Torrent: The first book of Byte short stories Read online

  Torrent

  (A collection of short _bytes)

  By

  Cat Connor

  Torrent is a work of fiction.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons,

  living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved.

  Copyright © 2011 by Cat Connor

  This book may not be reproduced in whole or part, by any means, without permission.

  Making or distributing electronic copies of this book constitutes copyright infringement and could subject the infringer to criminal and civil liability.

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN: 1496125789

  ISBN-13: 9781496125781

  For Chris

  "Yippee-Ki-Yay"

  Acknowledgments

  Special thanks to Sara J Henry and Pat Testerman for being so supportive and quick to offer help.

  Extra special thanks to Admin One and Admin Bubbles for DC and for naming the final bad guy in this short series.

  1 QUAD ESPRESSO AND A MOCHACHINO

  Standing in the lunchtime queue at the bank wasn’t what I wanted to be doing. I conceded it was preferable to listening to Mom’s accusations. That particular joy was way up there with burning in hell. Images of my comfortable bed and my quiet house in Mauryville danced through my weary mind.

  A furtive glance at my watch caused me to stifle another impatient sigh; twenty mind-numbing minutes of waiting were taking their toll.

  The sigh became a yawn.

  Why they don’t have a fast deposit box like every other damn bank? Why do I have to wait for a teller? What in hells name did I do that was so bad? This is punishment for something serious.

  Sometimes I’m a bit slow. I huffed internally at myself. Upsetting mother carries a price, and this is my penance. I would’ve preferred a couple of Hail Mary’s and a few Our Father’s at least it would be over by now.

  It occurred to me that I wasn’t alone in my misery. There were many faces around me sharing my restless annoyance. I yawned again and watched with silent amusement as my yawn spread through the bank.

  Sunlight streamed through the large plate glass windows increasing the heat and my irritation. I needed coffee, sleep, or both.

  To top the experience off nicely, a bank guard at the counter hadn’t taken his eyes off me since I joined the queue. I flashed a smile in his direction. There was no return smile. He just stood there arms folded across his chest glaring at me from under his thick mono brow. Fighting a tide of rising mirth at his unwavering staunch stare became more and more difficult.

  I let my black cotton jacket hang open, it was too warm to contemplate doing up buttons, and every fidgety movement brought my holster into view.

  He began to alternate his gaze from my hip to my face but never for longer than a split second. I was certain he saw my badge that I so responsibly hung around my neck before leaving the air conditioned comfort of my car. It was tempting to rest my hand on my gun, just to see his reaction. He looked like the jumpy type so I thought better of it. Just because I was bad-tempered, hot, tired, and fed up there was no need to stir trouble in the bank. The mere thought of such a thing lit a spark of enjoyment that pushed away some of my fatigue.

  I yawned so widely my eyes watered.

  The waiting continued interrupted only by the yawn as it passed from person to person. My mind began to sift through garbage. I blocked out Mom’s ignorance and let one of Dad’s questions play on my mind, am I happy?

  A large woman behind me squawked loudly in my ear, startling me back to reality, “You’re holding up the queue, dear.”

  “Thank you, ma’am.”

  I approached the counter, slid the check and deposit form over to the teller and as I turned to leave I smiled sweetly at the cranky looking guard. He had to stay, and had I not been wearing a federal badge, I probably would’ve poked out my tongue; yep I’m all grown up. To prevent myself from flipping him the bird I stuffed my hands into my jacket pockets, and left.

  Something delicious floated on the mid-summer breeze, the smell of fresh ground coffee. I quickly located the source of the aroma, Starbucks. As I walked along the hot sidewalk, a display of newspapers caught my eye. I paused recognizing the front-page picture. The caption under the picture read, ‘The now familiar faces of Delta A leaving the Richmond FBI building after the arrest of the Mall rapist.’ There we all were in glorious color. I quickly read the first paragraph, ‘Delta A once again proves their expertise in serial crime. The two women three man team led by SAC Caine Grafton successfully ended a reign of terror with the capture of a suspected rapist after a grueling investigation.’ I stopped reading.

  I’d lived it no need to read the hype.

  The smell of coffee encouraged me to move on.

  One order for a mochachino and a quad espresso later, I was sitting in a booth facing the door wriggling to get comfortable in the oppressive heat.

  I hauled myself back to my feet and removed my jacket which I lay carefully across the far end of the table.

  Sitting back down and feeling much better, I relaxed and waited for my coffee to arrive.

  With my legs stretched out across the seat, and my back wedged against the wall I had the perfect spot to watch patrons come and go. I conjured little stories about their lives in the privacy of my thoughts to pass the time.

  Then I saw him, tall, dark haired, and good-looking with a twinge of familiarity. I had no idea why he seemed familiar but he warranted more than a cursory glance. I noted a map hanging out of his back pocket and a general air of confusion in his expression; he carried a dark blue cap in his hand. I sat up a little as I heard him order exactly what I had. He took the booth in front of me closer to the door. I could hear the paper rustle as he unfolded the map and spread it on the table.

  A young waitress arrived at my table. “Quad espresso and a mochachino?”

  “Thanks,” I said, smiling.

  The girl smiled back, “I think I saw your picture in the newspaper, are you’re in the FBI, part of that new Delta team?”

  “Yes.”

  She almost squealed with delight, “Wow it must be so exciting!”

  “It has its moments.” I smiled; it was hard not to smile at her enthusiasm.

  “I’ll leave you to your coffee; I think it’s really cool what you did.”

  She bounced away before I could thank her, leaving me feeling appreciated for the first time in a long while.

  The dark haired stranger in the booth ahead of me looked up briefly.

  Our eyes met. My heart skipped a beat. And he went back to his map. A few minutes later, the same waitress delivered exactly the same order to him.

  Map man intrigued me so did his order, I’d never met anyone who had my taste in coffee.

  I could feel the smile on my face as I thought about the errand to the bank for Dad that led to being in this particular Starbucks. Maybe I should be honest with Mom more often; that thought led to a mental head slap of giant proportions; yeah that’s exactly what I shouldn’t do.

  For everyone’s sake, I’d be best to keep away from her for a while. Cool down time while she decides which version of the truth to adopt now, the real one or her farcical self-serving version. The morning’s breakfast conversation rolled through my head, her accusing me of being gay and of having an eating disorder. It must be hard for her to have such a boring child.

  With my coffee finished and my mood much improved, I stood slowly and stretched my tired shoulders and back. I slung my jacket over one arm. As I passed the booth containing the man with the map, he looked up. I smi
led at the obviously perplexed man with a road map.

  He spoke, “You wouldn’t happen to know a short cut to Route 64; they forgot to publish the detour signs on my two year old map.” I watched his eyes flash from my visible FBI badge to my holster and back to my eyes.

  “Actually I can help. Do you mind?” I asked indicating to the vacant seat opposite him.

  After all, I am in a helping profession so really I was just doing my duty. Yeah right!

  “Please,” he replied moving his legs a little so I didn’t have to step over them to sit.

  “East or west?”

  “Virginia beach,” he said shrugging.

  “East then,” I replied, “You need to be two hours that way!” I pointed somewhat randomly southeast.

  He looked even more confused at the mention of compass points.

  I turned the map to face me, pulled a pen from my pocket, and quickly wrote new directions. Then I remembered something, “One sec, let me check something I think there was a major accident on Route 64.”

  I pulled my cell phone from my belt and dialed quickly; “Hey, where was that crash on Route 64?” It was a brief call. I hung up and clipped my phone back on my belt.

  “Sorry,” I said, “They’ll have the road clear in a couple of hours.” Am I helpful or what?

  He grinned. “Typical.”

  Before I could stop it my given name fell from my lips. “I’m Gabrielle,” I said wondering why the hell I’d said the G word as I extended my hand and hoped it wasn’t clammy.

  “Pleased to meet you Gabrielle, I’m Cormac.” Firm handshake and strong hands which suggested to me he worked with his hands. There was a subtle change in his expression as if he too sensed the familiarity.

  “Guess I should’ve spent a few minutes and got more current directions from map quest,” Cormac muttered.

  I smiled hoping it didn’t appear patronizing. “Even they wouldn’t tell you about this accident.”

  “Maybe so but I should have at least checked and obtained more current directions, but dad reckoned this map was still good.” He sighed.

  I flicked the edge of his well-worn map. “You know, they have this really cool thing now, called GPS.” I fought rising amusement at his surprised expression.

  “You’re quite a smartass aren’t you?”

  “Just sayin’ – GPS, it’s perfect for…”

  “People like me who can’t read a map?”

  I shrugged. “Maybe you could look into something like NavMan or TomTom for future trips.”

  “Where am I?”

  “Starbucks,” I said forcing all hint of smartass from my voice. “You’re almost at the Richmond University campus. That’s one hell of a detour you took.”

  Cormac erupted in a warm throaty chuckle. “I’m directionally challenged. Only I swear this time I followed Dad’s instructions exactly.”

  So, the inability to navigate is a family failing?

  “Let me reiterate – NavMan, TomTom, Garmin, SatNav… all tools for the directionally challenged.” I couldn’t help but smile. “So you’re allegedly going to Virginia beach huh? Vacation?”

  He nodded. “Didn’t think it would be so hard to get to.”

  “You’re from the northern Virginia.” I finally placed his subtle accent.

  From the north and his name was Cormac.

  Whom did I talk to almost every night, Galileo AKA Mac?

  Who coincidentally was vacationing at Virginia Beach this week? I attempted to settle my thoughts and stop them running rampant with the possibilities.

  “Yes, Fairfax,” he replied draining his coffee, he stared into the bottom of the cup then looked up at me. “You know Fairfax?”

  “I know Fairfax, not as well as I know DC, but well enough.” It was easy chatting to him, comfortable even and a little voice inside was telling me this was my Mac and another little voice was saying wait a bit before you jump to conclusions and make a fool of yourself.

  “We haven’t ever met have we?” he asked.

  I suspect I didn’t hide my surprise at his question very well, he watched me closely; I could feel his eyes penetrating my skull searching for answers.

  He backed off with an apology. “Sorry I didn’t mean to sound like I was hitting on you.”

  I shook off the feeling of nakedness under his penetrating gaze. “It’s all right, I was thinking the same thing, and you are so very familiar. I’ve been sitting here trying to place you.”

  Map man Cormac and I chatted for a little while about various weird and wonderful subjects, and discovered as we did so that we had more and more in common. Conversation topics and expressions used triggered even greater familiarity; I waited for the revelation as my mind began to assemble everything. I knew eventually it would become clear where and how I knew him. It’s one of those tricky situations for someone like me, there is always a chance that the familiarity could be because I have arrested or interviewed the person.

  He wasn’t giving off any signals or vibes that would cause me to move carefully to the nearest exit.

  Cormac ordered us more coffee while we talked, eventually the subject of computers and chat rooms came up.

  “You ever been to an MSN chat room?” he asked.

  “Most nights,” I said. Instantly thinking of the rooms, I liked. The people I called friends that I hung out with on my seventeen-inch monitor. One person in particular sprung to mind again, my heartbeat faster as I wondered about the possibility of Cormac being that someone I already knew.

  “I like the poetry rooms.” I remembered his hat, my mind threw up images of my computer screen and a little corner of the messenger window where he resided often wearing his hat. I found myself studying him more intently I’m sure my attentiveness was bordering on creepy but then so was his. I had a feeling that this would all fall into place if he just did one thing for me. “This may sound weird but could you put your hat on for me?”

  He was most obliging. As soon as I saw him with the cap on his head I was ninety percent sure that it was the same person.

  Cormac leaned closer across the table. “I spend most nights in poetry rooms too. What’s your nick?” He chewed his lip for a second then added, “You don’t have to tell me.”

  “You want to guess?” I replaced my previous thoughts with a more reasonable, or realistic view, what were the odds of us knowing each other? It’s a big world out there.

  “Otherwisecat,” he said in a hushed whisper, as if saying the word louder would crack the very seams of our universe.

  I closed my eyes for a split second as he repeated, “Otherwisecat.”

  The whole world was silent as I looked up at him fighting a lump in my throat so I could form one word, “Galileo”

  The world changed forever.

  Our fingers entwined.

  “It’s me,” he whispered as I raised my eyes to his.

  “I can’t believe this.” I knew my voice was cracking slightly but he didn’t seem to notice, or maybe he did and that’s why he squeezed my hand a little tighter.

  “When did the world get to be so small?” Mac asked.

  I had nothing.

  A strange silence descended upon our corner of the room, it wasn’t awkward. It was just strange. We were coming to grips with this new development in what had until now been an Internet friendship. I had no idea what he was thinking; all I knew for sure is how I felt; stunned, shocked, and delighted all at once. Thrown fatefully into something that was both new and familiar, both scary and yet not.

  Mac grinned; we were face to face and I was looking at the best friend I had never met. “Ellie, damn!”

  My Mac!

  Mac leaned on his elbows capturing me with his smile I felt the danger and yet could do nothing to stop myself from being lost within his hazel gaze. I may re-think the no children in my future thing.

  He broke the silence with a question, “So Ellie, what are you doing in Richmond?”

  “Work,” I replied hoping
it was audible; suddenly feeling flushed and trying to avert my eyes. “Just wrapped up a job.”

  He nodded. “How was it?”

  I shook my head indicating I wasn’t prepared to go there and simply said, “Bad.”

  “Your folks live in Richmond don’t they?”

  “Yes.”

  “And your brother too.” Mac tapped his head and grinned. “Steel trap.”

  He was the only person I had ever met who really did have a steel-trap memory, he forgot nothing. Mac’s amazing memory was a double-edged sword, he couldn’t choose to forget, and like me had plenty of things he didn’t want to remember.

  “I was almost on my way home and Dad had me stop by his bank for him, so I ended up here.”

  My mind rolled over thoughts of karma and fate as I re-counted the events that led to our meeting. I was still stunned at meeting Mac slash Galileo. No matter what I tried, I couldn’t tear my eyes from him; my mind was taking its own sweet time in accepting that this was real. It’s not as if it didn’t have some clues and try and figure it out a little early so I was having trouble with it taking so long to catch up now.

  “Home is a bit of a drive isn’t it?” he commented.

  “Yeah, about two hours west give or take.” I found myself chuckling as I recalled past conversations; I very rarely get lost unlike Mac the challenge of direction was a constant for him, in that light I shouldn’t have been so surprised that he ended up here today.

  “What?” he asked.

  “I am not directionally challenged.”

  “Smartass!”

  “I wasn’t kidding about the GPS …,” I said with a wink.

  It became obvious that Starbucks was nothing more than an extension of the chat room.

  “I keep waiting for you to speak in typo,” Mac remarked.

  Impulse took over and I slapped his arm replying, “LOL.”

  Day drifted into early evening which became dusk as we lost ourselves in conversation exactly as we always had in the chat room and in our messenger windows. Some sort of magic seemed to be at work, everything felt right. I had imagined running into Mac in Washington DC or even Fairfax and always thought it would be cool, this surpassed even my wild imaginings, and to meet so far out of our comfort zones struck me as miraculous. The weirdest thing was two years ago when we first ‘saw’ each other over the Internet we both thought the other familiar. This was even possible, we’d probably seen each other in passing; we drove the same roads often; yet lived over three hours from each other. As teenagers, we road dirt bikes and back then, I even lived in Arlington not that far from where Mac grew up. My mind whirred through memories. Who would have thought two years after beginning an Internet friendship we’d be in the same Starbucks in Richmond and meet quite by chance? Thank God for Mac’s directional difficulties!