The Chemist Part 5

CHAPTER 5.

The rest went almost too smoothly... did that mean something? Her paranoia level was already so high, it was hard to say if this new worry elevated it or not.

He got into the cab at the Rosslyn station without protest. She knew how he felt-she and Barnaby had tried out most of the nonlethal preparations to have some concrete experience with what they could do. This one was like dreaming a pleasant dream, where problems and worries were for someone else to figure out, and all one needed was a hand to hold and a nudge in the right direction. In their notes they'd nicknamed it Follow the Leader, though it had a more impressive name on the official reports.

It was a relaxing trip, and if it weren't for the fact that she desperately needed her inhibitions, even back then, she might have indulged again.

She got him talking about the volleyball team he coached-he'd asked if he'd be back at school in time for practice-and he spent the entire cab ride telling her about the girls until she felt she knew all their names and their strengths on the court by heart. The cabbie paid no attention, humming along to some song too low for her to make out.

Daniel seemed mostly oblivious to the travel, but at a particularly long red light, he looked up and frowned.

"Your office is far away."

"Yes, it is," she agreed. "It's a h.e.l.l of a commute."

"Where do you live?"

"Bethesda."

"That's a nice place. Columbia Heights is not so nice. My part of it, at least."

The cab started moving again. She was pleased; the plan was going very well. Even if they'd clocked her getting on and off the last train, they'd be hard-pressed to keep track of one cab in a sea of identical cabs twisting together through rush hour. Preparation felt like a magic spell sometimes. Like you could force events into the shape you wanted just by planning them thoroughly enough.

Daniel wasn't as talkative now. This was the second phase of the drug's action, and he would be getting more tired. She needed him to stay awake just a little bit longer.

"Why did you give me your number?" she asked when his lids started to droop.

He smiled dreamily. "I've never done that before."

"Me either."

"I'll probably be embarra.s.sed about it later."

"Not if I call you, though, right?"

"Maybe. I don't know, it was out of character."

"So why did you do it?"

His soft eyes never left hers. "I like your face."

"You mentioned that."

"I really wanted to see it again. That made me brave."

She frowned, guilt pulsing.

"Does that sound weird?" He seemed worried.

"No, it sounds very sweet. Not many men would tell a woman something like that."

He blinked owlishly. "I wouldn't usually. Too... cowardly."

"You seem pretty brave to me."

"I feel different. I think it's you. I felt different as soon as I saw you smile."

As soon as I roofied you, she amended in her head.

"Well, that's quite a compliment," she said. "And here we go, can you get up?"

"Sure. This is the airport."

"Yes, that's where my car is."

His brow furrowed, then cleared. "Did you just get back from a trip?"

"I just got into town, yes."

"I go on trips sometimes. I like to go to Mexico."

She glanced up sharply. He was staring ahead, watching where he was walking. There was no sign of distress on his face. If she pushed him toward a secret, anything that was a pressure point, his docility would turn to suspicion. He might latch on to another stranger as his leader and try to escape. He might get agitated and call attention to her.

"What do you like about Mexico?" she asked carefully.

"The weather is hot and dry. I enjoy that. I've never lived in a really hot place, but I think I would like it. I get burned, though. I've never been able to tan. You look like you've spent some time in the sun."

"No, just born this way." She got her coloring from her absentee father. Genetic testing had informed her that he was a mix of many things, predominantly Korean, Hispanic, and Welsh. She'd always wondered what he'd looked like. The combination with her mother's Scottish background had created in her an oddly ordinary face-she could have been from almost anywhere.

"That must be nice. I have to use sunblock, a lot of sunblock. Or I peel. It's disgusting. I shouldn't tell you that."

She laughed. "I promise to forget it. What else do you like?"

"Working with my hands. I help build houses. Not in a skilled way; I just hammer where they tell me to. But the people are so kind and generous. I love that part."

It was all very convincing, and she felt a thrill of fear. How could he stick to the story so well, so effortlessly, with the chemicals moving through his system right now? Unless he'd built up a resistance somehow. Unless her department had created an antidote, unless they'd prepped him and he was playing her. The goose b.u.mps stood up on the back of her neck. It didn't have to be the department that had prepared him. It could be his interactions with de la Fuentes. Who knew what kind of results strange drugs interacting with her own would have? She touched her tongue to the false cap on her back tooth. The department would have just killed her if that were the goal. De la Fuentes would probably want to punish her for attempting to interrupt his plans. But how would he know in advance? How could Daniel have made her as an opposing agent so quickly? She didn't even actually work for anyone anymore.

Stick to the plan, she told herself. Get him in the car and you're in the clear. Sort of.

"I like the houses there, too," he was saying. "You never close the windows, just let the air blow through. Some don't even have gla.s.s. It's a lot nicer than Columbia Heights, I can tell you. Maybe not nicer than Bethesda. I bet doctors live in nice houses."

"Not me. Boring vanilla apartment. I don't spend much time there, so it doesn't matter."

He nodded sagely. "You're out saving lives."

"Well, not really. I'm not an ER doctor or anything."

"You're saving my life." Wide gray-green eyes, total trust. She knew that if this behavior was genuine, it was the drug talking. But it still made her uneasy.

She could only keep playing her role.

"I'm just checking up on you. You're not dying." That much was true. The boys back at the department might have ended up killing this man. At least she could spare him that. Though... after she prevented the catastrophe, Daniel Beach would never see the outside of a prison cell again. Which made her feel...

A million dead. Innocent tiny babies. Sweet elderly grandmas. The First Horseman of the Apocalypse on a white steed.

"Oh, a bus too," he said mildly.

"This one takes us to my car. Then you won't have to walk anymore."

"I don't mind. I like walking with you." He smiled down at her and his feet tangled on his way up the steps. She steadied him before he could fall, then maneuvered him into the closest seat on the mostly empty bus.

"Do you like foreign films?" he asked, apropos of nothing.

"Um, some of them, I guess."

"There's a good theater at the university. Maybe if the dinner goes well, we could try some subt.i.tles the next time."

"I'll make a deal with you," she said. "If you still like me after one evening together, I will definitely see a movie I can't understand with you."

He smiled, his lids drooping. "I'll still like you."

This was totally ridiculous. There should have been some way to direct this conversation away from flirting. Why was she the one feeling like the monster here? Okay, she was a monster, but she'd come to terms with that, mostly, and she knew she was the kind of monster that needed to exist for the sake of the common good. In some ways, she was like a normal physician-she had to cause pain to save lives. Like cutting off a gangrenous limb to save the rest of the body, just disa.s.sociated. Pain here, savior elsewhere. And elsewhere was much more deserving of the save.

Rationalizing, as she always had, so that she could live with herself. She never outright lied to herself, though. She knew she didn't exist in some moral gray area; she existed entirely in the black. But the only thing worse than Alex doing her job well was someone else doing it badly. Or no one doing it at all.

But even if she fully embraced the label monster, she was never the kind of monster who killed innocent people. She wasn't even going to kill this very guilty one... who was still looking up at her from under his long curls with big hazel puppy-dog eyes.

Dead babies, she chanted to herself. Dead babies, dead babies, dead babies.

She'd never wanted to be a spy or work undercover, but now she saw that she was also emotionally unsuited for the job. Apparently she had too much gratuitous sympathy floating around inside her body, which was more than ironic. This is why you never talked to your subject before you talked to him.

"Okay, Daniel, off we go. Can you stand up?"

"Mm-hmm. Oh, here, let me take your bag."

He lifted a hand weakly toward her briefcase.

"I got it." Though in truth her fingers were pins and needles around the handle. "You need to focus on your balance right now."

"I'm really tired."

"I know, look, my car is right there. The silver one."

"There are a lot of silver ones."

Exactly the point. "It's right here. Okay, let's put you in the back so you can lie down. Why don't you take off your coat, I don't want you to get too warm. And the shoes, there we go." Less for her to manage later. "Bend your knees up so your legs will fit. Perfect."

He had his head pillowed on the backpack now, which surely wasn't that comfortable, but he was past caring.

"You're so nice, Alex," he murmured, his eyes closed now. "You're the nicest woman I ever met."

"I think you're nice, too, Daniel," she admitted.

"Thanks," he half articulated, and then he was asleep.

Quickly, she pulled the beige throw out of the trunk. It was the same color as the seats. She covered him with it. She pulled a syringe from her bag and inserted it into a vein in his ankle, hunching her body so it blocked any outside view of what she was doing. Follow the Leader would wear off in an hour or so, and she needed him to sleep longer than that.

Not an agent, she decided. An agent might have played along with her kidnap drug, but he would never have let himself get knocked out like this. Just a ma.s.s murderer for hire, then.

THE TEMPORARY LAB she had created was in rural West Virginia. She'd rented a nice little farmhouse with a milking barn that had been a very long time without cows. The exterior of the barn was a white composite siding that matched the house; inside, the walls and ceiling were lined in aluminum. The floors were sealed concrete with conveniently s.p.a.ced drains. There was a little bunk room in the back; it had been advertised as extra s.p.a.ce for visiting guests, delightfully rustic. She was sure there were many naive travelers who would find the rusticity charming, but all she cared about was that the electricity and water were hooked up and running. The farmhouse and barn were situated in the middle of a 240-acre apple orchard, which was in turn surrounded by more acres of farmland. The closest neighbor was over a mile away. The owners of this orchard were making money during the off-season by renting out the s.p.a.ce to city dwellers who wanted to pretend they were roughing it.

It was very expensive. She frowned every time she thought about the price, but it couldn't be helped. She needed a secluded facility with a usable s.p.a.ce.

She'd been working nights to get everything ready. During the day she had followed Daniel from a good distance, then caught up on what sleep she could in the car during school hours. She was completely exhausted at the moment, but she still had a lot to do before her workday was over.

First stop, a minor freeway exit more than an hour out of the city. A narrow dirt road that looked as if no one had used it in a decade took her deeper into the trees. It must have led somewhere, but she didn't drive far enough to see where. She stopped under a thick patch of shade, cut the engine, and went to work.

If Daniel was employed by the department or, more likely, one of the organizations that worked closely with it-the CIA, a few military sections, some other black ops floaters that, like the department, didn't have official names-he would have an electronic tracker on him. Just like she'd once had. Absently, she rubbed her finger across the small raised scar on the nape of her neck, covered by her short hair. They liked to tag the head. If only one part of a body could be recovered, the head was best for identification purposes.

She opened the back pa.s.senger-side door and knelt on the damp ground beside Daniel's head. She started with the place both she and Barnaby had been tagged, brushing her fingers lightly along his skin, then again, pressing harder. Nothing. She'd seen a few foreign subjects whose trackers had been freshly removed from behind their ears, so she checked there next. Then she ran her fingers through his hair, probing the scalp for any b.u.mps or hard spots that shouldn't be there. His curls were very soft and smelled nice, citrusy. Not that she cared about his hair, but at least she didn't have to put her hands into some greasy, malodorous nest. She appreciated that.

Now for the heavy lifting. If it was de la Fuentes keeping tabs on this man, the tracker would probably be external. She threw the shoes into the woods beside the road first-they seemed the most likely culprit of his clothes; lots of men would wear the same pair every day. Then she stripped off his shirt, grateful for the b.u.t.ton-down, though it was still hard to get it out from under the weight of his body. She didn't bother trying to get the undershirt over his head; she pulled a blade from her pocket, untaped it, and cut the fabric into three easily removable pieces. She scanned his chest-no suspicious scars or lumps. The skin on his torso was fairer than his arms; he had a faint farmer's tan, no doubt from building houses in Mexico with a T-shirt on. Or from acquiring superviruses in Egypt-also very sunny.

He had what she thought of as sports muscles rather than gym muscles. No hard-cut edges, just a nice smooth alignment that showed he was active without being obsessive.

Rolling him onto his stomach was hard, and he fell into the foot s.p.a.ce, draped over the hump between seats. He had two light scars on his left shoulder blade, parallel and even in length. She explored them carefully, prodding the skin all around, but she couldn't feel anything besides the normal fibrous, hypertrophic tissue that should be there.

It didn't take her long to realize she should have removed his jeans before rolling him over. She had to climb on top of his awkwardly positioned form and reach both arms around his torso to get the b.u.t.ton fly open. So very thankful that he was not wearing skinny jeans, she then climbed out the other pa.s.senger-side door and yanked the pants off over his feet. She was unsurprised to see that he wore boxers rather than briefs. It fit his clothing profile. She stripped the boxers off, then the socks, and then she grabbed up the rest of the clothes, walked them a few feet off the road, and stuffed them behind a fallen log. She made another trip for the backpack. The laptop would be a very good hiding place for any electronic device someone wanted him to carry around unknowingly.

This wasn't the first time she'd had to strip a target down herself. In the laboratory environment, she'd had people who prepped a subject for her-Barnaby called them the underlings-but she hadn't always been in the lab, and during her first field trip to Herat, Afghanistan, she'd learned to be deeply grateful to the underlings. Stripping down a man who hadn't bathed in months was not pleasant-especially when she didn't have a shower available for herself afterward. At least Daniel was clean. She was the only one working up a sweat today.

She found the screwdriver in the trunk and quickly changed the DC license plate for one she'd pulled off a similar car in a West Virginia sc.r.a.p yard.

Just to be thorough, she did a cursory examination of the backs of his legs, the bottom of his feet, and his hands. She'd never seen a tracker on the extremities, probably because extremities sometimes got cut off to make a point. She didn't see any scars. She also didn't see any calluses that suggested he trained with guns or used them frequently. He had soft teacher hands, with just a few hard spots that spoke of blisters from inexperienced labor.

She tried to roll him back up onto the seat but quickly realized it was a vain effort. It wasn't a comfortable sleeping position, but he wouldn't wake up regardless. He would be sore later. Though it was completely ridiculous to even think of that.

As she repositioned the blanket and tucked it around his body as best she could, she was constructing a story about him from the doc.u.ments she'd read and the evidence in front of her.

She believed Daniel Beach was mostly the man she saw now, the pleasant all-around good guy. The attraction for the avaricious ex was understandable. He was probably easy to fall in love with. After some time had pa.s.sed, enough time for the ex to take love for granted, she would have been able to shift her focus to the things she didn't have-the nice apartment, the big ring, the cars. She probably missed this side of Daniel now, the gra.s.s always being greener and whatnot.

But there was also darkness in Daniel, buried deep, perhaps born from the pain and unfairness of losing his parents, aggravated by his wife's betrayal, and then ignited by the loss of his final family member. That darkness would not surface easily. He would compartmentalize it, keep it away from this gentle life, pack it into the dark s.p.a.ces where it fit. No wonder he could speak of Mexico so blithely. He would have two Mexicos: the happy one the teacher loved, and the dangerous one the monster thrived in. They probably weren't anything close to the same place in his head.