A Deeper Blue Page 3
After he had the girls in the van cleaned of the blood, though, he had a problem. None of the girls had homes to go back to. To their parents they were "no deposit, no return." Not only were they, presumably, no longer virgins, the farms in the area were too marginal to bring another mouth back to feed.
The Kildar had, therefore, brought them into his own household as concubines. But he had a very odd view of what to do with harem slaves. The first rule he'd laid down, damn him, was that the girls had to be sixteen before he'd bed them. It was, as he pointed out, younger than his culture would consider "okay" but given that twelve was considered marriageable in the area it was a good median. The second rule he'd laid down was that the girls had to learn. When they were old enough he intended them to move on, to go get a job, go to university, get a husband, have kids, have a "real life."
And he'd been careful and considerate in bedding them. Yes, he occasionally had an evening just to relieve his need, but most of the time the girls returned to the harem half unconscious with endorphins and ready to go back as soon as they recovered. The Kildar was as good in bed as he was in battle. None of the girls who had done so minded bedding him, not one bit.
And then there was the matter of status. This region was very backward and she'd come to understand that. It was not a normal place compared to the U.S. or Europe. But it was the culture she had been raised in. And in that culture, the Kildar had very high status. The Keldara, and the Kildar, were legends in the region long before the present Kildar arrived. It had been a long time since a true Kildar was in the valley, and the old people had bemoaned that. The new Kildar, furthermore, truly had brought back the good times. The Chechens no longer extorted "taxes" and burned farms when they didn't pay up. They no longer stole children. They no longer took the food and livestock. And the money the Kildar brought in—often through killing Islamics which to the mostly Orthodox believers in the area was a good thing—spread out. Things were looking up in the region.
Thus, Martya's status, even as a "harem slave," was far higher than it had been as the daughter of a penniless farmer, much less as a whore. She loved the Kildar for bringing her into his household, for feeding her febrile mind through learning, for giving her status even in her parents' eyes. And she was counting the days to her sixteenth birthday.
But at the moment, she had a problem. The noise from Katya's room was disrupting class. Especially the whooping.
Katya was the one thing in the Kildar's household Martya did not enjoy. The Russian whore was . . . evil. Mean didn't begin to describe it. She would do small, petty, things that she could get away with to hurt the other girls. And there was little they could do about it. The whore was being trained by the Kildar as an "insertion agent," a spy. And the Americans had given her special powers and, notably, poisoned fingernails. Even before she'd started training, all of the girls had feared her. Now they were terrified of her.
But she had changed after the last battle. She hardly put on anyone at all anymore and occasionally did nice things for them. She had fixed Nikki's broken CD player. She had helped Martya with her English lessons.
But the girls weren't willing to place too much faith in the unexplained change. Not with Katya.
So knocking on her door to ask her to turn down the stereo was the last thing that Martya wanted to do. But Tinata had insisted. Nobody was getting anything done.
The music cut off and the door was yanked open. The sight left Martya staring.
Katya was a very beautiful blonde, just medium height with bright blue eyes that could be cold as a shark or innocent as a virgin depending on her choice and mood. At the moment she was looking pissed, but not deadly. What had Martya's attention, though, was that she was wearing a two-piece bathing suit and the top was dangling from her hand, leaving her topless.
The girls, naturally, had often seen each other naked. But answering the door holding the top of your bathing suit was unusual. As was wearing one in the depths of the Georgian winter. It was below zero Celsius outside and blowing hard. A bathing suit didn't make much sense. Even with the heaters, the caravanserai was cold.
"Katya, please," Martya said. "We cannot study with all the noise."
"That's a problem," Katya admitted, lowering the suit. "Because I'm studying."
"What?" Martya said, then noticed that there was another woman in the room. She was older and dressed in Western clothes. Not very pretty even when she was younger, Martya was sure.
"That you don't need to know," Katya replied.
"Can you at least stop the whooping?" Martya asked. "That is what is getting us."
"No, I need to do the whooping," Katya said. "I won't be doing this much longer. I think."
"Okay," Martya said with a sigh. "Sorry to have bothered you."
"No problem," Katya said. "I just need to get back in character."
"Okay," Martya said as the door closed in her face. "What did that mean?"
"I have to wonder if this is really necessary," Katya said, waving the bathing suit back and forth. "And I'm freezing."
"You'd be surprised how cold it can get at Daytona Beach in spring," Jay replied, gesturing with his chin at the muted TV set. "Look at the nipples. Most of those girls are quite cold."
"Yeah?" Katya said, striking a pose. "Well, look at mine."
"I've seen them," Jay replied evenly. "If you're prepared to continue?"
"Why in the hell would I want to be on a 'Girls Gone Wild' video?" Katya asked.
"You don't," Jay replied. "Ever. Be assured of that. But you do need to learn to mimic the actions. Girls like that can get into virtually anywhere but a shield room, and you'd be surprised how many have made it that far. Playing the stupid, wild, partying slut is a very good cover. Among other things, if you have to avoid capture, slipping into that guise is a good way for a girl as good looking as you to disappear. Change your appearance slightly, go into a club and be the sluttiest slut there. Pick up one of the many guys who are hankering for you, take him home and stay there overnight. No hotel room, no traceable apartment. I can think of a thousand reasons to learn this particular cover. That you cannot troubles me."
"This padwan asks the Master's apology," Katya said, bowing with a smirk. "I see what you mean, though."
"Now, let us work on removing the top again," Jay said with a sigh. "I will admit that I'm enjoying the sight, I am heterosexual, but you are just not doing it right. If you'd only spent some time as a stripper it might help. With mental conditioning if nothing else. You have to feel the need to expose yourself and you so dislike the very thought that it is interfering."
"I've been naked in front of many men," Katya said, coldly. "And none of them have ever known I was not happy about it."
"I do," Jay said. "Any trained observer would see it in you. Most men, yes, are not so trained. But it is not those you need fear. If you are in a situation like this the most you need to worry about is a Rohypnol slipped in your drink or date-rape. Don't drink anything you don't see poured by the bartender for the former. Since you are intending to fulfill your side of an implied contract inherent in going home with a male from such a party, you need not fear the latter. You, in fact, need to let go of your fear. That is what is trapping you. You will not be the agent you could be until you stop fearing men."
"I don't fear men," Katya said. "I just want to kill them all."
"Are you refusing to accept my training?" Jay asked calmly.
"No," Katya replied. That was the one agreement between them. Katya would do whatever Jay told her in training and the only punishment was that, if she stopped learning, if she decided she knew more than he, he would simply stop training her.
Since Katya wanted to know it all, she was very careful to be on her best behavior with the master spy.
"Then do not challenge that statement," Jay said. "Especially since it's true. Are you unaware that you fear men or unwilling to admit it?"
"Unwilling to admit it," Katya said after a moment.
"Yes," Katya admitted.
"But these women, these girls, these do not," Jay said, restarting the video. "Watch them carefully. They are enjoying themselves. They have no fear of the stares, of the shouts, of the attention. Oh, a few do. That mousey girl on the left, brown hair and nipples. She is afraid of the attention. Basically introverted I suspect or just raised in a prudish environment. Generally not a problem unless you're in a situation like that. I have no clue why she is up there having ice water dashed on her. A dare from friends? A boyfriend who has psychological power over her? Drink? But she fears. Could you be her? You would have to wrap yourself around your fear, show it, use it, let it blossom in your eyes? Could you do that? And still be the predator you truly are?"
"No," Katya said.
"Then, again, you are not the person you must be," Jay said, stopping the video again. "When you can be that girl, up there on stage in a wet T-shirt contest, on TV no less, afraid of all the consequences, the men suddenly charging the stage, her parents seeing the video, her friends back at college whispering behind her back, guys figuring she's a slut and only after her body, then, padwan, you will be on the road to perfection. But we will concentrate on the blonde in the striped bathing suit again. Now, in character . . . Whoop!"
"Mike, open the damned door," Adams said. The damned wood was hurting his knuckles.
He stepped into the room and looked around. He hadn't been up to Mike's sanctum before but it was pretty cozy. A radiator kept it warm, it had nice paneled walls, the chair looked comfortable. On the other hand, it smelled. Stank, really. Booze—the bottles were all over the place—and just the reek of a person who hadn't washed enough holed up in a small room too long.
"I gotta ask," Adams said. "What's behind the steel plate? Everybody is dying to know. A black hole? A TV? What?"
"None of your God-damned business," Mike said.
Mike Harmon was thirty-seven years old, brown of hair and eye, medium height with a muscular build due to years as a SEAL instructor. An almost prescient talent for silent-kill had earned him the nickname "Ghost" while on the SEAL teams. After sixteen years as a SEAL, mostly an instructor in everything from "direct action" to HALO, he had found himself physically beaten and psychologically unsuitable to the Teams. So he'd gotten out and gone to college. It was a long road to being the Kildar, one with half the terrorists on earth searching for a guy code-named Ghost, but he'd made it every step of the way. The scars on his body, and in his heart, were proof.
"What do you want, Ass-boy?" Mike asked.
"Ass-boy yourself," Adams replied. "We've got a mission."
"I heard," Mike said. "We really don't need the money and I'm tired of laying it on the line over and over and over again. So . . . no."
"I want to go."
"Go."
"I want to take two teams."
Mike finally looked at him, then back at the wall.
"Whatever."
"Is that a 'yes,' O Kildar?" Adams asked angrily.
"Just try not to fuck up too much," Mike said. "Now get out."
"Christ, I really should beat the crap out of you," Adams said.
"Do you really think you could?" Mike asked, his teeth grinding.
"In your current condition?" Adams said. "Hell, yeah. Let me tell you something, Kildar. I had a talk with your team chief after you quit. I wanted to know how such a God-damned good operator could have had his ass fucking fired by a chief I knew had his head on his shoulders. And do you want to know what he said? It had dick all to do with the AD, by the way."
"I could give a fuck less," Mike said. "Now would you get the fuck out?"
"He said you weren't hard-core enough," Adams replied. "Simple as that. You'd gotten soft playing big boy instructor with the meats. You thought it was all a big game, that you could just wave a fucking stress card and get a point for effort. He called you a fucking crybaby. When I pulled you out of that fucking bunker, I couldn't figure what the fuck he was talking about. But he saw it when I didn't. You're a fucking crybaby. So you lost a piece of ass. Ass is cheap, buddy. You got a dozen pieces here in the house. There's more in the Keldara and they're all willing and you know it. So get off your fucking ass!"
"You done?" Mike asked calmly.
"Yeah," Adams said, sighing.
"Go do the mission," Mike said. "Collect a bonus. Then stay in the fucking States. I don't want to see your face again after that door shuts."
"You're fucking firing me?" Adams said, incredulous. "Well then, fuck you, I'll just leave."
"Big mission," Mike pointed out. "American civilians might die. You might stop that. And do you really want the Keldara wandering around the U.S. alone?"
"Fuck," Adams said. "You know just where the buttons are, don't you?"
"You weren't hired for your brains," Mike replied. "By the same token, you should know when you're out of your depth on something. And you just proved you don't. So I don't want you around."
"What the fuck does that mean?" Adams asked.
"You've been married, what? Six times? Which means that you're the perfect SEAL, more balls than brains and no fucking heart at all. It's just a piece of ass. Big fucking deal. Which meant you had no clue what you were just saying. No fucking clue at all. Since you don't even have the introspection to realize that, please leave this room and get the fuck out of my life. Go do the mission and then just . . . leave."
"I should have left you to die in that damned bunker," Adams said, hitting the door control.
"I wish you had," Mike whispered after the door was closed. Then he raised the plate . . . .
Chapter Two
Adams stepped off the plane and breathed deep. Humid as hell and about seventy degrees. Ah, Florida winter.
Homestead Air Force Base was located just south of the city of Miami near the town of Homestead, Florida. The base had once housed a variety of bombers from Strategic Air Command, back in the days when "pad alert" had teeth. But the end of the Cold War had caused various reevaluations of the base, especially given the pressures from the burgeoning Miami area.
However, its strategic location—it was the only base that really had a lock on the Caribbean—had kept it at minimal status. Demoted to an "Air Force Reserve Base" it, nonetheless, maintained a squadron of "reserve" F-16s as an antiterror Combat Air Patrol over the Miami area as well as supported the antidrug planes that patrolled the region.
The old girl was getting a little weary, but hanging in there.
"Mr. Adams?" the officer waiting for them asked, holding out a hand. "I'm Lieutenant Mike Himes, sir. I'm your liaison officer."
"Pleased to meet you, Lieutenant," Adams said. The officer was tall and almost skeletally thin, maybe weighing one-fifty if he was soaking wet. A shock of red hair was apparent under the beret. Adams had learned to read Army doo-dads over the years, though, and the LT was wearing a CIB and a combat patch from the Third ID.
"I've arranged billeting for your personnel on base," the LT continued, waving to the terminal building.
"I think we've got a hotel set up," Adams said. "Sorry about that. The usual clusterfuck. But we'll need someplace to store our gear."
"About that . . . yes," the LT said. "We've got a meeting just about to start you probably should attend. The joint headquarters for the action team
s is here on base. You'll be able to meet all the movers if you know what I mean, sir. And there are some issues to resolve."
"Ain't there always," Adams said with a sigh. "I swear that's why the colonel stayed behind; he didn't want to sit in the meetings."
"Possibly, sir," the LT said. "I've got escorts for your personnel and a truck is on the way to pick up their gear. We'll arrange transport to town. If you could follow me?"
"Hello, my old friend," Kurt said in perfect German. It was, after all, his native language.
He was sitting in an open air bar in Bimini, listening to some really awful rap music. But the view was spectacular since some Canadian girls were down on vacation and seemed to quite enjoy the caterwauling.