really saw it was on the news when police were investigating one of his assassination jobs. And the few times he saw it in person were when he was going past it on the freeway to work or around construction zones. He never thought he’d see it in Knight’s Bridge.

At the end of the hall, a Marine was being questioned about what she had seen in the locker room.

He looked at the tape and shook his head. In a way, he wasn’t really bothered by it. The body was someone he didn’t know and had never met. He had just entered his office when he was approached by two police officers. They held up a picture and asked if he’d seen the woman in it. Did he know her? Did he know anything about her?

He’d shaken his head and answered no to all three questions.

The girl was twenty, just out of the academy and at her first duty station. All he knew about the redhead was that she was new and had only checked into the command that morning. Who she was what had happened were a complete mystery to him.

“Agent…” a tall, slim man with light brown skin walked over to Michael. He searched his memory for the agent’s name, but came up blank. In fact, he wasn’t even sure this was the guy he was supposed to talk to.

That was the problem with these people, he decided. They all look alike in their identical white suits. An old adage came back to him. You’re unique… Just like everyone else.

He looked at the agent before him. The man was just over six feet tall; had sandy brown hair; gray eyes behind ordinary, metal-frame glasses; a medium-athletic build; and a light copper, possibly olive cast to his naturally tan skin. The man was in no way unusual or remarkable. In fact, he was the definition of ordinary. He was literally the average Caucasian male.

Agent Enrique Ayarzagotia-Martinez, “A to Z” to all who knew him, looked at the tallish agent. The man was a bit taller than average, but not remarkably so and he was perfectly proportioned, unlike many tall people who had ridiculously long legs and average size bodies. “Um, are you…” he looked at his notepad. He was being sent to talk to a Kevin Tall Deer.

It occurred to the agent that if the man he was talking to was Tall Deer, then his name alone would explain the tan and the olive caste that made him seem almost Mediterranean, possibly even Middle Eastern. “Kevin Tall Deer?”

Michael was immediately on his guard, though he didn’t let it show. What did this guy want? He decided that it was better to be safe than sorry. “No, sorry.”

“You sure? You kinda match the description we were given.”

“I match a lot of descriptions,” Michael answered. His tone was just light enough to deflect the agent’s statement while not being flippant.

“You got ID?” The agent asked.

“Right here.” Michael took his photo ID card out of his jacket pocket and handed it to the agent. He had several ID cards and all of them could pass even the closest scrutiny and background check that anyone could put them through. The agent looked the card over carefully.

Michael made note of the agent’s attention to detail and looked the man over while his ID was being checked.

Former INS. Recently divorced. Knows what to look for in a fake ID. Probably Border Patrol Agent.

The agent handed the ID card back. “Sorry to bother you, Mr. Voruskia.”

“Not a problem, Agent.” Michael ignored the butchery of his last name. He’d heard it all his life, so it was nothing new or unusual to him. “Just out of curiosity, why are you looking for this Tall Deer character anyway?”

“He’s wanted for smuggling contraband, illegal border crossing, and for questioning in a murder case.”

“That’s bad news,” Michael’s mind was racing to find out why his description had been given to the feds and who had done it.

“Yeah,” Ayarzagotia-Martinez answered with a nod. “We followed him here on a tip from his brother, North Wind.”

Michael nodded. Rodger that. “I see. Well, I hope you get him.”

“Do you have any information on him, maybe? ‘Cause frankly, I’m at a dead end.”No, Michael answered silently. No, Officer, Tall Deer is going to be a dead end. A very dead end. “I’m afraid not. You got a picture? I can post it in the Squad barracks and my guys’ll keep an eye out for him.”

“Not yet, no. I’ll get one here as soon as I can.”

“Thanks. Sorry I couldn’t do more.”

“No, that’s cool. I appreciate your cooperation. Sorry to bother you.”

“Not at all,” Michael smiled and went on his way. As soon as the elevator doors closed, his mood changed drastically. Tall Deer was going to get it. It was one thing for the guy to steal his horses, but border jumping and smuggling were patently illegal on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border. And now identity theft could be added to the list.

His right hand reflexively became a fist. He could almost feel Tall Deer’s face connecting with his hand again and again until the man’s face was a barely recognizable pile of broken bones. Tall Deer had finally crossed the line. He stepped out of the elevator and stopped when he saw Marella looking at him with a noticeably relieved look on her light cocoa face. “Where were you? Martinez called because she couldn’t find you. Your bike was here, but you were gone. What happened?”

Marella didn’t mind the questions. His tone said it all for him. He was worried about her and was glad to see she was back and unharmed. “It’s a long story.”

“I have plenty of time.” He opened the door to his office and stepped aside, making the message very clear.

“I don’t want to talk about it here.”

“Why?”

Marella took the slip of paper out of her purse and handed it to him. “I didn’t tell you about it earlier because you weren’t up to any more stress.” Michael looked at the note. “What does this mean?”

“He wants me to see him. The other one’s a warning. He’s watching me. I had Devon pick me up yesterday after work and I didn’t want to leave Sandy a message because… did- did she tell you what was on the door yesterday morning?”

“No. I haven’t seen her yet.” Michael looked at his aide. She was clearly shaken. “What is it?”

“A cow tongue. A warning. It means that he knows I’ve told someone and that if I don’t do as he says, he’ll kill me… or worse.”

Michael didn’t ask what could be worse than death. He had been living it every day since he woke up in White Haven after Red Star had been shot to pieces. “He won’t come near you.”

Marella wanted to tell him that D’jolou didn’t need to come near her to kill her. He could kill her from wherever he was without even looking in her general direction, let alone going near her.

“Trust me. I’ll bring Benson over. No one in their right mind is going to bother you with two hundred pounds of over-protective Rottweiler nearby.”

“You don’t have to. D’jolou has ways.”

Michael looked at Marella. He had no idea what kind of power she believed this D’jolou character had or why she feared him, but he meant to get to the bottom of it. He looked at the far wall. “We’re going to talk. In.”

Marella followed him into his office. She had a bad feeling about this. The last time Michael had had a talk like this was with Gabrielle. And three days later, the woman had been transferred to Red Star.

She knew why Gabrielle had been transferred, or at least, she’d heard the rumors. Everyone knew about Gabrielle and how the woman had set her sights on Michael. Rumor had it that she had made one pass to many at him and he had decided that enough was enough.

Michael waved Marella to a chair and sat down facing her instead of at his desk. He didn’t want to spook her any more than she already was. “Okay. What- Who is this D’jolou character?”

“He’s a- he’s a d’jolou.”

“I thought that was his name?”

“That’s what voodoo priests are called. They’re called ‘d’jolou’.” Marella looked down at her hands. She knew Michael would never hurt her, but she was still fairly intimidated by him. His profile listed him as a ‘psychological Rock of Gibraltar’, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t scare the hell out of people. In fact, it was his ability to do just that that made him as effective an interrogator as any torture device.

Michael, Marella focused on anything but her fear of the man across from her. Hebrew. It means ‘like the Lord.’ Michael is an Archangel, an Angel of the Lord. Michael was sent over Egypt to kill the firstborn in the land. It was Michael who defeated Lucifer and cast him into Hell on the Lord’s command. Anthony is English for Antonio. Saint Antonio of Monticello fought in the Crusades and is the patron saint of warriors and mercenaries.

His sign is Aries, the ram. Aries was the Greek god of War. The Romans called the god Mars. The planet that rules Aries is Mars. People born under Aries tend to be fierce and relentlessly stubborn. They make great warriors. His people call him North Wind. The winds from the north are typically cold and have a distinct chill to them that makes them feel like ice.

Jesus, whoever named this guy sure knew what they were dealing with.

“What does he want with you?” Michael sensed Marella’s uneasiness and tried a different angle. No sense in spooking her.

“He probably wants me to marry him.”

“Then he’s got a weird style of courtship.”

“He’s not courting me, sir. He never did.”

“I’m guessing there’s a history here. Is it anything like me and Maria?”

Marella smiled. Michael’s history with Maria von Furster would have a made a great action-suspense novel. If it could be called anything, the word ‘saga’ would fit. As a miniseries, James Mitchner’s Centennial or James Clavell’s Sho-Gun would pale in comparison. Their relationship had more intrigue than most spy novels and more drama than any day-time soap.

Her own history with D’jolou was heading for the same area. She could almost see the critics’ review. An epic saga of good vs. evil. A compelling story of a young Haitian girl’s struggle to escape the tyranny of a corrupt voodoo priest.

She shrugged.

“What’s going on? Why’s he after you?”

“I refused to marry him.”

Michael shook his head slightly. Some guys just didn’t know when to give up. “He just doesn’t get it.”

“No, D’jolou gets what D’jolou wants,” Marella answered crisply.

“Really.” Michael’s eyebrows went up.

“Things were going bad for my family. After my parents died in a mudslide, I was sent to live with my aunt and uncle in Port-au-Prince. They took over the… business, I guess, and were waiting for me to get old enough to go to work with my sisters. They made sure my brother died in a prison brawl and put my cousin in charge of my sisters and cousins. He practically worshipped his parents, so he was the favorite. They picked him because they knew he would make sure that the money went to them and not their employees.”

“What’s this business?”

Marella walked over to the window and watched the gathering clouds. “In Haiti, there’s only two real ways to make money. Drugs and prostitution. The only people with money are the drug lords, but they live in Cuba, Jamaica, or somewhere else where they can be safe from the law in Haiti. They pay local thugs to run the plantations or fields, so the average locals are pretty much left in the lurch.”

Michael listened closely. He was known for being able to elicit information and use it to his advantage later without the person giving it to him ever realizing what they were doing. And any information he could get on drugs, the dealers, and the people in charge of them would prove valuable when he needed to enlist the DEA’s operatives.

The DEA supplied manpower and gear. In return, he handed over drug busts that usually made headlines because of the size and got the DEA agents, their bosses, and the president-appointed Drug Czar huge kudos and the funding every agency needed, but was hard pressed to get legally.

“The locals make money working for the drug lords, but they don’t generally get paid enough to support their families, and the government of the day doesn’t share its revenue, so people do the only thing they can to get by. They put their daughters to work on the streets as prostitutes. But the real shot of the situation is that you have to pay the government for a permit to carry out ‘personal services’, and pay the local cops to look the other way, so you don’t really have much in the end.”

Michael nodded. This was more good information. He wasn’t sure how he would use it yet, but he wasn’t about to ignore it. One never knew when inside information might be handy. And in the right hands, almost profitable. He smiled slightly. He had enough information on a certain member of the Committee to end the man’s marriage, career, and just ruin him in general. And that was the best that would happen if the information landed in certain hands. If it went to someone else, the man would be patted on the back, but in another set of hands, the consequences would be disastrous.


“You know, Michael, I could always let it out that you’re a homosexual.”

Michael smiled. He wasn’t gay, but he knew he’d have a hard time proving it. Time to fight back.

“I imagine that would make very short work of your career.”

“Maybe, but unlike your sexual proclivities, mine won’t make national headlines and cause a scandal bigger than Watergate.”

Crowther chuckled. “Blackmail won’t work on me, Mike. May I call you Mike?”

“No, you may not. And yes, I have plenty on you. Does ‘Nude Cuties’ mean anything to you?”

Crowther shifted uneasily.

“What about ‘Billy’s Backyard’?” Michael knew he’d hit the mark. “I guess that means you’re also familiar with ‘Silly Sandy’ and ‘Kiddies-’”

“Okay. Okay.” Crowther loosened his tie. “What do you want?”

“Marella Hounsou.”

“What about her?”

“She’s not happy in New Mexico and I want Gabrielle gone.”

“She’ll disappear.”



He had information on all of them and could use it at his whim or not at all depending on what he wanted to accomplish. Right now, that information was keeping them at bay. They didn’t know he had it, and each one thought that he was the only one that Michael didn’t have any dirt on.

Marella didn’t pay any attention to the rain that splattered against the window. “Anyway, my family was having a bad time. My cousin was sick, so he couldn’t control the money as well as he should. My sisters and cousins started skimming a little from time to time and complaining about how I never had to work. I was a whole nine-years-old at the time, so I couldn’t be out on the streets. My cousin, Eddie, got thrown in jail for pandering because he couldn’t pay the weekly overhead. There was no money to bail him out, either. My cousin, Darci, was killed by a job because he refused to pay and she threatened to tell the cops. My oldest sister died of a heroin overdose, and my other sister got knocked up and after a few months, she couldn’t work anymore. All the while, I’m too young to work, my aunt and uncle can’t find work, and there’s no one for them to put on the streets.”

Michael was silent for a moment. He thought his family was bad. His mother turned a blind eye to what was happening, or insisted that he was either making it up, or deserved it. His father was a violent drunkard who ruled his family with an iron fist and tried to put his children to work as apprentices to relatives to avoid having to pay for their education.

He, like his older sister, he’d never gotten past the sixth grade. He was apprenticed to his uncle to become a carpenter. His father figured that the apprenticeship saved him money, and his uncle saw it as free, limitless labor since there was no law against apprenticeship. After all, the law stated that a child had to attend school unless the child was apprenticed in a meaningful trade.

Neither man realized that the boy was actually learning in the process.

His older sister had become a waitress at a topless bar. From there, she graduated to stripping, and from there she mastered the fine art of prostitution to support her drug habit.

His younger sister, who had only recently gotten her high-school diploma and landed a good job because of it, had fulfilled her lifelong dream of having her outside match her inside. She had saved up for years, but she had eventually been able to afford sex reassignment surgery and until her death, a happily married firefighter in Chicago.

As for himself, he had a GED and was little more than a government hit-man. He guessed he was somewhere between James Bond and a garden-variety murderer. “So how does this voodoo idiot fit in?” Michael sat back in the chair and looked up at the ceiling. A chill ran up his spine. He didn’t know what it was, but he was unnerved by ceilings.

“My aunt and uncle went to see him because they believed a rival family was using voodoo against them to take over their territory.” Marella watched Michael look up at the ceiling. He seemed completely unnerved by it, but unsure why. She wracked her brain for the clinical term for a phobia of ceilings. She watched him for a moment and debated whether or not she should tell him why he was wary of ceilings.

She had worked with Michael for nearly four years, and he was still a complete mystery. He was intelligent bordering on genius, and a brilliant strategist. Yet he had a GED. And unless he was physically threatened, preferred not to fight even though he could easily handle himself in a fight. He was a talented artist, but he never really did much more than carve custom chess sets and furniture although he sometimes lent investigators a hand as a sketch artist.

From a psychiatric point of view, he was the Rock of Gibraltar. But oddly enough, he had some of the most off-the-wall phobias. While acute acrophobia was fairly common, he was one of the best HALO jumpers in the country and a SAR swimmer who had regularly jumped out of helicopters into the ocean. He had what could best be described as a mild anxiety attack when in tight spaces for prolonged periods of time, but did some of his best espionage work while in spaces that most people would never be able to imagine a man his height could fit into.

His more unusual fears surprised her, to say the least. He was probably the only man alive who was afraid of diving boards, balloons, and any open doors in his room when the lights were out. And now he seemed unsettled by ceilings.

Marella watched him for a moment longer. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Michael’s tone was even and unreadable.

Marella’s eyes narrowed. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” Michael met her searching look evenly and without the slightest flinch. “I’m just trying to figure out why I’m having nightmares about being on the ceiling.”

Marella nodded slightly. “I see.” Does he know? How can he remember?

“Well, that’s nowhere near important. What I need to know is why this D’jolou bozo is after you.”

“Well, he told my aunt and uncle that they were cursed.”

“Was someone placing a curse on them?”

“He didn’t say. He just said that he’d take care of it.”

“And what happened after that?”

“Well, he handled the problem and they were grateful. A few years later, when I was about fourteen, they tried putting me on the streets and D’jolou told them not to. He said that their plan to make me a prostitute was the reason they were having such bad luck in everything. They told him that they needed the money, but he told them that they would be calling down even more bad juju on themselves if they didn’t comply.”

“Did they?”

“No. They accepted D’jolou’s offer to take me in and considered it a great blessing that the most powerful d’jolou in the area took a liking to me. Well, he got a little to friendly with me and I got scared. I started to resist, but he got angry and then violent. I can’t tell you how many times he beat me senseless and did God-knows-what to me.”

Michael shook his head. He’d seen that all too often as a child. Especially where he grew up. His decision to stand against it had cost him dearly. There were many times he’d woken up tied to or hanging from something, locked into a cabinet or wardrobe, or whatever else his disobedience might incur.

“I ran away. I was sixteen, scared, and I needed to get away from him before he killed me like he killed all the other voodoo priests in the area.”

“What happened then?”

Marella looked back out the window. “I ran away to Cuba. From there, I went to Jamaica, and then on to Miami by way of the Bahamas.” She opted not to tell him about the abortion she had gotten in Cuba.

“Kind of a round-about route.”

“Anything to throw him off my trail.”

Michael nodded. He glanced at his watch when it beeped at him. “Hell.”

“What?”

“I have an appointment in about twenty minutes,” Michael stood up and slowly straightened his left leg. The physical therapy was helping, but not much. “Why don’t you take lunch?”

“You want anything?”

“Not, really, no. Thanks.”

Marella nodded. She knew he wasn’t feeling well, but a complete lack of appetite wasn’t normal for anyone. It was time to see Ellen Beeks. She slipped out of the office just as D’jolou Mordecai Bannik walked down the hall in his light gray and black suit. “Good afternoon, D’jolou.”

Bannik nodded and smiled his easy, warm smile. “Good afternoon, Miss Hounsou.”

Marella didn’t know what it was about D’jolou Bannik, but she had liked him from the moment she met him. Maybe it was his deep voice that reminded her of Darth Vader. Maybe it was his big, barrel-chested frame. Maybe it was his genuine, unconditional love and concern for all he met regardless of who they were, where they were from, what religion they practiced, or what their lifestyle was. She had liked him and trusted him from the moment she was first referred to him because of she was having a string of bad things happening in her apartment for no apparent reason.

The faucets dripped regardless of what any plumber could do about them; the doors all stuck even though Michael himself had come over and replaced the rusted hinges and warped doorways; lights refused to work, but no electrician could figure out why; and things had a way of disappearing for days at a time only to turn up in the most unlikely places.

She had finally reached the conclusion that her apartment was jinxed, and asked Leticia Wilkins for advice. The older woman had referred her to her own d’jolou.

D’jolou Bannik had come over and after hearing about the unexplained incidents from both Marella Hounsou and her room mate, Sandra Martinez, and had come to the conclusion that there was indeed a bad omen in the apartment. But it was easily fixed.

On the d’jolou’s advice, and despite feeling completely absurd about doing so, she had hung a barbeque fork, prongs down just outside the front door to ward off the evil spirits that were entering her apartment at will and wreaking mischief and havoc at their leisure.

She wasn’t sure why, but as soon as she hung the fork up, the problems stopped.

The fork stayed where it was.


Michael looked at the fork by the door, then at Marella. “A fork?” She smiled and shrugged. “Some people like plants, some like flags, I like cooking utensils.”


Michael looked at the tall dark-skinned man across from him. “Mr. Bannik. Thanks for coming over. Please, have a seat. Can I get you anything?”

“I’m fine, thank you,” Bannik’s deep, resonant voice and clear Jamaican accent immediately caught Michael off guard. “What can I do for you, Mr. North Wind? Where exactly are the Konochine from?”

Michael answered easily. “We’re somewhere between Hopi and Apache.”

“Interesting. Why did you ask to see me if you are Native American? I don’t think I can be of much help.”

“I’m worried about a friend.”

“Ah,” Bannik nodded. “Miss Hounsou.”

Michael smiled slightly. Bannik was every bit as observant and intuitive as he was. That would make this so much easier. “Yes. She’s being- I don’t know if this is quite the right word, but she’s being stalked by a man named D’jolou.” “Which d’jolou?” Bannik’s face openly revealed his concern.

“I don’t know. All I know is that his name is D’jolou.”

“D’jolou is the Haitian term for a voodoo priest. We are all called D’jolou.”

“Great. I don’t know his name, but he’s from around Port-au-Prince.”

Bannik nodded. He knew exactly whom Michael was referring to. “Oh, him.”

“You know him?”

“I have heard of him, yes.”

“Well, he’s been leaving these all over the place for Marella.” Michael handed Bannik the pictures of the drawings on the door and copies of the notes that had been left on the desk. “On her desk, painted on her door, and just recently, a cow’s tongue was nailed to her front door.”

“The notes are written by someone else.”

“I know. But he’s behind both of them.”

Bannik nodded. “He is getting angry. And impatient. The tongue on the door, though, that concerns me.”

“Why?”

“When a tongue is used, it is very powerful juju. On a door, it means that you have been talking to someone you shouldn’t be. It is almost always found with a warning.”

Michael handed Bannik another picture. “The lab reports identified the red stuff as chicken blood. But the drawings under the door are in snake blood.”

“Snake’s blood and venom,” Bannik nodded. “It is not a warning, Mr. North Wind, it is a death warrant.”

Michael looked up sharply. “He’s gonna kill her?”

Bannik nodded.

“Hell. Is there anyway I can prevent it?”

"Take her into your custody.”

“I can’t. He’s killed a man I had in custody.”

“Kino Jabute, I know.” Bannik smiled at Michael’s slightly confused look. “The message was loud and clear to all of us.”

“How? His death hasn’t been made public yet.”

Bannik smiled. “I am a voodoo priest, Mr. North Wind. I have my ways.”

Michael nodded. “So how do I protect her?”

“This d’jolou fears you. He thinks your juju is more powerful than his. He doesn’t leave notes here or anywhere you are because your power protects her.”

“I don’t have any power, Mr. Bannik. I’m not a shaman. Hell, I’m not even a full-blooded Konochine.”

“But you have power over this d’jolou.”

“How?”

“A priest or shaman only has the power that people give him. If people believe that he has power, if they accept that he has power, then he has power. If they do not believe or accept it, then he is powerless. That it why all priests strive to have the best reputation they can. Ask Red Bird, I’m sure he’ll tell you the exact same thing.”

Michael gave Bannik a wary look. The man knew way too much about him.

“But you do not believe in medicine, do you?” Bannik’s kind smile was warm and knowing. “You believe in logic, reason, and common sense.

Michael nodded slightly.

Bannik’s kind smile broadened. “You have no need to worry about me, Mr. North Wind. I am no danger to you. Red Bird asked me to watch over you. Your ma did as well even though she does not believe in voodoo.”

“How do you know them?”

“I may be from Jamaica,” Bannik smiled. “But I still enjoy a good rodeo. I met Little Tree who introduced me to Mae Jacobs and your real mother. Early Winter introduced me to Red Bird and we spoke for hours about the many similarities and differences between native medicine and voodoo.”

Michael nodded.

“Do you have somewhere she can go until you find the priest that is after her?”

“Yeah. So is he, I don’t know, is he a bad priest?”

“Yes. He kills others to show others that his power is greater than theirs. He is doing this to get her under his control. He is afraid that if he does not make her obey him, then others will begin to defy him as well.”

“It’s all about power.”

“Exactly. For him, power is the only thing. For priests, it is all about helping others. This priest is corrupt and must be stopped as soon as possible.”

Michael nodded. He suddenly had a very bad feeling about sending Marella to lunch.

“You have that sense,” Bannik smiled.

“It’s just a suspicion; what you told me, what I know, what I did just before you came here. I simply put two and two together. No magic.”

Bannik’s smile became knowing. “As I understand it, no one chooses their way in life.”

“I don’t believe in predestination, fate, or destiny any more than I believe in luck or coincidence.”

“I am not talking about the path you walk, Mr. North Wind. I am referring to the way you walk. Ask Red Bird. He knows what you can do.”

Michael shook his head slightly. “No. Thanks, but no. I don’t go in for that kind of thing.”

“To deny your culture is to deny your heritage and identity. You may be half-Russian, but you are still half Konochine. And your gods choose whom they will regardless of what the man’s bloodline is.”

Michael couldn’t argue that. Okay, he was half Russian, but the rest of him was Konochine.

“Now, if you will excuse me, I have an appointment shortly.”

“Sure. Just one question.”

“Of course. You may ask anything.”

“If believing someone has power gives them power, will denying it take their power?”

“Yes. That is why this d’jolou wants Miss Hounsou. She has no power of her own, but she has great faith. And great faith creates great power.”

“How do I get her to not believe he has power?”

“You can’t. She must decide that on her own.”

Michael nodded and stood up when Bannik rose. “Thanks for coming over, Mr. Bannik, you’ve been a tremendous help."

“No need to thank me, North Wind. I am merely doing my job. And don’t worry about me. I can find my own way out.”

Michael smiled slightly as the tall Jamaican walked out.

Part Six

Knight’s Bridge, Virginia
15:27 Tuesday

Michael looked at his watch, then at the door. He was starting to have a very bad feeling.

Sandra Martinez walked over and asked him if he’d seen Marella. They were supposed to meet for lunch at That Diner.

That Diner was a small café just off the main road that led to the building. It was a popular place among the agents because of its location and great food. The owner, having grown tired of seeing diners named after their owner or having some completely unoriginal name or another, had called her café “That Diner”.

Michael liked to meet people there when it wasn’t safe to do so anywhere else. They knew where he was talking about, but ‘that diner’ could easily refer to any café, barista, or diner damned near anywhere. His favorite place, though, was The Usual Place.

The Usual Place was owned by a friend of his and he could always blend into the crowd of working-class Russian Americans and Russian immigrants that flocked to the place after work in the factory ended.

It was the best place in town for borscht and while far enough away to be in the middle of Little Moscow, it was still close enough for a quick lunch run or a leisurely lunch.

The one thing they both shared in common was the fact that they were the place to go for information on anyone, anything, anywhere. It was also the prime place for rumors to start and secrets to be exchanged safely.

Michael picked up the phone and called Ruby at That Diner.

“No, Honey, I ain’t seen her all day. Why don’t you ask Aunt Mae?”

"Thanks, Ruby.” Michael waited for Mae Jacobs to get to the phone.

“Baby Boy, why you don’t call me?” Mae Jacob’s Southern accent warmed her rich voice. “You know I expect you to call from time to time.”

“I know, Ma. I’m sorry. I’ve been busy.”

“Honey child, you work too much. You know that?”

Michael smiled. Ever since he could remember Mae had been like a mother to him. She was more of a mother than Marie Voruskaya had ever been. “Yeah. Hey, look, Ma. Have you seen Marella today?”

“No. Why? You want me get you something and have her bring it back?”

“No, thanks. I’m just- I sent her to lunch over an hour ago, and she hasn’t come back. She was supposed to meet a friend for lunch, but she was a no show.”

“Oh, Baby Boy, that bad news.”

Michael nodded silently. “I’m worried about her, Ma.”

“Oh, Baby Boy, now don’t you go worrying yourself over her. She a big girl, she can handle herself.”

“Someone’s been stalking her, Ma.”

“Then you better find her, boy. Now I keep an eye open for her an I’ll keep her here if’n I see her. But you better get yourself in gear and stop that maniac before he hurts her.”

“I’m afraid I might be a little late.”

“You think he already got her?”

“God, I hope not.”

“Now, boy, don’t you go usin’ the Good Lord’s name like that,” Mae’s tone hardened.

“Sorry.”

“Oh, you gonna be if’n I hear you do it again.” Mae waved to a customer as he walked in. “You think your daddy used to beat you, boy, that ain’t nothing next to what I gonna do to you if I hear you use the Lord’s name like that again.”

Michael winced. He didn’t need to see the older woman’s face to know that her kind, benevolent smile was gone and replaced by a look that would give a stampeding herd of rabid buffalo pause.

Mae Jacobs was often asked if she had ever posed for Purina, the company that made Aunt Jemima pancake mix. People often confused her with the woman on the box because she had the same warm, genuine, kind smile that woman on the box had. In fact, Mae Jacobs looked enough like Aunt Jemima to have been given the nickname by her friends.

But now, that kind, older woman was gone to be replaced by a strong, unwavering warrior. Mae was as faithful a Baptist as they came. “Now, you go find that girl ‘fore something happens to her, hear me?” Mae’s tone was stern.

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“Good. And don’t you even think about causin’ no harm to her.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“Now, y’all go on an hang up now and get to findin’ her.”

“Yes, Ma’am. Thanks, Ma.”

“Any time, Baby Boy.”

Michael hung up. He stopped by the front desk to see if Marella had left the building. She hadn’t. Her ID was still checked out.

He asked Sandy to check the women’s locker room while he looked in the cafeteria.

No luck.

Michael stopped in his tracks when he found Marella’s purse on the floor near her desk. By the looks of it, she didn’t go willingly. “God.”

“What’s wrong?” Sandra joined him a moment later. “That’s her purse. What’s it doing on the floor?”

Michael went to his office. “Don’t touch anything. I’m calling security.”

A team arrived in a few minutes and went over the scene with a fine-tooth comb.

Michael found himself on autopilot the whole time. He had that weird feeling he sometimes got when he was on a case. It was as if he was there, but he was watching everything from a few feet away at the same time.

Once everything had been done, he sat down at his desk and tried to collect himself. He felt as if this somehow wasn’t happening, but he knew it was all too real and that if he didn’t get it together and act fast, Marella would be in a world of trouble if not outright killed.

Sandra was shaken as well, but she was having a harder time hiding it than Michael was. He seemed as if he didn’t care one way or the next what happened. She watched him as he sat at his desk and stared down at the pencil in his right hand. She knew him well enough to know that his apparent aloofness was just his way of dealing with what was happening. He was just as rattled as she was; perhaps more so because, as always, he felt responsible for his personnel. That was the great thing about him. He made a point of knowing his people and looking out for them and their interests and safety as if they were his own family. She wondered if that was all the family he had. His wife had died of breast cancer earlier that year, and he hadn’t remarried. He didn’t even date regularly. He just went about his life raising his two kids, Zachary and Jessica.

She wondered about Zack. He was a good kid, but he didn’t look much like his father and nothing at all like his late mother. She figured it was because he’d been adopted. But the weird part was that if Zack was adopted, why did he bear enough of a resemblance to Michael for people to know that they were related?

She shrugged it off. It was none of her business.

It was a long day, and when it finally ended, Michael was in no mood for company as he walked toward his motorcycle.

He put his helmet on and started his bike.

To his left, Marella’s red and gold Kawasaki Katana was parked just where she’d left it earlier. It was weird not to see her starting her bike.


“You know, sir, you might want to consider a lighter color for your bike.”

“You might want to consider a bigger bike. Preferably one that you sit on.”

“I sit on this one.”

“You sure? From this angle it looks like you have to lay down on it to ride it.”

“What,” Marella feigned shock. “Are you saying I’m pulling a Gabrielle?”

“No, I said you that you were laying on it, not getting laid by it.”

Marella laughed and put her helmet on.


He missed their conversations. Sometimes their quips and retorts had vaguely sexual undertones, but most of the time, they were just trying to get a laugh from the other.

Zack was playing a piece by Paganini when he walked in and Jessica was at the table doing her homework and softly singing a song by Bonnie Tyler.

He looked Zack over as he walked by. “How many rounds?”

“Ten,” Zack lowered his violin. “I swear, I didn’t think Corey would ever let up. He cracked off some good shots.”

“I can see that,” Michael glanced at the beginnings of a nasty shiner on Zack’s right cheek. “You know, I’m not so sure you should be kickboxing.”

Zack looked as if he had just flunked his history exam. “But, Dad…”

Michael stopped at the tone in Zack’s voice. He hated to see the kid upset, but he disliked seeing him getting pounded even more. He didn’t even know why. Zack wasn’t his son, not really, anyway. Zachary Matthew was his younger brother.

The boy had been sent to live with him after his parents got a divorce. JoBeth Janeczec, the woman his father had married only days after his wife’s funeral, had gotten a divorce as soon as she found out the provisions of her predecessor’s parents’ wills. Michael Coldsmith-Briggs Jr. wasn’t going to get a dime of his late wife’s inheritance because the woman had died before inheriting. On top of that, her parents had written her out of their will. There was no money, so there was no reason to stay. She could only put up with poverty for so long and since there was no light at the end of the tunnel, there was no sense in going in that direction anymore.

She had left and gotten a divorce after signing over full custody of their infant son to her husband.

Michael Jr. had lost custody of Zachary a little over a year later when Child Welfare had gotten word of a baby crying all the time in the small apartment over a mechanic’s garage. They had taken one look at the dirty, cramped apartment and removed the boy from his father’s custody. Which was just as well, Michael Jr. sneered. The good-for-nothing bastard was just a waste of space and a drain on his income anyway.

Zachary had been placed with his older brother, Michael Coldsmith-Briggs, III.

Michael and Rachel were unable to have children of their own, so they were more than happy to take in and adopt the adorable little boy despite the infection that would later claim the boy’s vision, and all the many challenges that came with raising an albino.

And now, at seventeen, Zachary looked a bit like his older brother. He was tall; muscular; and had platinum-white hair and ice-blue eyes that shone blood red when light hit them. He was an albino. His voice wasn’t as low as Michael’s but it was close and on the phone, people often confused them. Zack wore a goatee and kept the sides and back of his head shaved while allowing the top to grow long enough to brush the tops of his ears. He looked nothing like his sister.

Jessica Marie looked like her father, but was a bit darker. The Native American appeared to be stronger in her than it was in her father. She wore her long, chestnut hair in a French braid; sensible, yet stylish, wire-framed glasses framed her large gray-green eyes; and in most areas, she definitely favored her father’s side of the family. She was tall, slim, and strong despite her femme-fatale looks. She also had her father’s iron will, yet marshmallow heart.

Michael looked at his son. Zack looked in his direction.

He knew Zack would obey him if he said to quit kickboxing, but he knew that the martial arts were as much a part of Zack’s life as horses were a part of his own.

As a child, he’d always go to the tracks and help with the horses when things got really bad at home. And he had to admit, there were plenty of times when horses and their care were the only things in his life that made sense or were stable and unchanging.

It was the same way for Zack.

There were lots of things for him to do, but few things really remained constant for him. All he ever really understood was that his mother had died and his father had chosen not remarry. He knew that his father sometimes had to go away for days, weeks, even months at a time and he couldn’t say where he was going or when he’d be back.

For a kid like Zack, the presence of a father figure, or any regular male role model was crucial. As a teen, he needed someone to show him how to be a man. He needed a man around, and there were times when Tater Tot wasn’t quite good enough.

Talking Stick would come over when their father had to go away for prolonged periods of time, and sometimes it would be Rolling Pony or even Gray Owl. But no one could replace a father.

Zack had taken a different road than most teens in his position. A lot of his peers were involved with drugs, drinking, street racing, or other illegal activities. He had chosen music and martial arts as his anchor; an odd selection but an incredible achievement for a blind albino.

“I’m not saying you can’t, I’m just saying I don’t like the idea of seeing you get pounded,” Michael answered mildly.

“Why? You’re hardly ever around enough to know how often it happens,” Zack answered flatly. “I mean, I know your job makes you go away for a while, and that’s cool. I’m cool with that. It’s just- you don’t see me in the ring, Dad. I don’t always get beaten up. This was just a tough match.”

“But that doesn’t change the fact that I don’t like it when you do get beaten up.”

“You want me to quit kickboxing?”

“No, I just want you to be more careful. I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

Part Seven

Hawke’s Cabin
Thursday

Rain tapped against the window.

Michael didn’t notice it. He had other things on his mind.

To his right, a mug of Constant Comment tea cooled while he went over this new mess.

To his left, rain continued its steady tapping.

Tall Deer was at it again.

Kino Jabute had tested positive ci’apii.

He looked at the results. The numbers meant absolutely nothing to the lab technician testing the blood or the forensic pathologist who had ordered the test. They spoke volumes to him.

He had always been interested in plants had settled on botany as a major and had had recently completed his doctoral thesis.

The chemical in the blood was a mix of plant extracts that had been carefully refined until they came to have certain properties.

The odd part, though, was that none of the plants should have been mixed to begin with. There was absolutely no point in mixing ci’apii with mescaline. The two plants did the exact same thing and mixing them would in no way increase potency. That bizarre mix had in turn been blended with dried, ground marijuana and ephedrine, a mild stimulant found in most cold and allergy medicines.

“Do you like to live dangerously?”

Hawke froze. There was no way Michael could have seen him coming, and with the noise the spy called music playing, there was no way he could have been heard. He glared at the radio as the station’s identification was played. The second word was drawn out slightly, giving it an odd, slurred sound.

K-UUUUUUUUUU-P-D.

KUPD, known as Red Radio was popular among those people whose musical tastes ran from Santana, The Eagles, and Three Dog Night to Def Leopard, Motley Cru, and some of the earlier works by Van Halen.

A song began and immediately began to grate on Hawke’s nerves. He had never pictured Michael as the classic rock type. He seemed more like the kind who would like Barry Mannilow and Neil Diamond.

The band’s lead singer went on about some guy coming from an alcoholic, broken home. In the process, he hit notes that Hawke firmly believed no male, heterosexual or otherwise, should be able to reach.


With dreams he tried.
Whoa-ohhhh, lost his pride.
He drinks his life awa-a-a-ay.


“Not really. Why?” Hawke tried to ignore the guitar riff that set his teeth on edge.

“Your plant.” Michael glanced up from the toxicity report.

“What about it? And why’d you move it?"

“I’m not big on having poisonous plants where a dog can get to it.”

“Tet doesn’t eat plants.”

“Really? Would you like to see the vet’s report?” Michael slid a sheet of paper across the table. He didn’t personally go for the whole ‘cozy, country-home’ look, but Hawke did, so when he rebuilt the table, he used that style. Hawke picked up the paper.

“Millia toxicity.” Michael went back to what he was reading. “Apparently your dog has a taste for foxglove and castor beans.”

“Are they poisonous?” Hawke looked at the plants as if they had taken a life of their own.

“Depends. If you’re just looking, no, they’re not. Ingested, however, digitalis is a very potent neurotoxin. Castor beans are okay as long as their shell remains intact.”

“How was that making Tet sick?”

“Dogs, like most people, have a tendency to chew their food.”

Hawke looked at his hound. Tet regarded him calmly. He looked at Michael. He knew that the spy had an incredibly broad range of out-of-the-way facts, but botany surprised him. That seemed more up Marella’s alley than Michael’s.

Michael sipped his tea and went back to the report. How the hell did Jabute get ci’apii? He set the file aside and watched the rain. He had two problems to deal with now. Kino Jabute had been poisoned by a plant that was, in all likelihood only from the reservation. The second, and more pressing problem was that Marella had been kidnapped from her desk in broad daylight.

Airwolf was still unaccounted for, half the Committee was ready to lynch him for letting Hawke keep it, the other half were fully supporting Kirchner, his brother had been killed recently, and he’d just had his ten-year-old nephew dropped on him.

One headache at a time, Michael told himself. He closed his eyes for a moment to ease the slamming migraine that had decided to land squarely behind his right eye. It didn’t help that he was still getting used to the prosthetic, either. At least I can wear normal glasses again.

Hawke sat down at the table for a moment, then stood up. He looked at Michael.

“I got tired of it wobbling,” Michael answered absently. “And the boards were warped, that’s why everything kept falling over. And you have a hell of a problem of a problem with termites.”

Hawke nodded. He knew the cabin was old and that everything in it needed to be replaced, but he never imagined that Michael would do it.

Thus far, the spy had taken down the front deck and built a new one, refinished the cabinets and counters in the kitchen, replaced the mantle over the fireplace that had been missing since God-only-knew when, built new stairs to the loft, and built new dining room furniture.

But what amazed Hawke wasn’t so much the top-notch craftsmanship as the fact that Michael just did the work simply because it needed to get done and he had the skills to do it.

He looked up as a short, slender boy rolled in like a self-contained tornado. The kid reminded Hawke of the Tasmanian Devil.

“UNCLE MIKE!”

Michael didn’t move. He reacted as if nothing had happened at all.

The kid blasted over with a huge smile on his tanned face. “Uncle Mike, guess what I found?”

Your ‘mute’ button? “Not a clue. And don’t shout inside.”

“Okay. But guess what I found?”

A way to make yourself disappear? “What?”

“Check it out,” the boy held out a shiny green and gold snake. “It’s a gopher snake. I caught it outside. Can I keep it?”

“No, you may not. Please put it back where you found it.”

The kid rolled out slowly, clearly disheartened.

“How’d you get stuck with him?” Hawke poured himself a cup of coffee.

“My sister decided she didn’t want him anymore.”

“Why’d they dump him on you?”

“I’m guessing it’s because I have a job, a home, and I’m the only one in my family who doesn’t drink excessively, do drugs, or hurt children.”

Hawke nodded. “Hey, take your jacket off.”

“It is off,” Michael answered flatly. He watched the rain as it began to fall with a vengeance.

“Not you.”

“That’s not where it goes, Dustin.”

Dustin froze and turned to look at his uncle.

“It’s very rude to stare.”

Dustin picked his jacket up and hung it up in the closet. His uncle was strict and kind of cool if a bit grouchy. “How come I can’t have a snake?”

“Because I said so.”

“Okay.” Dustin sat down on the couch. “Okay if I play with the dog?”

“If you can get him to do anything,” Hawke answered.

“Thanks.” Dustin picked up Tet’s tennis ball and tossed it.

Tet walked over to it and picked it up. He dropped the ball on Michael’s lap and sat down.

Michael looked at the hound. “Is there a reason you’re drooling on me?”

Tet’s tail thumped the floor.

Michael tossed the ball.

“Any word?” Hawke didn’t mention the topic. There was no need to. Marella’s disappearance was probably the only thing on Michael’s mind at the moment. “And what’s with the jeans?”

Michael looked up at Hawke. “Believe it or not, I hate wearing white.”

“Then why do you?”

“Dress code. I’m on leave right now, so I’m wearing what I want.” Michael moved his feet before Tet could drool on them. “Nice try, mutt.”

Hawke smiled. Michael avoided Tet as much as possible because the dog tended to drool on him more than anyone else. The old hound had also taken a liking to the spy and made a point of lying on his feet any time he sat down. Michael gently pushed the dog’s face away before he got licked. “Go away.”

“He likes you.”

“A queer dog. Great.”

“You don’t like dogs?”

“I’m more of a cat person.”

“I bet they shed all over you.”

“You have no idea.” Michael tossed the ball for Tet again. “What gets me though, is how. Magellan is entirely black, so how does he get white fur all over my blue sweater? And then Knucklehead goes and puts orange fur on everything else.”

“He’s black, too?”

“No. He’s a seal point Siamese. Between my cats and Benson, it’s amazing I have any clean clothes.”

Hawke smiled. He’d heard about Benson. The Rottweiler was big for one of his breed and tended to drool like an infant. But he would only drool on his owner.

Michael looked over at the couch. He knew Dustin was a good kid, but he was still a kid and kids got into mischief unless they were constantly supervised. He could almost hear Mae Jacobs reprimanding him about something or other.

Boy, you get yourself into more trouble… I swear you can drive the good Lord Jesus to drink.

“Not big on kids?”

“No, I just don’t like them dropped on me out of nowhere.” Michael watched Dustin read a comic book. He idly wondered about Maria. He suspected that she had meant for things to happen the way they did, but he couldn’t figure out why. Why would she take advantage of him like that?

She had gotten herself in trouble and staged her own kidnapping not two days after telling him she was pregnant.

He wondered if he had a son or daughter, but quickly cast those thoughts aside. Knowing Maria as well as he did, he guessed that she had either lied about the pregnancy, or that she had had an abortion. Either way, that was in his past and was going to stay there.

Dustin turned a page in the book. He hated being sent from one home to the next and was already anticipating being shoved off into another home within the month. He’d been moved around so much from one foster home to the next that he never bothered unpacking and he didn’t keep much beyond the basics. When would his uncle hand him off to the courts the way his mother had?

The social workers kept saying that this time would be the last time; that his next home would be a long-term, possibly permanent home, and maybe he’d even get adopted. Wouldn’t that be great? He’d have a family all his own. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?

It was all he could do not to roll his eyes and say ‘yeah, right’.

He knew he’d never get adopted. No one wanted a paraplegic, ten-year-old, half-Hispanic boy. They wanted White newborns. They wanted perfect, White, babies, not defective, half-White rejects that weren’t even wanted by people who were paid to care for him.

How long? He asked the comic book. A picture of Professor Xavier looked back at him. The mutant was a freak, just like he was. Just like him, Xavier couldn’t walk, run, jump, or climb trees like anyone else could.

The mutant’s face was calm, but there was a kind understanding in his eyes. He knew that Xavier was supposed to be looking at another character, but he liked to imagine that the man was looking at him. At least someone gave him a kind look.

How long? Dusty asked the character. How long before he realizes what a freak I am and gets rid of me as fast as he can?

“What are you reading?” Michael crossed to the couch and looked at the comic book.

“A comic book.”

“X-Men,” Michael nodded. He wasn’t too familiar with the nuances of the characters and plots, but he had a good working knowledge of who was who and who could do what. “I like Nightcrawler.”

Dustin made a sort of snorting sound. This guy probably didn’t even know who Nightcrawler was.

“I’m serious. I’d love to teleport. I just don’t think I could handle the whole tail and yellow eyes, though.”

“He’s not in this one.”

“Yeah. I think they put him in Excalibur after he got knocked off in the Phoenix Saga. He’s in England, right?”

Dustin looked up in surprise. It wasn’t often an adult knew anything about comic books or superheroes. They just liked to pretend they did so they could get you to talk to them and make you feel like they understood where you were coming from. Like they ever did.


"I know how you feel, Dusty,” Mrs. Jordan smiled kindly.

No, you don’t, he wanted to shout back. You’re not a bald, crippled, half-white freak.


“Yeah. You read comics?”

Michael shook his head. “Not really. I always liked to watch them. I like the Duck Dodgers ones.”

“Daffy’s a jerk.”

Michael nodded and sat down at the opposite end of the couch. He glanced at the battered, hospital-issue wheelchair. He hated those things. They were big, boxy, hard to move, and even harder to turn. He was glad he was still able to walk.

“Nice wheels, huh?” Dustin knew that the jokes and comments would begin shortly. They always did.

“Classic,” Michael watched Dustin and read the boy’s tone and body language like a book. “Put some new suspension and shocks on that thing, and I bet you’ll be hauling.”

Dustin looked at the older man. How’d this guy know he liked cars?

“But we’ll have to fix the frame if you want to do any kind of bouncing. That model just doesn’t support hydraulic boosters that well. And then we’ll need to slap on some new paint. I know a guy who does great detailing on cars. I think I can get you a deal.” Bingo. Michael’s face didn’t show any humor. He was as serious as if he were discussing a real car.

“You a car buff?”

“Not really. I just have friends who are."

Dustin nodded slightly and went back to his comic book.

Michael noted the indifference. This kid was probably used to being shoved off onto someone else as regularly as mail arrived. He had probably gotten used to people trying to get close before dumping him back into the system.

System Kids, Marella called them. System Kids were kids who’d been taken from their families and dropped into a child welfare system that was supposedly there to help them. Most of the time, the foster care system helped, but there was a growing number of kids who ‘fell through the cracks’ of the antiquated, overburdened, under-funded, and critically under-staffed program.

It was supposed to be that there were only five children to one caseworker, but the reality is that there were nearly forty children for every caseworker. And to make matters worse, long-term care homes were scarce and often as dangerous, if not more so, than the homes the kids had been taken from.

System Kids were usually the ones who wound up on the streets; the lucky ones landed in jail.

Michael sat back and watched the fire in the fireplace. He didn’t need or particularly want another child, but he couldn’t turn Dustin away. He couldn’t force a kid to live like that.

He’d loved the rodeo, but hated always moving from town to town to town every few days. He didn’t have many friends outside the rodeo, and once he’d proven that he could stay on damned near anything, he was sent to work with the riders.

The bull and horse riders didn’t have much to do with him because he was younger than they were and rapidly proving to be far more talented than all of them. On the other hand, the boys his own age shunned him because he got paid for his work and was given all the rights and privileges an adult enjoyed.
What the kids didn’t see was that he also had to work like an adult. He didn’t have to hang up flyers, sell snacks and drinks, clean up the stands or help work the vendors’ stalls because he was too busy cleaning stables; shoeing, feeding, watering, and grooming horses; cleaning bull stalls; saddling horses and bulls; and unsaddling them at the end of the day. He worked as hard as any adult despite the fact that he was only fourteen.

He didn’t get cut loose from work early on weekdays or when things were slow. He didn’t get to have fun and be a kid like the others. He had to be a man, and men worked. They worked hard all day every day.

It was his uncle, Little Tree, who had made certain that he had gotten some time off to be a kid.

Little Tree had made sure that he got paid when the adults did and that he got as much as the adults. If he did a full day of work, then he was entitled to a full day’s pay for it. If Mike worked like a man, he should get paid like one.

A good thing, too. Michael watched the flames as they leapt and danced. God knows how Carlene and I would have handled the situation otherwise.

He wasn’t sure he was ready for what had happened. Sure, it was a big thing for a guy, but he was just barely fourteen. But it had happened, and there was nothing to do about it now. That was then and done.

After a while, Michael glanced at the boy on the couch to his left. The kid hadn’t turned a page in almost ten minutes. “You want to talk about it?”

Dustin shrugged. What was there to talk about?

Michael nodded slightly. “I guess you’re tired of being bounced around from one home to the next.”

Dustin continued to stare at the picture of Banshee. The character was letting out of one of his legendary screams and the face looked exactly like Dustin was feeling inside.

“Always being told that this time will be the last; that you’ll have a real home soon?”

Dustin swallowed the knot in his throat. How did this guy know? Did the social worker tell him?

“You know,” Michael sat back and crossed his legs at the ankle. “I bet you don’t even unpack when you get somewhere.”

Dustin looked up at him.

Michael smiled slightly. He couldn’t see the boy, but he knew what the reaction was. “When I was a kid, my family moved around a lot. A week here, coupla days there. I think the longest I was ever in any one place was three weeks.”

Hawke listened while working on a crossword puzzle. He wanted to know as much about the spy as he could.

“Were you a System Kid?” Dustin looked at the spy.

“No. I just-” Michael shook his head slightly. “Let’s start with I ran away when I was thirteen. I found my real mom and lived with her and her husband in the rodeo they worked in.”

“Yeah, right.” Dustin’s tone conveyed his disbelief.

Hawke, however, found his suspicions confirmed. He’d seen Michael with horses and that kind of skill wasn’t learned in white-collar prep schools or snobbish, exclusive country clubs. The skills and knowledge Michael had could only be gained from close-up, hands-on experience with animals that weren’t too friendly. On top of that, Michael could do things with a rope that no country club or high-brow academy kid could ever master.

The only place to learn what Michael could do and get said skills honed to that level of expertise was a rodeo. But it didn’t happen over a few weeks, Hawke knew. Skills like that had to be learned early and used daily to get to where they were second nature the way they were with Michael. To be that good with horses and ropes, he had to have spent a considerable part of his life in a rodeo.

“I did. You can ask my brother when you meet him.”

“I have another uncle?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you gonna dump me on him?” Dustin’s tone became wary.

“No. I don’t do that. But like I was saying, I know how it is to move around a lot.”

“Were you trailer trash?”

Hawke looked up sharply. He hated phrases like that, and could only imagine what Michael’s reaction would be.

“Not even that,” Michaels smiled slightly. “I was tipi trash. God, that sounds awful. T.P. trash, what a phrase. My mother, her husband –I call him my dad, ‘cause he adopted me- my brother, and I lived in a tipi because we couldn’t afford a trailer. Hell, we couldn’t even afford a tent, so we lived in a tipi.”

Dustin laughed. “You seriously lived in a tipi?”

Michael nodded. “Yeah. We lived in a tipi. It was kind of neat, though. See, when most people move, they only take their things, right? Well, when my family moved, we took our entire house.”

Hawke smiled. He had a feeling that Michael joked about his home the way other people joked about things they were ashamed of or didn’t like. Making fun of it somehow made it easier to deal with. He couldn’t imagine growing up in a rodeo. He’d lived in an apartment with Dom most of his life and hated that, so he could only imagine what the nomadic life of a rodeo was like.

Sharing a three-bedroom apartment with his brother and legal guardian sucked, but it was probably the lap of luxury compared to sharing a small, one-room, conical tent with your entire family.

What he wondered now was, why had Michael left such a nice home to live with a bunch of bull-riding nomads? His family was probably very well of if not wealthy, so why had he decided that a life of poverty in a traveling Western circus was a good idea? And what did he mean ‘real mother’?

Dustin looked at his uncle. He didn’t know why, but he was beginning to like the guy. He reminded himself not to get too attached. It was only a matter of time before he got packed out to another home, so no point in getting cozy-friendly with this new person. He went back to his comic book. “Do you have any other kids?”

Hawke listened intently. He couldn’t imagine Michael as a father, but stranger things had happened. The agent wasn’t at all what he seemed, so who knew? May be the legendary Archangel would be the best father a kid could hope for.

“I can’t really talk about that in public.”

“You don’t?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“So you do.”

“I didn’t say that, either,” Michael answered with a cryptic smile.

Dustin looked up at the spy. He couldn’t figure this guy out.

Hawke shook his head. He couldn’t figure Michael out, either. Like himself, Michael was a fairly private person. But Michael kept his personal life and professional life so well separated that they might as well have been separate identities.

Michael went back to his contemplation of the fire. He glanced at his watch. It was almost ten back in Langley, which meant that Zack would be back from his kickboxing match. The Morp, the Prom for freshmen and sophomores, would be in full swing. Jessie was allowed to stay until the end of the dance when Sandra Martinez would pick her up and take her home.

Dustin glanced at the papers on the table. Michael had been looking at them earlier, but hadn’t commented on what they were or why he had them. “Your friend was kidnapped by a voodoo priest?”

“Who told you?” Michael glanced at Hawke, but dismissed that idea immediately. He knew Hawke better than that. Business matters were not discussed with kids.

“I saw the squiggly pictures. That looks like something I saw in a movie once,” Dustin pointed to the notes that had been left on Marella’s desk. “And there’s a copy of a police report. I know I’m not supposed to read it, but I was curious. Are you gonna get rid of me now?”

“Excuse me?”

“Are you gonna take me to family court and tell the judge you don’t want me?”

“Why would I do that?” Michael studied Dustin’s face and body language.

“Cause I’m a defective freak who read your papers.”

“Who said you’re a freak?”

“I am.”

“Why?”

Dustin shrugged.

“I feel like a freak sometimes,” Michael went back to watching the fire. Dustin seemed more comfortable when he wasn’t the center of attention.

“How come?”

“As a kid I was always darker than my White friends, but not as dark as any Black. And not all of my friends were White. That’s not a good thing where I’m from. Where I’m from, White people stay with White people, and Black people stay with Black people.”

“Was it segregated?”

“Big time. Still is, as a matter of fact.”

“But President Kennedy made it illegal.”

“Tell that to my hometown. You can go there right now and see places that are ‘Whites only’. Now, they may not always have signs, but you can tell by the way people are treated.”

Dustin nodded. “So what does this voodoo bad guy want with Miss Hownsow.”

“Hounsou,” Michael replied.

“Hoon shoe?”

“Close. You know that weird ‘o’ sound in ‘book’?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s how you say the first part. The second part is like ‘shoo’.”

“Hounsou.” Dustin nodded. “What’s he want with her?”

“Not sure. Rumor has it that he wants her to marry him.”

Dustin thought for a second, the reached for the papers. He stopped in mid-act. “May I?”

“Sure.” Michael sat back. No harm in letting the kid see it a second time. Dustin went over the papers and reports. “He wants her because he’s afraid of something.”

Michael remained silent.

“He’s afraid that if others see that she’s not afraid of him and he doesn’t punish her for defying him, he’ll lose his control over his congregation.”

“You’ve got a good vocabulary for a kid your age,” Michael observed.

“Told you I’m a freak.”

“Do you read a lot?”

“Do you think I can do whole lot in that jalopy?”
Michael smiled. Dustin was definitely family. That kind of attitude was a hallmark of his father’s family. “I guess not.”

Dustin went over the reports and looked at the pictures again. His dark eyebrows drew together over his dark brown eyes. He rubbed the stubble on the top of his head. “A guy like this probably won’t stay in the area of the kidnapping. He’s too smart for that. He’ll stay where he believes his power is the strongest. I’d say somewhere in the Keys or southern Florida, but that’s too high profile. That’s the first place people would look for him. He’ll take an area that’s too out of the way for people to think about, but not so far out that it’ll draw suspicion because of the sudden increase in activity.”

Michael looked at Dustin. He’d reached the same conclusion, but hadn’t shared it with anyone, so there was no way the kid could know about it.

“I’m guessing he’s nowhere near Langley.” Dustin set the papers on the coffee table.

“Any ideas where to look?”

“Have you tried Los Angeles? I lived near a huge Jamaican population once. We called it Jamaica Junior.”

“You think he might be there?”

Dustin shrugged. “Maybe. I know there’ve been a lot of voodoo priests killed there recently.”

Michael nodded. He considered checking it out, but he wouldn’t be too successful simply because of cultural barriers. This was something Marella could handle. While she wasn’t as dark as most Haitians, courtesy of her mother being raped by a white serviceman on a port call, she was still Haitian and considered Black because she was too dark to be truly White. She was also apparently very well versed in voodoo.

He shook his head. Another dead end. If he were to go to a Jamaican neighborhood and start asking questions, he’d run into more trouble than the effort was worth. It would be about as effective as sending Marella into Mill Creek to investigate a murder. Only in Mill Creek, she’d quite possibly be lynched before dawn.

The thought of her being lynched bothered him. He’d seen too many of what his father called ‘Niggerswings’ to ever be comfortable with the thought of lynching. Hanging was never a pleasant way to die. But then Mr. Wilman hadn’t met a much better end. He’d been tied to a tar-covered cross and coated with gasoline before the local Klan members set the cross on fire. His father had called that ‘Southern Darkmeat’, and ‘Hopping Johns’ were what Black people were called when they were in church when it blew up. The term was also applied to the few Hispanics in the area because of some of their traditional dances. He forced his thoughts elsewhere.

“I could call my friend and have him ask around,” Dustin offered.

“You don’t need to get involved with this,” Michael said quietly.

“But I want to help. One of my friends was kidnapped once and I was really worried. And then I heard some rednecks laughing about how they’d made a ‘Niggerswing’.”

Hawke noticed the change in Michael’s demeanor. The shoulders squared a bit more than they normally were and he just seemed to radiate warning signals.

“I don’t want to hear that word again,” Michael said coldly.

“Why?” Dustin resolved never to use that word again. He would gladly take a vow of silence if meant he could stay in one place for more than a few days. “Is it a bad word?”

Hawke watched the scene unfold. He wasn’t entirely sure what the thing in question was, but he knew what the first half of the phrase was.

“It’s a very nasty term for lynching a Black person in Alabama,” Michael replied. “And I don’t want to hear you say it again.”

“Okay.” Dustin looked at the comic book. He’d done it now. He was going to get dropped into a foster home first thing in the morning. “I can still call my friend and ask. I mean, not right now, but in the morning when we get to town and there’s a phone.”

Michael looked at his watch. It wasn’t too late to call someone in L.A., but it was getting toward dinnertime and that was one of the worst times to call. “Dial nine, the area code and number.”

Dustin did as he was told. He had never used a cordless phone before. “I wait for a dial tone after I dial nine?”

Michael nodded. He watched Dustin move off the couch and into the big, clunky, metal wheelchair with incredible ease. He’d obviously been doing it for a while.

Dustin forced the chair to go over to the counter where the phone was and reached up to grab it.

Santini walked in a moment later and watched the kid. “Hey, you wanna leave that alone?”

“But I have to make a call.”

“Then go do it in town,” Santini took the phone away.

“I told him he could,” Michael replied absently.

Santini looked at the spy. Faded Levi’s; scuffed, black flight-deck boots; a black T-shirt advertising some band called ‘Queensryche’ and a blue sweatshirt were not typical clothes for Michael. Nor were two eyes and no glasses. “Do I know you?”

“No, and unless you’re going to ask me to dinner, stop checking me out.”

Hawke nearly choked on his coffee while trying not to laugh. Michael had come back with a good one in what had to be record time for him.

Santini was too stunned to speak. He snapped something in Italian and went into the kitchen. To his and Hawke’s complete shock, Michael came right back with a witty retort in fluent Italian with a flawless Sicilian accent.

Santini went as red as his ball cap. He was completely unable to come up with a reply, so he simply glared at the spy for a minute before starting dinner. He grumbled in Italian the entire time.

Michael sipped his tea and continued to work on the report he had to file on the assassination he’d just done. No one would really Miss Senator Gregston. And his death at the hands of an unknown shooter, possibly a sniper, would make headlines, but then fade away as the public picked a new senator; hopefully not one who was willing to hand American servicemen over to the KGB, the North Koreans, and the Russians.

The Senate Oversight Committee had exposed Gregston, the Senate in general had renounced him, the media had a field day with him, and Michael had been called in to once again play ‘Angel of Death’. But before that, the FIRM had seized all the man’s assets, frozen all of his accounts, and effectively rendered him helpless, powerless, and penniless.

By the time he was assassinated, Senator Gregston was contemplating leaving the country by any means possible. Michael had traced the man to the US-Mexico border in Arizona and had allowed the man to reach the border crossing before killing him.

Gregston had been yards away from walking across the border to safety when the first bullet hit his left knee.

Michael had taken the only shot he could from that vantage point, so he moved, reloaded, and took aim again.

Gregston limped to the border and was about to cross it when a bullet his him in the left eye, killing him instantly.

Michael melted away into the shadows and within fifteen minutes, he was just another tourist en-route to Tucson after a brief visit to the border. He’d left Tucson and gotten to Red Star to find orders out to Hawke’s cabin. He had just been tasked with finding Marella Hounsou.

His orders were clear.

Find her and bring her back if possible. If retrieval wasn’t possible or she’d switched sides or broken under questioning, he was to kill her.

He stood up and went outside. He couldn’t get past the last line of his orders.

If retrieval is not possible or desired, terminate agent.

Intermission

Yorba Linda, California
Thursday<br>
D’jolou paced like a caged tiger. The woman was outright defying him now. He considered using some of his magic, but he didn’t think it would work. No, he’d need something stronger than juju if he was to get her back in line.

Tall Deer leaned against a pillar and watched the voodoo priest with amusement. "She’s not afraid of you.”

“She should be!” D’jolou snarled.

Tall Deer paused to figure out what had just been said. D’jolou’s accent was so thick it was sometimes hard to understand him.

“It’s that Archangel!” D’jolou continued. “His juju is bigger than mine. He needs to be put in front of me.”

“What good will that do?” Tall Deer tossed his long hair behind his shoulder. “If we’re talking about the same man, there’s no breaking him.”

“He will bow before me where all can see him so they will know that my juju, not his, is bigger.”

Tall Deer rolled his eyes. He’d heard this kind of spiel before, but from someone else.

“He must-”

“Shut it.” Tall Deer straightened and walked over to the fuming priest. “There’s a way you can bend her to your will.”

“How?”

“There’s a plant called ci’apii. It does wonders.”

“I want her submissive all the time, not just when she’s drugged.”

“That could be a problem.” Tall deer looked out the window. “But… I am in the mood to help you.”

D’jolou watched the tall, lean Native American saunter across the room.

“If you want the one called Archangel to acknowledge you, use it on him.”

“How?” D’jolou snapped. “No one knows where he is.”

“Leave that to me. All you have to do is deliver it on time, deal?”

“Deal.” D’jolou knew that the heroin shipment would arrive exactly on time. The people shipping it would make sure of that. They were too scared to let it fall behind.

“Then if you’ll excuse me, Mr. D’jolou, I have an appointment.” Tall Deer stopped at the door. “But let me give you a word of advice. Don’t hurt her. If Hounsou gets hurt, Archangel will get angry. Very, very angry.”

D’jolou nodded and watched Tall Deer leave. He didn’t like the man, but people like him were necessary. People like Tall Deer were the only ones who could make the phone calls and close the deals that brought money and eased the burden and risk of growing and smuggling drugs.

Tall Deer went down the stairs and got into his car. The Dodge Dart had definitely seen better days, but considering it had been in impound for the last ten years, it was in surprisingly good shape. He cursed North Wind. North Wind had a steel horse that the White men enjoyed riding. The horse was called a Honda Valkyrie.

North Wind had it all: a house off the reservation, a wife, a steel horse, and a family.

As for himself, all he had was a criminal record and a beaten-down Dodge that barely ran.

He hated North Wind and wanted to see the other man hurting. Killing North Wind’s white brother had only been the beginning.

He thought about going after North Wind’s wife, but he wasn’t sure that was such a good idea. Blue Sky and North Wind were happily married and had been so for nearly twenty years. They had a fine, strong son and a beautiful daughter. Killing Blue Sky would only anger North Wind.

North Wind had to suffer and if that meant using that bozo D’jolou, then that’s what he would do. And afterward, maybe he’d help himself to that attractive woman that was being kept prisoner. Just put a dash of ci’apii into her drink, and she’d be his do with as he pleased. And she’d do it willingly. But the best part of all was hat she’d have no memory of what had happened. He smiled and turned on the radio. It was time to head out to the Tree Stump and get more ci’apii.

He hated going all the way out there for a few leaves, but if that’s what he had to do, then that’s what he had to do. He’d used up all he had on that loser, Jabute.

It occurred to him that he’d need more borrachero as well. He’d used up the last of that on the guard that had brought Jabute his food.

Just slip some borrachero into the bastard’s coffee and wait ten minutes. Once the eyes glazed over, simply tell the man what to do and he did it without complaint, hesitation, or question. Nothing could be easier.

Part Eight

San Bernardino, California
Friday

Marella sat in the corner of her small cell and watched the sun filter through the grate overhead.

Was this how Michael had been treated when the FIRM interrogated him?

She looked at the door. She knew she should tell him what had happened, but she was scared of what he’d do. He was the closest she had come to a true friend, and she didn’t want to lose that.

She had known from the very beginning what was going to happen to him, but she didn’t do anything.

She had been called in to brief the team on what they could expect of Michael. She had told them flat out that unless they wanted someone to get seriously hurt, possibly killed, they had better have a marksman with a tranquilizer gun in the wings in case he got violent. He was not going to go willingly and would, if he felt the need, use deadly force to keep from being caught.

They had taken her advice and found that she was right.

The team had been personally selected by Zeus himself, and were the best agents the FIRM had.

Four of the best hand-to-hand men tried to take Michael by force and had wound up getting embarrassed. Two of them landed in the hospital, one was severely beaten, and the fourth was alive simply because Michael refused to kill one of his own agents unless he absolutely had to. He had disarmed the man and leveled the gun at the man’s head. He had given the agent a choice: leave or die.

Agent Defries had reported back to the Committee and had gotten orders to sedate him as Marella had advised.

Michael had been hit in the back of his left shoulder by the dart and had pulled it out.

The sedative was powerful enough to knock him out for a while, but slow enough to allow him time to remove the dart from his shoulder and identify it before the sedative took full hold of him and left him completely unconscious on the pavement next to his motorcycle.

He had been put in the back of a van and restrained in the unlikely event that he regained consciousness before they reached their destination.

She had gone to her bike after work and found his helmet and gloves on the ground beside the black and chrome Honda Valkyrie right where he’d left them. She knew what was going to happen.

She was on the team that had developed the Room, a method of interrogation that had been adapted from James Clavell’s best-seller Noble House.

He would be stripped to his briefs and put in a completely dark room. Once he regained consciousness, he would be subjected to a forced sleep-wake-sleep cycle.

He would be sedated for a while and then awakened by stimulants at irregular intervals until the control team was certain he was thoroughly disoriented. He would then be given a mild dosage of Scopolamine to keep him calm and compliant while he was in transit to the second phase of the interrogation process.

The best part of the Scopolamine was that it inhibited the chemicals in the brain that were responsible for the formation of memories. He wouldn’t have any memories of the transition because of the drug.

He would be left in the Room until the drug began to wear off.

As soon as he started to show signs of cognizance, the session would begin. The lights in the room were red strobes that flashed at irregular intervals while weird, distorted, sounds were played over the hidden speakers in the room while mild tear gas and stink pellet fumes were circulated by the carefully disguised vents.

The room itself was specifically designed to cause panic and fear in an already disoriented subject.

None of the walls in the room were straight until the very top and they met each other and floor at weird, distorted angles.

The walls, floor, and ceiling were all the same shade of red as the lights. When a subject was in there, a light would flash outside the room to keep people from going in and ruining the environment because the door leading into the room blended into the rest of the wall seamlessly.

But the worst part of the room was the ceiling itself.

Bolted to the ceiling were a table and two chairs. On one side of the room was a door that was partially ajar, but on the ceiling like the table and chairs. The overall impression was that the subject was in an interrogation room that had somehow been turned upside down. Or, more accurately, the room was right side up, but the subject was on the ceiling.

On the ceiling above the subject were patches of shiny red glass and shards of glass that were tinted to absorb light instead of reflecting it to render them invisible. Warm water was leaked onto the glass by hidden sprinklers and allowed to run down the shard of glass and drip down on the subject.

The subject’s impression was that they were on the ceiling and blood was, impossibly enough, dripping up at them.

The subject would be in the Room for five minutes. During that time, they would be subjected to foul smelling, acrid air; warm water; ear-splitting, head pounding sounds; and red strobe lights.

After that, the subject was mildly sedated with Scopolamine and taken to the third phase of interrogation.

They would be put in a pleasant-looking room done in soft pastels and lit with muted lighting.

When they began to show signs of awareness, they would be gently questioned by a specially trained psychiatrist, sedated if needed, and either sent back to phase two, or, if the objectives had been met, slowly reintroduced into normality.

At no time would any subject be recycled to Phase Two more than twice. After the third time through, it was another two days of Phase One before Phase two could be restarted.

Michael had been recycled through Phase Two twice, sent back to Phase One, and re-subjected to Phase Two three times before he broke.

He hadn’t broken as far as agents went, but he had definitely been shaken to the point that Dr. Beeks had refused to allow him to undergo anymore interrogation. If they hadn’t gotten the information by now, then Michael honest-to-God didn’t know where Hawke and Santini had hidden Airwolf and no amount of time in the Room would get it from him.

Michael had been allowed to sleep for a while and when he woke up, he was given a glass of apple juice and a blueberry muffin… his favorite breakfast. Unbeknownst to him, the juice was spiked with Scopolamine, a colorless, odorless, tasteless drug that would render him as calm and compliant as a cow, yet leave him nearly fully functional.

Once the drug had taken affect, he was taken to the locker room and told to take a shower, wash his hair, shave, and get ready for work.

He did so as if he was on autopilot.

They had brought his gym bag because that had everything he’d need and in order for him to resume his life, he needed things around him to be as normal as possible.

He dried off, dressed, shaved, and put his flight-deck boots and motorcycle jacket on as instructed and got into the van without any kind of objection or resistance.

He was dropped off exactly where he had been picked up and left to go back to his life.

Dominic Santini had just parked the Jeep he was driving and got out when he saw Michael staring at his motorcycle as if he was completely lost.

He had approached the agent and asked if he was okay, but got a blank look as a reply. Not sure what to do, but somehow knowing something was wrong, Santini had taken Michael inside to security.

Security wasn’t sure what to do with him, so they called Medical.

Medical sent a corpsman who had taken Michael to Medical for a complete going over. Unable to find any apparent reason for his complete lack of fine motor skills and impaired coordination to say nothing of a complete lack of any short-term memory, he was admitted for observation and further testing. Marella had been called in as had someone from Psych.

Marella knew that he had been interrogated in the Room, but she didn’t know about the drugs he’d been given.


“Where was he?”

Santini looked up from the magazine he was reading. He’d never admit it, but he was worried about Michael. “He was by his motorcycle. Just staring at it like he had no idea what to do with it.”

Marella nodded. She asked a few more questions before conferring with the doctor. The fact that Michael had almost failed a Global Skills Function test worried her. Normally, he’d blow the charts, but according to this test, he was just barely able to walk around and do anything on his own.

He was, according to the test, a few IQ points above a cheese enchilada. She talked to the doctor, then went to see Michael. He was many things, but completely compliant wasn’t on the list. Now, however, he was completely docile and willing to do whatever was asked of him.

“Do you know who I am?”

“Yes.”

“What’s my name?” She watched him carefully. She knew him better than anyone else, so she was the best one to determine just how spaced-out he was.

“Marella Hounsou.”

She nodded. “Good. Do you know where you are?”

Michael looked around. “A room.”

“Okay. Do you know where this room is?”

“Inside.”

“Inside where?”

“A building.”

“Do you know which building?” She got a blank look. “Okay. Can you tell me what happened?”

“What happened to what?”

“What happened to you?”

“When?”

She sat down on a chair facing the exam table he was sitting on. This was not good. She tried a basic question. “Who brought you here?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you know where you were?”

“No.”

Marella frowned slightly. Michael was definitely on something. Either that, or he had a head injury of some kind. She looked at the doctor. “Did he have any head injuries?”

The doctor shook his head. “No. He’s perfectly healthy. Slightly dehydrated, but there’s no injuries.”

Marella watched Michael for a moment. “He’s on something.”

“Tox came back clean.”

Marella’s eyes narrowed slightly. She had a feeling she knew what he’d been given. She decided to test her theory. If she was right, then she could get all the information she wanted simply by asking questions. But she would have to be careful. There was no telling how he’d respond to anything and there was always a chance that he might get violent without warning. “Were you given any drugs?”

“I don’t know.”

“What day is it?”

Michael had to think about that one. “Friday.”

“Are you sure?”

“I think so.”

Marella nodded. It was Tuesday. “What’s today’s date?”

“June seventh.”

“Are you sure about that?” It was the twenty-fourth.

Michael nodded.

Marella sat back in the chair. She took a piece of paper from the desk and a pen. “Do you know what Scopolamine is?”

“Yes.”

Marella handed him the pen and paper. If she could get him to write down the chemical or chemicals that made up the drug, she could have him tested for it. “Here.”

Michael took the paper and pen and waited for instructions.

“I want you to write down the chemical composition.”

“Of what?”

“Of Scopolamine.”

“What about it?”

She could have screamed. His short-term memory was completely blocked, so he wouldn’t be able to remember what had happened not ten seconds prior. She tried a direct approach. “I want you to write down the chemical properties of Scopolamine.”

“Okay.”

She had asked him a few more basic questions before agreeing with the doctor’s assessment that he was in no shape to go anywhere. She’d had them keep him there that night and had gone in first thing in the morning when they called her and told her that his behavior had taken a sudden, drastic change for the worse and that they’d had to sedate and restrain him.

She knew what had happened. He was remembering what he felt, but had no clue why he felt that way.

It had taken the psych team three days to get him unwound enough to start talking. The entire time, they’d kept him fairly calm with mild anti-depressants and restrained in the event that he became violent.

She wondered if she should tell him what had happened. He deserved that much, but was he ready for it? How would he respond?

She looked out the window and hoped he’d come for her before D’jolou did anything to her.

Clouds skidded across the sky and occasionally blocked the sun. She had a feeling that she wasn’t in Virginia, but she had no idea where she was.

Upstairs, she could hear D’jolou and several people talking. Were they upstairs? The space she was in didn’t seem like a basement.

She could just make out what they were saying. Something about the other d’jolou coming to avenge her if she was harmed.

She decided to employ the skills Michael had taught her. The first of which was a Marine Corps adage. Adapt and overcome.

There was nothing to adapt to here, so she decided to learn as much about her location and captor as possible.

She had no idea where she was. She was in a storage room or shed of some kind a few yards away from a building. Her cell was ten feet by six feet by four feet and completely empty. There was a door that slid upward to her right on the narrow side of the shed. The door was down and, in all likelihood, locked. There was a grate in the ceiling to let in light, but that was it. D’jolou was giving someone instructions.

She couldn’t make out what was being said and lost the voices entirely as a train roared by. A freight train, to be exact. She wracked her brain for the location of train tracks in and around Langley. None came to mind. She glanced at her watch. Perhaps that would give her some clue as to her location. Trains usually ran on a set schedule. To her surprise, she discovered she wasn’t in Langley. She wasn’t even in Virginia.

She didn’t know where she was, but she knew she was somewhere out west. The sun was setting when, if she had been in Virginia, it would already be gone. In the distance, she could hear the occasional roar and faint screech of what sounded like a roller coaster and the screams of the riders. She could also hear traffic from a highway or very busy street nearby.

Where the hell was she?

She sat back against the wall and waited for whatever was going to happen. There was no escape and, from the distance of the sounds, nowhere to go. She wondered what D’jolou was going to do. What was he going to do to her to get her under his thumb where he felt she belonged?

D’jolou wasn’t above torture, she knew. And she wasn’t sure how much, if any, she could take. She wasn’t like Michael. He was built to take a beating, she wasn’t.

Her last conversation with Stringfellow Hawke came back to her.


Hawke looks down at the sleeping spy. He won’t admit it, but he’s amazed by the scars.

“He’s been there and back,” she looks up from her book.

“Where? Hell or the Inquisition?” Hawke notices that some of the scars on Michael’s back are relatively new. Someone had apparently decided that they needed to use a cat ‘o nine tails to illicit information.

“Both, I think.”

Hawke shakes his head. Over the years, he’d only heard of Michael getting captured a few times. The first time, he was a rookie and inexperienced enough to unwittingly walk into a trap. The second time, he was on his way to help Maria von Furster. The third time, he’d been handed over to the North Koreans by Walton Kirchner, a senior member of the Committee who had recently disappeared under what could only be termed ‘questionable circumstances’.

In all the years he’d known the spy, he’d seen the man walk away from beatings and methods of torture that would kill most people. He won’t admit to being somewhat envious of Michael’s ability to survive. He hoped his brother, St. John, was as strong.



Marella looked up at the ceiling. She knew that she was in a world of trouble and hoped to God, the gods, or whatever might care to listen, that Michael found her in time. But most of all, she hoped that D’jolou wouldn’t find out. If he found did, he’d skin her alive…

Literally.

D’jolou walked over to the car and got in. She wouldn’t be going anywhere for a while, so he decided to get some dinner before deciding how best to bring her under his control.

He looked at the business card that had been taken from Kino Jabute. It wasn’t a typical government business card. It was white, but in place of a name was a flaming, winged sword, point-up in gold and a phone number beneath the sword.

He had yet to meet this Archangel, and he was a little scared. Kino Jabute had been under Archangel’s protection when he had been murdered, so the priest was bound to be outraged that his power had been undermined. And there was no force on Earth that compared to an angry priest.

He decided to beef up his security. If Archangel came looking for trouble, he would find lots of it.

Hawke’s Cabin
Friday

An inhuman scream freezes him in his tracks.

Oddly enough, he’s looking out over a vast expanse of scrub and dry, barren land that reminds him of his home.

A large, black and white wolf leaps over his head from behind him and lands in front of him. It turns to look at him. It’s wearing a sheep’s head and skin as if it were a disguise of some kind.

He looks at the wolf.

Follow me, the wolf’s voice is eerily familiar, but he can’t place it.

The wolf begins to run into the desert, so he follows it.

Soon, he’s in the air running behind the wolf as fast as his feet can take him. Ahead of him, the wolf’s paws are encased in flames as it runs through the air.

He glances down and sees land streaking by at an incredible speed. He turns his attention back to the wolf.

The wolf runs toward a giant tree stump and dives in through the open roof. Against all laws of nature and physics, he follows it to the tree.

He doesn’t go into the cave. He slows down to a walk and stops at the opening in the front of the tree stump. He knows he can’t go in without the Ancients’ permission.

The wolf comes to him and looks at him. Follow me.

Reluctantly, he obeys and stops when he reaches a pool of light in the center of the cavern.

This is my lair. The wolf walks to the center of the pool of light and lies down. It is here that you will find me.

He looks at the wolf as the creature stands up, looks up, then jumps up into the air and flies out of the tree stump with an alien, inhuman, screaming howl
br>
… Of a cello being tuned.

Michael closed his eyes. His head throbbed and he felt incredibly cold.

“You okay?” Hawke walks over to the spy. Michael was pale and sweating as if he’d just run a marathon. The only problem was, the man hadn’t gone anywhere and it was a cool evening. “Hey. Talk to me. Are you okay?”

“I’m cold.”

Hawke gave the spy a worried look. He had no idea what had caused the sudden onset of shock that the spy was having. “Can you stand?”

“I think so.” Michael stood up slowly and put his hand on the rail for balance as much as support.

“Let’s get you inside. Dom.”

Santini walked out and stopped dead in his tracks when he saw Michael. “Mama Mia. Is he sick?”

“I don’t know. He’s just damned cold.”

Santini put one of Michael’s arms around his shoulders. “You’re not kidding. Want me to call a doctor?”

“Let’s just get him inside first.”

Santini took Michael inside and had Hawke get him a blanket.

After being wrapped up in a quilt, Michael sat down on the couch. His head throbbed worse than any hangover he’d ever had and he was colder than he had ever imagined being. He didn’t remember falling asleep.

Hawke and Santini exchanged worried looks.

“What do you think happened?” Santini watched Michael sleep. The spy was still cold, but not as cold as he was only ten minutes ago.

Hawke shook his head. He had no idea what had just happened. “Bad reaction to something.”

“What? He hasn’t eaten anything that I know of.”

“Maybe his medication,” Hawke shrugged. “Or maybe something in his tea.”

“You sure you don’t want me to call them?”

“Let’s let him sleep for now. If he doesn’t get any better in a few hours, I’ll take him in myself.”

Santini nodded and went back to the kitchen to finish cooking dinner.

Dustin rolled over in his clunky wheelchair. “I talked to one of my friends. He said that there’s this huge voodoo meeting in San Bernardino tomorrow. He said something about a big offering.”

Hawke and Santini looked at each other.

Earlier that day, Michael had finally given in and told Hawke about the situation with Marella and the corrupt voodoo priest. Until then, all Hawke knew was that Marella had been abducted from her office. And once he had found out he details, he wouldn’t have believed it if it had been anyone other than Michael telling him. Even then, he was still skeptical until he’d seen the pictures and situation reports.

He had told Dom what he had been told, and the Italian’s response had been a hearty laugh.


“You know, String,” Dom set his coffee down. “That sounds like the plot of a really hokey A-Team episode.”

“I know. I felt the same way at first. Then I saw these,” he handed the file to his friend. “And if it had been anyone other than Michael telling me this, I’d have called them crazy.”


It didn’t take a genius to figure out what was going to happen next.

“Does your friend know where in San Bernardino this is going to happen?” Hawke looked over at Dustin.

The boy shook his head. “He only said that it was going to happen. He doesn’t know where.”

Hawke nodded and looked at Michael. The spy was sleeping peacefully for once, but probably very sick. He wondered if he should wake the man up and tell him about this new piece of information.

As if reading the younger man’s mind, Santini looked up from the lettuce he was shredding. He didn’t mind salads, but what he really wanted was some good, old-fashioned country cooking. Once he had heard that Michael was up at the cabin, he had stopped by the store and picked up cornbread mix, green beans, catfish, and a few other items that would be needed in the hopes that the spy would cook for them. “Leave him alone, String. We can tell him in the morning.” “Marella might not have that long, Dom.”

“Yeah. And what good’s he gonna be if he can’t even stand up on his own? How much help is he gonna be?”

Hawke sighed. Dom was right. It was best that Michael be allowed to rest. If he wasn’t even able to walk unassisted, there was no way he’d be any good at sneaking into what was sure to be a very heavily guarded, very public place and sneak someone out unseen. “Yeah. I’ll tell him in the morning.”

Michael shifted slightly, but didn’t wake up.

Hawke looked at the coffee mug that Michael had made tea in. He didn’t know why, but he suspected that the water, the mug, or the tea itself had been tampered with, but how, when, why, and by whom, he had no idea.

He sat down at the table and went back to work on the crossword puzzle he’d started the other day.

Dustin watched Hawke and Santini carefully. He didn’t know which of them had made his uncle sick or why, but he was determined to find out.

He sat back in his wheelchair and sorted out what he knew about the case. It wasn’t much, but it was something to do. But the question came back again unbidden. What had made his uncle sick?

It wasn’t the tea, he reasoned. The teabag was in a factory-sealed pouch.

It wasn’t the water. It couldn’t be. If it was, they’d all be sick.

It wasn’t the mug. He knew that because his uncle had washed it out before using it.

It wasn’t something that anyone had put in the tea. His uncle didn’t take sugar or milk in his tea and he hadn’t let the mug out of his sight. What was it?

He was mentally replaying the scene over and over in his mind when it hit him. No one had made his uncle sick. It was just a migraine.

Migraines could sometimes hit without warning and they were accompanied with nausea; sensitivity to light, sound, and smells; and could, if they were severe enough, be debilitating.

But what would cause it?

“It was his tea.”

“What?” Hawke looked at Dustin.

“It was his tea. He said he had a headache earlier, so it had to be the tea that made him sick just now.”

Hawke gave the kid a blank look. Like Michael, Dustin figured things out too fast to realize that not everyone reached the same conclusion he did when he reached it.

"Uncle Mike said he had a headache earlier,” Dustin explained. “Now, most migraines are just really bad headaches that get triggered by something in the body. In this case, caffeine. Migraines hit fast and can be so bad that the person having one sometimes gets sick or looks really sick. That’s what happened to him. The caffeine in the tea triggered a migraine.”

“What the hell?” Hawke gave the boy a wary look. “Are you Sherlock Holmes or something?”

“No. I’m just a bit more observant than the average kid.” Dustin rolled over to the table and moved onto one of the chairs.

“Are you sure he’s your uncle?” Santini chuckled. “’Cause you sure act like him.”

“Yeah. He’s my uncle,” Dustin looked down at his hands. But I wish he was my dad.

San Bernardino, California
Saturday


The shed was cold and damp in the morning.

Marella sat up and immediately wished she hadn’t. He head throbbed where D’jolou had struck her the day before. She gingerly touched her right cheek and found that she had one hell of a shiner. Fortunately, that was all that had happened.

She knew it was only a matter of time now. There was to be a ceremony and she was going to decide what kind it was, D’jolou had told her. It could be a wedding celebration, or her wake. It was her choice.

She hoped it would be neither. She hoped that her friend, Michael Coldmsith-Briggs, III, would come and get her out of this mess.

It struck her as unlikely that he even knew where she was. He was on leave and she was… wherever she was.

She had no idea where she was and no way to find out.

The door opened and D’jolou walked in.

Marella looked up at him and carefully hid the hate that she was feeling. It was all she could do not to spit in his face and knee him in the groin as hard as she could.

“So.” D’jolou walked in and stood over her. “Have you decided?”

“Not yet.”

“You have until sundown,” D’jolou hissed in Creole. He turned and stormed out.

Marella watched as the door was closed behind him. Oddly enough, there was no sound of it being locked.

She inched toward the door and waited for it to be locked. She hoped that the guard had forgotten to lock it. She wanted to open the door, but perhaps that was what they were expecting her to do. Perhaps they were waiting for her to make an escape so they could have an excuse to do with her as they chose. After what seemed like an eternity, she inched the door up a bit and looked around. The door was unlocked and there was no one in sight.

But that doesn’t mean a damned thing, she told herself as she lowered the door. Just because you can’t see them doesn’t mean they’re not there.

It was one of the first things she had learned about Michael. Just because you couldn’t see him, didn’t mean he wasn’t there.

She went back to the corner she had slept in and closed her eyes in the vain hope that it would ease the pain in the right side of her face.

She focused on anything but where she was.

That was another thing Michael did, she found. When he was getting questioned or was in physical therapy, he simply shut down. He took his mind off where he was and put it somewhere else.

She did the same and found herself suddenly feeling very calm and at ease in the cold, slowly-warming shed. She had found something very pleasant, if unlikely, to think about. There was just something about being the first female, professional race car driver to win the Indianapolis Five Hundred that had always appealed to her.

All she had to do now was keep it from sliding into another subject and she would be fine.

After a while, though, her thoughts came right back to the one thing she didn’t want to think about. It was the one thing that she couldn’t let D’jolou know if she wanted to stay alive.

Please, God, let him find me. She looked at the door. It hadn’t opened or been touched, so she left it alone. There was no sense in drawing any more attention to herself. She’d get plenty of that later.

She hoped that Michael would find her, but as the morning wore on, she found herself hoping for anyone to show up.

At noon, the door opened and she was dragged out. Time for the fun to begin, she guessed.

She was hauled into the back of a van and driven somewhere.

After what seemed like an hour or so, the van stopped and she was dragged out and forced into a hotel room. She hoped to God that D’jolou wasn’t going to rape her. He had done that once before, and she never wanted to do that again. It was the rape that had made her run to begin with.

She knew she’d overcome the horror of being forced by an adult, but getting pregnant as a result was more than she could handle, so she ran away.

She had stowed away on a boat bound for Cuba and had used what little money she had to pay for an abortion before fleeing to America.

Once she was safely in America, she began her life anew.

She was an undocumented immigrant, so she had very little options as far as work went. She had wound up working as a stripper in a club that could only barely be called a club. It was more like a run-down bar with a rickety stage and two equally rickety poles.

It wasn’t the greatest, but it was a living and she made the most of it until the day she met a tall, tanned gentleman who had found her while she was walking to the small apartment she shared with three of her friends.

He hadn’t given his name, just a business card with a number written on the back, a ride to her apartment, and the assurance that he wasn’t after anything more than making sure she got home safely.

She didn’t know that she’d run into him a few years later.

The card was white and had nothing more than a flaming sword and the word “Archangel” printed on it.

On the back was:

Call anytime if you want a better career.

It was almost three years before she took the mysterious stranger up on his offer and had called the number on the card.

She had gotten someone at what she guessed was the front desk and asked for Archangel. He was out, but the woman had given her all the information she needed to get a spot at the academy where her counselor had helped her get her green card and later, citizenship.

She looked around as she walked behind her escort. Any information she could get on her surroundings would be a plus.

She wondered what was going to happen, but resolved to be as strong as she could as long as she could. She owed Michael that much. He was the one who had fought to get her in Counter Intelligence and had volunteered to train her in the field. She had to at least try to escape.

As soon as she was taken indoors, she began to take stock of her surroundings. She memorized landmarks and how may turns in which direction she went so she could find her way out if needs be.

She was shoved into a small room and the door was closed behind her. She waited to hear if it was locked, but the lock was on her side of the door. She could lock them out, but they couldn’t lock her in.

Okay, what now? She looked around, forcing herself to think like Michael did. Like Houdini, that man could escape from virtually anything. There’s a window, but it’s too small to get through and too high to reach. There are probably thugs on the other side of the door. And there’s a phone on the table by the bed.

She walked around the room and paused when she saw the phone. She knew it was a long shot, but she had to at least try. She picked it up and almost jumped when she heard a dial tone.

She dialed a number and waited for it to connect.

“Hello?” Tater Tot answered on the third ring.

“Eli?”

“Speaking.”

“Eli, is your father home?”

“Excuse me?”

Marella could almost see the puzzled look on he man’s tanned face. She had to address him that way because there was no telling who might be listening to her call. “Is your dad there?”

“No. I haven’t seen him.” Tater Tot didn’t know if the woman on the other end of the line knew he was really an adult, so he chose to keep it a secret. “Do you want me to take a message?”

“Yeah. Tell him I called.”

“Okay. What’s the number?”

“I don’t know. I just know I’m out west somewhere.”

“Okay.” Tater Tot wrote down a message and handed it to Carmen Herrera. “I’ll tell him you called. Anything else?”

“No. I just can’t talk long. Tell him I’m okay and that I have no idea where I am, but there’s lots of people nearby.”

“Okay.”

As soon as she heard footsteps in the hall, Marella hung up and moved away from the phone.

D’jolou walked in and grabbed her arm. He turned her around to face him. “You will decide now.”

“No.” Marella pulled what courage she had left and squared her shoulders. D’jolou slapped her as hard as he could and threw her to the floor. “Did you think you could defy me?”

“Yes.” Marella got up and looked D’jolou in the eye.

D’jolou’s large, ebony hand slammed into her face again. “Do not defy me, woman. You are mine and you will obey me.”

Marella wanted to tell him to go to Hell, but decided against it. There was no telling what he’d do. And since he was taller and stronger than Michael, it was probably not a good idea to provoke him.

“No one will come for you. Your friend Archangel will not come for you, either. He cannot protect you from me anymore.” D’jolou stormed out and slammed the door behind him.

Marella sat against the wall in the small room and stared at the door. What had she been thinking? Talking back would only make things worse. Michael could take a beating, but she wasn’t built for that sort of thing. She closed her eyes and hoped that someone would come for her.

After a while, she tried the only other number she could think of. Bonnie Barstow answered the phone.

“Bonnie? It’s me.”

“Marella! Where are you?”

“I don’t know. I’m in a house or hotel of some kind. I can’t talk long. I don’t know when they’ll come back.”

“Gotcha. You want me to have Devon call Michael?”

“Yeah. Is there any way you can trace this call?”

“Not from here, no. Call your office and have them run a trace.”

Marella could have kicked herself. Why hadn’t she thought of that? Some field agent she was shaping up to be. Why not just put a big, neon ‘Damsel-in-Distress’ sign over my head? “Good idea. I’ll call as soon as I can.”

“Call now.”

“Right.” Marella hung up and dialed another number. She didn’t give Tranh Vu a chance to speak. “Vu, trace this call.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Vu immediately started a trace on the call.

“Have it yet?” Marella looked at the door. She didn’t know how much time she had before things went from bad to worse.

“Almost. Gimme a sec.”

“Vu, I don’t have a second.”

“Gotcha,” Tranh Vu grinned and wrote down the number. “You’re at-”

“Call Archangel and give him the number. Tell him that I don’t have much time. I have until sundown at the latest. Wherever I am, I’m under heavy guard and-” She hung up as footsteps sounded in the hall. She scrambled toward the corner D’jolou had left her in.

The feet passed, but she didn’t want to risk another call. She stayed where she was and worked on a way to escape. D’jolou was going to have a field day with her if he had his way. And unless her attempt was successful, she was in for a world of trouble.

Outside, rain started to fall.

Tonight was the Harvest Moon. It was the night when the dead walked the Earth with the living and feasted upon the souls of those that weren’t protected. She hoped her soul would be safe.

I want to protect my soul, Marella sighed. Listen to me. I’m starting to think like them. But then, I am one of them.

Part Nine

Hawke’s cabin
Saturday

Rain was tapping on the roof when he woke up.

Tet’s cold, wet nose pressed against his left hand and his leg hurt beyond words.

“Feeling any better?” Santini sat on the coffee table as the spy slowly sat up. It was so weird seeing Michael with two eyes now.

“I think I forgot to take my contacts out,” Michael pushed a big hand back through his shaggy blondish-brown hair. He was heading toward fifty, but he had yet to fall victim to the male-pattern baldness that had plagued his family for generations. At least, it plagued his father’s side of the family. His mother’s people were notorious for having full heads of thick, unruly hair from birth to the grave.

“What happened to you yesterday?”

“Not sure.” Not sure I can tell you, that is. Michael rubbed the back of his neck absently. “I just had a slamming headache that took a turn for the worse. I felt like someone hit me on the head with a two-by-four.”

Santini nodded. It sounded like a migraine all right, but he didn’t quite believe it. “You hungry?”

“Not really, thanks.” Today was not going to be a good day for his leg. “Any news?”

“Yeah.” Santini stood up and went to the kitchen for coffee. “Coffee?”

“No, thanks.” He knew better than to have coffee. The last time he’d had coffee, he’d spent the rest of the day feeling weird. He couldn’t have described exactly what he was feeling, but the best he could come up with was that he was there, but he wasn’t. It was almost as if he somehow wasn’t connected to his body. And once the caffeine high wore off, he’d felt like he had the mother of all hangovers complete with queasiness and headache.

“What, you don’t trust me?”

“That depends.” Archangel forced himself to focus on his environment, but for some odd reason, everything was a complete, fuzzy blur.

“Damn, Michael,” Hawke set the glasses down. Just out of curiosity, he’d looked through the lenses. He felt as though he had looked at the world through a funhouse mirror. “I bet I could see your office from the front porch with these.”

“Probably,” Michael smiled.

“You know, as a kid I used to use things like these to fry ants.” Hawke handed the glasses to their owner.

Michael put his glasses on. Suddenly, his whole range of vision came into focus. “What’s the news?”

Dustin looked up from his pancakes. He liked it here. Ever since he’d been brought up to this place, he’d had fun exploring and felt safe for the first time in his life. It also helped that he didn’t have to choose between hunting through garbage cans for food or going hungry. “Hey, Uncle Mike.”

“Don’t chew with food in your mouth,” Michael stood up slowly. His left hip shrieked in protest, sending shards of white-hot pain up to his ribs and down to his knee.

Dustin gave him a weird look. “Um, I kinda have to have food in my mouth if I’m gonna chew it, Uncle Mike.”

Michael closed his eyes. “You know what I mean.”

Dustin smiled and went back to his breakfast.

“Why don’t you sit down?” Hawke could only imagine what cold weather did to Michael. His right wrist hurt whenever the weather changed, so he could only imagine what the agent was going through.

“No, thanks. If I do, I won’t get back up.”

“Can’t or won’t?” Santini chuckled.

“Both, but more of the latter.” Michael made his way to the counter and sat on the edge of one of the bar stools. “Shit, I hate this kind of weather.”

“You’re not supposed to swear, Uncle Mike,” Dustin sipped his milk.

“You’re not supposed to listen when I do,” Michael shot back.

“I can’t help but overhear what you say right in front of me.” Dustin picked up his napkin.

Michael decided to concede the point. He was in no mood to get into a word war with a kid.

Santini smiled as he poured coffee for himself and Hawke. “You’re losing your touch, old man.”

“Who are you calling ‘old’, Father Time?”

“I’m not old-”

“Just hell and gone beyond the hill,” Michael added before Santini could finish.

Santini huffed something in Italian, then remembered that the spy probably spoke the language fluently.

Hawke watched the spat unravel. He always enjoyed listening to Michael and Santini bicker. They took some really good, if low, shots at one another.

“You know,” Santini gave the spy a dark look. “One of these days, I’m gonna slap you silly.”

“Just be careful when you do. I hear walkers are hard to manage with only one hand.”

“I’m gonna get you,” Santini walked around the counter.

“Finish your Ensure first,” Michael retorted.

Santini went red, but he didn’t advance. He knew better than to strike the agent. Michael was well known for his skill in a fight. “You…” He shook his head and stormed off.

“Touchy today,” Michael sat down at the bar.

“I’ll show you ‘touchy’,” Santini snorted.

“Why Dom, I didn’t know you cared.”

As entertaining as the scene was, Hawke decided that it was time to intervene. “Dusty called his friend in L.A. yesterday. I guess there’s some kind of ceremony that’s supposed to take place tonight in San Bernardino.” Michael looked at his nephew. Dustin’s brown eyes met his levelly. “What’s the word?”

“All Rashad said was that there was going to be this big voodoo deal in San Bernardino tonight. He didn’t say exactly where and he had no idea when.”

Michael nodded. “At least we know where to start looking.”

“You like Miss Hounsou?” Dusty put his plate on his lap and rolled into the kitchen.

Michael was silent for a minute. He wasn’t entirely sure how to answer that. He liked Marella, but he wasn’t exactly sure how he liked her. He settled on a middle-of-the-road answer. “In a way.”

“Do you like her, or like her like her?” Dustin put his plate in the sink and went back for the glass.

“I like her okay.” It wasn’t the best answer, but it was the only one he could come up with. He liked Marella a lot. She was genuinely funny and could do stand-up comedy as easily as any professional comedienne, she was smart, and attractive was a no-brainer. Hell, Ray Charles could tell she was good looking. She was the closest he came to having a best friend and the only female to ever make him feel completely awkward.

He hadn’t felt that way since he had met his wife. But even then, it wasn’t anywhere near what he felt around Marella. Around Rachel Castillo, he was just a shy guy who wasn’t sure what to do with a woman who had as fiery a personality as he did. Marella, on the other hand, had all that and the backbone to use it. She was as stubborn as he was and could get things done with all the force of a platoon of Marines while still seeming as gentle as fabric softener.

Of all the women he’d ever met, she was the only one to completely baffle him while being as plain to read as a newspaper. She was as forbidding as she was alluring and as sensual as she was innocent.

He guessed it was that kind of paradoxical nature that had gotten his attention when he had first met her in the strip club.

He didn’t normally frequent places like that, but he had to get a friend who’d had a bit too much to drink. He’d stayed to watch a cocoa-skinned woman who looked as though she should have been in a centerfold instead of a seedy, run-down, trucker’s bar in the middle of nowhere.

He had stayed to watch. He didn’t really like pornography, exotic dancing, or anything like that because he felt it degraded women by portraying them as sex objects instead of the people they were.

Afterward, he had seen her walking down the road toward the small town by herself. It wasn’t safe for Black women to walk alone at night in that area of Alabama, or any other area for that matter, so he had offered her a ride. It had taken some doing, but he had finally convinced her that he wasn’t interested in anything more than making sure she got home safely.

He had dropped her off at her apartment and stayed until she went inside and closed the door. He hoped she would find the business card he’d slipped into her purse. Any woman who could do what she did for a living and still refuse to go to the back room or home with someone no matter how much was offered deserved a better life than working as a stripper. But then, no one really deserved to have to put their bodies on display or worse, on sale, to make ends meet.

“How ‘okay’?” Hawke’s eyes narrowed. He didn’t think Michael didn’t seem like the kind of guy to have an affair with just anyone. He was more the long-term commitment/marriage kind of guy.

“Honestly, I have no idea.” Michael’s answer was as honest and direct as the questions he’d ask someone he was interrogating. “She’s a good agent. I think she’d really go far if she would just get it together and get her head in the game. She’s too locked into ‘rookie mode’. She needs to step up and take a chance. Beyond that, she’s great.”

“What do you think of her as a person?”

“As a person?” Michael seemed a little uncertain how to respond. “As a person, she’s great. She’s funny, smart, talented, and the list goes on.” Hawke nodded. “That’s all you think about her?”

“What else should I think about her, Hawke?” Michael’s tone chilled a little. “She’s a good person who’ll make a great agent someday. What else do you want me to think about her?”

“You know what I mean.”

“If we’re talking about the same thing, then again, I have no idea. I’m not Gabriella Martin. I don’t look at people like that.”

“You mean you never-” Hawke wasn’t sure how to say it politely.

“Noticed her?” Michael offered. “When I first saw her, yeah. Hell, any straight guy would. Then I got to know her. Yeah, I think she’s attractive, but I don’t- how do I say this? I’m not interested in her like that. Yeah, I like women, but I don’t see them as- I don’t think about them like that.”

Hawke nodded.

“The question is: do you think about her like that? Because if you do, I’ll let you know right here and now that she’s out of your league. Hell, she’s in a league of her own.”

“How do you know?”

“I’ve seen guys try,” Michael sighed. “She’s untouchable. Beautiful, dangerous, intelligent, and completely untouchable. That’s why she’s called ‘Cleopatra’.”

“I heard that she likes the other kind,” Santini sat down at the bar.

“You’re asking the wrong person,” Michael smiled. “I have no idea what she does on her own time. Her private life is just that… private. I don’t know, I don’t ask, and it’s none of my business.”

Hawke smiled slightly. He had a feeling that Michael knew, but he didn’t want to press the issue. But he did know that the spy wasn’t involved with Marella. At least not romantically anyway.

Michael looked at the glass of orange juice Hawke had given him along with the admonition that it’s not good to skip breakfast. He didn’t see what the problem was. He always skipped breakfast, usually passed on lunch as well, and dinner was never very high on his list of priorities. If he got hungry, he’d grab a quick bite. He was never the sit-down meal kind of person. “She’s in San Bernardino, but we have no idea where. Great.”

“Maybe you could use one of those satellites to find her,” Santini offered.
Mvr<“GPS?” Michael looked up. “That’s for helicopters and other big things. It’s not on line for people yet.”

“How do you know?”

“They’re still making me wear white,” Michael answered tartly. “They make me wear white because they figure it’ll make it harder for me to vanish. If GPS tracking chips were possible for people, I have no doubt they’d stick one in me.”

“For all the good it’d do,” Santini laughed.

“No shit,” Michael smiled. “But seriously, San Bernardino County is a big place. She could be anywhere out there, not necessarily in San Bernardino itself.”

“Where else could she be?” Hawke tried to come up with as many locations in San Bernardino as he could, but was drawing a blank.

“San Bernardino, Redlands, Big Bear, Devore, Arrowhead, City of Industry, Central City, Mammoth, or damned near anywhere in the Inland Empire. Hell, she could be as far south as northern Riverside or as far north Hemet. San Bernardino County is huge. That’s a lot of ground to cover and little time to cover it. Even with Airwolf, there’s no way of getting a fix on her.”

“What if we knew where this voodoo convention was being held?” Hawke offered. “Wouldn’t that narrow it down a little?”

“Yeah, considerably. There’s just one problem: we have no idea what this D’jolou idiot looks like. And if he isn’t stopped, he can easily come back and try again. And maybe even succeed.”

Hawke nodded. Michael had a very good point there.

“About the only thing I can think of that would help us now is for her to call or someone who knows her to call us.” Michael sipped his juice and watched the rain. He had a bad feeling about this, but he couldn’t say why. It was just one of those times when his instincts told him something was in the wind. Red Bird had once told him that his guardian spirit was the Elk, a strong, elegant creature who was able to sense danger before it approached. That was why the elk was such a difficult animal to hunt or capture.

He didn’t believe any of it, but there were times when he had to wonder if maybe there was something to all the hocus pocus beliefs that his mother’s people held onto.

It struck him as odd that he kept thinking of them as his mother’s people. They were his people too. While he was technically half-Konochine, he was still part Native American and had been adopted by his mother’s husband. Therefore, in the eyes of the tribe, he was just as much a Konochine as they were. The memory of what had happened the other night came back to him. He refused to believe in visions, but he somehow knew that whatever he had seen while looking out over the lake was no repressed memory. Wolves didn’t speak; he had never been to the Tree Stump; and as far as he knew, the only wolves he’d ever seen were in pictures or on television in nature programs. And then there was the fact that he was wide-awake when it happened.

“I’m going to call my friend. He works out that way, maybe he’s seen something.” Michael picked up the phone and dialed a number.

Brian Falling Leaf answered on the first ring. “Yo.”

“When was ‘yo’ in your language?”

“Our language, North Wind,” Leaf answered. “What’s up?”

“I was about to ask you the same thing. I heard through the grapevine that there’s a huge voodoo gathering in your neck of the woods. What’s the word?”

“You heard right. Out in Devore by the Palladium. This is bigger than Billy Graham.”

Michael reached for a pen and piece of paper and made note of the location. “Any ideas what’s going on?”

“Don’t know. But I know that we’re clearing out until it goes away. There’s some bad music in the wind and I don’t want to be here after dark.”

Michael nodded. “Hey, do you know of anyone, I guess, suspicious hanging around?”

“Not personally, but Fire Eyes mentioned something about some Jamaican guys needing a storage shed for a few days.”

Michael made note of that fact as well. “Any ideas what they’re keeping in it?”

“Not a clue, but they’re sure uppy about it. One of them’s always hanging around like he expects someone to try to break into the shed.”

Or out of it, Michael noted. “Get me sketches. I wanna see if these guys are on any wanted posters.”

“One of them is. A guy named M’Bekki. He’s wanted for drug-running, extortion, kidnapping, and rape throughout the Florida Keys and parts of mainland Florida.”

M’Bekki, Michael nodded. “Get me a sketch of the other bozos. I think I know who I’m looking for now.”

“I’ll send it right away. Where’s good for you?”

“Send it to Agent Chee out in Knight’s Bridge. I’ll get it from him.”

“Rodger that. And be careful.”

“I will.” Michael felt his curiosity getting the better of him. “Since I’m going out that way anyway, is there a chance I could see Grandfather?”

“Of course. He’d be offended if you didn’t visit.”

Michael smiled. “Thanks.”

“Anytime.”

Michael hung up and stared at the phone for a minute. He didn’t know why, but the thing Marella had jokingly referred to as his ‘spider-sense’ was, as she would put it, ‘going bonsai’. He couldn’t help but feel that there was something terribly wrong. Either that, or it was about to.

He’d always had a knack for sensing impending danger, but it had never been this strong.

“You okay?” Hawke noticed the change in the spy’s whole attitude. It was nothing specific, and to the casual observer, it was nothing at all. But to one who knew Michael and had a good handle on his body language and what was normal for him, the change was as sudden as it was drastic.

“Yeah.”

“What’s wrong?” Hawke watched the tall agent study the glass of orange juice.

“I just have a really bad feeling about this whole thing. I don’t know what it is, maybe it’s nothing, but I have a bad feeling that something’s going to happen and it’s going to be big.”

Hawke, like Marella, and anyone else who’d worked with or around Michael knew to trust the man’s instincts. There were too many times when his hunches had saved the lives of agents and those around him.

Hawke nodded and went to get his cello.

Michael sat at the counter for a few minutes puzzling over what he’d heard and matching it up with what he knew and what he was suspecting. The answer hit him like a snowball to the face. He knew there was nothing he could do at the moment, so he decided to sit back and wait.

He left the counter and went to his duffel bag to get his sketchbook and pencils. He found his colored pencils, but the sketchbook was gone. The sound of laughter told him where it had gone. As irritated as he was that someone had taken it out of his bag, it was nice to know that the drawings were having their intended affect.

“I wonder if she’s seen this one,” Hawke held up the sketchbook.

Santini couldn’t help but laugh at the picture.

The drawing was in colored pencil and featured a classic drawing of an alien seated at desk typing up a report. The alien was the stereotypical shade of green with large, oval, lidless eyes; a thin, lipless mouth; and no nose on the characteristically inverted-egg-shaped head.

It wore a white, conservative, women’s business suit and reminded Hawke of Marella.

The humor in the picture came in the surroundings.

The desk looked like any other, but beside the computer monitor, where Marella would normally keep the stuffed alien, was a toy version of Marella. Michael had apparently seen Marella and the alien at her desk and decided to do a portrait. But instead of drawing exactly what he saw, he switched the agent and the alien.

Hawke turned a page and gave the picture an odd look. It was just a couple of people throwing a Frisbee back and forth on the lawn in front of Knight’s Bridge. He took a closer look. This picture was too normal to be something Michael would draw.

Santini looked at the picture and shook his head.

“I don’t get,” Hawke looked at every detail of the sketch. “What’s so funny?”

“Look at the Frisbee,” Santini pointed to the Frisbee an agent was throwing. “Now look at the pizza.” He then pointed to a pizza box on the grass near the agent’s left foot.

In the pizza box was a Frisbee with two pizza-slice-like wedges taken out of it and the agents were throwing a pepperoni pizza back and forth.

Hawke shook his head. “He’s out there, Dom.”

“Maybe,” Michael walked over and took his sketchbook back. “But I’d have lost a long time ago if I didn’t have a sense of humor.”

“Did she see that picture?” Santini tried not to laugh.

“Did who see what picture?”

“Marella. Did she see the alien picture?”

“Not yet. I’m working on the final draft of that one.”

“You paint?”

“Only houses and fences. I do all of my work in pencil, wood, or airbrush.”

“You’re going to give her that drawing? She’s going to kill you.”

“I won’t let her open it until she’s gone. She’s transferring Friday. I have the alien, so she can have the picture.”

Hawke shook his head. Only Michael and Marella could joke like that and have fun. He had a feeling that if it were anyone else, the relationship would be far more professional than it already was. He wondered how Michael really felt about Marella Hounsou. And did she feel the same way about him? If they did, the certainly didn’t show it.

Michael flipped to the picture he was working on and sat down on one of the chairs he’d built.

Hawke sat on another chair and began piece of classical music by Mozart. He was aware of the occasional glances Michael would give him, but decided to ignore it. He was probably going to be the subject of one of the agent’s off-beat drawings. He couldn’t help but wonder where Michael got some of his ideas. The pictures were normal and included everyday objects that had been put in unlikely, even incongruous situations like the Frisbee and pizza, Marella and the alien, and the formula one racecar speeding on the rings of Saturn which were made up of luggage with airline and destination tags.

He wondered how he’d be depicted in the picture. Would he be playing his cello, or would that be replaced with something else?

Santini glanced at the sketch. He chuckled and shook his head. “Don’t let him see that.”

Michael smiled slightly and continued his work.

Hawke glanced over at Michael. “Don’t let me see what?”

“I’m drawing you.” Michael erased a line and redrew it.

Hawke gave the agent a wary look. God only knew what the man was drawing.

A chopper broke the still morning air.

Michael looked up and watched as the chopper glided down to the pier and landed neatly.

A tall Chinese agent stepped out of the chopper as soon as the engines had wound down and the propellers had stopped moving. He was accompanied by Carmen Herrera.

Hawke glanced at Michael for an explanation, but the spy seemed as puzzled as he was.

“Archangel?” The Chinese man glided over. Randolph Yi was tall for a Chinese, but still a bit below average height compared to most Caucasians.

“Yes.” Michael closed his sketchbook and put the pencil he was using back in the box he’d set on the deck to his right.

“I’m Agent Randy Yi.” He held up his badge.

“Okay.”

“I have something from Knight’s Bridge. It came in this morning. I thought you’d want to take a look at it.”

Michael stood up slowly, ignoring the stabs of pain in his leg as he did so. He set the sketchbook on the chair and took the file folder from the agent. If he noticed Carmen Herrera’s eyes giving him an appraising once over, he didn’t show it.

Este hombre es muy caliente. Carmen felt her face warm when Michael’s cobalt-green eyes regarded her calmly over the top of his wire-frame glasses. She looked down at her feet. She knew she wasn’t supposed to be thinking about men like that. That was lust and therefore a sin. But she couldn’t help occasionally ‘window shopping’ as Marella would put it.

You can look all you want, Carmen, just don’t touch the merchandise.

Carmen noticed Hawke’s slightly amused look. She knew she wasn’t as young or pretty as most of the agents in the division, but she still liked men and knew a handsome man when she saw one.

Hawke sat back in his chair and watched the scene unfold. Michael apparently didn’t notice what his female employees looked like. This one was good looking, but she might as well have been an old, mud-covered tire compared most of her female coworkers.

Carmen waited for instructions.

Michael looked at the transcripts of the phone call. “Did you trace the call?”

“Yes, sir. Tranh Vu traced it to this address in Devore.”

Michael looked at the slip of paper.

“Do we send in a team?”

Michael shook his head. He had already considered sending a team in to retrieve Marella, but that was just asking for trouble. If she was as heavily guarded as he suspected she was, not even the best Special Ops team would be able to get her out unscathed. And that was if they managed to stay alive long enough to find her. They certainly wouldn’t get out alive. “Too risky. There’s going to be too many of this bozo’s fanatics around to pull it off safely.”

Yi nodded. He had suspected the same thing, but wasn’t sure. He was glad of the second opinion.

Carmen stepped up and pushed a stray lock of brown hair out of her plain, oval face as she did so. “This is the man that has Marella Hounsou hostage.”

She handed Michael a picture of D’jolou. “And this is his henchman. They call him Screwface.”

If the man in the picture hadn’t been so sinister, Michael would have laughed at the man’s name. Screwface? Why not call him ‘Fuckhead’ or ‘Sex-’ He stopped that train of thought before he came up with an entire list of similar, yet equally unflattering names.

There was something about the man called Screwface that worried him. The face was ebony, flat, severely oval, and slightly angular. The eyes were almond-shaped, flat black, slightly canted, and almost lidless. The nose was thin and straight and the mouth beneath it was narrow, heart-shaped, and drawn up into a smile that gave the entire face an eerie, maniacal look.

On each of the man’s cheeks was a spiral of white dots.

Hence the name, Screwface. Michael felt a twinge of fear at the sight of the man. “What do we have on this maniac?”

Carmen handed him a folder. “He is M’Bekki’s right-hand man.”

“Nice,” Michael set the transcripts on the chair and flipped through the folder. “Rape, murder, mutilates victims… sweet guy.”

Yi and Carmen exchanged glances.

“We go out to Devore and get her back,” Hawke stood up and set his cello aside.

“This isn’t a civilian affair, Mr. Hawke,” Yi answered kindly. “I’m afraid we can’t let you get involved.”

Hawke looked at Michael. “How the hell you gonna get there?”

“We have ways, Mr. Hawke,” Carmen’s sweet smile caught Hawke off guard and the steel in her voice kept him there.

“We may have to get him involved,” Michael pushed his glasses up. His face hurt slightly where his left eye had been, but the doctor said that it was normal and would go away as he got used to the prosthetic eye. “According to the transcripts, we have until sundown Pacific Time.”

“That’s about seven-thirty out there,” Carmen answered.

Michael nodded. “What time is it there now?”

“Noon.”

“Damn.” Michael looked down at the file. He had a feeling that they were here to get him back to Knight’s Bridge to brief him and send him out to California. “And you guys are here because…”

“You’ve been recalled. The Committee is sending you out to Devore to get her back.”

Michael looked up at Yi. “Among other things.”

“Yes, sir.” Yi looked at the wall behind Michael. How did the man know? How had he found out?

“I wish to God you people would make up your damned minds.” Michael put the file on the chair.

“Excuse me?” Yi looked puzzled.

Michael shook his head. “I get sent here, now they want me back so they can send me somewhere else. So what exactly is going on?”

Yi looked at Hawke briefly, then back at Michael.

“Yeah.” Michael nodded. He glanced in Hawke’s direction. “Okay if we talk inside?”

“Sure.” Hawke didn’t mind if the briefing was held indoors or out. He would find out soon enough what Michael’s assignment was. And if the spy didn’t tell him, it would probably be all over the news the way most of the agent’s work was.

Michael was the FIRM’s best hit man and often went abroad to kill someone. He would never say where he was going or what he was going to do, but the results made front-page headlines and were the top stories in the local news. They had even made news in the States. Granted, the stories were usually just side notes that had been inserted in the news as time fillers, but they were definitely worthy of notice.

Yi and Carmen followed Michael into the cabin.

Carmen looked at Dustin as she walked in. The boy bore the faintest passing resemblance to Michael. Was he Michael’s child?

Yi looked at Dustin. He’d gotten word that Michael was taking custody of his nephew, but had never seen the boy. Surely the boy would be more comfortable in a Hispanic home.

Michael waved the two agents to the table and joined them a minute later. “What’s going on?”

Part Ten

Devore, California

Marella sat at the table and watched as D’jolou’s right-hand man paced like the caged animal he reminded her of.

She only knew him as Screwface, and didn’t want to get to know him any better.

She knew about Screwface, and he was all she had imagined he was: handsome, dark-skinned, and completely insane.

She kept her eyes on the wall ahead of her. The last thing she wanted was for Screwface to have any reason to touch her. He went through girlfriends like a machine gun expended bullets. The only problem was that the girls usually wound up dead and horribly mutilated.

Screwface was waiting for D’jolou’s permission to begin. He wanted to know what the famous Marella Hounsou was like. Was she a screamer? A fighter? Or would she be submissive? Was she skilled or would she need to be taught?

Marella could feel Screwface’s gaze on her. She guessed he was sizing her up and decided that if he wanted to have his way with her, one of them was going to end up severely mutilated if not dead. She wondered why D’jolou hadn’t checked her for weapons when he had brought her in. He had taken her gun and badge, but it obviously didn’t occur to him to check her for a switchblade that she had taken from one of her captors without him knowing it and stashed it in her bra.

While that wasn’t the most comfortable place for it, it was easily accessible if she needed to get to it in a hurry. Screwface was going to get a real surprise if he tried to force her.

D’jolou walked in a moment later and sent Screwface to get things ready. Screwface’s heart-shaped mouth had curled into a menacing grin that on any normal person, would have been adorable. He slunk out after making an obscene sexual gesture at the prisoner.

Marella didn’t pay any attention to him. All she was concerned with was the wall.

D’jolou walked over to her and shoved a voodoo doll in her face. “Now we talk.”

Marella felt her blood run cold at the sight of the doll. He was going to hurt Michael to get her to cooperate.

D’jolou held a long, sharp needle above the doll’s left knee. “Who did you call?”

Marella remained silent for a moment. She knew that if D’jolou shoved the needle in, Michael would get hurt. She kept her eyes on the wall and hoped that he would forgive her.

The needle went through the doll’s knee and another was poised above the doll’s right knee. “Who did you call? Was it Archangel?”

Marella remained silent, but her heart pounded at the sight of the long needle going into the doll’s right knee. How much pain was Michael in because of her? She considered telling D’jolou whatever he wanted just to keep him from hurting Michael any more than he already was. She decided not to show any fear. If she gave in to her fear, then D’jolou would have even more power over her.

“Do you not care what happens to him?” D’jolou held the doll only inches from her face as he slid a needle into the doll’s chest just below the heart. “I will kill him.”

Marella swallowed the knot that had taken hold of her throat. She could only imagine what Michael was going through right now. She hoped D’jolou would make the end quick so her friend wouldn’t suffer long.

Disgusted, D’jolou threw the doll down and stomped on it. He smiled slightly as Marella cringed. She knew what was happening to the man the doll represented. He increased the pressure on the doll and waited for her to talk. When she refused to speak, he slammed the back of his right hand into her face hard enough to nearly knock her out of the chair.

Marella sat up straight. She didn’t care that face hurt. How much pain was Michael in? How long would he hurt until death mercifully ended his suffering? D’jolou’s dark eyes narrowed and his full lips curled back into a snarl. He smashed his right hand into her face again. This time, he knocked her out of the chair. “If you don’t want to talk, fine. It does not matter who you call. No one will come for you.” He kicked her left side as hard as he could and stepped back to watch her reaction.

“He’ll come for me.” Marella hoped she sounded more certain than she felt. D’jolou laughed and grabbed her arm and hauled her to her feet. He pulled her close and tried to kiss her.

Marella decided that she’d had enough for now. She kneed D’jolou in the groin and backed away. “Leave me alone.”

D’jolou forced himself to his knees. “You will pay for that, bitch.”

Marella backed up a step. If he wanted a fight, then she’d be happy to oblige.

D’jolou stood up slowly and shuffled out. He was in no shape to deal with her at the moment. He could always come back later and make her submit.

Marella sat down against the wall and hugged her knees to her chest. She had just gotten her friend killed and now D’jolou was going to kill her or worse.

After a few minutes, she pulled herself together. There was no sense in falling apart now. Michael was dead or fatally wounded and there was nothing she could do about it. That being the case, there was no reason for her to give in to D’jolou. There was nothing he could do to her that would change or even compare to what she had done to Michael.

She dried her eyes and picked herself up. She walked over to the window and looked out at the slowly setting sun. I am SO sorry, Michael. I had no idea what he was going to do. I’m sorry.

The sound of a chopper shook her out of her thoughts. There was no reason for a helicopter to be in this area at this time of day, was there?

She looked for the chopper, but didn’t see it. She tried a different window, but again, no luck. She shrugged. It had probably just flown overhead on its way to somewhere else anyway.

She sat down at the table and tried to collect herself. She knew there was no way to escape. She had tried that earlier and had been caught before she left the building. She had used every trick Michael had taught her and a few that she’d picked up over the years, but she had been caught.

D’jolou had beaten her for a while and would have continued if he didn’t have to preside over a ceremony. He had settled for locking her in a room from which escape was impossible and had doubled her guard. He had also put a powerful spell on the door that would cause her hand to rot and fall off if she touched it.

She rested her forehead on her hands and hoped that someone, anyone would come for her before D’jolou got back.

Screwface slunk in after a while and grabbed her by the arm. He forced her toward the door and down the hall. He had heard the helicopter and had a feeling that she would be needed to ensure D’jolou’s safety.

He hadn’t seen the chopper land, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t there.

Outside the makeshift compound, Michael adjusted his Kevlar vest. He checked his gun before sliding it into his shoulder holster and put his butterfly knife in the side pocket of his pants. He knew that flip knives, like stilettos and switchblades were patently illegal, but that didn’t make them any less useful than traditional pocketknives.

He walked away from Airwolf as noiselessly as a shadow. He glanced back at the chopper and paused when the sun set behind it. The odd images that raced through his head from time to time came back with a rush.

He closed his eyes and shook his head slightly. He didn’t believe in visions. He never had, and saw no reason to start now.

He walked over to the edge of the brush and made his way up the low hill that led down into a vast expanse of nothing for several hundred yards. At the end of that barren nothing, was an abandoned hotel that was used as an office complex of sorts by the venues that performed at the Palladium.

Hawke moved up beside him. “Looks like we have our work cut out for us.”

“Not ‘we’, Hawke.”

“You’re not going in there alone.”

“And if you go with me, who’s gonna fire up the bird and get us out of here? I can’t fly that thing and neither can Marella. It only makes sense that you stay here and stand by to get us out.”

Hawke hated to admit it, but Michael was right. It was best for him to remain by Airwolf. Not only would he be needed to start the bird up and fly it off, but they might need someone who had some basic skill in First Aid. While Michael was a surprisingly good field medic, if things got ugly in there, he might not be able to patch himself up well enough… if he could do so at all. Marella was also good at First Aid, but if she was beaten up as well…

He nodded. “Yeah.”

Michael looked at Hawke. “I’ll be back as soon as I can. In the mean time, stay low and be ready to get out of here on a moment’s notice.”

“How long are you going to be?”

“Can’t say. I don’t know where she is, if she’s hurt, what kind of problems I’ll run into on my way in, or what’s going to happen on the way out. If I’m not back in, say, three hours, leave. Leave sooner if that place gets really busy before I get back.”

“How busy?” Hawke looked to his left, but Michael was gone. “I hate when he does that.”

Michael made his way down the steep slope as carefully as he could while hugging the shadows. He had a vague sense of déjà vu as he made his way down the hill. This was just like the hills he used to climb as a kid back in Alabama when he’d sneak out of the house and into the fields just outside the plantation.

He’d become accustomed to stealth at an early age and was able to sneak into and out of damned near anywhere on a moment’s notice.

He glided down the hill and across the field.

It wasn’t until he got to the compound that he realized what he was up against.

Marella wasn’t kidding when she said she was heavily guarded. There were people everywhere and the smells of incense, animals, and less pleasant scents resulting from the rituals being performed were almost overpowering.

He closed his eyes and clenched his teeth. He’d been a lot of places and smelled a lot of things, but nothing could make him as queasy as the smell of burning chicken blood mixed with cow manure, garlic, smoldering hemp, and sweat. It took him a few minutes to get accustomed to the smell. And once he was used to it, he could ignore it and go on his way. He stopped when a draft brought the smell over to him and around him. This time, the smell was accompanied with the scent of dirty pigs and the associated scents of that came with their pens and slaughter.

He was suddenly glad he’d opted out of lunch. With the smells around him, he knew he’d have been very sick. Instead, he was fairly queasy and pulled his black T-shirt up over his mouth and nose to avoid smelling any more than he had to.

He wondered if the smells would cling to him the way scents always seemed to. It was always easy to tell where he’d been because smells clung to him like tape stuck to paper.

God, I’m gonna fucking reek.

He made his way past the dancing, the pounding drums, and bizarre chanting and singing. He stopped by a sprinkler and considered letting it soak him. He decided against that because odors clung to him even more when his clothes were wet. If he had to walk past that mess of smells again, he knew that Hawke would smell him well before he left the compound.

He made his way into the building and hugged the shadows.

He froze when he heard two sets of footsteps. One was moving quickly and deliberately, the other was resisting.

A quick glance told him that Marella was being taken somewhere. He followed the tall whip of a man that was called Screwface.

He followed the pair into a large room that had once been a ballroom or large dining room. He stayed in a shadowy corner to see what was going to happen next.

Screwface shoved Marella forward and down so she was kneeling in front of D’jolou.

The voodoo priest said something and Marella’s shoulders squared.

The priest slapped her hard enough to make anyone cringe, but she didn’t make a sound.

Marella started to get up, but Screwface shoved her back down onto her knees. Michael found his hand going to his gun and stopped himself. There was no need to draw his gun yet.

D’jolou grabbed Marella’s face and forced her to look at him.

She said something that got her slapped hard enough to send her to the floor if D’jolou hadn’t been holding her dark hair in one huge fist.

Rule number one, Michael sighed inwardly. Keep your mouth shut.

Marella looked up at the priest. She moved like with all the speed of a pissed-off cobra. She had a switchblade in her hand and had shoved it into D’jolou’s groin as hard as she could.

Just like any guy, Michael cringed. He had never been knifed there before, but he’d taken a kick or two in his day. The last time was the most memorable as much as he wished he could forget it. Getting a knee in the jock was bad, but the pointed toe of a high-heel shoe at the end of a soccer player’s foot... As much as he hated to see another guy take a knife to his masculinity, he was proud of Marella’s quick thinking.

D’jolou staggered back and lashed out at Marella. His hand collided with her face with enough force to put her on the floor with a resounding thud.

That was enough.

Michael stepped out of the shadows and raised his gun. “Don’t you know you’re not supposed hit women?”

D’jolou stared at the newcomer through a haze of pain.

Marella looked up in complete disbelief. She’d seen what D’jolou had done to the voodoo doll, so how was Michael still alive? Had D’jolou’s spell failed? D’jolou shouted something in Creole.

Marella and Screwface both backed away.

Michael stood his ground.

D’jolou tried another spell. He had to show his followers that he was the more powerful.

Michael lowered his gun and watched D’jolou. Was this guy for real?

D’jolou waited for the spell to take affect.

Michael walked over to Marella and helped her up.

D’jolou screamed another incantation.

Michael looked at the voodoo priest the way he would look at a child that was throwing a tantrum. “Are you finished?”

Marella looked at Michael. He wasn’t affected by any of D’jolou’s spells.

“It’s okay.” Michael put his black cammo shirt around her shoulders.

“He’s using all his power against you.”

“So?” Michael shrugged slightly and turned to leave. “C’mon. Let’s get you out of here.”

Marella went without question even though she was starting to have quite a list of questions.

“You will not take her!” D’jolou shouted. “She is mine!”

“She is her own person,” Michael answered levelly. “She doesn’t belong to anyone, least of all you.”

Marella wanted to tell him not to speak to D’jolou like that, but in light of the fact that D’jolou’s magic had no effect on the spy, she kept silent. Screwface stepped forward and took a knife from his belt. He smiled and tossed his long, thin dreadlocks out of his face.

Michael reflexively moved in front of Marella. If the psycho was going to try anything, he would have a real fight on his hands.

D’jolou stalked over. He was perfectly content to take advantage of the distraction. He grabbed Marella and pulled her away from her protector.

Michael turned to see what had just happened, and realized his mistake just a second too late as a searing pain tore through his right side. Instinct and training took over. He moved away from Screwface and took stock of himself. The blade hadn’t gone very deep. While he’d probably need stitches, he wasn’t likely to bleed to death.

Screwface’s maniacal smile sent a chill up Michael’s spine. He’d never fought a madman, and he had no desire to do so now. He backed up and Screwface moved closer.

Oh, shit.

Screwface darted left, then right and caught his quarry off guard. He drove his knife deep into Michael’s right shoulder just below the collarbone and started to drag the blade left toward the sternum.

D’jolou smiled as the spy’s gun hit the floor. This man wasn’t as tough as he appeared to be. Apparently he wasn’t all his reputation said he was.

Marella watched the scuffle for a moment longer before deciding that enough was enough. She refused to stand by and watch her friend get carved like a totem pole. She drove her elbow back and down into D’jolou’s injured groin and escaped his grip as he staggered back. She turned around and punched him as hard as she could.

D’jolou stared at her. How dare she raise a hand to him? Before he could react, she kicked him in the crotch as hard as she could. Once he was doubled over, she kicked him in the ribs.

“How does it feel?” She hissed in Creole. She kicked him in the stomach just as he had done to her. Behind her, she could hear a fight going in full swing.

D’jolou grabbed her gun from his belt and raised it while she was busy helping her friend. He fired once, catching Michael’s back just above the right kidney.

Marella picked up Michael’s gun and shot D’jolou. She then turned to stop Screwface just as he drove his long knife deep into Michael’s right side.

Screwface looked up from his victim. He looked at the hole in his shirt. He pulled his knife out with a sharp jerk to his right and lunged at Marella. Marella wasn’t surprised to see Screwface coming at her. He probably didn’t realize how severely he’d been hurt. “Drop it.”

Screwface moved toward her with his cat-like, graceful gait.

Michael forced himself to his knees. “Shit.”

“I got it,” Marella’s icy gaze never wavered. “You okay?”

“Not sure.” Michael sat down. He was too dizzy to stand up and seeing the rapidly growing red stain on his favorite Queensryche shirt didn’t help matters any. He wasn’t concerned about the shirt, it was the blood that spooked him. “When- when’d you put pig killers in your gun?” He closed his eyes and tried to ignore the growing cold and nausea.

“Pig killers?” Marella watched Screwface approach. “Put the knife down.”

“Yeah. Cop Stoppers. Rhino Shells. Armor-piercing bullets.”

“I don’t. Those are illegal.”

“So is…” Michael clenched his teeth. He could taste blood.

“I don’t use Rhinos,” Marella leveled the .9 mm at Screwface. “I don’t want to shoot you, Screwface. Put-the-knife-down.”

Screwface flashed his maniacal smile and rushed at his quarry despite the broken blade on his machete-like dagger.

Marella dodged out of the way and slammed the butt of the gun into Screwface’s head.

The man fell to his knees, but didn’t seem bothered. He whipped around and nearly caught Marella’s left leg with the knife.

She stepped back and was about to take aim when Screwface’s face changed. He looked puzzled and shocked. She wondered what was going to happen next. Screwface looked up at her as if asking for help.

Marella watched the man fall to the floor dead. “About damned time.” She lowered the gun and went to her friend.

“I’m okay.” Michael wiped blood away from his mouth.

“The hell you are.” Marella helped Michael to his feet. “Jesus.” She put his let arm around her shoulders. “Can you walk?”

“I think so.”

Marella led him out of the ballroom and into the main foyer. She knew that to get out she had to go right, turn left at the potted palm, and then another right at the grand hall. She moved slow enough for Michael to keep up, but fast enough to get him out of the building as fast as safely possible. Two of D’jolou’s thugs stopped them at the door.

“D’jolou’s hurt,” Marella cut them off before they could speak. She spoke rapidly in Creole and added a tinge of fear mixed with panic to her voice. “There’s a madman in there with a gun. I think it’s Screwface.”

“Screwface?” The taller thug’s hand went to his gun.

“Yes. He went mad. D’jolou needs help.”

The two thugs looked at each other, then ran into the building.

“Where’d you land?”

“Over the… Over the hill… Just- just past the pavilion.”

Marella shook her head. There was no way he was going to make it that far. “Could you have parked any father away?”

“I tried Pasadena, but the lot was full.”

Marella smiled in spite of the situation. “C’mon. We’ll just borrow their car.” She got him into the Jeep and slid into the driver’s side. “Christ, that guy had to be ten feet tall.” She moved the seat forward and started to hotwire the car.

Michael didn’t ask where she’d learned that. He didn’t want to know. “Try these.” He handed her a set of car keys.

“Thanks.”

Michael nodded slightly and put his seat belt on.

“What, you don’t trust me?” Marella started the engine.

“I’ve… seen you drive.”

Marella smiled as she put the engine in gear and drove off toward the amphitheater. She picked the smoothest course possible to keep from jostling her injured passenger too much.

She had little trouble locating Airwolf. “Okay, we’re here.” She killed the engine and got out of the Jeep as Hawke ran over with a First Aid kit. “Hell.”

“Bad?” Hawke opened the kit.

“He’s going to need more than a Band-Aid and some Neosporin. Look under the back seat. There should be a red MediKit.”

Hawke went back to get the kit. “This it?” He had no idea the kit had been there.

“That’s the one.” Marella inspected the box before setting it on the hood of the Jeep. She opened it and took out a needle.

“No… needles,” Michael managed.

“You need this,” Marella took an alcohol pad out of its pouch and looked at him. “Arm or leg?”

“Neither.”

“Okay. The arm.”

Hawke looked at the Kevlar vest. “How’d he shoot you?”

“Armor-piercing bullet,” Marella answered as she administered the morphine. She set the needle aside and took out a marker. What time is it?”

“Seven forty-five.” Hawke watched Marella write a note on Michael’s right hand.

“We’re good. Help me get him in.”

“You want to do something about the bleeding first?”

“There’s nothing I can do, Hawke.” Marella unfastened the seat belt. “If I try to take this off, I’ll only make it worse.”

“How?”

“Look.” She pointed to the hole in the right side of the bulletproof vest. “That’s part of a knife. If I take the Kevlar off, there’s a chance I’ll move the knife and that could do more damage than help. Now, are you gonna help me or let him bleed out right here?”

Hawke helped Marella get Michael out of the Jeep. Between the morphine and shock, Michael wasn’t able to do much of anything. “How’d this happen?”

“D’jolou was about to rearrange my anatomy when he stepped in. Screwface got involved, and it went to shit from there.”

“Who?”

“D’jolou’s right-hand-man. He’s known only as Screwface. Don’t ask me why. All I know is that he does D’jolou’s dirty work. And we’re in for some trouble if we don’t get out of here fast.”

Hawke looked at the hill as Jeeps made heir way across the empty field. “Hell.” He got in and started the engines. “He gonna be okay?”

“That depends. He’s already been bounced around enough so keep the hot-dogging to a minimum.”

Hawke was about to comment on her remark about his flying, but decided to wait. They were being shot at. “You know what to do back there?”

“I’m a quick study,” Marella looked over the consoles. Most of them were pretty self-explanatory, but a few were new to her.

To Hawke’s surprise, she figured out the consoles faster than Dom had.

“Any chance of you rearming any time soon?” Marella activated the guns. “Locked and loaded.”

Hawke took aim and returned fire while slowly lifting the chopper. Once clear of the ground fire, he set Airwolf in motion. Loma Linda University Medical Center wasn’t too far away and they could make the hop fairly quickly.

“We have company.” Marella adjusted the helmet.

“You don’t sound surprised.”

“D’jolou was a high-power drug and arms dealer as well as a voodoo priest.”

“Handy guy.”

“You’d think. Fire when ready.”

Hawke glanced at the heads-up. “How the hell do you know how to use that stuff?”

“I told you I learn quickly. Besides, I play a lot of video games with his kids.”

“Michael has kids?”

“Yeah. Son and two daughters. One daughter. Becky was murdered a few years ago.”

“That’s gotta suck.”

“Yeah.” Marella didn’t mention how Rebecca’s death had affected him. It was the first time in all the years that she’d known him that he’d made an appointment with Dr. Bruner for counseling. Normally he only saw her when he had to go in for his evals.

“Hang on.”

“I’m fine. It’s Mike I’m worried about.”

Hawke just barely avoided a rocket from the other helicopter. The sudden jerk back knocked everyone in the cockpit back in their seats.

A quick glance to the left told Hawke that Michael hadn’t taken it well. He decided to end the fight before it began. He lowered the visor and got a lock on the helicopter. He only fired once. Only one shot was needed to bring the chopper down in a fiery ball of flames.

After that, it was off to Loma Linda.

He didn’t know why, but he hoped they got there in time.

Epilogue

Knight’s Bridge, Virginia
Six weeks later

“Oh, hell.” Michael stopped by the desk and looked at the woman seated behind it. “Can’t I get rid of you?”

Marella smiled. “I’ll leave when you do.”

“In that case, I think you should get a new handle.”

“Really? I was just getting used to ‘Cleopatra’.”

“Well, get used to ‘Herpes’.”

“Herpes?”

“Yeah. You just keep coming back.”

Marella smiled and answered the phone. “He’s right here.” She handed the phone to Michael. “It’s your boss and don’t even think about touching Roswell.”

Michael gave her a ‘who me?’ look as he took the phone. “Yes, sir.”

“I thought I told you to go home for a while,” Zeus snapped.

“I did.”

“Convalescent leave doesn’t count. You checked out on leave, so leave.”

Michael couldn’t figure that one out. “I don’t understand, sir. I was on leave.”

“And you were recalled then sent on medical leave. Now finish your regular leave before I suspend you.”

Michael looked at the phone as the man on the other end disconnected. “Someone woke up on the wrong side of his BOB.”

Marella nearly choked on her coffee as she tried not to laugh.

“Are you okay?” Michael gave her a worried look. “You’re turning red.”

“I’m fine,” Marella said after a moment. “Laughing and coffee don’t mix.”

“I’ll take your word for it,” Michael smiled.

“What’s a BOB?” Tater Tot asked. He had a feeling he’d just walked in on the end of something.

“Battery Operated Boyfriend,” Marella answered.

Tater Tot looked at Michael. “You have one of those?”

“No. And if even if I did, I sure as hell wouldn’t admit to it.”

Tater Tot looked at Marella.

“Don’t look at me,” Marella raised her hands in surrender. “I’m not the self-service kind.”

“I did not need to know that,” Michael went into his office. He walked out a minute later with his briefcase. “I’m leaving. Is there any other intensely personal information you want to give me?”

“Well if you must know…”

“I’d rather not,” Michael gave Marella a mock-disgusted look. “Excuse me.”

“That bastard,” Marella looked around her desk to confirm her suspicion. “He abducted my alien.”

FINIS