"Any leads on who bought it or programmed it?"
"Not yet. We haven't analyzed the programming yet, and the manufacturer information has been sanded off the outside. We'll get some of it back, but I'll bet it's another dead end." Special Agent Flaherty is not happy. "I'm thinking of putting a detail on you."
Fuck me. I think it, don't say it. Perez has an answer.
"No thank you. I'm going back to my parent's in two days anyway."
I'm suddenly depressed, reminded that she's leaving day after tomorrow.
Flaherty has some good news. "You can have the car back tomorrow. We'll put a new chip in it, and a new gas tank, complements of the FBI."
"Can we get it washed too?" It's the only thing I can think of. Perez hits me.
"Thank you," Perez says the better thing.
Flaherty keeps going. "My office, noon. You can bring the Joker with you if you want." I guess that's me.
"Sorry," I apologize, "I had kinda hoped we were past having bad guys after us."
"Somehow," we get a formal FBI laugh out of her, maybe they train them how to do that too, "I think you two will always have bad guys after you."
Nothing better to do after we say our goodbyes, we pick up a few groceries, go back to my place, do a little planning on my upcoming assault on the Rio Magdalena and Guerrero, talk about how we might locate whoever put the chip into her car, have some wonderful couch sex, and fall asleep in bed in each other's arms.
She's up first, in the kitchen briefly, making sure I know to get out of bed and get breakfast going, then rolling into the shower. There is something on the kitchen table. It's trouble with a capital T that doesn't rhyme with S, but stands for salami. She's put an authentic kosher salami on my kitchen table, with a hand written note that simply says, "Tonight."
Fuck me. She must have snuck it past me at Von's yesterday.
The FBI is in the federal building on Wilshire, a dozen miles north of the airport. Simple, white, nondescript, 20 stories with an unusually nice parking lot for Los Angeles. Flaherty has left visitor passes for us, and I follow Perez who knows the way.
Our favorite special agent is waiting for us in a conference room, manilla folders scattered across a large alleged wood table, a laptop too, a big screen TV on the far wall (currently off). There are 12 pictures thumb tacked to a board on a side wall, some of which I recognize. Eight men worked with Ali. Four dead now, four more out there somewhere, their pictures grainy images from LAX security cameras (one blond American, one dark haired American, two younger Middle Eastern types). He's up there too, the Mysterious Flying Man, helicopter in hand, along with Ali himself, and two more folks in more mug shot type photos.
Perez and I slide into big, comfy leather chairs, Kiana next to Flaherty, me a respectful two chairs out. Flaherty nods toward a water pitcher and plastic cups before she starts.
"The chip was sold to a reputable Mustang modification shop," she gets right to business, "We have agents out talking to the owner right now. Our cyber team says it is an electronically reprogrammable chip compatible with any PC with the right software and cable, and modified to go to full throttle once you reached 70 and stay there. You may not have noticed, but your brakes were tampered with as well."
"I noticed."
"Sorry. I should have assumed you did. Everything is repaired, new chip, upgraded brakes, new gas tank. It's parked in our lot on the east side of the building."
"We had teams knock on every door in your apartment complex yesterday, but no one remembers anyone near your car, and there are no cameras in the parking lot."
"One change since you were here last. We still can't figure out who transferred the money to Ali, or where the other conspirators are. But, we finally have a lead on who might have been selling the nerve gas, I'm going to Moscow next week." Sounds like we drove 30 miles for nothing.
She looks at Perez. "You have almost two months of sick leave coming, but you don't look very sick to me. How about I get you temporary duty with me for a while. I could use the help, especially if you're willing to fly to Russia." She looks at me. "You'd have to leave the Joker at the airport. No offense."
"None taken. I like the airport." In fact, today was my day to be there, but Johnson let me off to be with Perez.
Flaherty looks at Perez, who doesn't hesitate. "Yes."
"Good." She pauses for a second, seemingly unsure about what she's about to say. Instead of saying it, she goes over and closes the conference room door, then walks back slowly to her seat.
Flaherty takes a deep breath, looks Perez straight in the eye, and says, "What's the connection between you and the Mysterious Flying Man?"
A half glass of water I had been about to swallow exits my nose.
While I scramble to grab napkins and clean up my mess, she keeps talking.
"Both of your fingerprints were in the room at the Marquis. Kiana's blood was there too, and yours," she moves her eyes to me, "was on the roof. We have a witness who saw the MFM fly in at high speed from the south, shatter a slew of windows, catch something falling off the roof of the Marquis, and then fly off. Three of the four dead men have blunt force trauma injuries consistent with fists prior to being shot."
"The logical explanation is that they grabbed the two of you, tried to extract information, and the MFM rescued you. I wouldn't have mentioned it, except that there is an unusual dent in the rear of the Mustang that our techs swear looks like a large hand made it, and they also swear the hole in the gas tank was made by something resembling a finger."
Fuck me.
Perez looks at me, I look back. She obviously is letting me make the choice.
"He has a thing for Perez." I keep looking at Kiana while I sort of lie, water dripping on the table from the wet napkins I should have dumped by now. "It fucks with my head every time I think about her and that salami."
Perez doesn't look away from me. "Without him, we'd both be dead."
Flaherty got the tense correct. "Has?" Decidedly a question.
"Has." I pause, thinking of what to say. "Damaged, not dead."
"Saved you Tuesday night." A statement and a question simultaneously.
"Yes."
She doesn't respond, obviously thinking again about what to say. There's way more to this story than she's said. Just like us, she's not sure what should be said.
"After the Rose Bowl incident," a really long pause, "an Air Force Colonel paid me a visit, wanted whatever I had on the MFM, but wanted it off the record. I asked for paperwork, he said he'd think about it." Another really long pause.
"I had a strange dream that night and the next, lost in fog, a voice asking me not to trust the Colonel." Another really long pause with some hand movement. "I destroyed the evidence. Every fingerprint, every blood drop, every report, every computer file. I broke about 100 federal laws and regs. When he came back, I gave him some suspicious activity reports from the summer. Told him that's all there was."
Then a long pause. Just before I get to the point that I am thinking I need to say something, Kiana beats me to it.
"We've both been lost in that fog. You did him a huge favor I'm sure he'd happily return. He's worth protecting."
"I agree," she says, "Chile, Syria, Afghanistan, all worth it. Does he need protecting?"
Kiana answers. "The Air Force was following him with drones, threatened him if he did anything they didn't like. He doesn't need protection, he needs to be left alone."
There is one of those heavy pauses when everybody knows that someone should say something, but nobody knows what to say that won't sound wrong. Flaherty solves it by pretending we didn't just have the conversation that we just had. She looks at me.
"Kiana and I need to talk about our trip. You should probably head home."
I nod, push the chair back, and slide up and out of the leather. I look at Perez.
"Call me when you're done."
She nods. Now it's a nod fest, so I nod back at her and then at Flaherty, get two nods in return, then I turn, nod at the door, and head on out, making sure to nod at the woman working the front desk.
Chapter 20
The drive home is slow and go from the moment I get onto the 405 until we get south of the airport, half hour to go 12 miles. I turn the radio on to sing away the boredom, but its commercials. I sing the jingle from a local car dealer, then sigh as another ad starts. Ten seconds in, my brain clicks over, and I know.
Home, I don't even bother to talk to Halloween before starting up my computer. She comes and jumps in my lap, nuzzling my arms while I try to keep typing, she's not mad, just lonely. I try typing with my right and scratching behind ears with my left, but it doesn't work, and I go back to two handed typing, dodging her head as she tries different ways to get in my way.
When I finish, I have to sit and wait while the printer does it's thing, so I can share my happiness with the cat, scratching and playing, then shooing her off so I can grab my tablet, a yellow pad and a pencil. Perez and I have a rough plan to attack the cartel, now it flies across pages until nine yellow sheets, cross checked by references to stuff in the tablet, are scattered across my kitchen table and the rough becomes the ready.
Kiana, it turns out, didn't bother to call, and walks in the door about four. Halloween, the tramp, abandons me for her new best friend. Perez walks across the apartment (three steps for her), stops to read the pages in the printer, then stands over the table to briefly examine my work.
"Did I ever tell you not to do anything stupid?", she says, laughing.
"It's not stupid, it's karma. You going to be back in time?"
"Yeah. We're flying out Tuesday, meeting the arms dealer, and getting back in Friday morning. Plenty of time for stupid Saturdays."
"It's actually stupid Sunday. We can have fun on Saturday."
She laughs again, gives me a half hug from behind. "You sure it's time?"
"Past time actually." I pick up one of the yellow sheets. "I'm going to take care of business I should have done something about a month ago."
She rubs my hair. "And the General?"
"Gonna have to do something about that too, eventually." I pause. "Though maybe there's not enough eventually left to worry about him."
Perez goes back to a hug, and neither of us moves or talks until it's dark outside.
Halloween breaks the mood by announcing that it's time for dinner, loudly. We make her a bowl of cat food, turkey tonight, then we put together whatever's in my fridge and pantry, put it onto a platter, and sit on my living room floor, eating with our hands and talking about my nine pages of Hulk smash.
A couple hours later, the pages, complete now with various food stains, go back on the table, and the platter and cat bowl get cleaned. I only splash Perez a couple times while we do the dishes, and when we're finished I pull her in close and give her the longest warmest kiss I can manage. I pull pack slightly, my hands on her hips.
"You ready to ride the salami?"
She detaches her self from me silently, walks to the window, pulls the curtain shut, turns back to me, takes her clothes off, and walks as slowly as I have ever seen her walk back to me. I'm basically drooling by the time she stops.
"I'll take that as a yes." Staring at her standing naked six feet in front of me her legs set shoulder width apart, her hands on her hips, I get naked, then grab the light, and whisper, "Perfect." Despite the fact that I am totally, utterly, lost to the sight of her, the change is bliss, but not the least bit sexual. The salami is, however, already ready.
We walk over together, not touching, throw the cushions off the couch, not caring where they go, and pull out the bed. Not exactly optimal, but at least it's not the dusty stairwell of a bank or hotel.
She throws herself onto the lumpy mattress, and I join, wrapping together and kissing, tongues exploring, an occasional nibble on a lip. I kiss the side of her neck, then open my mouth to give her a combination lick and gentle bite at the nape.
Before I can execute the rest of my plan, the magic of the salami is upon us, and she reaches out to grab it, an almost desperate sound escaping her lips. Her eyes are already glossy. Giving in, I push her over onto her back, spread those ripped, muscular legs, and she and I together slide it inside her.
I can no longer look in her eyes, the pupils rolled so far up they are invisible. Not a stroke from me yet, but she is already wretched into a far more potent happy ending that I have ever given her as me.
Pretending not to care, I start moving, watching in amazement as the perfect body responds in pleasure. I finish, start, finish, start, over and over, until I give her more than I had ever given Celeste. Then a big finish, a moment to catch my breath, and I separate myself from her.
