Part 24 (1/2)

GI Bolton continued. ”After this general introduction, we'll be adjourning to Rock Creek Park for some low-level introductory parkour-by which I mean, the kind that isn't likely to get you killed, but ought to be fun.”

More nods. More murmurs. Not from me.

But I caught the lieutenant's eye. Or he caught mine, as the case may be. Regardless, I saw him looking just a smidge too long, and something about the gaze felt intensely curious beyond the expected. I wanted to close my eyes-they were getting dry, pried open corpse-like as I sat there-but I didn't. I held my unblinking ground and tried to use my psychic feelers, even though they were kind of s.h.i.+t in this sort of situation.

Too many people. Hard to single out just one. Too many s.h.i.+t-head boys thinking inappropriate (yet immensely flattering) thoughts about me.

Mostly I made them uncertain, it seemed. They didn't know girls were invited into this clubhouse, and at least one a.s.shole in the front row was hoping that I wasn't any good at this parkour thing. I swear, some men just can't stand the thought of being beaten by a woman. At anything. Funny. In my experience, and as a matter of irony, they're the men who most desperately need a good a.s.s-kicking.

I was aware of Cal's...well, not his thoughts thoughts exactly. More like the presence of thoughts, or the presence of exactly. More like the presence of thoughts, or the presence of him him-sitting ramrod-straight in his chair, displaying better posture than I'd seen him use yet. He was antsy, and fighting the impulse to look over his shoulder at me. For rea.s.surance? For confirmation that I was present? I couldn't tell. His motives were too tangled for me to do more than scan him. I wished for a second that I had Ian's link with him, and I could pa.s.s along a tiny nudge of encouragement. But I didn't have that link, so when I concentrated hard and thought, right at the back of his head, You're doing a good job. Keep your eyes on the beefy grunt up front You're doing a good job. Keep your eyes on the beefy grunt up front. I had no way of knowing whether or not he'd heard me.

”We have a van outside to take us to the park,” the grunt up front announced, and I realized I'd probably missed a few key phrases while I was doing my amateur-hour psychic spelunking. ”Though the park is open to the public, we have special permission from the park service to cordon off one acre for use with our activities. Some of you guys who've been doing this longer can go ahead and get your p.i.s.sing and moaning out of the way now, but the newbies have to start somewhere, and this is a safe place to test your physical capacity and your commitment to the sport. Any questions?”

I raised my hand so swiftly that it would've shocked anyone who'd watched me do it. But no one was watching, much to my chagrin. The hand successfully drew Bolton's attention, though, and he pointed at me. The finger-point was accompanied by that gaze, the same one that I'd felt earlier. It was not exactly a knowing gaze, but a suspicious one.

I had the floor, so I asked, ”I know what parkour is and I'm pretty sure I'll be fine, but I want to know what that other thing is.”

”What other thing?”

”The other thing you said, at the beginning. Urban exploring. What's that?” As if I didn't know. I thought of my storehouse, and of Domino and Pepper, and it was all I could do to keep from seething.

I felt it more intensely, when he looked at me now. His interest was less a vague fog in a room full of mist, and more like a flashlight beam. ”We'll get to that later.”

”Well, before we get to it, I want to know what it is.” Really, I wanted to get his attention and get him talking. I wanted him to look at me and know that something was wrong.

I lucked out and a couple of the other guys in front of me were ignorant on the matter, and they mumbled that they, too, would like some information. I was half afraid Cal would chime in, but he didn't.

Good ghoul, Cal. Don't agree with me too much. Don't even notice me. Don't forget, you're mostly here in case something goes horribly, horribly wrong.

”All right,” Bolton relented. The irritated twitch to one eyebrow told me that this was considered jumping some gun, somewhere, and that I'd derailed his evening's lesson plans. But he was game, and so he said, ”Urban exploration is, at its core, a propensity toward trespa.s.sing in abandoned buildings. It doesn't always go hand in hand with parkour, but you could...I don't know. You could think of it as a master's cla.s.s in parkour, if you wanted to.”

”A master's cla.s.s with night-vision goggles and burglary gear?” I followed up, knowing I was pus.h.i.+ng my luck and wondering if it wasn't too much-if he didn't have some secret panic b.u.t.ton hidden in his uniform, or a lackey at the table behind me. Any moment, the doors could burst in and armed maniacs from Project Bloodshot (or whatever it'd morphed into) would take me away and drop me in a bas.e.m.e.nt on an island, never to be seen again.

Or I could needle the f.u.c.ker a little more and trust my powers of bulls.h.i.+t and escape to see me through. I squeezed the handles of my go-bag and it gave me confidence. Maybe undue confidence. It didn't matter.

”No,” he barked. ”We don't do that kind of thing.”

Everybody in the room instantly thought he was lying.

He stuck to his guns anyway. ”It's not a master's cla.s.s because anybody's burglarizing anything. It's a master's cla.s.s because there's a lot of legal legwork to untangle, making sure that the abandoned buildings are actually abandoned, and that they don't belong to anybody who'll prosecute if you get caught. Working your way up to urban exploration also means you go out there with a good working knowledge of the distinctions between breaking-and-entering and merely trespa.s.sing, and the legal hairsplitting that can mean the difference between jail time and a slap on the wrist. But since that's the master's cla.s.s and this is the bunny slope, we're going to save that for later, Miss...”

He was clearly cueing me to give him a name, so I said, ”Raylene. Raylene Spade.”

”Spade, very nice,” he said, and I felt a stab of condescension that said he knew for a fact that I was lying. I didn't like the condescension because it had come radiating off him, flaring through my psychic radar like a laser beam, not a flashlight. Oh yes. He knew something now, or he suspected it so positively that the semantics wouldn't mean the difference between saving my a.s.s and becoming a pain in his.

”Something funny about that?” I played it cool.

”Not at all, Miss Spade. But we'll save the UE talk for later and for now, if you don't mind, we'll talk bra.s.s tacks instead.”

What a stupid expression. There were no tacks involved, and not much that any idiot who'd ever seen a cop show on television couldn't have sussed out. That which followed was a miniature thesis on how to fall without breaking an ankle, how to roll without bas.h.i.+ng your head in, and how to climb without tearing all the skin off your knees. It was basically a twenty-minute starter cla.s.s on stunt falls, and I could see how it might be useful to some of the pasty-faced high-schoolers present, but I had to pretend to give it my rapt attention while my real attention wandered elsewhere.

Near as I could gather-a qualifier that was in no way authoritative-Bolton seemed to be alone, insomuch as he seemed to be the only military representative present. If anyone else was there on Uncle Sam's dime, he was out of uniform and keeping his allegiances to himself. But as I'd previously speculated, that didn't mean Bolton didn't have an easy means of summoning more of his camo-uniformed buddies at a moment's notice.

I didn't really know anything. I had nothing but suspicion and a c.r.a.ppy psychic sense urging me to play my cards carefully. I kept an eagle eye on Bolton as he pranced back and forth up front, lacking only a long wooden pointer and a blackboard to be a junior caricature of Patton himself. Wait. Did Patton have either of those things? Or just a big American flag behind him? Maybe I'm confusing him with John Madden.

Things eventually wound down and Bolton quit pacing up front, announcing that this was the time for people to finish up coffee and use the restroom before getting into the van and heading out to the park. And just this once, the line for the men's room was the slow-moving one.

Actually, I think there was only one bathroom, one small single-seater with a naked yellow bulb and a box of matches for air freshener. Thank Christ I didn't need to go. No woman anywhere wants to follow that filthy man-funk parade to a potty. I may have been functionally dead for a few decades, but some things never change. And trust me, that's one of 'em.

While the boys lined up to do their duty, at least the ones who had to go, I considered sidling up to the lieutenant but he sidled up to me first, giving me quite a start. ”Why h.e.l.lo there,” I said, shooting for casual but idly interested, and ooh, aren't you kind of cute? casual but idly interested, and ooh, aren't you kind of cute? This was a stretch, since his sudden appearance had in no way charmed me and frankly made me a little worried, but this had been the plan, hadn't it? Figure out if he-or anyone else affiliated with the club-knew about my kind. This was a stretch, since his sudden appearance had in no way charmed me and frankly made me a little worried, but this had been the plan, hadn't it? Figure out if he-or anyone else affiliated with the club-knew about my kind.

I hadn't thought past the point where he might. If he were utterly clueless, that'd be one thing. I'd write it off and continue exploring the exciting and aerobic world of parkour for fun and fitness (as the awkward marketing text suggested). But if he knew? About me? I hadn't considered that far in advance. Because it's always the one thing I don't think about that turns around to bite me in the a.s.s.

He said, ”Hey. You new in town?” Only it didn't sound like a line. It sounded like he actually wanted to know, in a calculating fas.h.i.+on.

”Sort of.”

”I can't place your accent.”

”Oh. I wasn't aware that I had one,” I said coyly. I knew I didn't have one. I'd been in the Northwest long enough to have matched the bland diction that's so common there. Unless you want to argue that the absence of an accent is an accent in itself, in which case I'd have to kick you in the s.h.i.+ns. And I can kick very hard.

”Where'd you move here from?”

”I haven't moved here from anywhere. Just visiting. Saw your flyer. Thought I'd check this out on my free night. It was either this or wander around on the lawn with a map of the big white monuments, trying to tell the difference and deciding whether or not to care.”

He grunted like a man from a tourist town who'd already seen all the tourist bits himself. ”Okay. Welcome, then.”

Standing so close like that, almost right up against me in a fas.h.i.+on that might be considered hara.s.sment under different circ.u.mstances, he was a whole G.o.dd.a.m.n cl.u.s.ter of laser beams, projecting his intentions like a searchlight on a river. He'd locked on to me, and I didn't like it. I didn't like his welcome. I didn't want it. And suddenly I didn't want to be anywhere near him, and I considered bolting on the spot except that a flash of panic kept me standing there, not quite touching this guy and not quite running away.

”Thanks,” I said. My mouth was dry. His was predatory. I lowered my voice, thinking it might be best to barrel forward, rather than play patty-cake politics until he could rouse the cavalry and have me carted off. So I said, ”Maybe we could take a moment to talk in private, eh, Lieutenant?”

”Why would we do that?” Ah. Not stupid. Not wanting to be alone with me, even though a casual observer might've a.s.sumed that was all he wanted. The body language is not so different, when you watch it from afar.

”Because I want to ask you some questions. And you want to ask me some, too, or maybe you don't want to ask me anything. Maybe you just want to get the h.e.l.l away from me and get on with your Cub Scout activities.”

”You're quite a-”

I turned to face him full-on, letting him get a good and nasty look at my too-black eyes and my too-white skin with the fragile blue veins crawling spider-like beneath it. I wasn't wearing any makeup and that, too, had been deliberate. ”Look buddy,” I growled, still keeping it quiet. ”I know about your program, and I know what you're doing here, rounding up these a.s.sholes for reconnaissance.” I used Major Bruner's word. The one that gave me the shakes if I thought about it too hard.

”You don't know d.i.c.k, d.i.c.k,” he argued.

Trying to lure him now, trying to draw him outside, I turned my back to him halfway and began to ooze toward the rearward door where the back stairs appeared to be. ”d.i.c.k? Oh, I know him. But I think his name is actually Bruner,” I sneered, keeping close watch on his face as I retreated.

”Boss?” somebody said. One of the young grunts, the parkour acolytes.

”Not now!” he hissed, reaching out to take me by the arm.