36: A Novel (34 page)

“So what?  If he did, I’m sure he had a good reason.  Maybe you did something else I don’t know about.  You’re dead, asshole.  You’re fucking dead!  You don’t kill an FBI agent and get to walk around like nothing happened.  One day you’re going to turn around and I’ll be standing there.  And I’m going to put a bullet in your goddamn head!”

I sighed and picked the two pairs of cuffs off the table. 

“Stand up,” I said.  “And keep your mouth shut and you just might live long enough to try and kill me.”

He stood, eyes boring into mine.  I twirled my finger in the air, telling him to turn around.  When he did, I pulled his hands behind his back, put the cuffs on and pushed him back onto the sofa.  Next, I cuffed his unconscious partner, then walked into the bedroom.

Sweeping all of Julie’s clothes onto the floor, I stripped the sheet off the mattress and used a knife I’d taken from one of them to cut it into long strips.  Once I had them ready, I went back out and picked up one of the kitchen chairs from around the table and moved it to the middle of the living room.  Pointing at it, I stepped back as Agent Cooper slowly stood and moved to take a seat.

“Think about something,” I said as I worked with the strips of sheet.  “If I’m who you think I am, why are you still alive?  Why is your partner alive?  Why am I tying you up when it would be much simpler to just cut your throats?”

“Who knows why a fucking psycho does something,” Cooper said.

“Whatever.  Just remember something.  You’ll survive this because I don’t want to kill you.  No matter what you think, I’m not some bloodthirsty madman.  So, unless you’re in on the whole conspiracy with Johnson, you’ll come out of this OK.”

“You’re fucking crazy,” he hissed.  “That fucking machine has scrambled your brain.  Or were you always fucked up like this?”

At that point I wrapped a strip of fabric around his head, covering his mouth.  That ended the conversation.  His hands were cuffed behind his back and he was completely secured to the metal frame of the chair.  Each ankle was tied to a leg and a thick strip went around his chest, holding him tight in the seat. 

With the gag in place, I grasped the back of the chair and pulled, tilting it back to rest on the floor.  I didn’t want him to start bouncing around and come crashing over.  He just might succeed in making enough noise to alert the downstairs neighbor that something was wrong.

Five minutes later his partner was in another chair, secured in the same manner.  I’d worried about gagging him at first, afraid he wouldn’t be able to breathe through a broken nose and would suffocate.  But the blow with my knee had missed his nose.  There was a long split in the skin of his forehead.  That was where the blood had come from.

Agent Cooper watched every move I made, glaring at me with hate filled eyes.  I couldn’t say that I blamed him.  If our roles were reversed, all I’d be thinking about would be getting my hands around the throat of the guy who had tied me up.

Once they were secure, I had Julie open the suitcase.  I paid attention this time and memorized the combination.  The three guns I’d taken off the agents went in and I was starting to close the lid when Julie stopped me.  She snatched her laptop off the table and put it in, too.

A quick trip to the bathroom to make sure I looked presentable enough to board a chartered jet, and we were ready to go.  Leaving the apartment, Julie locked the door with her key, then lead the way to an aging VW Jetta in the rear parking lot.  The suitcase went in the trunk and I slipped into the passenger seat as she got behind the wheel and started the engine.

40

I sat there looking at Julie, waiting for her to put the car in gear and start driving.  But she just sat there, hands tightly gripping the wheel as she stared through the dirty windshield.  She was breathing fast, trying to get herself under control.

“I just screwed myself,” she whispered.  “Those were FBI agents!”

I didn’t know what to say.  She was right.  If things were normal.  But there was nothing about this that was normal.  A time traveling ex-con trying to foil an assassination plot that involved the Vice President of the United States and at least one FBI agent.  God only knew who else was involved.

“And you haven’t told me everything,” Julie said accusingly, turning to face me.  “What was he talking about?  You killed two cops in Arizona?  And what machine has messed with your head?”

“You’re right,” I said with a sigh.  “I haven’t told you everything.  Some of it would just be too hard to believe.”

“Harder to believe than the fact that I’ve just ruined my life helping a man I don’t even know?  Emptied my bank account.  Pointed a gun at an FBI agent while you tied him up.  What the hell was I thinking?”

“You were thinking that I’m telling the truth,” I said gently.  “And I am.  Just because there’re some things I haven’t told you doesn’t mean I’m lying.  If I don’t get to DC and stop this, the President and the Speaker of the House will be dead this time tomorrow.  And the people behind the conspiracy will be in control of the country.  That’s the truth.”

“I don’t know if I can believe you,” she said after a long stretch of silence.  “I did.  Or I wanted to, maybe.  But the deeper I get, the more it feels like there’s more going on here that you’re hiding from me.”

I leaned my head back on the car seat and blew out a quiet sigh of frustration.  She was smart and intuitive.  There was no denying that.  And she also had enough strength of character to stop helping me as quickly as she’d started if she felt I was playing some sort of game.  The truth was, without her help, I wasn’t going to be able to pull this off.

“Look,” I began.  “Nothing I haven’t told you has anything to do with why you’re helping me.  I understand you don’t trust me at the moment.  Don’t blame you.  But we’re running out of time.  I’ll tell you everything once we’re on the plane.  We’ll have plenty of time to talk.”

She stared at me so long I grew uncomfortable and wanted to look away.  That’s probably what she was waiting for.  To see if I couldn’t look her in the eye.  So, I forced myself to endure the scrutiny, sitting still and remaining quiet.  Finally, she broke eye contact, savagely yanked the transmission into drive and roared out of the parking spot.

The drive to the airport took most of an hour.  And it was quiet.  Neither of us spoke.  I didn’t think Julie was mad at me or pouting.  I suspected she was thinking.  Trying to figure out how she’d gotten in so deep, so fast.  But isn’t that the way it always is?  It takes one decision and minutes of action to get yourself into a mess that will take years to put behind you. 

Exiting the freeway, she followed large signs to the airport entrance.  A smaller road peeled off from the heavy traffic, heading for the charter terminal.  We pulled into a half full lot and Julie whipped the VW into a parking spot near the walkway to the building’s entrance.

“I’m not going,” she said after turning the engine off.  “You can take my suitcase and I’ll go in with you so they can scan the barcode on my phone.  After that, we’re done.”

“What are you going to do?”

I was surprised.  Of all the possibilities I’d mulled over during the drive to the airport, this wasn’t one of them. 

“I don’t know,” she said.  “Maybe head for my brother’s house in Oregon.”

“Julie, I think you should come with me,” I said, turning my upper body so I could look directly at her. 

“Why?  So you can lie to me some more?”

“I haven’t lied to you!  I haven’t told you the whole truth, but I haven’t lied.”

“A lie by omission is still a lie,” she said in a sad voice.

“And I’ve said I’ll tell you everything.  Most of it you aren’t going to believe anyway.  That’s why I didn’t tell you before.  Well, that and it’s classified.  But I’m going to tell you as soon as we’re on that plane and have time. 

“I know I have no right to ask, but please trust me.  I am going to stop the assassination, and then I’m going to deal with Agent Johnson.  You will get reimbursed every penny you’ve put out, and your name will be cleared.  I promise.  All you have to do is trust me.”

I watched her closely as I spoke, hoping my words would get through. 

“Why do you want me to come along so badly?”  She asked suspiciously.

“Because it’s not safe for you to stay behind.  They’re looking for me.  And when those two agents we left tied up get free, they’re going to be looking for you, too.  And it will be men working for Agent Johnson.  They aren’t interested in the truth or anything other than following their orders.  

“You know what orders he issued to deal with me.  Do you really think he’s going to let you live?  The safest place for you for the next twenty hours is right next to me.  Then it will all be over and you can go back to your life.”

She turned and looked at me for a long moment.  Thinking.  Deciding what to believe and what to do.  Faster than I expected, she removed the keys from the ignition and popped her door open.

“We’ve got a plane to catch,” she said, resignation clear in her voice.

I hopped out and dashed to the trunk.  Julie already had it open and I lifted the suitcase out and placed it on the ground.  She locked the car and after we made sure our pistols were well concealed, we walked across the sidewalk and into the terminal.

Imperial Charters was a large outfit with professionally dressed staff working the check-in counter.  Julie and I walked up and she identified herself.  Within minutes, the bar code on her phone had been scanned, the suitcase had been taken to be placed in the luggage compartment and we were escorted through a set of doors into a large hangar.

A gleaming Gulfstream, medium range jet reflected the overhead lighting.  As we approached, I saw an employee load the suitcase in the plane’s belly.  He closed the hatch and locked it in place. 

The cabin door was open, a set of stairs integrated into the jet extending to the hangar floor.  A tall, trim man wearing a pilot’s uniform stood on a narrow landing at the top of the steps, waiting for us. 

“Mr. and Mrs. Broussard.  Welcome!”

I was momentarily taken aback at the greeting.

“I’m your pilot, Captain Henderson.  My copilot, Ms. Torrel, is in the cockpit finishing the pre-flight checklist.  We’ll be ready to go in just a few minutes.”

He had descended to the floor and shook hands with each of us as he spoke.

“Thank you, Captain,” Julie said, somehow managing to give him one of her thousand watt smiles. 

I followed her up and into the plane.  We turned right and I couldn’t help but stop in amazement.  Plush carpeting.  Burled walnut trim.  Gold fixtures and accents.  And half a dozen, well spaced leather seats that looked big enough to hold two people each.  This was nothing like I remembered air travel being.

There was a bang as the pilot retracted the stairs and secured the door, then he appeared briefly to tell us where the bathroom was.  There wasn’t a flight attendant, and I suspected that was an expensive option that Julie hadn’t selected.  When the pilot disappeared into the cockpit, I sank into one of the seats.  It was the most comfortable chair I’d ever sat in.

Julie stepped into the small galley, returning a moment later with a bottle of Jack Daniels and two, cut crystal tumblers.  She poured a healthy slug into each as there was the gentle bump of a tractor pushing the jet out of the hangar.  Handing me a glass, she leaned back and fastened her seatbelt.

“Start talking,” she said, downing half the amber liquid in one swallow.

 I took a sip, resisting the urge to cough when the fiery whiskey hit my throat.  The engines started as we came to a stop.  There were a couple of bumps as the tractor was unhooked from the front landing gear, then the pilot throttled up slightly and we began rolling.

He came on the intercom and reminded us to fasten our seatbelts and thanked us for choosing Imperial Charters.  We bounced along and waited for a couple of Delta and one Alaska commercial airliners to take off.  Then the engines howled and we began rushing down the runway.  Much faster than I expected, we left the ground.  I looked out the window at the lights of Orange County and began speaking.

41

“You are either the most accomplished liar I’ve ever met, or that’s a story that should be made into a movie,” Julie said when I finished.

She was a good listener.  Attentive, even when refilling our glasses.  She hadn’t interrupted, and let me talk until it was all out there.  And I’d held nothing back.  My brother.  Bringing the drugs across and killing the two cops before they could kill me and my entire family.  My trial and imprisonment.  My execution, or my faked execution to be accurate.  The Athena Project.  My plastic surgery.  The training I had gone through.  All of it.

“Do you understand why I didn’t tell you before?”

“I understand, but that doesn’t mean I’m happy about it,” she said.  “That’s if I believe you.  I may not be a genius or have a college education, but it just sounds too much like science fiction.”

“It did to me, too.  At first,” I acknowledged.

We both looked up when the cockpit door opened.  It was the pilot coming to check on us.

“Can I get you folks anything?”  He asked with a big, friendly smile.

“Do you have internet access?”  Julie asked.

“Yes, ma’am.  Onboard Wi-Fi.  No password needed,” he beamed.

I was starting to wonder if he was a pilot or a salesman, but after making sure we had everything we needed he disappeared back into the front of the plane.  Julie had taken her phone out and was busily tapping away.  Draining the last of my drink, I placed the empty glass on the table between us and got up to check the galley for food.

There was a small fridge, and after a moment I figured out how to release the catch that secured the door while the aircraft was in flight.  Two large platters of vacuum wrapped dinners rested on the middle shelf.  Taking them out, I read the contents of the first one.  Roasted chicken breast with gravy, new potatoes and baby carrots and a dinner roll.  Hoping for something different, I checked the other.  It was the same.