Edge

Chapter 68

“POGUE… WHAT HAPPENED?” I was as delighted to see him as I was surprised he’d survived.

He said nothing and when I continued to look him over he repeated his request: “Water?”

“Sure. Sorry.” I handed him a bottle. He drank about half and upended the rest over his head. He rubbed his eyes and looked past me at a med tech. “Any chance you could take a look at this?” A nod at his burned arm. He coughed hard and spat. Made a face at the taste of scorch in his mouth.

Two medics got him sitting. He refused requests both to lie down and to take a painkiller. A tech began to cut his sleeve. “Don’t do that!” Pogue barked and unzipped then pulled off the jacket. “Why cut it?”

The burn looked bad but Pogue lost interest as the men went to work.

“What happened?” I repeated. “How did you…?”

“I got trapped in the corner, ’cause of the fire. Managed to make it up the stairs on the balcony but they tossed another phos grenade up there. I took the last hostile out but the flames were pretty intense by then. I went down an elevator shaft to the basement, conked my noggin. Came to about a half hour ago and didn’t know what I’d find out front so I tracked down a back fire exit.”

I told him that Loving had done much the same.

“Why’re you limping?”

I explained.

“Ouch. You nailed his ass, though, I heard.”

“Not me. Ryan Kessler.”

A snicker. “Well now. How’d that happen?”

“Joanne.”

Pogue grunted. “Hm… The wife sprung him. He going to be okay?”

“Seems so.”

Pogue’s face wrinkled up, maybe from the pain as the dressing went on his burned arm or maybe from seeing my smile that he was alive.

“That’s one feisty girl. Pepper spray. Fucked up our plans. But it was good to see that prick hurt, have to say.”

Grit…

“The primary?” he asked, looking over the expanse of fields, with a dozen highways beyond.

“Loving warned him off. But I’ve got some good leads. My associate’s following them up right now.” I thanked him again for everything and we agreed to stay in touch. If he ever wanted to leave his organization, I’d hire him in a minute. Though he didn’t seem the sort to run away from a threat as a first impulse, which is what we shepherds are trained to do.

I pushed off from the fire truck, which I was leaning on for support, and put some weight on my foot with the raw toe.

Damn, it hurt. I exhaled softly. Thinking, if I actually had had information about Amanda’s whereabouts, how long could I have held out before I talked? I would have talked, of course. There are differing opinions about whether torture leads to valid information. But one thing it definitely leads to is talking. People may be intent on remaining silent but in the face of pain they will talk.

I returned to my car and sat in the driver’s seat, eyes closed, and let the tears from the stinging pepper spray flow, which for some reason eased the pain. Bottled water didn’t do much but tears helped.

Fifteen minutes later I got an email. I wiped my face and, squinting, read what Claire duBois had sent in response to my request not long before.

As I read it I was thinking of the phenomenon of endgame.

Although the concept can apply to many games, it is most common in chess, which is where I study the subject exhaustively.

As the middle game draws to a close and the endgame approaches, a fundamental change occurs in the players’ attitudes, and, I swear, a macabre eeriness descends over the board. The surviving pieces take on different roles and importance. For instance, pawns become vital; not only can they move to the opponent’s first line and become queens but they provide important defensive barriers that limit the other player’s moves. Similarly the king spends most of the game in hiding, protected by his minions. But in endgame, he often must go on the offensive himself.

Each move is intensified. The odds of a single error leading to defeat rise dramatically as the match draws to a close.

Endgame is rife with improvisation, desperation, flashes of brilliance and instances of fatal panic.

There are many surprises too.

I stared at my notes from Amanda and at Claire’s email for some minutes. As Pogue had said earlier, I’d had all the bits of information as to why Amanda was the target; I just hadn’t put them together… until now. I considered my endgame strategy and I composed another email that began with a stern warning to keep the contents absolutely secret. The subject had to do with the Saturday course that Amanda Kessler took at a local community college, taught by a part-time professor named Peter Yu. He worked during the week for a software developer, Global Software Innovations, and it was he who distributed to Amanda and the other students beta copies of software to try out-like the picture editing program that Amanda had given Maree.

But the most interesting fact about Yu was that GSI did more than create commercial and consumer software. The company-and Yu’s specialty, as it turned out-happened to be developing military programs for cutting-edge battlefield imagery analysis. The software for those applications was classified at the highest level.

I finished my email and read through it once more.

My finger hovered for a moment. Then I clicked SEND and sent my words into the ozone.