Torrent: The first book of Byte short stories Read online

  “You okay?”

  “Sure, my dead husband is having surgery on his wrist and I thought his ashes were buried in Fairfax.”

  “They are. There is no way that guy is Mac. Ya think someone might have noticed he’d come back to life?”

  “Ya’d think. Doctors, nurses, someone in the morgue.”

  “Come here,” he said holding out his hand and indicating for me to move closer. “We’ll find out what’s going on here that much I can promise you.”

  I nodded. “It’s the uncanny resemblance that’s screwing my head up here.”

  “They say we all have doppelgangers.”

  “I know. I’ve just never met one before.”

  I stopped and stared up at the stars. A helicopter circled the building then disappeared from sight. By the noise, I’d say it landed on the roof. Someone’s night ended badly and required an airlift.

  Suddenly I was tired, exhausted, and empty. My life is so normal it should be a Days of Our Lives episode.

  I was sure I should be clutching the back of a settee dramatically looking into space while wearing four inch heels and a designer gown.

  Any minute the camera would pan out then fade to another scene.

  The camera would pause on a seriously handsome man looking desperately worried and staring into the flames in a fireplace of some alpine ski lodge.

  Sometimes it sucked to have my imagination. This was one of those times. Noel was watching me with way too much interest. For a second I could’ve believed he’d never seen Days of our lives. But he looked too much like the guy in front of the fire.

  A nurse emerged from within the hospital. She looked over at us and beckoned.

  “We have an update on Randall,” she said holding the door open for us. I read her name badge. Tamsin.

  “Thank you Tamsin,” I said.

  She smiled. “The doctor is waiting for you – down the hall second on your left.”

  Noel nodded.

  Moments later, we were told Randall died from his injuries.

  Closure? For my case, there was a certain amount of relief. The victim would no longer be required to go through the third degree in a court room. We had his DNA on file. We knew he did the rape, but legally it was ‘alleged’ until proven guilty in a court of law. As far as I was concerned, he was a dead rapist. Seemed to me that it was the best possible outcome.

  Down the hallway, the dark night waited. From the darkness, I heard the unmistakable thump of helicopter rotors.

  Tamsin waved us down as we headed to the door.

  “Ma’am, I have some news regarding the other man you were asking about, John Smith?”

  “That’s him.”

  “He was airlifted to another hospital.”

  “I didn’t know his arm injury was that severe?”

  “Special circumstances ma’am. They’ve transferred him to another hospital.”

  “Do you know where?”

  “No ma’am only the pilot would know that.” She dropped her voice to a whisper, “All his records were taken too, and his treatment paid for in cash.”

  I nodded.

  Gone.

  Once the blood sample was processed by our lab, I would know more. It seemed so simple. Take the blood to the lab. Reality was different. It could be months before I got an answer. Being nosy isn’t a priority. Blood sample with no case number meant I would have to wait until there was nothing else in the queue. Good luck ever getting an answer from the blood.

  There was no point hanging around. Randall was dead and Smith was gone.

  “Home,” I said as Noel held the door open.

  “Yeah, I’ll send my team back – they should be half way here by now.” He pulled out his cell phone and made a call.

  An hour later, everything was packed and in the car. Our short stay at the miserable motel was over. I paid for the broken window, it just seemed easier than the owner trying to squeeze cash out of the deadbeat we’d had arrested.

  Dawn broke with slow deliberation.

  In silence, we headed into the daylight.

  The end

  8 ONE WAY OR ANOTHER

  A light knock on my office door was followed by Sam’s entrance.

  “Chicky Babe - you need to see this…” Sam drawled, sliding his kindle into my hands.

  I glanced at the screen. For the life of me I couldn’t imagine why I needed to see whatever he was reading. My eyes roamed the e-ink on the screen looking for Reed Farrell Coleman’s name, hoping Sam had stumbled upon another Moe Prager mystery for me to enjoy.

  No such luck.

  “Unless this is the latest Moe Prager mystery I’m not interested.”

  “Nope…,” he replied.

  I started to hand the Kindle back. “I don’t have time…”

  “It’s not even close to being as cool as a Moe Prager mystery, but it is a mystery,” Sam replied holding both hands up, to indicate he wasn’t about to take the Kindle back off me.

  The only thing for it was to play along.

  “Fill me in?” I asked looking up at him. The instant I looked at him I noted an expression I’d seen before. Amusement mixed with concern. The concern was normal. If I was being completely honest with myself, so was the amusement.

  “Read, we’ll talk,” he said.

  “I’m not going to read an entire book …,” I protested with a feeble gesture at my laptop. “Working here.”

  “You won’t need too,” he replied ignoring my work comment.

  I settled back in my chair and began to read. Two paragraphs later I looked at Sam. His coffee colored eyes danced with glee.

  “Punctuation would help.” As would better dialogue, plot, and characters. Sam’s request that I read the story had me perplexed.

  “Good ain’t it?” Sam asked.

  “Yeah, no!”

  “Keep reading, it gets worse.” He paused. “And you might recognize someone.”

  “Can I skip?” My eyes not so subtly checked the time on the clock above the door.

  “Some where you’d sooner be?” Sam crooned.

  “There is a messy crime scene…. somewhere.” I can feel it in my bones.

  Sam chuckled. “Read.”

  I skipped pages and skimmed as much as I could then all of a sudden I saw a familiar name.

  My name.

  Well, that got my attention.

  “Who is this idiot?” I growled at the screen, not expecting Sam to answer. I read another few pages. “And why am I a character in this God awful story?”

  Sam laughed. “See told you this was interesting.”

  “Who wrote this?”

  “Clarvell Bruyere.”

  “We have background on Mr. Bruyere?”

  Sam handed me a file and pulled up a chair.

  It seemed Bruyere was a professor.

  I read on. Or that’s what he told people. His online bio’s implied he had degrees in human resources, accounting, and management. I made a note to check that. The more I read the more I knew we’d be paying Bruyere a visit.

  Canadian. His residence was listed as Montreal. That made it tricky but not impossible.

  Lee poked his head around the door.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  Yeah right, like he didn’t know.

  “We’re going to locate this lunatic. A-sap,” I replied. “He’s obviously addled.” I circled my finger in the air by my ear.

  Lee swung the door wide open and ambled in.

  “Does Kurt know?” he asked.

  I rocked back in my chair and shook my head. “Unless either of you told him.” I looked from one to the other, neither flinched. “So, no, then?”

  I watched the affirmative head nods and went back to my thought train.

  “Apart from appalling fiction, what is this guy guilty of?” I needed something more than my name in a crappy novel that no one in their right mind would read.

  Sam coughed. My eyes landed on him. He fidgeted.


  “Problem?”

  “You didn’t get to the best bit yet.”

  I groaned. “There’s more?”

  “Oh hell yeah.”

  I picked the Kindle up and read more. If it weren’t for the men in my office I would’ve tossed the entire thing in the trash.

  “Help me out Sam, how far?”

  “Three quarters through.”

  I skipped page upon page, eventually finding more mentions of me. According to Bruyere I was a helicopter pilot with Special Forces training, who did a stint with CIA in the Middle East before returning to the FBI. He bandied about words like extraordinary rendition and black sites.

  I wasn’t a chopper pilot.

  Carefully, I placed the Kindle on my desk and leaned forward, resting on my elbows. Sam and Lee waited.

  “We need to know if he’s taking a stab in the dark, or he has access to classified information…” I sighed. “Dammit let’s find him.”

  Lee tapped the desk, his eyes glazed over. He was thinking. I let him think and turned to Sam.

  “How did you find this?”

  “Twitter. He’s been blowing his own trumpet all over Twitter.” He smiled. “Maybe you should use your Twitter account.”

  I shrugged. “I don’t need too, as long as you use it for me. I much prefer the mental image of people thinking they’re talking too little ol’ me, but in fact they’re talking to a big black dude like you.”

  “Whatever floats your boat.”

  “My boat’s floating right out of the harbor,” I replied. “All right people, let’s get this fucktard.”

  Lee pulled his phone from his pocket and made a call. He walked out of the room and paced the hallway. I could hear him. Sam could hear him. Sandra popped into my office, alerted to some fun by Lee’s pacing and talking.

  “What’s going on?” She asked slipping into the spare chair next to Sam.

  “Is that the new phrase for this team?” I asked, smiling.

  She shrugged. “What do you need?”

  “Intel on a Clarvell Bruyere from Montreal,” I said.

  “And he is?” she asked writing his name into her notebook.

  “A wannabe author.”

  “And he did?”

  “He used me as a character in a very very bad novel.”

  She grinned. “I always thought bad writing should be a crime. Can we arrest him for that?”

  “I wish,” I replied. “He appears to have access to classified information.”

  A ping sounded from my laptop. I glanced at the screen. “Oh, hello. Check this out.”

  I motioned to Sandra and Sam. They joined me around my side of the desk.

  “Moron,” Sam hissed.

  “You still want me to use my Twitter account?” I asked as I ‘unfollowed’ Clarvell Bruyere.

  Sam shook his head. “Nope. I’ll take care of it.”

  I read the message again. “@EllieConwaySA, you should read my book. I use you as a character. You rock.”

  I could feel my blood freezing in my veins.

  Sandra excused herself. “I’m going to start pulling files on that man.”

  “We have a back ground check,” I said.

  She smiled sweetly. “But you don’t have - what I can do. Let me take my fingers to my computer and I’ll get you everything there is on Clarvell Bruyere.”

  “We await your brilliance,” I replied as she left the room.

  Faith.

  Sam sat rocking on two legs of the chair. His phone was in his hand. He was texting. I checked my email, and answered two work related emails then one from Carla. She wanted Joey to come for dinner. She always wanted Joey to come for dinner. I had no problem with that. Joey was the product of a super dysfunctional family, but he had potential. The more time he spent in our home, the safer I knew he was. I called my father and let him know there was an extra for dinner again. Like me, Dad was not surprised. He too liked Joey. Carla had good taste in best friends. Although part of me waited for the day that one of them said or did something that would test that friendship. Boys and girls. It’s the nature of the beasts.

  A chime alerted me to yet another @ message on Twitter.

  An open message from Clarvell Bruyere. @EllieConwaySA You seem to have unfollowed me. :) #JustSaying

  “Sam, how could he know this?” I asked spinning the laptop to face him.

  “Now that’s creepy,” Sam replied. He tapped a few times on my keyboard and let out a long sigh. “He has one hundred and fifty five thousand seven hundred and fifty four followers. No way could he know you ‘unfollowed’ him so quickly, unless…”

  “Unless he was watching for activity from me, specifically or he has an app.”

  “Yep. I’d say he’s running an application that tells him when people unfollow him.”

  “Well fuck me, that’s still creepy.”

  “You’ve got a fan.”

  “Nope, I’ve got a potential stalker. Let’s shut him down before he gets any closer to home.”

  A beep sounded.

  The cold clawed.

  “Sam … @EllieConwaySA You have a daughter but no husband. Who will raise her with you?”

  “Not good, Chicky Babe.”

  “Incoming, we have more. @EllieConwaySA She’s beautiful, like her mother.”

  Sam growled, “This guy is pushing it.”

  “I’m ignoring him but he’s persistent. And we have another, @EllieConwaySA Is she home alone today? I’ll sit with her and wait for you.”

  I felt sick. Part of me wanted to whip out a smart-assed reply about how we don’t live in Montreal and my daughter is trained to kill.

  Sam shut my laptop, severing any connection to Twitter. If only it were so easy to get rid of lunatics.

  “Lee!” I called through the half open door. “Get in here!”

  He swung the door open and shoved his phone into his pocket. “Here!”

  “I want a protection detail on Carla, now.”

  His eyes widened. “Done.” He picked up the phone on my desk and pressed three numbers. “Special request, protection for an active agent’s family. Credible threat.”

  It seemed stupid that I couldn’t just do it myself. But I was about to be the subject of a protection detail along with my teenage daughter. Ordering it for one’s self just seemed panicky. I don’t do panicky. I do death. A smile settled on my face. Lee saw it.

  “And what’s the smile?” he asked.

  “Nothing.” I shrugged.

  Yeah, like I was going to tell the team I was thinking ‘I do death’, nope. Not happening.

  “We have a problem,” Sam said.

  No fuc’n kidding Einstein.

  “A new one?” Instead of being wise-assed I encouraged him to share. It wasn’t easy for me. “Give.”

  “A protection detail… and you. You don’t see a problem?”

  I shrugged. “Nope.”

  Lee intervened. “I do.”

  “How’s that?” It was my best attempt at innocence.

  “Yeah, whiter than white. It’s not washing with me.”

  I tried another innocent look.

  Fail.

  “Give it up Chicky, you know damn well…”

  “I know jack.”

  I smiled. I do know Jack. But we’re not talking about Jack we’re talking about jack shit.

  Sam grimaced. Guess he’d seen this mood before. Well, crap, me too.

  “We want you to cooperate with the protection detail.”

  “Sure, I’ll cooperate.” I changed the subject and gestured the Kindle in front of me. I’ve got a brand new stalker who is writing bullshit and including me in his sordid tale. That is just about as un-cool as anything could get. “Is anyone reading this crap?”

  He grinned so wide his white teeth glowed.

  “From what I can tell he’s not exactly making the top 1000 list,” Sam said.

  “Well that’s comforting.”

  It wasn’t.

  The thought
of anyone reading that shite and coming across my name made me ill. “How about we spread some rumors through social media about how awful his writing is, or throw around a few truthful reviews. He might just crawl back under the rock he came from.”

  “A smear campaign. I like it. But I doubt it’ll work.”

  “Me too, but it’d be fun.”

  “Not like you to be so quick to condemn.” He arched an eyebrow at me. “I’m not buying. What do you want?”

  “His head on a pike.” The more I thought about it the more pissed off I became. “We’re going to Canada. Get me whomever I fuc’n need to talk to at Homeland. If he knows then we have national security breech.”

  “You want to involve them?”

  “Hell yes. I’m seeing Guantanamo Bay in this moron’s future.”

  Sam laughed. “I hope he likes water sports.”

  I smiled. “Show me his picture again?”

  Sam held out the photo in the file.

  “Looks like he needs a good wash,” I commented. “What happens in Gitmo stays in Gitmo.”

  “Wow, you’re not pulling any punches.”

  “He mentioned Carla, gloves are off.”

  “Let’s find out where he really is,” Sam replied cracking his knuckles. “And go get him.”

  “Not without me.”

  We stood up and headed for the door together, it instantly became apparent we weren’t going to fit. Sam stepped back. I walked through the bullpen and called out to Lee and Sandra. “I need a location.”

  Sandra smiled and called me over to her desk.

  “We’re getting interest expressed by several agencies. He must’ve pissed a few people off. Kurt is in Reston. Do you need him?”

  “I wondered where he was,” I said. “We’re good at the moment.”

  I called Carla. “Hey sweet pea, get Grandpa to save me dinner. I might be late home.”

  “How late Mom?”

  “I don’t know, sweetie. Could be late late.”

  With a sigh Carla deflated. “Oh.”

  I knew she hated it when I was late home. In all fairness, I was often late home. I sucked at nine-to-five.

  “There will be uniformed officers outside the house soon. Don’t give them a hard time.”

  “Why?”

  “A precaution, that’s all. Just be nice.”

  “Okay, but Joey can still hang here, right?”