Fade (2005) (11 page)

"That was me." For some reason he'd expected her skin to be cold bu t it wasn't. "Why don't you pop the hood and I'll take a look."

A three-minute examination with a penlight she'd dug from a pile o f junk on her floorboard was all he needed.

"When you use the word 'hopeless,"" she said, "do you mean a bi t forlorn or truly despondent?"

"Probably somewhere in between. You're looking at about two hundre d and fifty bucks."

"No way to just give it a few good kicks so I can get home?"

" 'fraid not. Do you have Triple-A?"

She shook her head.

He'd offered to give her a ride home and, surprisingly, she'd taken hi m up on it despite the fact that the party was lousy with people wh o would have given their eyeteeth to do it.

He couldn't remember how the conversation had come around to politics , but it had and she'd displayed a not too surprising activist libera l streak. He, on the other hand, had been smack in the middle of hi s brief "humanity is doomed" period and thrown every plot she had to hel p the downtrodden back in her face. He'd seen a lot in his short lif e and had come to the conclusion that the downtrodden were downtrodde n because they deserved to be. It wasn't about poor soil and drought. I t was about culture and politics.

Now, why he'd not just agreed with everything this unbelievabl e creature sitting in his passenger seat had said, he still wasn't sure.

Some unhealthy combination of nervousness and self-doubt, probably.

By the time she stepped out into her driveway, she was pretty angry.

Which made it all the more strange when she'd called him the next da y and told him she was doing some reading to prepare for continuing thei r discussion at the Italian restaurant around the corner from he r house.

"Matt?" Elise sang. "Oh, Matt, darling."

He blinked. "Yeah?"

"What's wrong with you tonight? You look like you're auditioning for a zombie movie."

"Uh, I've got a business trip."

"A what?"

"It just came up today."

"What are you talking about? When?"

"I have to leave tonight."

"Tonight?"

"It just came up."

"You said that already."

He nodded dumbly. Fade was probably still in the process of workin g through his new reality, but pretty soon he'd get his shit together an d then there was no telling what he'd do. Actually, that wasn't true. I t wasn't hard to predict at all.

"How long are you going to be gone?"

"I'm not exactly sure."

"A day? A month? A year?"

"Maybe a week?"

"Where are you going?"

"Kind of around .. ."

Elise's mouth hung open for a moment and then she patted Kali on he r head and told her to go watch TV.

"But I'm not finished."

"You can let your audience finish it in their minds, honey. It coul d be a catalyst for their own imagination."

Kali had no idea what that meant, but a moment later it sunk in tha t her TV time was going to be extended and she ran off before her mothe r could change her mind.

"Have a seat, Matt."

"The dishes aren't done."

She pointed to a chair and he did as he was told.

"What's going on?"

"Nothing."

"Tell me this isn't an operational job. We talked about this before w e adopted Kali. You're too old and you have a family now. You're a paper pusher."

"I am a paper pusher. I'm "

"You agreed to this, Matt." She waved her hand around the kitchen.

"You wanted all this. I didn't stand here and dictate your life t o you."

He was not in the habit of lying to her and it was making hi m uncomfortable enough to turn him defensive. "I don't know what yo u want me to say, Elise. When you and Madonna are like sisters, maybe I c an quit. But for now, a job is a job."

"Don't even go there, Matt. If you're walking out of here tomorrow t o go shoot Afghans, I can damn well get a nine-to-five job in soun d production or something. I "

The ringing of his cell phone interrupted her train of thought. "Fo r God's sake, Matt! That's the fifth time tonight. Pick it up or tur n it off!"

The previous five times it had been Hillel Strand, who was obviously a bit concerned about him disappearing from the office after thei r meeting. He was undoubtedly wondering if his deputy had found an angl e he hadn't covered.

Egan pulled the phone from his pocket and was about to shut it off, bu t then realized it wasn't Strand's number appearing in the window. H
e couldn't remember ever seeing it before.

"Matt?"

He felt an uncomfortable jolt of adrenaline and held a hand up , silencing her and hoping the blood hadn't drained visibly from hi s face. She was looking right at him.

"Hello," he said, pressing the phone to his ear.

"Hello, Matt."

"Could you hold on for a second?"

"Sure. Why not."

Egan pressed the mute button and walked around the table. "I'm sorry,"
h e said, kissing her on top of the head. "I don't want you to get a nine-to-five job and I'm not going to shoot any Afghans. It's just a training thing. That's all."

She didn't seem convinced, but there wasn't anything that he could d o about that now. He clicked the mute off and started for his den.

"Hello, Fade."

"Cops. That wasn't nice."

"I don't suppose you'd believe me if I told you that I had nothing t o do with that."

"I don't suppose I would. You've been spying on me, man. Who els e would have known about the Colombians? Who else would have cared wha t I did after I left?"

Egan closed the door and sat down behind his desk, not bothering t o turn on a light. The moon glowing outside the window was enough to se e by and he couldn't shake the feeling that Fade might be across th e street with a rifle.

"There were .. ." Egan let his voice trail off. What was the point?

"What's done is done, Fade."

No response.

"So where do we stand?"

"You fucked me, man. Again."

"You know, I'm getting a little tired of hearing this shit. I went t o the very top to get you that surgery. And when you went to Colombia t o get the money yourself, I covered it up "

"Thank God you've got my back, huh? Without you, my life might b e screwed up."

"What did you want me to do? Put a gun to the president's head and ge t him to write your doctor a check? This is Washington, Fade. No t Rwanda. If I'd had the fucking money, I'd have given it to you myself.

You know that."

Silence.

"So where are we, Fade? How do we get out of this?"

"There is no way out."

"Bullshit. What if I help you leave the country? How much money d o you have? Enough to live on?"

"You're remembering me stupider than I am, Matt. You and Strand got a bunch of cops killed to make a point. I doubt you're going to take th e chance that information or anything else I might have to say could com e out in court. I imagine it'd be a little tough on your careers."

"Fade, we can "

"You can what? Just let this go? What about the cops? Are they jus t going to forget about me? Are you going to give me a few million an d set me up in a beachfront place in Brazil? Or maybe you think I ough t to just slink off there myself and hide in a sewer until my legs don'
t work anymore. Come on, Matt. Say it. I want to hear you say it, yo u son of a bitch. Say, "Come in, Fade. We'll fix this. We'll put i t all right again." "

"I can't make guarantees not about things I don't have control over.

All I can tell you is that I'll do my best."

"Your best isn't good enough, though, is it? I've never gotte n anything but fucked by your best."

"Fade "

"I let it slide the first time, man. But not again. I'm not lookin g forward to it, but I'm going to kill you."

Egan had known where this conversation was going from the beginning bu t actually hearing the words hit him hard. Suddenly, breathing didn'
t seem to come naturally and he had to concentrate on not stopping.

Nothing had ever felt like this before not even when he'd worked in th e field. The difference, of course, was simple. Back then, he hadn'
t had all that much to lose. So what now? Argue? Beg? Reason? To o little too late. Always too little too late.

"I ... I assume it goes without saying that Elise and Kali are out o f this, right? Nothing happens in front of them."

"And I assume it goes without saying that you're still man enough no t to hide behind them?"

Matt nodded into the phone. "See you soon, Fade."

Chapter
Thirteen.

"All I'm saying, Karen, is it's kind of strange that he drilled you r entire team and left you without a goddamn scratch."

The interrogation room was what anyone who watched television woul d expect: gray walls, a single table surrounded with uncomfortabl e chairs, a small window covered in chicken wire. The fact that she wa s there and not in a slightly more cheerful conference room probabl y wasn't good news. On the other hand, maybe it was a blessing i n disguise at least it blocked out the rest of the precinct. When she'
d walked through it that morning, she'd been preceded by dead silence an d followed by quiet whispers. No one bothered to hide the fact that the y were staring and very few bothered to hide their animosity.

"Your team's dead. And you're sitting here sipping tea." Not a n entirely accurate statement. All reports suggested that Erin was goin g to pull through. And she was drinking a Coke. Karen leaned back i n her chair and looked up at Captain Pickering, who seemed content t o stand against the wall and let Ken, the department's top interrogator , do the heavy lifting.

"I just want you to tell me why you think that is, Karen." It was th e fifth time this particular question had come up. The first time it wa s delivered in a friendly, offhand way. Now, though, Ken was leanin g over the table, supporting himself with his knuckles, face turning a light shade of pink. The fact that this puffy jerk thought he coul d intimidate her was just more proof that no one in this organization ha d a clue who she was. They were still locked onto what they needed he r to be.

"He was kind of cute so I fucked his brains out. After that, I gues s he thought it would be rude to kill me."

Ken's jaw tightened. "Maybe he wants something from you goin g forward?"

"What would that be exactly?"

"I don't know. Maybe you made a deal with him. He lets you go and yo u give him information about our investigation." He softened so suddenl y and perceptibly that there was little doubt it was affected. "I sur e as hell might have if I'd been in your situation. Tied to a chair b y some psycho ..."

The general theme taking shape was that her guys had fought valiantl y and died heroically while she cowered and bargained to save her neck.

No big surprise. Many of the men she worked with had turned searchin g for her weaknesses into a full-time job. Whenever she failed a t anything, they were there with yet another blonde joke. And more ofte n than not, they weren't even funny.

"Taped actually I was taped to the chair. And I have no doubt you'
d have made a deal. But I'm not you, am I?"

Ken backed away from the table for a moment, shoving his hands in hi s pockets and trying to calculate a new angle. She sipped her Coke an d stared directly at him.

The truth was, she deserved at least part of the anger some of he r colleagues directed at her. When she'd gotten the job, the combinatio n of her own self-doubt and all the affirmative action talk had cause d her to react in a way typical for her but not exactly productive. Sh e should have been in the bars after hours drinking beers with the guys , but instead she'd let that spark of insecurity focus her solely o n making sure she did everything just a little better than everyone else.

She'd told herself that she was doing it to gain her team's respect , but that wasn't really the whole truth.

Worse, she'd refused to allow herself to be politicized and walked awa y from the feminist contingent who were her only supporters. They'
d quickly labeled her as a traitor and now probably wanted to see he r fail as much as anyone. The lesson to be learned? The end result o f mixing slightly tarnished intentions with defensiveness and ego coul d be kind of explosive.

"You said he was expecting you," Ken said, spitting the words out wit h disgust that she figured he really felt. "Are you suggesting he has a source in the police department?"

Again, the implication was clear: that she was trying to divert blam e from herself. To make excuses.

"I said he was waiting for someone. Not us. I honestly don't believ e that he knew we were cops until he saw it on TV. If he had known, I'
d be dead now."