Authors: Laurie Mains
She was thinking about what he said when she noticed the intense way he was looking at her. He was sitting close beside her and the intensity of his gaze made her face flush with warmth and she became aware that she was naked beneath her robe. Her attention had shifted to the rough texture of the material and the way it made the new flock of goose bumps on her arms and chest feel.
He was so confusing; she did not know what he meant and she knew from experience that it was pointless to try to and guess. She was losing patience with everything about this situation, she turned to him and reached out and took his chin and lifted it so he would have to look at her eyes.
“Why Tyler? Why because?”
Her voice was lumpy with emotion. At first she was surprised by it but after a moments reflection she wasn’t surprised at all. She told herself she needed to be honest about her feelings. She knew very well where this emotion came from. It was there because, deep down inside, she knew exactly what she wanted it to mean.
He considered her question for a long time. His eyes turned away from her and looked at the floor, then at the wall, at the poster of a tree with a poem on it, then at the stuff on the floor again and finally at her face. He inhaled a gambler’s breath and rolled the dice.
“You are my girlfriend.” He risked another quick look at her eyes to gauge her reaction and he saw tears in her eyes and realized he used wrong words again. He gambled and lost but he wanted to understand why he lost. He needed to figure out why she was crying.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“Sorry for what?” she said. She was sniffing and grabbed a tissue and wiped her nose.
“You are upset.”
“I’m not upset Ty I’m confused. I’m not sure I understand what you mean,” she said.
She used a corner of the towel wrapped around her hair to wipe her eyes. She could see by his expression his mind was working and she knew he was trying to think of something he could say to fix the problem. She felt an urge to help him but waited.
“I like sleeping with you,” he said.
He was trying to hit the right combination of words to undo whatever it was that made her cry. This made her laugh and cry at the same time and at that point he decided to fold and not say anything more, the words he used just made things worse. She was looking at him with tears in her eyes and he was looking at her eyes and wondering if she could see okay with water in her eyes. He reached out a finger and lifted a tear from her cheek and examined it.
The gesture was so intimate, tender, and unexpected that she took his hand in both of hers, uncurled his fingers one at a time and kissed his open palm, and held it to her cheek.
He liked the warm feeling of her tear-wet face and, even though it was skin, it was her skin. He put his other hand up and gently held her face and looked into her eyes.
He held her eyes for a long time, longer than ever before, and she melted a little as she was pulled into those intense grey eyes. It felt like for the first time she understood him at a deeper level. The look she saw in his eyes made her realize that something was changing between them, something was different. She felt a shivery surge of elation mixed with fear when her heart dared to name what that something was.
He thought she was about to speak and he touched his finger to her lips to stop her. He was aware that something important was happening and knew instinctively that words would chase it away.
He spoke more clearly with the touch of his hands than his words ever could and it set her adrift. She drank in the sweet emotion she felt from his touch and slowly moved her face towards his. She saw his eyes widen and was heartened when he fought the urge to pull away from her. Her lips touched his softly and in that sweet instant of contact she had new tears but this time of joy.
When that sweet kiss ended she looked into his eyes and time slowed and her heart grew with the certainty of their connection. Something new was happening; it was new to her mind but old and familiar to her heart. There was a change happening within her, a shift of perspective that was subtle but fundamental to her existence, in a profound sense she knew her existence now depended on his. It did not matter to her he did not know, or might not ever know, the right words to say or the things he was supposed to do as her boyfriend.
“I wasn’t crying because I was upset, Tyler. I was crying because I am happy you want me to be your girlfriend,” she said.
She kissed the words she spoke into his neck.
“You are my girlfriend,” he said.
“I am your girlfriend,” she said.
She whispered the words back and realized he had known and been certain of this all along. The towel wrapping her hair came loose and he put his face into the wet strands and breathed in the heady scent of shampoo and clean girl.
“I love you, Zen.”
Teen Lawyer
September 25
8:00 PM
RCMP Building, Victoria, BC.
“Dr. Mann, the police have not charged you with anything. They are holding you as a material witness but because you live in Ontario they have convinced Judge Ryan you are a flight risk.”
“Flight risk? Why would I go anywhere?” he asked.
“They do not have to specify why they simply needed to convince a Judge,” she said. His lawyer, Melanie Woods, gave him a smile which said she agreed that it sucked.
“Great,” he said, slumping back in the chair.
They were in a locked interview room in RCMP Headquarters on Nanaimo Street in Victoria, where he’d been cooling his heels for the last two days. The police offered to provide him with a lawyer but he opted to call his lawyer in Toronto. She called back an hour later and recommended Melanie. The only problem was she was unavailable and he needed to wait.
“What about Andi?” he said.
“She is in the ICU at Victoria General Hospital. The police are claiming she sustained her head injury while resisting arrest,” she said.
He jumped up from his seat and yelled, “That’s bullshit! She didn’t resist anything because she was unconscious. A cop grabbed her by her hair and slammed her head to the floor I thought he killed her,” he said.
“Sit down, Dr. Mann, and please do not say any more. Do you understand?” she said.
He sat down and controlled his anger. She was right of course. The police could be listening to their conversation and probably recording it too.
Are you ready now?” she asked and waited for him to make eye contact before accepting his answer.
“Yes,” he said.
“Okay, remember to follow my lead. No matter what they say to you, when I talk, you stop. Do not get emotional, do not argue, this is what they want. They will try to get you upset and say something incriminating, do not let them do it. Are we clear on this?” she said. He nodded.
When she stood up she gave him a big bright confident smile followed by a wink. Amazingly, the wink made him feel better. She was a smart capable lawyer but when he first met her, less than two hours ago, he was struck by the thought she was too young to be a lawyer.
She looked to him like a high school girl but he lost that opinion when she immediately began teaching him how to answer the questions he was going to be asked and she showed no mercy in critiquing his answers. One question she asked that he answered caused her to look at him and in a matter of fact and dead serious voice said, “That answer in court could mean jail time for you.”
In two short hours she managed to sharpen his focus and whip him into some kind of reasonable shape. He had complete confidence in her ability but he was not sure about his own. She tapped on the door and a few minutes later three men came into the room.
What Boys Do
Zen wrapped her arms around his neck and clung to him. Immersed in this newly learned sensation she pecked tiny kisses on his neck until he pushed her away. It was not rejection he wanted to kiss her mouth again and when they came up for air, she smiled.
“I love you too,” she said a little out of breath.
She thought about those words and though she said them easily enough she realized how deeply affected she was by the power they held.
Without letting go of her he found the remote control and turned off the television and she was aware of a new intensity in the air. The room was quiet; she had not noticed the constant background sound of the television until he turned it off. The bedroom was dark but for the soft autumn light filtered through drawn curtains which cast them in shadow.
The only sound she heard now was her beating heart as she crawled further onto her bed and laid her head on the pillow and looked up at him. He hesitated but only for a moment and then he lay beside her and turned onto his side to face her. He reached out his hand to touch her arm and she was struck by the strange thought he was checking to see if she was real.
She turned onto her side and faced him and watched his eyes as she reached out and touched his chest. He was wearing his faded blue Star Wars T-shirt and the material was worn dangerously thin from washings. She was keenly aware of the presence of warm skin over taut muscle beneath. She watched his eyes as her hand explored translating the ancient language of touch into sensory a melody. It awoke a need which grew sharper as she played. It was part desire, part fear; unnamed yet familiar.
She sought the heat of his flesh, dark heat, the heat which threatened to tip the caldron. Her eyes were messengers but she knew he could not read her gaze so she willed her roving fingers to transmit her intimate mind. She slipped her hand under his T-shirt and made Yoda dance in an impossible way.
“Resist the force you cannot,” she said and giggled.
He was watching her in the near darkness and his beautiful open face was serious and betrayed nothing of what he was feeling.
It was her need that made her interpret his lack of squirming as license to continue. She could see he was attending to her in a singular and focused fashion that she never saw him do before. She gauged his reaction when she moved her fingers under his shirt lightly scratching his skin with her fingernails.
“Mmmmmmm. Do you like that, Ty?” she murmured dreamily adrift on her tactile journey of discovery. He did not answer her directly but his answer was clear enough. He let her continue to do it and fought the urge to get away from her touch. She tugged the front of his T-shirt up to expose his tummy and to her amazement he sat up and peeled it off and tossed it on the floor. Her breath caught at the sight of him. His shirt had been off earlier when she was applying the tattoo but now the context was different.
They were on her bed and he was naked from the waist up and leaning on one arm looking at her and she drew in a ragged breath. He looked different from when she applied the tattoo and her eyes consumed him tasting the contours of his arms his thick chest inhaling his musky male scent. She stroked the taut skin of his stomach, it was hard and flat, and she wondered again what miracle of genetics gave him a body like this without exercise.
Her touch was light, too light, and it tickled. He laughed and squirmed like a little boy and she could not resist the temptation. She leaned forward and burbled her lips in a noisy baby kiss above his belly button and when she looked up he had an odd expression on his face and she wondered if it was because his mom had done that to him as a baby? The thought that Andi had kissed him that way made her feel inexplicably jealous.
Four on the Floor
September 27
2:00PM
Vancouver, BC
Colonel John Western drove off the Queen of Nanaimo ferry into a blinding west coast rainstorm. He opted to use his own car for this trip to Vancouver because he was not on official business and now he was glad he did. If he got creamed over here driving his military vehicle he would have to explain why he was there. Welcome to Vancouver, he thought, as he adjusted his driving style and speed to match the more aggressive driving on the lower mainland.
His wipers on the highest setting barely kept up with the rain coming at him horizontally in vast amounts. He was driving faster than good sense would suggest but in an odd way it was exhilarating and of course preferable to being run down by a gravel truck. He winced as another fully loaded dump truck with pup trailer roared past him on the inside lane. He was heading downtown to meet Arne Schlect. They served together, though for different countries, in some interesting places around the world, and their friendship solidified when they were both stationed in Peru.
It was in a strip bar on Maguire Road in Lima over too many tumblers of whiskey they came up with the idea for getting into the import export business. He could not remember which one of them came up with the original idea, but when they sobered up and it still seemed like a good idea they did it. They shipped a lot of high-grade cocaine and made a pile of cash, and they never got caught because they knew exactly when to get out of the business.
The reason they knew when to quit was Arne was a Major in the US Military Police and the base commander in Peru, when the memo came from headquarters that someone was smuggling drugs on military aircraft, it landed on his desk first.
He knew his friend Arne was bent enough to like a deal like this Worthy kid, and he knew Arne had blown through all the drug money he made years ago and was in need. He also knew Arne wouldn’t burn him and the guarantee was the knowledge that the US military doesn’t have a statute of limitations on criminal activity committed while in uniform. His old friend knew if he tried to burn him it would result in mutually assured destruction.
It was the Cold War all over again, only better, he thought, and laughed at his joke. He told Arne enough about the deal to get him interested. He did not know anything about the virus or how it worked, but that was not his problem. He would soon have the kid and that was all he needed. There was some personal risk involved in this deal, but if they worked it right he would end up extremely wealthy.
The parking lot at the Royal Hamilton was full and he circled the block three times to find a surface spot. On the third go round he caught a glimpse of a grey sedan he was certain he saw earlier on Georgia Street. When he found a spot and got out of his car, the sedan passed him and turned at the next intersection. A man in his thirties was driving, he looked military and although he did not recognize him, seeing the same car twice activated his internal threat detector.
This thing with the kid was potentially huge and could involve lots of money. If Arnie yapped to someone about it, and they understood its significance, it could pose serious health problems for both of them. He walked into the lobby of the hotel and loitered until he could be sure he was alone in the elevator on his way up to Arnie’s room on the nineteenth floor.
Inside the elevator he turned his back to the surveillance camera and pretended to check his teeth in the mirror while he slipped his automatic out of its holster. He always carried a nine-millimeter Beretta. He joked it was like his dick: he never left home without it. He quietly jacked a round into the breach, flipped the safety on, and then slipped it into his coat pocket. He was glad he had the foresight to screw the small sound suppressor onto it before he left home.
He put it in his pocket because he might not have a chance to reach the holster if something went wrong in the meeting. He did all this naturally and with few noticeable movements anyone reviewing the security video later would think he was simply checking his appearance before meeting someone.
He stood outside the room for a few moments listening before he knocked. He knew something was up because when he knocked Arnie opened the door two seconds later with a big bullshit grin slapped on his jowly face. This was a giveaway because Arne never smiled when a scowl would do as well. He stepped into the room and saw two men he did not recognize. They were seated. The reason they were sitting down, he figured, was to put him at ease. It had the opposite effect on him. He recognized they were sitting in positions which ensured at least one of them would have a clear shot.
It was exactly how he would have set things up. He positioned himself between the large fake wood cabinet which held the television and the door with the wall against his back. That way he could watch all three men.
“What’s the deal, Arne?” he said.
The man sitting on the chair on his left answered.
“We want to talk to you about this virus,” he said. The man’s demeanor was one of reasonableness but given the shooting gallery setup he was not in the mood to be reasonable.
“Who are you?” he said.
The man answered and the dismissal in his voice was clear.
“We are your best chance for surviving this,” he said.
The same man answered both times, and judging by his smug over-confident tone, he was no pro. Western continued to look at him but he knew he was not the leader so it had to be the other guy. It did not matter who was in charge because he had already decided it was time to leave but he needed to check one thing before he left. He smiled at the man who spoke and relaxed his posture. When he saw the man relax it confirmed to him he was no pro. When he reached into his pocket and took out the Beretta no one missed the soft click of the safety coming off.
“I’m leaving now,” he said.
He pointed the gun at Arne’s big belly and said, “You are going through the door first.”
He was disappointed to see the colour drain from his old friend’s face because it told him all he needed to know about the situation and more than he wanted to know about Arne. He was in on this thing otherwise he would not be afraid to go through the door first. It meant there was someone outside, probably the guy that followed him to the hotel, and he did not plan to be front and centre in a firefight. He looked around the room without taking his eyes off the seated men for more than a second at a time.
On the nineteenth floor of a modern hotel there was no reasonable alternative for getting out of a room other than the door you came in. He tried to remember what kind of load the Beretta was packing. It usually carried light loads for subsonic or hollow points for close work but it’s been a long time since he was in the field.
The interior walls of hotel rooms were notoriously thin and he did not want to kill a guest with a through shot. He was ready now, he just needed the poke and it came when the man who had not yet spoken shifted in his seat and started to get up.
Western was jumpy and he mistook the movement thinking the man was reaching for a weapon. He fired one shot which hit him in the forehead and immediately turned and shot “best chance” guy as he was reaching for his gun, then he shot Arne.
Jonas had heard the whole thing and as Colonel Western spun around to cover the hotel room door he stepped out of the bathroom and shot him once in the back and then in the head and Western died on his way to the carpet.