Mystique Rogue (14 page)

             
“Call your team in here. I know they’re hanging out in the hallway.” Carmen paused a moment. “And you’d best get someone strong to restrain Bobby because what I’ve got to show you is not going to be pretty.”

             
He arched an eyebrow at her. “How bad can it be?”

             
Carmen lifted the lid on the severed finger, “I’m borderline berserk right now.  One wrong move on anyone’s part and I’m going to start ripping body parts off screaming people. I’m holding on by a thread. If what I saw on the DVD has put me in this state of mind, imagine what it’s going to do to Bobby and Philipe. You guys’re like brothers. Most of you can keep a level head, but those two are going to go off the deep end.”

             
Wincing, Gus looked away from the finger, and into her eyes through the glasses. “Mark and I can handle the boys.  But before we do this, take off the shades.”

             
Knowing he’d ask, Carmen pulled them off and then raised her eyes to meet his.  When he opened his mouth to ask, she held up a hand. “No, Gus. You don’t have the right to ask and I’m not ready to talk about it. However...” Carmen leaned close and let him see exactly what burned within the depths of her feline eyes. “I want the person responsible for every violation of my father and I want him on his knees begging for mercy he won’t get.”  She slipped the glasses back on. “By the way, I’d rather not have to explain the eyes to anyone else until it’s necessary. Now get everyone in here.”

                                                                                    *****

             
Michelle put an ice pack over Carmen’s jaw. “Well, I’d say this went over like a lead balloon.” She muttered sarcastically as she glared at the two unconscious bodies on the ground in the security room.

             
Carmen winced. “Be thankful you weren’t in there when they used the strap on in the DVD.  It took three of us to hold down one of them and a Glock 9 in the face of the other to keep them from getting out the door and tearing people to pieces.  If I hadn’t warned them about the whole thing, I think there wouldn’t have been any stopping them.”

             
By the end of the video, everyone had at least one serious bruise and Rick had a broken nose before Gus got the bright idea to sucker punch both men. Now they were laid out on the floor, being tended to by their friends.  Mark and Gus were talking with Logan, Lois and Carla off by one of the monitors. Fortunately, for her, she hadn’t lost her glasses. Those questions weren’t something she wanted to answer at the moment.

             
A gentle hand touched her shoulder. “Carmen?”  She looked up into
The
Rogue’s
masked face.

             
“I’m okay. Michelle, can you get everyone together. I think I have an idea to get all the birds with buckshot and a solid slug blast.” Carmen leaned back in the chair she sat in.

             
“Sure boss.” She walked over to the other group.

             
“Sean,” she whispered softly. “Set your performances up for an Egyptian theme. Because I have a feeling the shit’s gonna hit the fan with one goddess in the audience and probably a pissed off one once
the necklace comes off.” 

             
He nodded. “Already in the works. How are you holding up?”

             
She sighed. “I’m still feeling like I want to tear things to pieces, but it can be put on hold until we get my dad and get him out of reach of anyone.  He’s going to be in a bad way when they find where ever they have him. I want him whole and safe, Sean. I don’t want him to go through this.”

             
“None of us do, Carmen.”  Mark walked in, followed by the other members of both teams. Gus
and Rick were present while Bobby and Philippe were still unconscious. “Michelle mentioned you had a plan?”

Before she could explain, Khan showed up.  Slowly, he padded through the group, silent as a shadow, yet very visible in his black and white fur. His sudden appearance produced the expected reactions
.

             
“Holy shit!”

             
“What the Fuck!”

             
“How in hell did a tiger get in here?”

             
As most of her people were used to the big cat, they merely stepped out of the way to let him through. The others, however, began reaching for weapons. Hidden or otherwise.  Even she could sense the fear pouring off the team. 
Better diffuse this whole mess before someone gets shot.
She thought.
“Ease off, guys, you know better than to draw down on
The
Rogue’s
bodyguard.” She put
the ice pack on the table. “Or don’t you guys ever read the entertainment section?”  Holding out her hand, Khan padded over and cuddled, then put his head in her lap.

             
Gus backed up to the wall, holding his Glock in a two handed stance.  At her words, he pointed it at the floor, but didn’t ease up. “The cat aint even restrained, Carmen! What happens if it goes on a rampage?”

             
“Look at me, Gus.”  She spoke in a commanding voice.  When he didn’t, she lowered her voice a bit more and added more force to it. “
Gus. Look at Me.”

             
Startled, he looked up to meet his reflection in her glasses. 

             
“Look at my face.” Her hand went up to touch the scars, both old and new. “I was attacked by a snow leopard which had been tortured beyond its endurance. I know what a rogue cat can do. There would’ve been a time when my guns would have beaten yours to the draw, but not now. Not this time. Khan is special. He’s no danger to anyone in this room.” Her hand scratched behind Khan’s ears and was rewarded by a nibble. “How do you think
The
Rogue
gets away with what he does after the show most of the time? Now put the damned gun up and get your ass over here.”

             
Khan’s mental voice caressed her mind. “
Geeze, Big Bad men almost stampede for the door at the first sign of the unknown. I’d laugh if I were in human form.”

             
As Gus edged closer, she sent a shaft of thought to the cat. “
Duncan, damn
it. You should know better than to pull a stunt like this. Now act like a good cat or else I’ll get the spray bottle and the ketamine!”
  To the rest of the room. “Okay,
The Rogue
here is going to be doing
a week long run of performances here in Las Vegas. My team’s job, as per our contract, is to keep him out of trouble.  Unfortunately, there are several factors which are getting in the way of us keeping to our job. I’ve got plans in the works to get the major players all together in one spot for one performance. Ahmed gave us a week to find him. I’ve got a damned good idea where he’ll be during the last performance. Because his father’s not gonna let him ignore a summons to join him in the front row.” Carmen looked up at Sean. “The invites gone out. Sheik Ali Hamadi and his wife will be joining us for your final performance.  My boss will call me when the Sheik gets back to her about Friday‘s performance. Yasmeen and her brother will be expected to show up as well to spend time bonding with the family.”

             
She looked at her dad’s friends. “Who here has the clearance to get the government goons off Daria Randall’s ass?  Her phones are bugged and they’ve been harassing her almost every other day with questions about clients and she’s getting very annoyed.” No hands showed and she frowned, “Okay, so don’t let me know. But get them off her ass before she and I start discussing sexual fantasies over the phone lines. If you know anything about women, my friends, we can get very inventive about who and what we will do to a man if given the opportunity.  Should those fantasies involve those listening in, I don’t think their superiors would appreciate it if those tapes became public knowledge.”

             
Shuffling feet and embarrassed coughs greeted her statement and Carmen allowed herself a small smile of satisfaction. “I’m sure my point was just made. Now, I have an idea, but I’m going to toss it out for you guys to mull over. Rick?  Who had surveillance on dad’s ring when he was taken?”

             
“I did.”  Rick nodded.

             
“Fine. You and Logan get together and see what you can do about finding out where he was when he got taken.” Carmen lifted her hand to show Rick the ring, “I found the pinhole, Rick. Something must have shown in the video. See if you can’t ID some of the people on the video from the ring and the DVD. If it’s Sam Lodina, I want him. Badly. He’s already been on my shit list for a while, and I want him to know exactly how far over the line he’s gone.” She looked at everyone else in the room. “You find him, you keep him safe because I have a few things I want to say to him.”

             
They nodded.

             
“Okay.
The Rogue
is going to do his Egyptian themed performance on Friday.  If all goes as planned, the entire Hamadi family, as I have said, will be there. If they’re at the performance, they won’t be where dad is.” She looked at Gus, “Your job, right? To get the goods on Yasmeen and Ahmed’s human slave trade?”

             
He nodded. “Top priority as a matter of fact.”

             
“Good. You can use the kidnapping and torture of one of your own to raid and/or get the evidence from wherever Dad is being kept. Got it?  I want you to let me know when he’s free. The show is what,
Rogue
, an hour long?”

             
Sean nodded. “I can possibly extend it to an hour and a half, but people begin to lose interest if it goes on any longer.”

             
“You have an hour. Dad has got to be out and gone to a safe place by the end of the performance.  Leave the rest of it to my team. Do you want to leave the sleeping beauties with me and let me put them somewhere on my security team? Or will they behave themselves in the situation they might find themselves in?”

             
Bobby sat up with a groan. “We’ll control ourselves, Carmen.”  He rubbed his chin and glared at Gus before sighing. “Even if I have to cold cock
Philippe myself.”

             
Carmen nodded. “The moment you radio me with the extraction, we can take out the two who
will be at the show on Friday. Agreed?”

             
Nods all the way around.

             
“Okay, everyone knows what’s going on, get busy
and work the scenarios.  You’ve got,” Carmen glanced at the calendar. “Five days.”
             

             
Chapter Ten

              “Damn it... What’s taking them so long?” Carmen snarled for the hundredth time during the introduction of
The Rogue
to the stage. “And who the hell decided I should be out on stage. I’m supposed to be back behind the wings. Not out in front of the stage lights. Geeze.”  She angrily swiped at the skin tight robes of peacock blue the production crew had stuck her in, then reached up to scratch underneath the black wig, only to remember the whole thing integrated into the leather cat mask covering most of her face. At least they modified the costume to allow for the shoulder holster and the two throwing knives, one for each vambrace.

 
              Somehow, someone had convinced Sean to choose a woman to play the role of the goddess Bast. The same someone pointed out she would be the perfect setup.
Thanks Isis. I detect your manipulative hand in all this.

             
As if in response, a familiar voice whispered across her mind,
“You’re quite welcome, Carmen. By the way, we’re all out front. Ahmed, Bast, his father, and backup.”

             
“Let me guess. Otherworldly backup, right?  A pair
of people
politely asked my boss where I was?”

             
A moment of startlement.  “
How did you guess?”

             
Carmen allowed a smile to cross her face.
Oh, just a few things.  My boss, Daria, mentioned a couple of people asking for my whereabouts. Not being demanding and from the tone of my boss’s voice, they were pretty polite about the whole thing. Not like those damned government people.  So tell me, who else is
pulling the mundane `I’m pretending to be a human so I can rescue a goddess’ routine?’

             
A soft chuckle echoed in her head.  “
Would you believe Ma’at and Anubis?”

             
“We’re fucked.” Carmen muttered to herself.  “
Gods, you’ve got the entire gang here tonight. Oh, wait, Osiris hasn’t put in a showing yet, has he? Please tell me the Sun god is sleeping and won’t burn down the house if he’s disturbed?”

             
“Relax, Carmen, you’ll do fine. Your father’s friends are closing in on him as we speak. We have helpers to keep all of them from harm. Trust me. Now quit worrying like a mother hen and concentrate on your end of the job.”
Isis’s mind voice took on the stern tone of a confident mother keeping her child in line.

             
Carmen stretched a bit more then moved back into the shadows to sit in the cool darkness and pressed a tab on her robes, “Give me a check in please, by the numbers.  And no smart ass remarks about the costume. You can razz me later about it.”

              Suppressed snickers reached her, but they began to check in. 

             
“Michelle here. Catwalk’s clear except for the crew keeping the electrical stuff intact.”

             
“Carla here, Louis is prowling the front entrance and keeping an eye on the side doors. I’m in the back, keeping an eye on the emergency exits and working my way back and forth to check on the dressing rooms.”

             
Logan on next, “Nothing on the monitors...whoa! Hold the phone. Contact on monitor five.  Khan’s quiet room. Getting a close up. Shit, it’s Lodina carrying a plastic baggie.”

             
Blinking, Carmen looked around to orient herself with the back stage. “Get security over there... now.  Take him down and put him in a holding pen.” A sick dread began to form in her stomach as she moved away from the curtains on the one side of the stage. She had a while before she needed to put in her appearance. Right now
The Rogue
was oooing and ahhing the audience with some special effects and pyrotechnic creations. Slowly, she formed the thoughts in her head as she moved. “
Sean, keep going, you’re doing fine. We just nailed Sam.  However, he was just caught coming out of Khan’s room with a baggie. Not sure what it contained, but I’m about to find out.”

             
His mental voice caressed her mind as he waited for the rest of the troupe to finish with the illusion by dancing and gyrating around the `sacrifice’. 
Be careful.

             
Moving as fast as she could in her costume without ripping it off her body, she managed to get to the door a couple minutes after the security team did.  Sam had been summarily handcuffed and held against the wall.  No one was yelling, no one spoke a word except to talk on the radios and clear the hallway. The head of security, a big burly man named Max Morris, looked confused as he sniffed the baggie, then arched an eyebrow at Carmen. “You wanted us to take down a guy for feeding  the tiger catnip?”

             
Reigning in what she really wanted to say, Carmen looked the guy in the eyes. “Mr. Morris, let me ask you something. What would be the odds of someone knowing where Khan is being housed, let alone being trusted enough to bring him something like this?”

             
He shook his head. “Almost zero.”
 

             
“Right. Now, what do you think will happen if this person were carrying catnip soaked with antifreeze or some other poison?  How do you think
The Rogue
will feel if he has to put his pet to sleep?”

             
“Uh?”

             
Carmen leaned down nd pulled off the wig and the mask and got into his face, fortunately everyone had been told she was wearing cat eye contacts. “Here’s the kicker. Tigers react to catnip the same way a regular cat does. Now get him into a holding room and I’ll deal with him in a few. Right now I want this corridor cleared of everyone except for me and my associate.”

             
“Yes Ma’am.” Max blanched at the thought of a rampaging cat around the backstage, then got everyone out of the way.

             
Carla chuckled. “You do have a way with words, don’t you?”

             
Carmen leaned against the wall. “I hate imbeciles who don’t understand what’s going on. Trust me, I would have just loved to be the first one here when he stepped out the door. I wanted to castrate the little fucker after what he’s done. On second thought, I’m glad they were here first. Getting the boss lady to bail me out of jail for cruel and unusual circumstances isn’t my idea of a good time.”

             
Something heavy hit the door of Khan’s room, making them both jump. Carla laughed shakily. “I hate it when things like this happen. I’ve got enough adrenaline running through my system this time around, I don’t need any more.” She glanced uneasily at the barrier between the tiger and herself. “What happens now?”

             
“I’ve got to go in there and see what’s going on.”
Duncan!  Talk to me. Are you all right?

             
Carmen? Help me! I can’t seem to control myself. The little bastard got me with catnip before I could shred his sorry ass.  We’re scheduled to go on in fifteen minutes and if I can’t get this whole shit under control, thing’s going to be bad.”
The exhausted mind voice was tinged with worry and fear.

             
“Carla, put everyone on notice. I’ll have my earphone in, but don’t talk to me unless it’s news of Dad getting somewhere safe, Okay? Any interruptions might set off Khan and I don’t need any more scars thanks.”

             
Before she left, the Carla turned and gave her boss a big hug. “You’ve been a great lady to work for, Carmen. Even if the rest of the team doesn’t show it, we all appreciate you and are honored to work for you. So you be careful and stay in one piece.”  Then disappeared down the hallway, leaving Carmen looking like a stunned ox.

             
Opening the door, Carmen swallowed the niggling thread of fear which wormed its way up her spine, and waved a hand slightly, “Khan. It’s just me. I’m coming in.” When nothing happened, she eased more of herself into the room, glancing at the wreckage. At first she didn’t see him, but when she shut the door, a faint huffing growl came from the far corner. On closer inspection, four paws waved lazily in the air as they batted at something only he could see.
“Isis? I’m going to need a bit of help here. Duncan got a big dose of catnip.  If he can’t go on stage in fifteen minutes, something is going to tip off Ahmed and Yasmeen. Unless they’re the ones who ordered this. I don’t know.”
She ground her teeth in frustration. “
Damn. I’m letting my emotions rule me again.”

             
Soft laughter invaded her thoughts. “
Keep calm.  Both of those two are seeing only what we want them to see at the moment.” 

             
“Thanks a lot, Isis!” she muttered.  Slowly, she approached the stoned cat. Carefully, Carmen stepped around an overturned table to crouch near him. “Duncan, come on mi amigo. We don’t have time to slowly flush the shit out of your system. The only way I can do it is to jump start your body with one of two ways. One is pleasure. Which I know you’d enjoy, but we’d have to work at keeping you in at least partially human form.”

             
“And the other?”

             
“Pain.”  Carmen winced. “The only way to do it right is to cause you pain. I don’t think I can do it. You and Sean have had enough pain in your lives already.”

             
He rolled to his feet and wobbled his way over to her. As he walked, his figure began to blur as he went from four feet to collapsing onto his hands and knees, panting heavily. “Carmen, you have to make a hard choice, love. Whatever happens, we’d best do it fast. The clock is ticking and I can’t hold this form too much longer. While I would love to pleasure you, we’d best do pain.” With no warning, he sucker punched her in the jaw, sending her flat on the floor.

             
Falling back, shocked at the sudden attack, she held up her hands as her back took the brunt of the hard floor slamming into her back.  Grunting, she watched his eyes as he made the leap forward, intent on following through with his attack.  Fortunately for her, he gave her all the openings she could ever hope for.  Her fists connected with his nose and ribs.  She’d pull her punches just enough to not break anything, just cause a lot of pain.

             
Duncan’s fists were doing the same amount of damage, leaving bruises and a few red marks along the hard line of her jaw. Nothing a little ice and some downtime wouldn’t cure. In the meantime, she watched as his eyes slowly lost their glazed look and returned to normal. Finally, he backed off and held up his hands in surrender, grinning like a fool.

             
“You know, a good kick in the nuts would have done just as well.”

             
Carmen laughed and spit some blood on the floor from a split lip. “Yeah, but I prefer not to use the oh so obvious woman’s weapon if at all possible. To me, it seems like cheating. We don’t have anything dangling which could be grabbed, twisted, or kicked to cause excruciating pain.”  Waving a hand in the air to prove her point she sighed. “Besides, I’d feel really guilty if you walked funny during the performance. It’d ruin your chances of finding a cute female tiger to nibble and mmmph!”

             
Duncan grabbed her and slammed her back against the hard door while lowering his mouth to hers in a savage kiss. His hands roamed up her legs to pause at the straps holding a small, two shot Derringer in a thigh holster.  Slowly he moved upwards as he deepened his kiss, brushing his fingers along the line of her thong. 

             
Carmen was lost in a sea of molten passion. Her entire body felt like even the smallest caress in the right spot would make her explode. Time seemed to stand still as she wrapped her arms around his neck and opened her legs to him.  All she could think of was getting him inside her right then. Moaning into his mouth, she wriggled her hips, aching for relief as she slowly bit down onto his lower lip, intent on tasting his blood.

             
“You’re clear to go, Carmen.”  Her dad’s pain ravaged voice through her ear phone. “I’m out and safe, now get those assholes. I don’t care how.”

             
Seconds later, Carla pounded on the door. “You’ve got one minute to get your butts out of there and into place on the stage.”

             
It took two seconds for Carmen to gasp for air, then grin. “Ten seconds, Michelle, and have the mask ready.  Dad’s safe so we can kick ass and take names.”

             
Duncan trembled against her. “Damn,” he growled. “Murphy’s Law strikes again”

             
Carmen began to laugh. “Okay big boy, its tiger time. Be nice and
we can have this done in time for a nice lobster dinner and tons of wild sex in the penthouse.”

             
Duncan backed off while his body made the transformation back to tiger. The moment he did, Carmen muttered into the mike, “Okay children, show time. We’re coming out, clear the hallway.”