Deep Undercover: Endgame A-10
Marta presses her body against mine. Not because she suddenly finds me irresistibly attractive, but because I’m standing between her and the back office. I hold firm. We bump and grind for a moment before she relents. Her breath is uneven and rapid.
“Don’t lose your cool,” I warn her, more sharply than I intend. “ our plan.”
“Is it Plan A or B?” She’s whispering to me, even though our adversary is still a hundred feet away and inside a car. “A or B?”
“Hold tight. We’ll know in a minute.”
I’m off by a good amount. Not more than ten seconds go by before the driver’s door opens and a familiar blonde’s head rises over the Porsche’s roofline. She’s wearing dark sunglasses and looks all business. A few steps and she’s around the front of the car, making a beeline for the spa.
“Dios Mio,” Marta gasps. “Plan A?”
I nod. I’m about to move into position and let Marta scurry to the back when the enger door opens and a second leggy blonde graces the parking lot. She’s also wearing dark sunglasses, along with a narrowly-tailored blazer and a skirt that’s a good three inches shorter than any she’d wear of her own free will.
“There’s Megan.” I push the startled Marta in front of me. “Thank Christ. Time for Plan B.”
A few days ago
Normally I’m on the ball more quickly than the average guy, but the sight of my beautiful partner pointing to her own naked body with a half-smile on her face throws me for a couple of loops, and I’m slow to catch up.
“Weakness? What weakness?”
“Tara’s weakness. Weaknesses, to be exact. As in multiple.” Cassie holds up a hand. “Headstrong,” she says, curling a finger. “Overconfident, probably?”
“It’s how we got here.”
Another curled finger. “And now we know why, because she’s got a touch of imposter syndrome. Curl. She’s jealous of Megan because Megan is everything that she is, plus everything you are. Would Megan ever ask you to brainwash her into thinking she’s someone else?”
“Oh, not a chance in hell. In fact she’d kill me if she knew just how much I’ve been conditioning her mind these last few…” And now the lights finally start to come on. “Wait, you think that all of this happened just because Tara wanted to one-up Megan?”
“No, but it’s a reason. She has to be the best. And that’s why she does things that Megan would never do.” Another curl, leaving only her pinkie jutting up. “She also does things that you would never do.”
“Like not giving up on this case.”
“Exactly! I’d bet my left toe that there’s a little part of her that’s always wondering if you’re going to dump her for Megan. If you’re going to fall in love with Megan. So she pushes herself. She’s a detective, too, Paul. She notices the same little things that you do. And a lot of little things you won’t ever notice about yourself.”
Her pinkie s the others. “That’s where we get her, Paul. That’s where we hit her.”
I can see where this is going. But I’m not convinced, not yet. “Avery’s hammered that nail flat. She doesn’t care about any of that now. It’s Avery Berman all day, every day, no exceptions.”
“True, but… does that change the equation? She still needs to be the best.” Her fingers flip up from her fist, in reverse order. “Needs to be the best. Stubborn. Overconfident and takes risks. Worried that she’ll be replaced. Still jealous of Megan, even if you’re not in the picture.”
“Still jealous of everyone, if that’s the case.” We know that Avery’s already built a little harem for himself. “Worried that Michelle or Lexi… hell, Madame Franz even…”
“Might win Avery’s heart. Just like Megan winning yours. If she’s willing to kill for him? To kill you for him? Do you see where I’m going with this?”
I do. Maybe I’ve been giving Avery Berman too much credit. He can make sex slaves and sleeper agents and spies with his brainwashing techniques, sure, but none of his other subjects have ever tried to commit murder. What if Assassin Tara was just a lucky roll of the dice? A tool he didn’t know he needed—or could even create—until he stumbled upon it by complete accident?
Now
This spa is like most of the newer gentrified ts in town, dropped into a remodeled retail space that probably used to be a coffee shop or a tanning salon. It still has the old layout from those days, including a row of storefront windows with a pair of glass doors in the middle. Tara yanks them both open and struts inside like she owns the place. This is Assassin Tara, cold, efficient, all business. Her heels clack across the marble tile floor, coming to an abrupt stop once she’s reached the center of the room.
Megan follows close behind. You can tell from her approach that there’s a different set of instructions in her head. Her demeanor is casual, almost indifferent, and she uses only one door to let herself in. Marta is at the reception desk, trying to look as nonchalant as possible, and Megan saunters towards her.
“Cassie!” Marta fakes a decent smile. “Back so soon?”
Tara says nothing. Megan steps in front of her and offers a hand. “Hello, Madame Franz.”
Part of Plan B was for me to scurry to the back and take cover in one of the ‘personal treatment’ rooms until Tara came looking for me. But Avery’s programming and my current status as a Dead Man work in my favor. There are two pairs of glazed eyes fixed on Marta, and none on me, so I stay put. I want to see how this plays out, in no small part because I trust ‘Madame Franz’ about as far as I can throw her. She’s cocky and angry. Not the best combo when you’re facing off against a couple of very determined and very brainwashed drones.
Especially when one of them knows how to hypnotize you.
Right on cue, Megan takes another step forward, her hand still out. She’s trying to pull off a hand-yanking Erickson Induction, but I’ve already warned Marta about that, and she doesn’t take the bait.
“Have we met?”
Megan smiles. She gives up on the handshake. “Maybe? I’m Megan. I’m with the Siberia Investment Company.”
I roll my eyes. Megan really loves flogging her dead horses. But if anything, the would-be trigger now has the opposite effect on Marta, who goes from half-hugging the reception desk to standing tall and defiant. She places hand on shapely hip and shifts her weight, signaling that she’s had more than enough of this mind control bullshit.
“Don’t engage! Just get them separated.” I whisper to myself. “Get her back here.”
“Ah. You must be the bruja. Bueno, puedes olvidarte de eso. You have no power over me now, so let’s cut the nonsense and get down to business.”
“You’re right, Madame Franz.” Megan takes a step back, deliberately giving Marta a small victory, a cheap way of getting her to lower her guard. “You can relax. We just want to talk. We just want you to listen.”
“S-sure,” Marta responds, with just the slightest hiccup in her voice.
A few days ago
“Okay, so maybe we have a weakness. What’s our point of attack?”
Cassie’s been on a roll, but this is where the roll comes to an end. She looks at me, mouth askew, nose upturned. “I was… um… hoping you can answer that one. Maybe we can work the jealousy angle? How much time do we have?”
“Only until Avery gets whatever intel he’s promised the Chinese. That depends on how much he needs and how long it takes for those officers to hand it over. Could be a couple of weeks, or a couple of months. No longer than that. But, Cass…”
“Yes?”
“That doesn’t guarantee that you’ll be a part of it to the very end. If Avery’s willing to use Tara as an assassin, I won’t be the only name on his hit list. And, there’s no telling what he might do to her when she’s outlived her usefulness. If he pulls this off, he’ll be putting supermodels and senators in that chair, not a bunch of dime-a-dozen blondes from the Valley.”
“Couriers are foot soldiers, Tara. They’re the first ones to get killed if things go bad.”
Facts like this hit Cassie differently than they did with Tara, no doubt thanks to my own hypnotic tinkering. The threat of being turned into a disposable assassin meant little to my partner, but Cassie knows how real that threat’s become. She sucks in her lips until they’re barely visible, two thin pink lines above a clenched jaw.
“I’m sorry,” I tell her. I really am. I didn’t mean to terrify her. “It’s just that we don’t have any time to work with here. If anything, Avery’s going to push up his timetable now that he knows people are starting to poke around. The jealousy thing is great. Brilliant, Cass, and I mean that. But you’re already the top dog over at that house and it’s only worse now that he controls Tara.”
“What about Megan?”
“What about her? She’s on our side, so of course Tara’s going to hate her, just the same as she’s programmed to hate me. So that’s…”
Cassie and I both think of the exact same thing at the exact same time. It’s like the end of one of those game shows where the host reveals the final puzzle answer and we smack our heads for not seeing it sooner, standing there with our mouths hanging open and looking stupid.
“Paul, that makes her a target. Probably his next target!”
Yep. Megan may not be a courier, per se, but she definitely counts as a foot soldier, and that’s just as bad. If Avery’s cleaning up loose ends and I’m out of the picture, she’s now the tallest tree in the forest.
Now
“There’s no need to be nervous, Madame Franz. Our Master’s orders were very clear. Cassie has the cash and the plane tickets. Would you like to sit down and discuss the options? You’re safe with us. You don’t have to worry. It’s all taken care of. I can see you’re relaxing a little, and that’s good.”
Tara opens her purse and pulls out two overstuffed envelopes. Presumably one is supposed to be stuffed with bills and the other with a stack of airline tickets, but I’ll quit my job and move to Nebraska if it turns out that Tara and Megan came here to actually negotiate an honest deal. My eyes go to the purse. It’s suspiciously fat even after being unloaded of its cargo, and the way Tara’s holding it implies that whatever’s still inside is fairly weighty. No points for guessing what that heavy thing is.
Marta starts to reach for the proffered envelopes, but Tara keeps them out of reach, and Megan steps in again. She’s shifting her weight from one heel to the other, her voice dropping into what she’s always called her ‘patent-pending’ hypnotist voice. “We should sit, Marta. I insist. We just want to talk. It’s important that you listen so carefully, listen to me and only me, because you only have one opportunity here, and you don’t want to miss it, do you?”
“No, but I…” Marta’s arm drops back down, fingers brushing the edge of her dress. Her shoulders sag, and I wince.
“Then listen carefully to me. I talk fast sometimes, so you’ll want to pay very close attention to all of my words. Listen and let my words reach you, okay? This won’t take long, and then you’ll be free. Isn’t that nice and wonderful? Soon you’ll be safe on a plane, drifting through the clouds. That will be so nice, you can finally relax and not worry, feel safe and not worry, listen and not worry.”
Tara and I once worked a case where the girl insisted to us that her rival had sabotaged her audition. Slept with someone backstage, set things up so that she looked bad, etc. It turned out that she was telling us the truth, and we got the other singer booted from the set, but when it came time for the second audition and a happy ending, our girl came out singing like she’d been gargling sea water for a week. It was horribly embarrassing, and I can still the feeling I had standing there on the stage, wishing I could just rush in and tackle her. Save her from herself before she dug that hole any deeper.
I’m feeling the same thing now as I watch my talented hypnotist frenemy guide Marta into a light but firm trance. Tara is still holding the promised goods, but Marta’s glazed brown eyes are firmly locked onto Megan’s baby blues now. She’s swaying from side to side along with Megan, without being aware of it, her voice growing softer and more submissive with each answer. She’s digging herself into the very hole I warned her to stay out of, and at this rate, Megan and Tara are going to have her out of the spa and on the way back to the mansion in a matter of minutes.
“You look tired, Madame Franz. Why don’t you sit down with me and talk, and listen? You can relax so much more easily if you sit and rest in one of these very soft, comfortable chairs.”
“Sssofft... yesss...” She’s fighting to keep her head up and her eyes open, and failing at both.
“You’d like that. You’d like to sit in one of these soft, soft chairs and rest, and listen, and relax. You want to relax. Just say ‘I want to relax,’ and I’ll help you over to those soft chairs.”
“I want… want to…”
“So tired, Madame Franz. You want to relax. Listen and relax.”
“Yesss… I’m… I have to… I want to relax”
“And sleep.”
“And… s-sleep?”
“Yes. Sleep.”
“Si, sleep.”
It definitely won’t be long now. I consider my options. It’s a depressingly short list.
Then
“If she’s willing to kill you, she’ll kill her, too. You have to warn her, Paul. For all we know, she could already be dead. I have no idea what else I was up to today! I could have—”
“Cass, calm down. Megan’s going to be okay, okay?” I stand next to her chair and place a hand on her bare shoulder. It feels weird. Granted, this was the same naked woman I was about to fuck a few hours ago, but right now that feels like an event from distant history.
Still, it helps to calm her down, so I don’t move away. “Avery’s a cruel asshole. We know that. And that means that he’s going to send Tara after me first and foremost, because I’m the biggest pain in his ass and it’ll prove that she’ll kill anyone on command. Her going after Megan first doesn’t provide him with any of those things.”
“But… counterpoint? He knows she’s a hypnotist, just like you. That makes her an equal threat. He can’t just ignore her. Especially if you’re supposed to be dead.”
It’s a fair counterpoint, and I agree with her. On the other hand... “I gotta be honest, Cass. Short of hypnotizing her into forgetting you exist, we have no control over what Megan might do next, even if I call and warn her. So it’s a moot point.”
Cassie wiggles free of my hand. “Then we’re back to my original plan. You turn me back into Tara, wipe her memory of tonight, make her think she killed you, and then start following her. See where she goes next. If she pulls a gun on Megan, you’ll be there to stop her.”
“I don’t think you understand. If I can’t drop the trigger on her quickly enough, or if something goes wrong, someone’s going to end up dead!” Jesus, why do I have to be the only sane person in the room every time? “Tara, Megan, me, you… do you want to risk that?”
She turns in her chair until her legs are draped over one arm and her back is arched over the other. She looks me in the eyes, deadly serious. “What other options do we have? We’ve been going over this for hours. We can’t reach Tara, and we can’t change the trajectory she’s on. But she’s also Avery’s weakness. He’ll trust her completely if he thinks you’re dead, and I’m still riding shotgun. We just have to goad them both into making a mistake.”
“And if Tara tries to kill Megan tomorrow? If Avery gets you into that chair and brainwashes you? What do we do then, Cassie? Who’s going to save you?”
“You’ll think of something,” she insists. “I know I said that Tara does risky things on purpose, but I don’t think she has a death wish. She knows that you’re going to pull out all the stops to keep her safe and that’s still the case now. I see the same man and I feel the same way.”
I hate this, and I make sure to tell her several more times, but all of my threats and talk about shots to the gut gets me as far with Cassie as it would have with Tara.
Which is to say, nowhere.
Now
As part of the remodel, Marta and her business partners installed a huge lounge area along the east wall, complete with a bubbling sandstone waterfall and a jungle of ferns. Little hidden speakers playing soft music, spotlights, bamboo coffee tables, plush accent chairs, the works. I’m betting that Marta is regretting those design choices now—or she would be, if she still had the ability to think. Unfortunately for the both of us, that ability is currently absent, and she doesn’t resist at all as she allows herself to be pushed into one of the chairs. Megan takes a seat next to her. Tara’s on guard duty, from the looks of it; her attention shifts from the lounge to the front doors and back, like the eyes on one of those cartoon cat wall clocks.
So much for Plan B.
Megan is whispering things into Marta’s ear, but her face too close to the brunette for me to read her lips. Granted, I’m sure it’s your standard stuff about relaxing and letting go and sinking into a deep sleep. Which means that Marta is down for the count. It’s now two against one here at the spa.
That also means it’s time to start taking chances, so I take my first by pushing hard against the door with my body until it closes with a loud thud. Not loud enough to cause a panic in the front room, just enough to arouse plenty of suspicion. Instead of hiding, I press my head to the door and listen in.
“Marta.” I’m surprised to hear Tara’s voice asking the questions. “Are there clients here today?”
“Yes, Cassie.”
It’s not until Tara pops the question that I realize how incredibly stupid and lucky I am. If she’d asked who was in the back instead of automatically assuming it had to be a wayward client, Marta would have dutifully spilled all of the beans about me to her and everything would have gone to shit. That makes me wonder how many times in a row I’m going to flip a coin and get heads. Technically it’s always a 50/50 shot, but in this business, math usually takes a back seat to fate.
Megan starts up again, clearly enough that I can hear her. “You’re doing so well, Marta,” she coos. “I’m going to start counting backwards from ten, and I want you to count with me.”
“Si, yes. Counting.”
“Ten, sinking into your chair.”
“Ten…”
“Good. Nine…”
Their little conversation is quickly drowned out by the clack-clack-clack of Tara’s stiletto heels, each clack a little louder than the one before it. I reach for my gun and make a hasty retreat.
Then
“Seven, six, five,” I begin. She’s putting on a brave face, but her lips are trembling. “Incredibly calm and relaxed, Cassie. ing how good it feels to let yourself drop into a deep and powerful trance. Four, eyes looking into mine. Three, a deep breath, in and out. Calm and peaceful. You can feel yourself already starting to slip away.”
“I, um…”
“Two and one. Sleep now.”
“Uhhnnnn.”
Her head lolls forward and down. My head drops, too. I feel like I’ve just killed her. And that’s exactly what I’ve done, if I can’t pull this off.
But I can. I have an idea. A couple of them, actually.
Maybe Cassie is right about me after all.