Cost of Life (5 page)

On the fourth level of the building, tucked behind one of two unmarked wooden doors, civilians could be seated in an oblong room with three solid walls and one wall made of glass. The wall of glass was reflective. About four feet off the ground ran a meager horizontal ledge upon which civilians could, presumably, rest their elbows. A thin slit ran above the ledge for the passage of paperwork. All in all, this tucked-away room was the kind one expected to find at a maximum-security prison, the kind of tight quarters into which some woeful mother or father might be sequestered in order to have a timed conversation with their convict child.

This was the FBI field office's interview room, and Xana had never ever been on this side of the glass. She felt knocked a bit out of her skin. Her guts were squeezed with claustrophobia. The anxiety parched her mouth and throat. She was Pavlov's alcoholic.

Pacing did not help. Pacing only reminded her how constrictive the space was. But still Xana paced, hugging her arms to her chest like mail. In this room designed to addle a person with a clear conscience, a person burdened by sin could quickly go mad, and when for fuck's sake would someone appear on the other side of the glass? Who would it be? How long had it been since Del had escorted her to this room? How long would they make her wait?

Or were they there already, the lot of them, watching her stalk to and fro as if they were patrons at a zoo and she the—what? Chimpanzee? Hyena?

Enough of this shit.

She was going to have to do the instigating.

As always.

In this small room in this federal building, she plucked out a cigarette and lit it up.

“Don't be an idiot, Xana.”

The male voice came from the other side of the glass, where the reflection of the lit cigarette faded and was replaced by the long hangdog scowl of Angelo Potter. His side of the interview room was identical to hers, only on his ledge, between his resting elbows, was an assortment of papers.

“Hey, Angelo,” she said, and snuffed her cigarette out on the glass, just below his left eye. “You look good.”

Lies. He looked awful. Necktie askew. Eyes laden with baggage. But Angelo always looked awful. So what if he would never be selected to run any press conferences? The man was within spitting distance of a pension from the FBI. The man deserved respect.

But so did she. She hadn't expected a ticker-tape parade, but she was Xanadu Marx, damn it. She had won the Medal for Meritorious Achievement and the Shield of Bravery, and yet her reappearance after all these months warranted the attention not of Jim Christie, for whom she had for years dutifully and—frankly—extraordinarily closed difficult cases, but instead the attention of subordinates like Del and Angelo?

Not cool.

Unless this thing at the airport was even bigger than she suspected and Jim Christie was otherwise occupied. That would explain a lot.

“So when did you finish rehab?” Angelo asked her.

“Seriously? You have my paperwork in front of you. You know exactly when I finished.”

He shifted in his seat. “I was trying to make conversation.”

“Why?”

“Because it's what people do,” he replied, and let out a long, hangdog sigh. “Why are you here, Xana? You were never the nostalgic type.”

“No, but I also never missed a day of work in my life. Not by choice. And I know how hectic national holidays can be. And I know about what happened on I Seventy-Five a little while ago.”

He didn't even blink. “I don't know what you're talking about.”

“I'm saying I'm back, Angelo. I'm saying tell Jim to put me to work.”

“You're not talking to Jim. You're talking to me.”

“And aren't we having a fun chat? Look, hey, I get it. You don't trust me. That's fine. Get someone to give me a tube to blow into. You can all watch. But I'm ready to get to work.”

Angelo glanced down at the papers.

“A dead cop…a pilot on the run…a foreign national under arrest, possibly Middle Eastern, at the world's busiest airport on the Fourth of July…” Xana said. “Don't tell me the whole office isn't going nuts over this…and sure, it's probably nothing…but when you're not sure who you're playing against, wouldn't you feel better with an ace in your hand?”

Angelo muttered, “And you're the ace…”

“I mean, who else you got who can speak a couple dozen languages and can rattle off on the culture and history of every nationality now residing in the ashes of the mighty Mongol Empire thanks to dear old Dad. Angelo, you and I might have our differences, but we've always recognized each other's worth.”

“ ‘Each other's worth.' Spare me. You're convinced these past seven months without you, we've had our thumbs up our asses and couldn't even make a cup of coffee let alone do our jobs.”

“No…of course not…but—”

“You want to know how we've managed to survive without you. Lady, these have been the best seven months of our lives. Sure, we all feel bad for what you went through, but at least we didn't have to go through it
with
you anymore.”

Xana let his words linger for a bit before replying:

“I want to speak with Jim. Now.”

“Jim's busy.”

“Then I'll wait.”

“Yeah, that's not going to happen.” Angelo shook his head in bemusement. “You want to know why it is you got Del and me instead of anyone else?”

Xana didn't say anything.

“Well?” he prodded her.

“Oh. I thought that was a rhetorical question.”

“It wasn't.”

“All right. I think the welcome wagon was you and Del because you drew the short straws. You've been that perfectly clear. I'm not liked. Fine. But you all need to put aside your personal feelings and get your eye back on the ball.”

“If talent were enough, Pete Rose would be in the Hall of Fame, but what can I tell you, right?”

Xana pounded a fist against the glass. “Jim promised me—he
promised
me my job would be here when I got out!”

“One: Take your hand away from the partition.”

She complied and rested her hand on the ledge, where it refused to uncoil.

“Thank you. Two: That wasn't Jim's call to make.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

Angelo's eyes drooped with sympathy. “Think about it from a publicity point of view, Xana. An FBI agent
drove
into a
house.
”

“It's not like anyone was home at the time…”

“The police arrive at the scene and this very same FBI agent is recorded as having the blood alcohol level of a distillery. Then she, drunk out of her mind, gets into a fight with the police—”

“At least I wasn't carrying my weapon…”

“Xana, you were an embarrassment to yourself and you were an embarrassment to the Bureau. Jim fought for you. He really did. But I doubt even J. Edgar Hoover could have saved your job.”

“So, what, I'm a scapegoat?”

“Now, how can you be a scapegoat if you're actually guilty?”

Xana wiped the back of her hand across her eyes. Since when had she started tearing up? No. She had to remain strong. That was the only way she could win, the only way she could ever win…

“I'm glad to see you're back on your own two feet,” continued Angelo. “I am. But now you need to move on and find something new.”

“I'm forty-six years old.”

“Yeah…in your job interviews, you may not want to open with that…”

He tried to smile. He couldn't quite pull it off. He diverted his gaze back to Xana's paperwork.

“Wait here,” he said. “I'll be right back.”

And the window once again became a mirror.

In the reflection, her eyes were red with tears but her cheeks were still dry. Little victories, right? She chided herself over her ridiculous expectations. Not only had she burned this bridge to the ground but she had doused the flame with Ketel One. Coming here, thinking all would return to normal—how foolishly deluded she'd been!

Except her circumstances were even funnier than that! Because she had had another job offer and she had tossed it back in Madeline's face!

And so Xana was laughing uproariously when the one-way glass once again became a two-way window, laughing so hard that the tears in her eyes were finally soaking the hills of her cheeks. Her shoulders bobbed with every bark of laughter. If she wasn't careful, she was going to lose her balance and fall off the chair—but wouldn't that be perfect!

“Xana,” said Angelo.

Xana held up a finger. She needed a minute…to catch…her breath…

Ahh.

“Sorry,” she replied, her mouth still wobbling ear-to-ear. “I'm sorry. But Aristotle was wrong. Dramatic irony is hilarious.”

Angelo held a digital recorder up to the partition and pressed
PLAY.
A man's voice bleated from its speaker a series of sentences in a language that was very much not English. He pressed
STOP.

“Do you understand what he was saying?” asked Angelo.

“Who the hell was that?”

“Answer my question first. Do you understand what he was saying?”

“Yes. But who the hell was that?”

“Translate it.”

“Answer my question first.”

Angelo nodded. “The foreign national under arrest, the one who is ‘possibly Middle Eastern'—that's him. None of the translators at the airport has a clue what language he's speaking.”

“Well, that's not surprising,” she answered. “The number of people in the state of Rhode Island outnumber the number of people worldwide who speak Chechen.”

“Chechen? You're sure?”

“Yes. Wait. That's the guy you have in custody?”

“The
police
have him in custody. What is he saying on the tape?”

Xana paused a beat before giving her translation:

“ ‘Happy Independence Day. You're all going to die.' ”

Two decisions were swiftly made:

“Seriously?” she asked Angelo.

He replied with a shrug; it didn't take an expert translator to interpret his body language thusly:
It is what it is.

And so Xana had to be content with what she had. It was what it was. She stewed in a leather chair in the civilian anteroom and waited for her chaperone to arrive. This anteroom was yet another space with which she was unfamiliar. She had briefly passed through here on her way to the interview room. A metal detector identical to the one in the building lobby guarded a pair of bulletproof-glass doors. Another pane of bulletproof glass served as window to the reception area, where Lizzie Dreyfus, visibly pregnant, sat typing away at her PC.

The room's other accoutrements tended toward nostalgia. On the wall to the left of the reception window rested a plaque detailing the FBI core values. To the right of the reception window rested a tower-case of federal tchotchkes: official FBI-labeled mugs, official FBI-labeled ashtrays, et cetera. The rest of the wall space in the anteroom was dedicated to the dead. Names carved into gold plates set into polished wood. Many of the gold plates were blank. Would her name one day be chiseled there?

No. She was a civilian now.

“Here's what we know,” Angelo had told her, “and I'm only sharing this information with you because it may come up in the interview with the suspect. In fact, in a few minutes, I'm going to get you to sign a confidentiality agreement and I'm sure the police are going to do the same.”

To which Xana had responded:

“I know the protocol. I'm not other people.”

“You are now.”

That shut her up and shut her down.

“Around six thirty this morning, an Atlanta police officer named Wynonna Price was killed in the line of duty on I Seventy-Five S within city limits. Her body was found beside her vehicle by a commuter. She had a single GSW to the chest. She also had in her possession the license and registration of one Laurence Walder.”

“The pilot.”

Angelo nodded. “Walder was scheduled to captain Flight Eight Sixteen to Cozumel, Mexico, at seven thirty
A.M.
The police showed up at the gate whereupon they were waylaid by an unknown foreign national who tells them—in English—that he shot Officer Price and that he can even produce the gun to prove it.”

“He snuck the gun into the terminal?”

“He stowed it in a car in the parking garage. Under the front seat.”

“I think I can guess whose car.”

“It gets worse,” Angelo said.

“Flight Eight Sixteen took off.”

“Worse.”

Xana blinked. What could be—

Oh.

Oh no.

Angelo read her reaction and verified it. Flight 816 had gone off-course. It was currently nonresponsive on all radio frequencies. People were missing.

This was now a Thing.

“Is the FAA going to issue a groundstop?” Xana asked.

“We're not there yet.”

“No, because it's better to duck after you've been shot.”

“You have your information,” he said. “Let me get you your paperwork to sign.”

He informed her about the chaperone when he returned—and then he left to handle other matters. She could hand-deliver the signed documents to Lizzie.

And she did it.

And now she stewed in the anteroom in a leather chair. Untethered, her thoughts traveled everywhere. She thought about Madeline. She thought about the passengers aboard Flight 816. She thought about Moonbeam and the halfway house and Alice's thousand-yard stare.

Xana had an idea of what Alice saw.

She sometimes saw it too.

But this had to be the cure, this, getting back in the game. Sitting at home wasn't going to heal her wounded ego.

Perhaps this was why, when asked to translate the recording, Xana had answered with “Happy Independence Day. You're all going to die,” instead of the actual translation, which was “I'm thirsty. Can I have some water?”

Sometimes to get back in the game, one had to cheat.

From reception, Lizzie called her over. Xana took her time. She wasn't in the mood to sign another waiver of liability.

“So here's the thing,” said Lizzie, after a long sip from her FBI-branded mug. “Hayley is a really special kid. I need you to promise me you're not going to give her a hard time.”

“Who's Hayley?”

“She…I thought they told you…Hayley O'Leary…she's your chaperone.”

“No, they didn't…” Then Xana frowned. “Wait…did you say
kid
?”

“I need you to promise to treat her with the utmost respect. Hayley's dealing with a lot and she's dealing with it better than anyone could in her shoes and, well, she doesn't need any of us adding to her level of stress—if you know what I'm saying.”

“Lizzie, I have no idea what you're saying. And what do you mean ‘kid'?”

The pregnant receptionist took another sip. “Just promise me you'll be…delicate.”

“Yeah, that doesn't sound like me. But what's the deal anyway? Christ, is she an intern? Is my chaperone a goddamn
intern
?”

“I thought they told you.”

“They did not,” replied Xana, fuming at the further indignation.

“Well, either way, promise me you'll treat her with kid gloves.”

“You're asking me to censor my natural charming behavior and I want to know why. Is she the president's niece or something?”

“No.”

“Is she made of glass?”

“No.”

“Is she dying?”

Lizzie looked away. “Yes.”

“Wait—seriously?”

“It's called Ewing's sarcoma.”

Xana took a step back. “She's got bone cancer?”

“You just know what that is—right off the top of your head?”

“I'm an exceptional human being, Lizzie.”

“Yeah, well, anyway, she'll meet you down in the lobby. It was good seeing you.”

Lizzie returned to her computer.

Apparently the conversation was over.

Dismissed, Xana took the elevator to the lobby, where Mikkelson the Mammoth glanced over at her from his station.

“I'm back,” she called. “Miss me?”

He grunted.

“Yeah.” She sat down beside the elevator. “That seems to be the general consensus.”

As soon as she got comfortable, the elevator doors reopened and out stepped a teenage girl with the BMI of a rubber band and a blue ball cap snugly tugged over her skeletal head. The girl had no hair underneath the cap, no eyebrows to speak of, and below it all a pair of large eyes so lively and blue that, in contrast, the rest of her snow-pale face appeared even more sunken and corpse-like than it probably was. Plastic tubes trailed from her nose to an orange oxygen tank she toted behind her on a small cart.

“I'm really excited to meet you, ma'am,” Hayley said, and held out a trembling hand. “It's an honor.”

There was the metaphor of walking on eggshells but Xana had never till now been afraid of breaking eggshells with a handshake. She did her best to be delicate.

Hayley then asked, “Would you like to take your car or mine?”

“Oh well,” Xana replied, “why don't we take yours?”

“Great. It's right this way. Bye, Officer Mikkelson!”

The mountain waved back to her.

The walk to the car wasn't long. Hayley's sparkling new compact was in a handicapped spot in the employees lot.

“I really hate to take up one of these spots,” she demurred, “but I promised my dad I wouldn't overexert myself and you know how overprotective fathers can be. I wish I got to meet yours. He must have been amazing.”

Xana cocked her head. “Excuse me?”

“Oh crap, I did it again, didn't I? Sorry. I like to do a lot of research about stuff and I guess sometimes it throws people off.”

“That you like to learn about their fathers? Yeah, that's not weird at all.”

Hayley blushed, adding a welcome touch of color to her cheeks. They got into the car. Before keying the ignition, Hayley reached into her pocketbook and removed something blue and plastic and L-shaped. She rattled it a few seconds before taking a deep puff off its short end.

“OK, let's go!”

Xana let her hand linger a moment on the pack of cigarettes in her pocket and then instead decided to grip the door—which proved to be a precognitive gesture, as Hayley proved to be maladroit a driver. She cut two people off and screeched left on red before even mounting the highway—not that she seemed to notice, her eyes retaining their effervescent cheer.

Once they merged with traffic, Hayley pushed a button on her steering wheel and activated her satellite radio. Elvis Presley's baritone warbled through the small car. “Can't get more American than the King on the Fourth of July,” she noted. “Which is ironic since it's a day meant to celebrate rebellion against a king. So what was it like growing up all over Asia?”

“You read my entire file before coming down to meet me?”

“What I could. A lot of it was redacted. I don't really have a very high clearance level.”

“Neither do I,” muttered Xana.

Within the city limits, the last of the morning commuters were snarled bumper-to-bumper, forcing Hayley to jerk the car into a rapid deceleration. Xana felt the Pop-Tart she had eaten earlier lunge backward against her spine. And so, in petty retaliation, she said:

“So, Hayley, what
did
you want to be when you grew up?”

But if her vicious choice of words fazed the teenager, her sallow face didn't show it. Instead, she simply dialed down the volume on her Elvis and responded, “Oh wow, I've always been fascinated by, you know, counterintelligence. So much of it is reactive, when it needs to be, like, proactive? OK, so, I took a class in game theory this past semester. Genius class. And intelligence is, like, the perfect example of a zero-sum game, or, to put it in, like, psychological terms: a series of social traps. Right? But it's more than that, because it's what we—I mean, you know, the United States—it's what the United States has been doing since the 1950s. Our worldview is totally a series of cost–benefit analyses—and that's cool or whatever but it's so not the whole story because what about all these advances in technology or cyber-intelligence—and, I mean, anybody who uses the Internet knows that our virtual infrastructure is becoming totally more valuable than our actual physical infrastructure and all that. So what do we sacrifice? It's like should we buy milk or should we buy juice because we can only afford one of them but we need what's in both of them.”

Hayley took a breath and then added:

“Anyway, that's what I was going to do. If I grew up. So what are you going to do when you grow up, Miss Marx?”

“Ouch. Nice zing.”

Hayley's cheeks glowed again and, to compensate, she rolled the volume back up and let Elvis remind her that only fools rush in.