Alien in the House (20 page)

T
HERE WAS THE USUAL BEDLAM.
It was stopped quickly. Because we had a troubadour in the room.

“Everyone, calm down!” Raj had total calm authority going in his tone. I'd only heard a few people sound more authoritative, and I was married to one of them. Mom would have been proud. Everyone shut up immediately. “Kitty, Ravi, are you alright?”

“I am. Ravi?”

“If you get off of me, I should be fine.”

“Most people don't complain.”

“Most of their fiancées aren't in the room.”

“Good point. A little help?”

Raj got me to my feet, then helped Ravi. “Is everyone okay?” he asked as Jennifer flung herself into Ravi's arms. I'd never seen Ravi look so proud, happy, or smug.

Took a look around as everyone else said they were fine. There were less everyones than I'd been expecting. And I'd just noticed this room was short about ten people I'd been thinking I'd see here. I was not batting even close to a thousand tonight. “Where's Olga and Mona and everyone?”

“Under the circumstances, this didn't seem to be the best place for them to wait,” Jennifer said as she extracted herself from Ravi and went back to being professional. “Len and Kyle agreed. Jeremy took them to the fourth floor. There's a nice sitting room there, where they could be comfortable.”

“And where Mossad and the Bahraini Royal Guard couldn't check out what the boys are doing here.” Camilla sounded like she thought whoever had sent them up to this floor was an idiot.

“It seemed like a good idea at the time,” said idiot replied. Without too much resentment or defensiveness in my tone. At least, I hoped.

She shook her head. “We're under attack. That means everyone's a suspect, and everyone's a potential enemy.”

“I don't normally think that way.” Well, I didn't normally think that way. Thanks to Colonel Hamlin's visit, I was thinking that way constantly tonight.

“Time to start.” She was examining where the disk had been.

Chose not to share that Camilla could be proud I'd already started on a full-blown case of paranoia and also had her on the Suspects List. She might be pleased or might be pissed, and since it was a fifty-fifty shot, I chose discretion as the better part of valor.

“Jeremy's staying with the guests on the fourth floor, just in case a fast exit is needed. And Len and Kyle are with them, too,” Jennifer said, sounding worried. “Was that alright?”

“Yes, that's great, Jennifer. Don't let Camilla throw you. She's still working on her people skills.”

Camilla snorted a laugh. “Takes one to know one.”

“No argument. So, what do you think? Of what just happened, the explosion, I mean. I'm clear you're not happy with our lack of distrust and stealth.”

She was quiet for a bit. “As explosions went, it wasn't a very big one,” Camilla said finally. “But it was powerful enough. I think it would have taken Ravi's hands, and possibly his head. So that means it was a contained explosion, and that takes skill.” She turned to me. “How did you know it was going to blow?”

“No idea. I just did. And I know that sounds totally lame, but it's all I've got, sorry.” I wondered where the Poofs or Peregrines had been. This seemed like a time when they should have intervened.

Then again, I hadn't been in danger, and maybe they didn't consider the hackers to be part of our Embassy. Except I knew that Jennifer and Ravi had Poofs. We had so many Poofs, the rest of the hackers probably had them, too. And the Peregrines loved Omega Red for whatever reason and they were warming up to Big George, too. Couldn't speak for the Poofs or Peregrines, but my cats thought Henry was da bomb for whatever reason, and that meant the Poofs would think he was okay, too. And my dogs loved Stryker, presumably because he always smelled like food and was a crumb smorgasbord. So, the animals certainly considered the hackers part of that which made up “us.”

Maybe it was a simple reason—this wasn't something that keen animal senses could have picked up. When someone's about to shoot they give off physical and mental clues, small and many times almost imperceptible, but not if you're an animal trained for thousands of years to protect. Even a highly trained assassin would give off some smell or vibrations that were different.

But the disc had just been a piece of equipment. It wouldn't have told an animal it was going to go boom.

So why had it told me?

“Kitty's reason is fine with me,” Ravi said as he joined Camilla. “I'm happy to still have my hands and head.”

“Is there anything left?” Raj asked as Ravi examined where the disc had been.

“Nothing.” Jennifer brought his Bluetooth over from wherever it had gone when Ravi and I had hit the ground. He put it back on. “You still there? Yes, sorry, had no idea it was going to explode, either. No, the ambassador saved me. Kitty. Yes.” He turned to me. “Serene says that next time you need to bring anything like this you find to her.”

“Serene's your contact at Dulce?” Managed to stop myself from asking how she'd gotten there. She'd taken the gate in the bathroom and gone to work, was the obvious answer.

“Yes.” He listened again. “Got it. Yes. Absolutely.” He laughed. “I'll tell them.” Ravi turned back to me. “They got a little before the disc blew. Serene said that she's going to look for explosive signatures and she'll let you know what she finds. She agrees with Camilla's assessment that it was a contained explosion, and she's got some ideas. She also said to tell you, Kitty, that she expects you to check in with her the moment you find another one of these discs.”

“How did they get anything? That explosion was instantaneous.”

Raj coughed. “Not for us.”

“Oh, right.” If you can move at hyperspeed, some things do indeed seem slower. I still wasn't seeing things in slow motion. Chose not to wonder if the A-Cs felt they were walking through gelatin every moment of their lives. Jeff had never indicated such, and when I could see people moving at hyperspeed it didn't make me feel like everything else was moving slowly, so maybe it was all in the perspective.

“Serene's an explosives expert,” Camilla added. “If anyone could get something from what little we had, it'll be her.”

“True enough. I wish I had brought it to her, because now we have nothing.”

“I'm sorry, Kitty,” Ravi said. “There were no outward signs of a bomb or a trigger. And I definitely looked.”

“Well, this just goes under the ‘our luck holds firm' heading. It wasn't really your fault, Ravi.” It was mine, for not going straight to Alpha Team. And I knew I was going to hear about it from the rest of Alpha Team as soon as they found out, too. “I have a related question for you, anyway.”

“Go ahead.”

“If someone can make a device like what just blew up, that can stop the most powerful empath from feeling anyone within at least a football field radius, could that same person make a device that could put an emotional overlay or similar onto a person? So that, say, I could be furious and ready to kill someone, but all an empath would feel was that I was happy and thoughtful?”

“I'd think so,” Ravi said.

“Absolutely,” Stryker chimed in. “It's already been done, in that sense, with the androids.”

“But the androids had the full range of human emotions. Jeff was able to find them based on things like murderous rage.”

Big George shrugged. “So what? They were last year's model.”

“We found them this year.”

“It's a figure of speech, Kitty,” Big George said. “And you know it.”

Henry chimed in for the first time. “You always strive to achieve more, Kitty. To make something more effective, smaller but more efficient, and so forth. Think of cell phones. The first ones were bricks. Now you can get tiny ones, and even though the trend is going larger again, they're sleek and thousands of times more powerful than the first models.”

“And they're always coming out with new models.”

“Right. Every six months or faster. So, you see—”

I recognized Henry going into lecture mode. “Selling past the close, Doctor Wu. Cease now, I'm on board.”

He snapped his mouth shut and gave me a dirty look. “You don't catch on as fast as you like to pretend.”

True enough tonight. But I wasn't going to tell him that. “Oh, blah, blah, blah.” Looked around. Omega Red was intent on his Braille keyboard and didn't seem to be paying attention. “Yuri, your thoughts?”

He didn't reply, but his fingers kept on moving,

“Yuri. Yuri Stanislav. Omega Red. Dude with the sunglasses on—what are you working on? Or are you asleep? Just please don't be dead, I've had enough of that tonight.”

“Just a minute, Kitty,” he said absently.

“Time's wasting, Yuri. We are busy people with a lot of horrible conspiracies to identify and thwart.”

“Really?” Big George sounded incredibly thrilled.

“Really, but I want Yuri to chime in on our bug situation.”

“I haven't been paying attention to that, Kitty,” Omega Red said without any shame in his tone whatsoever.

“Are you kidding me? Why not?”

“Because I've been doing something else. It's related, so calm down.”

“Tell me what you've been doing that's related and I'll think about not kicking you.”

“You won't kick me, and not just because I'm blind and that would be wrong. I think I've found the company that's created something very similar to what you described.”

“The bug or the overlay?”

“Both.”

“Awesome. Let me guess, Titan Security.”

“No. Gaultier Enterprises.”

“I
T SO FIGURES.”

As I said that, it occurred to me that there was one person I hadn't seen since I'd escorted Reyes to the bathroom—Amy.

Camilla looked at me. “Is Amy Gaultier-White around?”

Resisted the impulse to ask if Camilla was a mind reader. “No idea. Com on!”

“Yes, Chief?” Having the communications and sound system hooked into the Zoo had been costly, but oh so worth it.

“Walt, do you have any idea where Amy is?”

“No, Chief. She's not on premises.”

Fabulous. “Any idea when she left?”

“No, Chief, I'm sorry, I don't. It was chaotic for a little while. Do you need me to see if Dulce can track her?”

“That's okay, Walt. I'll just call her.”

“Yes, Chief.” The com went quiet.

Pulled out my phone and dialed. Amy didn't pick up. Called a few more times, all of which went to voicemail. Sent a text. No reply. “This is too reminiscent of Operation Confusion,” I said under my breath.

“Yes, it is,” Camilla said. Dang, she'd heard me. “We need her tracked down, immediately.”

“There could be a good reason for why we can't find her.”

“There could be. There could be some very bad reasons, too.” Camilla's expression softened. “I know she's one of your closest friends. She was a patsy before. Whether that means she was good enough to fake us all out, is a patsy again, is running down a lead, or is in mortal danger, we don't know. And we won't know until we find her.”

“I know. I just . . . Christopher's not here right now.”

“So? She's his wife, so either she's faked him out, or she could be in trouble. Either way, we need to know. Make the call.”

Heaved a sigh. Hated it when the right thing to do seemed counter to what a good friend would do. “Com back on.”

“Yes, Chief?”

“Walt, have Dulce track Amy, please. I can't reach her by phone and I want to be sure she's okay.”

“Yes, Chief. Hang on.” The soft white noise of the com played in the background while we waited for a couple of minutes. “Chief, I'm sorry,” Walter said after what felt like forever. “But Dulce cannot locate Amy Gaultier-White anywhere.”

“Ask them to keep on scanning for her.” A thought struck me. “Tell Gladys I want her to scan for Clarence Valentino, too. Regardless of the fact that right now you want to tell me he's dead and regardless of the fact that's the first thing Gladys will say. Scan for him, and Amy, until you find them both.”

“Yes, Chief.”

Sent Jeff a text. Got a fast reply—Christopher wasn't back and he couldn't feel him anywhere, though he could now feel everyone else. Shared the fun we'd been having in the computer room. He replied that he couldn't find or feel Amy, either. We both agreed this sucked, big time.

Didn't know what to do, so I grabbed a spare chair and sat down. Tried to think, to piece things together. Got nothing much. Other than that I was missing obvious things like people not being where I expected them to be and my not noticing until it was really late in the game.

Ran through everyone I could think of. Most of our personnel were at Georgetown Medical Center, on the third floor, in the fourth floor sitting room, or here. But I hadn't realized Serene was off-site and I hadn't noted Amy was missing until just now. So, was there anyone else I'd missed?

“Are Naomi and Michael still downstairs?”

Raj sent a text. “No, all the guests who are willing to leave have gone. They're back with the others on the third floor.” He chuckled.

“What's so funny?”

“Abigail said that Naomi used the time downstairs to add to her wedding guest list, and that now that those two are back, Michael's offering his shoulder to Missus Montgomery. She said to tell you her sister's a Bridezilla and her brother's a wedding crasher. She said you'd get the jokes.”

“I do.” Chuckled for a moment, then my brain chose to share that there was something very wrong with this. Sat up straight. “Ask her where Caroline is, and did either she or Amy get checked off on any of the exit lists.”

Raj texted at hyperspeed. “No, neither woman is on the lists. Abigail doesn't know where they are, has asked her brother and sister, and they don't, either. All assume Caroline went home or that she and Amy are both with the team at the hospital.”

“No way. Amy wouldn't have gone for anything medical, it's not something she could help with and Magdalena was along so they wouldn't have needed anyone else to facilitate with Georgetown. Caroline's loyalty is to the McMillans. If they're here, she's here. Unless . . .”

Unless she'd seen something or someone, or they'd seen her. Caroline and Amy had become friends, and they'd come down without backup to help me take on androids and supersoldiers during Operation Assassination. If one or both of them had seen something or someone, then they'd have gone for it, especially if they were together. “Raj, contact Dulce and see if anyone can find Caroline.”

Walter and Gladys were contacted. Caroline was also missing and unable to be found.

It was a safe bet they were together. So, people were dying and bullets were flying. When they'd left was probably key. Had to have left before the bullets, because after that Chuckie had put the Gowers on exit duty.

Who they'd seen suddenly seemed obvious. Caroline knew the Dingo on sight. Maybe she thought he was going to be shooting at our people, or at me, and she'd gone to stop him, to reason with him, whatever. Amy had probably gone, too. Meaning they'd gone up to the roof, because that's where all self-respecting members of the Assassination Squad loved to hang out.

Which roof? The shot that had killed Eugene had come from Sheridan Circle, and that was Raul's favorite perch. So the Dingo had been where? Either on top of Romania's Embassy, Ireland's Embassy, or on top of ours. Looking out the third floor windows of the Zoo you could see either one of those buildings.

This would also explain why the Dingo hadn't “shown up”—he'd been distracted by the girls. So, did that mean we couldn't find them because he'd killed them, or because he'd taken them? And if he'd taken them, had it been to hide them . . . or to protect them?

There was, as always, only one way to find out.

But there were people waiting for me, and Vance had a theory he wanted to put forward which I wanted to hear. No worries. I was the co-ambassador, and it was time to Delegate Some Authority.

“Ravi, work with Serene to see what, if anything, you guys can get that we can track on. Omega Red, you keep on tracking and give us everything you can on this division of Gaultier Enterprises and anything related to it. Big George, help Omega Red and see if you can determine any conspiracy theories related to Gaultier and Titan Security, too. There'll be a lot, look for theories I'd believe.”

“What about me and Doctor Wu?” Stryker asked.

“I want the two of you looking for coded messages talking about anything odd or out of the ordinary for coded messages.”

“Kitty, if a message is coded, it's going to be out of the ordinary,” Henry said.

“Do you want me to start calling you Doctor Won't? Or worse, Doctor No?”

“No, that's the worst James Bond movie ever made,” Henry muttered.

“Exactly. Positive damn mental attitude, dudes. This is why you live here now—find the ones that are
really
out of the ordinary.”

Stryker sighed. “You know you can't reason with her when she's in this mood.”

“Stryker, I have no problem hurting you.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. We'll scan the cosmos for the weirder than normal. We even have an official name for the level you're looking for—Kitty Weird.”

“Raj, make a note on my calendar that, when this is all over, I need to really cause Stryker some pain. Jennifer, ensure that we're getting whatever cooperation we need from Dulce and advise me if you think anything seems even a little off anywhere or with anything the guys find. Raj, Camilla, you two come with me.”

We trotted out of the room and down one flight of stairs. “Raj, I want you handling everyone here. They're going to want to be given an assignment. Have them help you research what happened to Raul the Assassin. I don't have a last name, but Len and Kyle were the reason he was arrested, so they probably know where to start. We want to track anything and everything he's done, particularly since he was arrested.”

Raj nodded. “Anything else?”

“Yeah. Listen to what Olga has to say, or insinuates, with incredible attention. Coordinate whatever else is going on in the Embassy, and be sure that people keep me advised. If Camilla or I fall off the Dulce radar, Alpha Team needs to be advised immediately. Tell the boys that I'll have backup and I want them staying with you.”

Raj went onto the floor and Camilla and I headed downstairs. “What are you planning?” she asked as we reached the third floor.

Looked through the stairway door's little window before opening it or answering. The Cabal was still here, clustered around Lydia. It was official—she was acting Kitty Weird. “Have a question for you.”

“Okay.”

“Are you married?”

“No. How is that relevant to anything?”

“Helps me determine how to phrase the relevant question. If Jeff were murdered, even if I was furious with him for cheating on and humiliating me, would you think I'd be hanging out or do you think I'd demand to go with his body?”

“Jeff's never going to cheat on you.”

“Work with me on this one, will you?”

She peered through the window with me. “You're wondering what the hell game Senator Montgomery is playing, aren't you?”

“Yes, I am. She rubs Vance the wrong way.”

“The pathetic momma's boy?”

“I think he may be less pathetic than we think.”

“If you say so.”

“Look, I don't want to go back in there, because if I do, power in the room shifts.”

“Well, look at you, actually paying attention.” Camilla's sarcasm knob went well past eleven. “But you're right. You want me in here, figuring out what's going on with a whole bunch of people who should be a hell of a lot more upset than they are, right?”

“Right. They'll do things around you they won't around me. But, I also need you to get Vance to meet me here, without having everyone else notice.”

“Consider it done. Figure it'll take a little time, though, both to get the message to Vance in a natural way the others don't notice as well as to get the others to join me into their conversation, their real conversation, not the one they'd be having if you were in there. You want me going along off-site with those people if they suggest it?”

“If you can cozy up to them enough that they will—and I'm sure you can—then yes. Just make sure you leave a trail of breadcrumbs, because I don't trust any of them.”

“You don't trust me, either.”

“What do you mean?”

“You're giving off signs of distrust. Minor ones, but I know how to spot them. You're right to distrust me, by the way.”

“Is this where you kill me?”

She chuckled. “No. I'm on your side. Still. But you only know me as a double agent.”

“Triple, really.”

“Whatever number makes you happy. I should be suspect to you, it's intelligent to distrust someone you know lies for a living. Keep in mind, though, that it's also intelligent to distrust others who lie for a living, as well as those who don't.”

“So, what, distrust everyone?”

Camilla smiled at me as she opened the door. “Now you're catching on.”