A Wanted Woman Part 55

She said, "Tell me this will be okay."

"This will be okay."

"Tell me again."

"This will be okay."

"I would sacrifice a thousand brothers to make our dream come true."

"I f.u.c.ked up."

"I will fix it. We will turn our dead into heroes, into martyrs, into champions for our cause."

As the plane descended into Trinidadian airs.p.a.ce, he thrust upward, entered her.

Just like that, as it had always been, she started to o.r.g.a.s.m.

SIXTY-FIVE.

Toronto, Canada My flight on Air Canada took me to Pearson International Airport.

Every Bajan on the plane chattered about the destruction to their homeland. Every tourist was happy to get away from the island. They saw me, saw my condition, and the malicious asked me what had happened. It was inescapable. I said that I had been in a car accident, that I was pa.s.sing by LIME headquarters when it had been destroyed and I was lucky to be alive. I needed to get to Canada to get medical attention. They joked that people could die from a paper cut in the islands.

I sent Diamond Dust a second picture of my middle finger from Terminal 1, on the platform of the LINK train, the people mover. I was 2,500 miles away.

I might as well have been in another universe, and she knew that.

I imagined that I heard her scream.

I made a call. "Hacker?"

"Reaper."

"Everything a go?"

"Yeah. I can make it happen. Download this app."

"Downloading."

"You owe me a car."

"I know. I will work hard and I will pay you back. I promise."

"Waiting on a bus sucks. It's like riding in a can of germs."

Under Canadian skies I became someone else, went to the check-in and bought another ticket, became someone who was in need of aid and was moved around in a wheelchair, an attendant pushing me from security to my gate, my face covered with a scarf, and I caught a flight to Miami. I landed and caught a taxi to the cruise ships, to the hotels on water. Again I was on crutches. A foreign victim of domestic violence trying to escape her psychotic husband.

Three days aboard MCS Divina, never leaving the ship as they docked first in Miami, then in Na.s.sau, and finally at San Salvador Island. Then on the Eastern Caribbean for seven days, again staying onboard six of the seven days. I could walk una.s.sisted by then, was back up doing push-ups, stretching. Left the ship long enough to trail a Bajan soca singer to the Flamboyant Hotel and Villas in Grenada and create pink mist before he attended an awards show. Did another job at Club Opium Nightclub and Lounge in St. Vincent. I did those jobs so Petrichor wouldn't have to leave her husband. I also did them for practice, to make sure that I hadn't lost my edge, that I could still battle, that my trigger finger didn't shake. Next I spent seven days aboard an Alaska cruise line. Never left the ship. The following seven days I was aboard the MS Veendam. Back in Miami, I boarded the Oceania Regatta for a twenty-five-night cruise. Twenty-five days of running, kicking, punching, lifting weights, preparing myself.

Hot. Humid. Raining. I disembarked at Port of Spain, where it had all begun. Carnival Cruise ships docked in the capital at the Cruise Ship Complex. Everyone was greeted by locals dancing in dazzling Carnival costumes, singing calypso. Some played the steel pan. I walked through the celebration, hair black, wearing white shorts and sandals, an Arkansas-accented woman wearing Jackie-O shades and a gray University of Memphis T-shirt. There were so many women who resembled me leaving the ship that it looked like I had been cloned ten times over.

An empty car waited for me, a car with darkened windows, suitcases in its trunk.

Petrichor had arrived here yesterday, made sure this was handled.

She had been on the roof of a home at Six Roads, had her sniper's rifle.

I could have killed Diamond Dust then. I could've had Petrichor kill War Machine then, but she would've had to escape. I wouldn't do to her what the Barbarians had done to me, send her on a suicide run. The photos had been enough to mess up their heads.

Soca jamming on the radio, I drove toward the Queen's Park Savannah. I parked in front of the American emba.s.sy, engine running, visor in the window to block being seen, and I changed, then drove the roundabout to the Carlton Savannah. I checked into the hotel wearing cloth that covered my head and chest and only revealed my eyes, clothing worn by Shia Muslim females. It was an island of many Muslims and Indians, so my attire was above suspicion, my accent on point, the workers never questioning my being alone.

The LKs had been tracking me.

Returning to their soil was my middle finger to all of those motherf.u.c.kers.

Thanks to Hacker, they had been thrown off. Thanks to an app I had, I could teleport the gunta's phone to anyplace in the world with two clicks. The app set up fake GPS locations so every other app in your phone believed I was there. I posted on Facebook, Twitter. Took more photos of my middle finger. The LKs thought I was hiding far away, had me fixed at 21.4167 N, 39.8167 E, had me hiding out somewhere near Dar Al Tawhid Intercontinental and Makkah Clock Royal Tower. They thought that I had escaped to Mecca. The arrogant f.u.c.ks had confused resting with running. They didn't know that if I was running, I was sprinting toward them at full tilt. The GPS on my phone said I was standing at 1040' N lat.i.tude and 6131' W longitude. Had been a long time since I had seen the beauty of Port of Spain.

I went to the roof of the Carlton. Black Jack's voice inside my head, I stood where the politico had been thrown from the roof, replayed everything that had happened in Trinidad.

The end was always about the way it started.

SIXTY-SIX.

The boy said, "Tobago is the cigar-shaped island. It has a northeast-southwest alignment. I can tell you all about Monos, Huevos, Gaspar Grande, Little Tobago, and Saint Giles Island."

"You're smart."

"If you need a tour guide, me and my father can show you everything. I can tell you about the geography of the islands. I know the archipelago, the reservoirs and dams in Trinidad and Tobago."

"Very smart. You're very smart."

Soon I was a pa.s.senger on a small boat riding the waves between Trinidad and Venezuela, a University of Cambridge backpack and luggage at my feet, riding choppy waters, eating bake and shark and sipping a beer. Checked the true GPS. Lat.i.tude: 1042'00" N. Longitude: 6142'00" W. I looked at my arms, my hands, my legs, inspected where scars had healed, where st.i.tches had been removed. I had been on antibiotics for days. Had been on antifungal meds for days. Was off the hard stuff, but was still on ibuprofen. The boat captain couldn't speak English. However, his teenaged son was fluent and very chatty, trying to earn a good tip. I told him my name was Dr. Jessica Lee. He told me that everyone called him Muppet. He used to watch Sesame Street all day as a kid, used to want to design muppets and become famous, like the guy who created Elmo. I was dressed in off-white Old Navy khakis and laced-up hiking boots, long-sleeved cotton blouse with the sleeves rolled up and tied to reveal my belly. An unopened pack of cigarettes was in the shirt pocket. My hair was purple, green, and orange, eyebrows deep-red, many silver and gold earrings in my ears and nose, my accent lazy and horrible North London.

He flirted, asked me if I had gone to college. I told him that I had a degree in advanced physics, had written a book on the theory of dimensionally displaced ma.s.s, but was trying something different until I returned to do postdoctoral work. That level of intelligence made him withdraw his application.

We pa.s.sed by speedboats and yachts, saw fishermen out in the beautiful waters where drug dealing was the rich man's hobby. Then I saw the magnificent mansion sitting at Pa.s.sy Bay.

It was only one of the homes of Diamond Dust and War Machine.

I took out my binoculars and tried to count the number of armed guards patrolling the dock and the grounds. A dozen women were outside as well. Some private gathering, maybe a small meeting with the top wives and top guntas, was ending, and a mid-size boat was there to take them to the next big social event. Couldn't see inside. Windows wore an emba.s.sy tint. Kept me from seeing in and kept the windows from shattering. The private home was cut into the side of the hills and the island was an estimated two miles wide. Behind the home was a tropical forest. In front of the home was the sea.

Muppet saw me looking and said, "Very powerful people live there."

"Priests? Social activists? Philanthropists?"

"Better. Everyone bows down to kiss their rings."

"Your voice trembled. Are you afraid of them?"

"Well, Jessica Lee, I want to be one of them. I want to one day join their group."

"Why?"

"Everyone gives them respect. Look at the crazy speedboat that they have."

"Material things make you want to be one of them?"

"The s.e.xy girls. s.e.xy like you. The man who runs their business, he has the most beautiful wife in the world. In the universe. I'd get a beautiful girl to be my wife. Maybe get two s.e.xy girls like you."

"Okay."

"I hear they have the best parties. The best parties in the world."

"You admire them with much intensity, almost sounds like you worship them."

"Mrs. Ramjit gave me a bicycle last year. Will never forget that."

"A bicycle won you over."

"No one had ever given me anything. It was stolen, but that's okay. I had it for almost a month. It was the best month of my life. I took my girlfriend for a ride every day. They're kind people."

The home was a technological fortress. Twelve high-def cameras surrounded the house. Those could be monitored from a laptop or a smart phone. A joystick could zoom in.

Diamond Dust and the well-behaved kids left the home, headed toward their private ferry, six armed guntas at her side. There had been more guntas guarding the queen, but I guess they thought I was in Mecca and they were only on yellow alert when they should have been on flashing red.

After what had happened at RCSI, they felt too d.a.m.ned confident.

They had attacked the company, had stormed in like they were in the Matrix, killed many from the guard desk to the main offices of RCSI, but didn't get to the level with the man behind the double red doors. They had put enough deaths in their column to make their members happy.

Since the initial onslaught, twelve had been found dead in the last month.

Binoculars in hand, I saw another woman at Diamond Dust's side.

Her main mistress. Her mistress left with her and their children. Everyone was beautifully dressed. There was a big event tonight. One for the LKs and not open to the public, not open to the press. The beauty and topography of Pa.s.sy Bay disappeared and in my mind I was back on Swan Street. I had bathed a thousand times and every day I smelled the guntas on my skin.

I glanced at the luggage that I had brought along for this trip, each piece locked.

Muppet laughed, said that maybe later he and his dad would hunt for white lobster.

I said, "Be careful what you fish for. You might catch it."

"You know what white lobster is?"

"Cocaine that's been thrown into the waters while someone was running from the authorities."

"We find some and we can be rich."

For a moment I blanked out, trembled with fear, could hardly breathe, had a shock of PTSD.

Muppet asked, "You okay?"

I nodded.

When I was near my drop-off point, I picked up my backpack. Muppet grabbed my luggage, two metal suitcases on wheels, both with hazard stickers across the top.

Each piece emitted a coldness that could be matched by my heart.

The father made broad sweeping hand motions and said something.

The kid said, "Dr. Jessica Lee, my father wants to know if we can help you with anything."

"You've done enough. I can handle it from here."

SIXTY-SEVEN.

Sh.e.l.l casings were all over. Air smelled like cordite. Heated weapons scattered on the marble floor. Many weapons. Self-loading rifles. Armalite rifle. Uzi machine gun. Glock pistol. Browning pistol. Beretta pistol. A revolver. Eight magazines. Almost three rounds of ammunition of the calibers of 7.72mm, 5.56mm, .380mm, and .45mm. I removed my earplugs, kicked the flash-bangs I had used out of the way, and started counting the bullet holes in the colorful wall. Too many to count. It was easier to step over blood and the fresh and warm Dora the Explorer art and count the dead men here and there.

War Machine was unconscious on his living-room floor, head bloodied from a cruel blow from my sap. His face battered from the blows I gave him, my hands covered in biker gloves. Now his hands and feet were in duct tape. I grabbed his ankles, dragged him across the room, down marble stairs, his head b.u.mping, b.u.mping, b.u.mping. That gave the unconscious man new pain, woke him up.

I paused, looked around, took in what felt like a Trinidadian museum.

He looked up, dazed, confused. Then things became clear.

In a Kiwi accent I said, "War Machine, by jingoes, I love your home. Especially the dunny in each bedroom. I have been working the wrong end of the business. The wrong end, indeed."

"The Woman of a Thousand Faces."

"It's me. The Killer Kiwi. Guess what I came to do? It's in the name."

I pulled away my camouflage bandana, my natural hair exposed.