Ghost Rendition Read online

  “I’m the owner. Well, my company is. I’m with Silicon Works and we own the house. What kind of incident could there possibly be?” Caroline would ask and flash that hypnotic smile.

  The rent-a-cop would swallow hard and stutter, “Well, your neighbor called and said that there was, um, well, I’d like to take a look inside to make sure everything is okay, if that’s all right with you.”

  “I don’t mean to be difficult, but the house is a mess, and I would be terribly embarrassed to have you see it that way,” with another smile.

  “Okay, then can you at least have the other fellows staying with you come to the door?” the rent-a-cop would ask.

  “I have only one fellow with me and he’s busy working right now. Maybe I should call your supervisor and discuss the situation with him?” she was turning indignant.

  If the rent-a-cop didn’t go away then, the Suit would come to the door. “Is there a problem here? I’m trying to get my work done and I am on a very tight deadline.”

  That would do it for the rent-a-cop. He would mumble an inarticulate apology and stage a clumsy retreat. I estimated the whole thing would take about four minutes. That’s how long I would have to get to the back door, get it open, and find a hiding place. I sprinted full out. The run was too long not to attract attention. If there were someone guarding the back door, they would hit me no matter how careful I was.

  The lock on the back door was a high-end dead bolt. I didn’t try my lock picking tools. I sprayed lubricant into the lock and inserted a tiny, power drill. It bore through the tumblers in less than a minute. It had a silencer and made almost no noise. I slipped in a screwdriver, turned, and was in.

  I started in the kitchen. I stuck a tiny webcam under the refrigerator, moved into the dining room and stuck a webcam under the table. I went back through the kitchen into the hall. I stuck a webcam under the frame of a Monet lithograph that hung on the wall. Now I needed to hide.

  I quietly opened a door and found a bathroom. That wasn’t a good idea. I heard the front door close. I was running out of time. I opened another door and found a closet full of coats. I had one more try before whoever had answered the door came down the hall. The last door did the trick. I closed it behind me and descended into the basement.

  I lit a glowstick and looked around. It wasn’t your average finished basement. It had multiple interrogation chairs with electronically controlled metal restraints capable of exerting variable pressure, some imaginative tools both sharp and dull, and a variety of drugs and syringes. It wouldn’t be needed for the boys, which meant I wasn’t in immediate danger of discovery, but Caroline or the Suit would find the drilled lock in the back soon enough. The clock was ticking.

  I slipped on my glasses, and the Bluetooth earpiece in case I could pick up any stray audio. I toggled between the feeds from the webcams I had set up. The kitchen and dining room were empty. I caught a glimpse of Caroline going upstairs from the webcam in the picture frame, which meant she had charmed the rent-a-cop all by herself. The poor guy would probably be dreaming about her for weeks.

  She was probably watching the boys, and the Suit was watching the property. That would likely put her on the second floor and him on the third floor. Assuming it was only the two of them, I would take out the Suit first. Getting past Caroline on the second floor was risky, but if I went right after her, I risked catching Pratt and the boys in a crossfire, and I had to admit that I didn’t like the idea of killing her. With the Suit dead, I might be able to negotiate.

  As I started up the basement stairs, my webcam picked up Pratt walking into the kitchen. The kid’s endless appetite had finally come in handy. He was staring at the open refrigerator with a forlorn expression on his face. Most safe houses aren’t stocked with candy and orange soda.

  “You shouldn’t have left. My snacks were better,” I said.

  He turned calmly as if he weren’t the least surprised to see me. “I wasn’t given much of a choice. You used the microdot to track us?”

  “When did you find it?”

  “About 30 seconds after you planted it. I was one of the guys who wrote the NSA software that jams those things.”

  “You wanted me to find you.”

  “Caroline said you were going to stop us from releasing Tiresias. That’s why she had to get us away from you. I didn’t believe her.”

  “Why?”

  “I knew she was manipulating me. You weren’t. She was watching me too carefully to contact you directly, but I made sure she didn’t find the tracking dot,” he said.

  “She’s Israeli, probably Mossad. She has no interest in letting you release Tiresias.”

  I could see Pratt digest this. His brain told him it made sense. His heart didn’t want to listen.

  “Who else is with her?” I asked.

  “Just this guy she calls Richard.”

  The Suit didn’t look like a Richard. He was more like a Trent or Brett. Then again, his real name was probably something like Eitan or Ori.

  “Tell her you can’t work unless you have Starburst and orange soda. We need to get her out of the house. Richard will want to tell you to shut up and work, but she’ll do it if you pitch enough of a fit,” I said.

  “I don’t pitch fits. She’ll know I’m faking.”

  “Be persistent. You’re good at persistence.” I heard movement on the stairs. “Do it quickly, we don’t have much time,” I said and hurried back to the basement.

  The webcam on the picture frame gave me a good view of Caroline walking down the hall, and the webcam in the kitchen picked her up after that. She had Pratt on a tight leash. That was no surprise. She’d had me on one too. It would make a good Dr. Phil show, “Spies Who Love Too Much and the Women Who Hurt Them.” Of course, any professional who actually went on a show like that would be discreetly disposed of, but it would get good ratings.

  “Your friends upstairs need you. They don’t make any progress without you,” I heard Caroline say to Pratt.

  “I need orange soda and Starburst. I’m going through withdrawal.”

  “We don’t have time for snack runs,” Caroline said.

  “I have a headache that feels like my cerebellum is imploding. If I don’t get a big sugar fix, I can’t code.”

  “Are you going to let Todd and Ben do this by themselves? This is your baby.”

  This was a nice appeal to his ego, but it was the wrong move. It was too obviously a manipulation.

  “They can’t do it by themselves. You said it yourself. Do you have to ask Richard’s permission?” Pratt asked with studied innocence.

  Caroline seemed genuinely annoyed by the idea that she might need his permission. Was there friction between her and the Suit? How could I exploit it?

  She put a hand on his shoulder and gave him one of her best high-wattage smiles.

  “Go upstairs and tell Richard I went for supplies. Will you do your best to keep things moving while I’m gone?”

  Pratt nodded like he meant it. He probably did. If she had done that to me, I would have gone upstairs and tried to do some coding too. That or had sex with her on the kitchen floor.

  I heard footsteps pounding down the stairs. I heard the front door fling open and then slam shut. The Suit was not happy about Caroline’s departure. I saw him come down the hall and into the kitchen. He pulled a beer out of the refrigerator. His Desert Eagle was in a shoulder holster. It was a better opportunity than I could have hoped for. He was away from the boys and he was preoccupied.

  I eased myself through the basement door and moved quietly toward the kitchen. The Suit scanned the backyard. He caught the drilled lock and went to examine it. I have no issues with shooting someone in the back. It’s not gallant or the way they would do it in the movies, but it’s a great way to stay alive. And he would do the same to me.

  My webcam glitched and I froze. Then it straightened itself out. The Suit hadn’t moved. I charged into the kitchen with my Browning in front of me, and everything went da
rk.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The world went from black to bright white in what felt like an instant. My head hurt. My senses returned slowly. I tried to move my arms and legs but no luck. I was in the basement confined in an interrogation chair looking into a bright white light.

  “You are awake now. Good. It is time for us to talk.”

  I couldn’t see the Suit, but I could imagine the shark smile he was wearing.

  “You figured out a way to feed back a loop of the last image the webcam saw.”

  “It is a new piece of tech. I thought you would be too smart to go for it, but I prepared in case.”

  It was practically the same trick I had used at Advanced Crypto. I should have seen it coming. I gave Nachash a dirty look in my head. All those cryptic warnings, and no warning about this?

  “You knew I’d track Pratt here,” I said.

  “Of course,” he said.

  “I don’t know anything that will help you and I wouldn’t give it to you if I did.”

  “You Americans are always optimistic. Live surrounded by people who want to kill you and then tell me what you will and won’t do.”

  “I spend most of my time with people who want to kill me, and I’ve never been accused of being an optimist.”

  He gave me a laugh that was more like an angry bark. I had the feeling his bite was worse. “I would like to continue our talk, but I have matters to attend to. I will return soon, and then we will see what each of us is willing to do.”

  Dread is a powerful motivator. You leave the subject to stew in his own fears, and he is much easier to break when you return. But it takes time, which meant the boys weren’t done programming yet. The Suit didn’t want to risk trying to get Pratt out of the country before he had the program in hand.

  I heard footsteps come down the stairs. It wouldn’t be the Suit, and he wouldn’t let Pratt or the boys out of his sight. The bright light went off, and Caroline appeared.

  “I didn’t take Richard for the good cop/bad cop type,” I said.

  “He doesn’t know I’m down here.”

  “Which is what the good cop would say.”

  “I’m sorry it ended up this way,” she said.

  “I’ve told you everything I know. You won already. You don’t have to keep up the act.”

  “It wasn’t an act. Not all of it,” she said.

  “Tell me one thing you told me that was true.”

  “I do have an asshole ex-husband.”

  “He couldn’t understand the job?”

  “That is the one thing he does understand.”

  “Mr. Personality is your ex?” It hurt just to say it.

  “I told you he was an asshole,” she said.

  “He let you take a bullet from his own gun to make your cover. That is some cold blood,” I said.

  “I took the bullet because I didn’t want him to kill you.”

  “So let me go. Or did you change your mind?”

  “I wish I could.”

  “You still haven’t told me what he did to hurt you?” I said. I was stalling. Trying to figure out how I could use her to get free. And I couldn’t help it, I wanted to know.

  “He was my supervisor. I was on a mission and he pulled the plug on me. Sent in someone to take over. It set my career back years.”

  “Maybe he was worried about you.”

  “He was worried about himself. If I succeeded, he felt threatened, and if I didn’t, it made him look bad,” she said.

  “Now you parachuted in on his mission. You both have a thing about revenge.”

  “Listen, he gets crazy jealous. Play to that. You might be able to get him to kill you quickly. He has a bad temper, but he’s not stupid. You’ll have to be subtle.” She gave me a quick kiss on the lips. “That’s another true thing. When I kissed you, I meant it.” She flipped the light back on and turned to go. It was literally the kiss of death.

  “Do me one favor,” I said, and heard her pause. “Tell Pratt I’m sorry I left him in the dark. I turned out to be inferior after all.”

  “I don’t . . .”

  “Promise me. I care about the kid. I don’t want to just disappear on him.”

  I didn’t know if she heard me. All I knew was that she was gone. I pulled against the hand and foot restraints, but the metal was new and had no give to it. I closed my eyes and visualized the room. The table with the interrogation tools was in the middle. There was a chair on either side. The Suit would be down soon to start the game. Some light pain to start. He would have his gun holstered. If I could get free, I had to neutralize that first.

  I counted slowly in my head to keep the dread at bay and to have some sense of time. I had only passed 900 when I heard the Suit’s heavy footsteps coming down the stairs. It wasn’t long enough.

  “Let us start our conversation,” he said.

  I could hear him picking something up from the table. The sound came from directly in front of me, which told me which chair I was in. He put his hand in front of the light. It held a lingchi knife. I had thought about writing a chapter on it for my Stabbing Weapons for Morons book, but thought it was too gruesome even for the morons.

  Lingchi translates as “the lingering death or death by a thousand cuts.” The idea was to surgically slice off parts of the body, one by one, while still keeping the subject alive. It could be performed with any knife, but this one had a wickedly sharp edge and the Chinese characters that announced its intentions.

  “I’m ready to chat. What would you like to talk about?” I said. I needed to play for time.

  “I thought you were dead set on giving me nothing.”

  “The dead part might have been a bit exaggerated.”

  “Who tipped off the Russians about Tiresias?” This was a test. He knew the answer.

  “Can’t we start with something easier? Game shows always begin with the simple questions so you can build momentum.”

  He stepped into the light and placed the point of the knife surgically close to my right eye.

  “Westfield, or whatever his real name is, tipped them.” The two people who knew about Pratt first were Rob and Westfield. One of them had likely tipped the Russians for them to have been on the scene that quickly. Westfield made the most sense. Rob wanted to protect Pratt. Westfield needed time to assemble his team of B-list contractors. The Russians were a quick fix and gave him plausible deniability.

  The Suit withdrew the knife about a millimeter. I had guessed right. “Caroline said you were stronger than this,” he said.

  “Sorry to disappoint you. My ex-wife feels the same way.”

  “You will find it less humorous when you have only one eye,” he said and moved the knife to within an eyelash of my pupil. “Who tipped us?”

  This was another test. I waited to give my answer for as long as I could and still avoid his plunging the knife into my eye. “It was my supervisor, Shrink.”

  “Why would he do that?”

  Another good guess. I had convinced him that I was answering truthfully. Now he wanted to know Shrink’s true motivation. I needed it to sound plausible. And I needed to play for time. I drew it out again, looking like I was thinking hard.

  “He recruited Pratt. He didn’t want him renditioned. If you and the Russians were in the game, it bought him time to make his case.” It was probably close to the truth. Rob didn’t want to leave me alone against the Russians. Bringing in the Israelis helped neutralize them.

  “I don’t believe you,” he said.

  “Rob’s dead. I have no reason to lie.”

  “You have many reasons. And this was far too easy,” he said.

  “Maybe for you. I’m working my ass off here.”

  I saw his hand tense. He wanted a good grip as he shoved the knife into my eye. He would pull his hand back slightly to gather momentum and then my eye would be gone.

  “Caroline knows it’s true. She got it out of Pratt,” I said.

  This got a barking laugh. “Now
you are wasting my time.”

  “She told me that she was going to keep it from you. You ruined her mission, and she was going to ruin yours.” I knew it would make him angry. But I also hoped it would make him pause to consider it. It did. For less than two seconds.

  His hand with the knife tensed again. I forced myself not to close my eye. It would only slice my eyelid. He pulled his hand back. Nachash whispered for me to be brave like he had when I first came to him as a kid. And then the lights went out. The power that kept the restraints in place went with them. I pulled my hands free and slid down in one motion. The knife plunged into the chair above me. Pratt had gotten my message.

  I freed my legs and drove my knee into the Suit’s groin. It doubled him over, but he recovered quickly. He wasn’t Nachash, but he was good. I pulled his gun from his shoulder holster. He knocked it free, sending it sliding across the floor.

  The lights went back on. I lunged for the table with the interrogation tools, but it took my eyes precious seconds to adjust to normal light. The Suit knew the room better than I did. He got there first. He grabbed a thirteen-inch spiral blade dagger and thrust it at my gut.

  I spun away and backpedaled to gain space. I unbuckled my belt and pulled it free. The Suit closed. I wrapped the belt around my hand in time to deflect another knife thrust and sent a hammer blow to his solar plexus in the same motion. He pivoted, took the punch in the side of his ribs, and raked my chest with the tip of his blade. It wasn’t a deep cut, but it hurt plenty.

  “I will still cut you piece by piece, but this way it will be sport,” he said.

  “Did I mention how much I enjoyed fucking your wife? How did you let her get away?”

  I slid the belt buckle off my belt as I taunted him. He lunged at me. I set my feet and prepared to deflect a knife thrust to the gut. It was a fake. As soon as I was back on my heels, he threw the knife. I judged the rotation. It would have impaled me through the neck. I got the hand with the belt up just in time to deflect it. The tip cut through to the knuckle. He might manage death by a thousand cuts after all.