Chronic fear

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Gundersson had been caught by surprise when the couple returned early. Their walks were usually twenty minutes, and over the last three days, he’d taken the opportunity to search the downstairs and the bathroom. He’d been searching the loft, looking for any signs of Seethe, when Roland’s boots banged on the porch below.

Gundersson had lifted the screen from the window above the bed, swung it up on its hinges, and climbed through, dangling by his fingers to lessen the distance of the drop. Still, it was good twelve feet, and when he hit the ground, his ankle twisted on a tree root. The chickens had squawked in alarm, and Gundersson hissed a quiet curse of pain.

He heard them talking inside the house, ignoring the chickens, and he made his way into the woods. The pain was worse by the time he reached the trail. He crouched beside the creek and massaged his ankle, waiting to see if someone would notice the window. He was good at leaving no trace, a real Boy Scout.

The forest immediately around the cabin was dense with laurel tangles, crabapples, and blackberry vines, pocked here and there with old-growth oaks and maples like the one he used as a surveillance post. He didn’t have time to reach the tree, and he wasn’t sure he could climb it with his game leg, anyway.

Then the argument had started, and he figured he might overhear something important despite the gurgling of the water over stones. He caught “Sebastian Briggs” and he figured “Alexis” referred to Dr. Morgan, which suggested the couples had been in contact. But the sudden explosion of Roland’s anger caught him unaware, and now Wendy was running right toward him.

He rolled to his feet and lightning raced up his leg. He put weight on the injured ankle and realized he’d never make it to concealment.

Might be broken.

His orders were clear: Avoid detection at any cost. He couldn’t afford to blow this mission through overconfidence. And he’d been warned what would happen if he was forced to leave corpses.

I’ll chew your ass like bubble gum and leave you stuck on the director’s toilet seat, Harding had said.

Wendy was coming up the trail about twenty yards from Gundersson, slapping at limbs and panting hard as she ran. He glanced around and saw a tiny recess where water had washed away soil beneath a hemlock’s roots. He lay down in the cold, shallow water and wriggled into the damp crevice. He wasn’t completely concealed, but he hoped they were too preoccupied to notice.

“I know you’re in there!” Roland shouted, just now entering the woods, apparently moving a little more slowly than she was.

Is he talking to me? Shit, if he saw me “Wendy!” Roland sounded more angry than concerned.

Ah, a lover’s spat. With firearms.

Through a gnarled web of exposed roots, he watched Wendy jog along the trail, lithe and graceful but gasping for air. She was dressed in her stained painter’s frock, a psychedelic camouflage that would hide her in a Phish concert but not here in the Blue Ridge forest. Then she was gone, and Gundersson lifted himself from the bone-chilling water.

Roland had stopped yelling for Wendy, so Gundersson couldn’t place his location. The bracing water had numbed his ankle a little, so he hobbled onto the opposite bank and found refuge in the scrub. He considered drawing his weapon, but that wouldn’t fit his cover story.

After a full minute, he got curious and wriggled like a snake until he could peer through the low willows. Some wild mint crushed beneath him, mixing with the fecund, earthy aroma of the creek. He gingerly pushed a blackberry vine aside and saw Roland scanning the spot where Gundersson had tended his ankle. After a moment, Roland bent down and picked up something from the ground.

Gundersson felt his pants pocket. Shit.

He’d placed three tiny wireless microphones in the cabin, but the place was so small he hadn’t needed the fourth. And it must have worked out of his pocket while he was rolling around in pain.

So much for getting answers the easy way.

“Wendy!” Roland shouted again, the anger leaving his voice. “I found something.”

After a moment, he added, “I’m not going to hurt you.”

Wow. If you actually have to say those words, it’s not a good sign.

Judging by the awkward bulge in Roland’s pocket, he would probably hurt if he had to. And he wasn’t hunting foxes this time.

“Wendy!” Roland called again. “It’s not you. It’s them.”

Gundersson ground his teeth together. On the bright side, at least Wendy was unlikely to find his camp. He’d have to scuttle the mission, and Harding would be an unhappy camper as well, but at least he’d avoided disaster.

All he had to do was wait it out, then limp half a mile through the woods and collect his gear, and “I know,” Wendy called.

From right behind him.

Gundersson rolled up on his side and considered going for his gun. She was unarmed, standing above him with flared nostrils and darkly intense eyes. She wasn’t menacing, given her small stature, but she was crouched and tense as if ready to explode. He wondered if she knew jiu jitsu or karate, and figured that was probably racist, because she was more American than Asian.

He decided to wait on the gun until Roland decided for him.

“Over here,” Wendy called to Roland.

As Roland splashed through the creek, Gundersson managed a smile. “I hope I wasn’t trespassing,” he said to Wendy.

“I hope you weren’t, either. My husband is a little paranoid.”

Gundersson started to agree, but then remembered his cover story. He adjusted his tone to sound casual and a little rural. “I’m a travel writer, doing a piece on backwoods hiking for Appalachian Today. I followed this trail up from Buffalo Bald,” he added, remembering a colorful name from the map. “Twisted my ankle and fell in the creek.”

“Where’s your camera?” Wendy said.

It was in his watch, but he couldn’t tell her that. “I just take notes,” he said. “They send the photographer separately. I can’t even take a mug shot without getting my thumb in the way.”

He tried a disarming smile but her oval face was hard as jade. Roland crashed through the shrubs along the creek bank and gave Wendy a glance before looking down at Gundersson.

“I was just telling your wife here-”

Roland gave him a hard kick in the ribs that drove out both his words and his breath. He raised a hand to ward off the next blow, examining Roland’s posture.

I’d lay four-to-one odds I’ll get my gun out before he does. But then I’d have to kill her, too.

“Who owns you?” Roland said.

“Excuse me?” Gundersson wheezed, giving diplomacy one last feeble attempt. “A magazine, like I told your wife.”

“He said he’s a travel writer,” Wendy said.

“No notebook, no camera, no laptop?” Roland said. “Unless you have a zip drive in your pocket. Do you have a zip drive?”

Gundersson was relieved that Roland hadn’t fished for his gun. He decided he had only one chance to buy some time and maybe even complete the mission.

He sat up, brushing blackberry blossoms from his arms. “Okay,” he said. “Would you believe me if I told you I was a federal agent?”

“Great,” Wendy said. “Tell the most unbelievable lie possible.”

Shell game. Half the truth.

“I’m with the Central Intelligence Agency,” he said, looking directly into Roland’s eyes and not blinking. “We know you’ve been targeted by the National Clandestine Service. And we’re conducting an internal investigation to find out why.”

“What’s he talking about, Ro?” Wendy said.

Roland raised his hand to quiet her, a big change from a minute ago when he’d seemed intent on brutalizing her. But she’d calmed down as well, as if learning to ride out his wild mood swings. He handed her the tiny microphone he’d found.

“Yeah, we got some e-mails,” Roland said. “It made references to the Monkey House trials. If you’re really a fed, you probably know about those.”

Gundersson nodded. He couldn’t believe he was winning Roland’s trust so easily. Uncle Sam might save a few bucks on ammunition today.

“Yeah,” Gundersson said. “Can you keep a secret?”

“That’s our full-time job,” Roland said, with a bitter laugh. Wendy eased over to her husband’s side and gripped his arm in loyalty, as if she’d already forgiven his homicidal rage.

Jesus. I’m glad I’ve never been in love. Talk about shell games.

Gundersson thought about standing, but he didn’t trust his ankle and Roland would consider him less threatening if he maintained an inferior position. But he also wondered if copperheads or water moccasins might be sliding through the weeds and rotten leaves.

“The NCS thinks you guys have the drug Dr. Briggs was testing on you. I’m not supposed to tell you this but…”

Gundersson licked his lips. Neither Roland’s nor Wendy’s faces expressed eagerness. But neither did they show fear. If half the stuff in the file was true, they had faced down more torments than a normal person would undergo in Dante’s nine circles of hell.

He continued. “Somebody in the NCS wants you dead.”

“Yeah, I got the memo,” Roland said, drawing a confused look from Wendy.

“They said it was all destroyed in the fire,” Wendy said. “And we don’t remember anything anyway. The other drug, Halcyon, wiped it all away. At least, that’s how Alexis explained it.”

She said it with such hope, with such a fervent desire to believe the trials had never happened, that Gundersson almost regretted having to drag it all out again. Roland must have worked hard to protect her, but his instability was a lingering effect of the drug exposure.

Another reason why half the truth could get us all killed, including me.

“Look,” Gundersson said. “My job is to keep an eye on you so the NCS doesn’t get what they want.”

Roland’s hand crawled to his pocket, where he cupped the outline of the gun like a teen jock flaunting his package. “And you expect us to believe the U.S. government is interested in protecting the rights and the lives of ordinary American citizens?”

Gundersson saw that brand of bullshit wouldn’t fly. So he decided on another half-truth. “If I find Seethe, then I take it back to Washington, the heat follows me, and you guys live the rest of your lives out of the spotlight,” he said. “Once it’s not a secret-at least, not your secret-there’s nothing the NCS needs to take from you.”

“And no need to kill us to keep us quiet.”

“Maybe you need to talk to Alexis,” Wendy said. “She said somebody’s been watching her.”

Gundersson’s heart skipped a beat. Fuck. I knew there were free agents working the case, and I wouldn’t be surprised if the CIA wanted a piece of the action, but maybe somebody’s closer than Harding told me. In which case, I can’t even trust my own people.

“Hush, honey,” Roland said, the supportive husband again. “Let him talk.”

“Can I get up first?” Gundersson said.

Roland took out his revolver and pointed it at Gundersson’s chest. “As long as you can do it without making me nervous.”