Just Cause: Revised & Expanded Edition (18 page)

“All right, you two lovebirds, hit the road. This park closes at eight.” She squinted into the truck’s interior. “Do I know you?” she asked Jason.

“I’m Mastiff, uh, ma’am. From Just Cause. And this is Mustang Sally,” stammered Jason.

“Hi!” Sally winced at the saccharine brightness in her own voice.

“We’re, uh, we’re working on a case?” Jason asked as if trying it out.

“Yeah, sure. I wasn’t born yesterday. I used to come out here and make out too. But it’s late, and it’s cold, and you’re supposed to be setting some kind of example, so what say you call it a night and head back to the clubhouse, huh?”

“Yes, ma’am. Right away.” Jason fumbled with the keys in the starter.

“Behave, you two, and have a good evening,” said the officer.

Jason backed the Blazer out of the parking spot and pulled onto the road rather faster than might have been advisable, given the police officer was still watching.

“Oh my God, I’m so embarrassed.” Sally buried her face in her hands.

“Yeah, me too.”

They drove in silence for a few minutes. Then Jason snorted. “I wasn’t born yesterday.”

Sally snorted; she’d thought the same thing. “Let’s hurry back to the clubhouse.”

That got them both laughing. Soon both had to wipe their eyes from tears of amusement. By the time they parked in the Just Cause garage, their laughter had subsided somewhat.

“Do you want to come over?” Jason asked. Sally could hear the longing in his voice. It matched a similar longing she felt deep within her, but somehow the magic of the earlier moment had passed. She wasn’t worried; she knew there would be another moment, and it would be soon.

“No, not tonight,” she said. “But you can walk me home, okay, cowboy?”

He smiled and tipped back an imaginary cowboy hat. “It’d shore be mah pleasure, ma’am.” He held out his arm and she took it with glee. Arm in arm they walked through the halls of Just Cause until they stood outside Sally’s door.

“Overly curious cops notwithstanding, I had a really good time tonight, Jason.” Sally gazed up into his eyes, so far above her own.

“Me too. I only wish…” He didn’t finish the thought, but Sally knew what he would have said.

“So do I,” she whispered. “We’ll have another chance.” She winked at him. “Soon, if I have anything to say about it.”

He bent down and kissed her. The touch made her tingle all over once more. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Sally.”

“Thanks, Jason. I had a lot of fun tonight. Good night.”

Sally went into her room and shut the door. Her heart raced as if she’d been doing four-hundred mile-per-hour wind sprints. She almost talked herself into going to his room anyway, but headquarters didn’t feel private enough. It was like somebody having sex in his or her office at work. She’d have to see about working around that feeling, though, because she was desperate to feel Jason’s hands on her, his bare skin against hers. Maybe she should check around for skeevy motels, she thought in amusement. Or nice ones, she added after a moment’s consideration. He drew a decent salary as a federal employee. She was still unpaid as an intern, but she had some money saved up from birthdays and such. No reason to shortchange herself.

She was falling for him, this giant of a boy with the gentle demeanor of his namesake. She could sense his loyalty to her, and felt he would stay with her for a long while. It felt comfortable to be wanted, to be desired. She wondered if he felt the same way. She knew she could ask him and he’d tell her. He’d been so forthright and upfront with her she almost didn’t know how to deal with it. She’d been brought up to expect men to be creatures of difficulty, impossible to please or understand, and that she’d have to use her feminine wiles to get what she wanted. The idea of just getting to be herself with him and him being okay with it made her feel like the luckiest girl in the world.

She stripped out of her costume and cranked up the heat in her room to luxuriate in the warm air as it blew gently across her skin. She didn’t want to dress yet. She felt sexy in her nakedness. Instead, she sat down at her workstation with a half-formed idea about perhaps composing a naughty email to Jason. When she opened the
JCMail
program, though, she found a message waited for her with such an intriguing subject line and sender’s address that she decided Jason would have to wait.

The message was from an Intelligence Analyst of the CIA, with a subject of
Your intelligence request #20040112-1825-003
, with an attached archive file. She’d asked the CIA—something she still couldn’t believe she had the ability to do—to try to identify the mysterious blond man with Harlan Washington in the pictures from Guatemala.

She slid her card through the workstation reader to unlock the file and began to scroll through it.

The analyst gave a high probability the man’s name was Heinrich Kaiser. He was a naturalized Guatemalan citizen who had lived in the country for an indeterminate amount of time. Records were available that showed someone with his name lived in the town of San José that dated back to the 1940s. The analyst theorized that the man might actually be the son of the original Heinrich Kaiser, and included a grainy photo of the senior Kaiser as evidence. Sally looked at them side by side and she could see a definite resemblance.

Kaiser Junior was a wealthy businessman involved in construction and imports. He was heavily involved with the Guatemalan power infrastructure. His company built new substations and generating plants and laid transmission lines across the great mountain ranges that divided the country. He was a mover and shaker in the local economy, a real powerhouse, Sally thought, and smiled at the joke. No wonder Harlan Washington was meeting with this Kaiser; the man owned half of the docks, a couple of freighters, and numerous buildings throughout the small town of Puerto San José. With his ability to import nearly anything into the country undetected, and his sizable power base, Kaiser was the perfect accomplice for Destroyer.

The question that stumped Sally was why Washington would choose Guatemala at all. There was so little there to appeal to the engineering wizard. As resourceful as he was, Washington could have disappeared just as effectively within the United States, where he would have easier access to the high technology, tools, and materials he needed to build his battlesuits.

Well, that was a problem for analysts, she decided. She’d solved the mystery she of the blond man in the picture. She picked up her phone and paged Sondra.

“
What’s up, Sally?
”

“Not much, I’m just hanging out tonight. I got an email back from the CIA on our mystery guest.”

“
The blond guy?
”

“Yeah. They sent me a whole file on this guy. Want to see?”

“
Sure. Want me to come to your room or do you want to come here or what? Ow, stop it!
” Sondra sounded like she had to bite back giggles.

Sally blinked. “Stop what?”

“
Oh, sorry, Sally. I wasn’t talking to you.
”

“I see.” Sally looked around her room. As usual, it was a minor disaster area. “Tell you what, give me about fifteen minutes and then I’ll come by if we can use your terminal.”

“
Deal.
”

Sally took a shower and washed her hair, then wrapped herself up in her fleecy pajamas. She stepped into her fuzzy bunny slippers and robe. At last, she felt warm and cozy and dried her hair lackadaisically. She decided to leave it down instead of coiling it back up into her customary braids.

She slipped her ID card into her bathrobe pocket and left her room. As she walked up the hall toward Sondra’s room, Jason came out of his door. He had changed into sweats, a tank top, and cross-trainers. Sally almost turned around and sprinted back to her room to hide from him, but instead took a deep breath and made herself smile. It was one thing for him to see her all dressed up in her costume, or even partway out of it, but she was in her robe and pajamas! Her hair hung halfway down her back, a little wavy from the constant braiding, but frizzy from constant windburn. She figured she must look pretty awful.

“Hey, Sally. I was just going to the gym.”

“Oh. I’m, uh, going to go over some stuff with Sondra.”

“Cool. See you tomorrow.” He smiled and started down the hall.

“Jason?”

He turned. Sally jumped up into his arms—she had to leap to reach his face as it was a good eighteen inches over hers—and kissed him full on the mouth. “Thank you for tonight,” she whispered in his ear.

“You’re welcome.” He set her down as if she were made of glass.

She wanted to say something more, something which would make him think only of her until the next time they got together somewhere private, but words failed her.

“Enjoy the rest of your evening, Mustang Sally,” said Jason with that smile which made Sally want to knock him on the head like a cavewoman and drag him back to her room. He whistled a Velma’s Glasses tune as he headed on down the hallway. Sally watched him go. When he reached the end of the hallway, he glanced back over his shoulder and saw her looking at him. He winked and then continued on his way.

She turned and knocked on Sondra’s door.

“Come in,” called Sondra from inside.

Sally opened the door and nearly bumped into Jack. “Hey, darlin’,” he said. “Don’t mind me, I was just leaving. Girl talk makes me all oogie.”

Sondra threw a pillow from her couch at him.

He laughed and handed it to Sally. “You girls behave yourselves.” He shut the door as he left.

“Goodness,” exclaimed Sondra. “Sally, are you ill?”

“N-no. Why?”

Sondra stepped over to her and laid a hand across Sally’s forehead. “No fever,” she said. “Do you know you’re blushing so much you look sunburned?”

Sally could feel her face prickling. “Yeah.” She let her hair fall forward.

“Oh, don’t be silly. Do you want some ice cream and then we’ll look at that file?”

Sally nodded. “I’m sorry. I just wasn’t expecting to run across Jack here. I mean, I’m not even dressed.”

Sondra laughed. “You don’t have to be ashamed. We’re all friends here. I’m the team’s field medic. I’ve seen most everybody naked at some point.”

“Even Jason?”

“No, so far he’s managed to keep his clothes on around me. Poor boy embarrasses easily. You kids and your hangups.” Sondra came back from her kitchenette with two pints. “I look at the two of you and all I can say is I’m glad I’m not a modern teenager. Chunky Monkey or Cherry Garcia?”

“Chunky Monkey, please. I never really thought of myself as a teenager. I mean, I’m out of school now. I’m here.”

“Sally, dear, you’re young.” Sondra chuckled.

“You don’t look very—”

“Watch it.” Sondra raised a finger in warning. “I’m not that old. Although…” She sighed. “I do find the occasional gray hair amid all this luscious black.” She shook out her head for emphasis.

“You’ve got beautiful hair,” said Sally.

“So do you, but you need a different conditioner. And you’ve got terrible split ends. You really need to trim them off. I could do it if you want. If you don’t mind losing a couple inches, that is.”

Sally shrugged. “It comes from all the running. Wind damage.” She pulled a plait around to look at it and clucked her tongue at the ends. Sondra was right. “Yeah, I guess you can trim it.
Trim
,” she said with heavy emphasis. “Not
cut
.” 

Sondra set down her pint and picked up a hairbrush from the end table. “Here,” she said. “You sit at the terminal and get that file open and I’ll take care of your hair.”

Sally found it hard to even get started on the file because having Sondra brush her hair felt so good. Her mother used to brush her hair when she was younger, before she’d left for the Hero Academy. It was something they’d done to bond. Sally would have returned the favor, but her mother always kept her hair practical and short. As she sat and Sondra’s strong fingers worked patiently through the tangles, she realized she really did miss her mom a lot. Maybe she’d see if she could head home for a visit.

“Okay, I’m going to
trim
it now. I promise, no more than two inches.” 

“You’re sure?”

“Honey, I can plug a quarter at a hundred yards and give you twenty cents change. When I say two inches, I mean
two
inches.” 

Sally gritted her teeth. She hated haircuts and had since she was a toddler. She remembered screaming tantrums from those days until her mom had given up ever approaching Sally with a pair of scissors. “Do it.”

Sondra snipped. “Done.” She showed Sally what she’d cut. If it wasn’t two inches, it was awfully close. “I’ll finish brushing it out in just a minute.” She paused in her brushing to eat a couple spoonfuls of ice cream

Sally opened the file and zoomed in on the first picture. “Sondra, meet Junior. Junior, Sondra.”

Sondra raised her spoon in greeting. “It’s a pleasure.”

Sally continued skimming down the first page of the report. “Junior’s real name is Heinrich Kaiser. He’s the son of a German national and possible Nazi war criminal who immigrated to Guatemala sometime after World War II.”

“That’s him all right.” Sondra looked at the picture with her odd, bird-like eyes. “And why’s he involved with Washington?”

“His specialties include construction, power infrastructure, imports, and buying off local government.”

“I imagine that’s not so tough in Guatemala,” said Sondra. “Okay, so he’s a local celebrity with his fingers in the kind of pies Destroyer likes. That’s a good starting point. He can bring stuff into the country without nosy customs inspectors and provide Washington with a suitable power base for his work. The question is, what is Washington doing for him?”

“Paying him?” asked Sally.

Sondra shook her head. “Look at the money this guy is making through his legitimate business.” She pointed to some figures on the screen. “He’s not lacking in funds. Shoot, he might be the wealthiest man in the country, maybe all of Central America. You don’t just pay someone like that. You give him something he wants.”