The Operator
Page 115

Worried, she glanced up at the ceiling grate, estimating it to be nearing five or six by the fading light. She had a few hours left before withdrawal became an issue, but she hadn’t heard anything in the last twelve hours or so since the camera Michael had left had run out of battery. No food, no water—she was cold and out of sorts. It was likely someone would come soon if only to taunt her. She almost had it, almost . . .
But her fingers slipped, and the makeshift lock pick fell to the cement floor.
“Damn it!” she hissed, drafting to fix her mistake.
Blue sparkles hazed her vision, and she breathed them in, then out as time reset. Angling her fingers a different way, she maintained her grip on her key, and with a soft and certain click, the lock disengaged.
“Yes!” she hissed as the draft ended, her two-second confusion so brief as to be nonexistent. The key dropped, pinging to the floor, but the lock was open. Adrenaline pulsed through her, and the fencing scraped her arm as she unwedged it. Pulse fast, she picked up the key, tugging her coat sleeve down when the bare-bulb light flicked on, warning Peri before the door screeched open.
The sharp piece of metal went into her jeans pocket as a faint glow of sunlight from the silent manufacture floor spilled over her and Michael came in. He had a briefcase in his hand, his face showing a five o’clock shadow. He was clearly not in the best of moods; his steps were fast and his expression tight. This is so bad for my asthma, she thought, backing from the chain-link fence and praying he didn’t rattle the door to prove it was still locked.
But Michael clearly had other things on his mind as he all but threw the briefcase atop the clutter before the bars. The open door behind him said more than the heavy silence and distant hoot of a train or boat that he was alone, and she stood, feeling the aches the hard floor had given her. She could smell gunpowder on him, and her thoughts went to Harmony.
“There are quicker ways to kill me other than freezing me to death,” she said, finding hope in his bad mood. With some luck, Harmony was gone and safe. Jack, she didn’t care beyond wanting to kill him if he’d told Michael her instructions to get Harmony safe. It didn’t look as if he had. Michael was too pissed for that.
“I’ve got a bullet if you prefer,” he said, and she moved farther from her unlocked door.
“Did they get the accelerator?” she asked innocently.
Michael frowned. Arms over his chest, he stood before her, his long face dark in anger. “Where did you tell Jack to leave it?”
Yes! “I didn’t tell him to leave it anywhere. I told him to get Harmony the hell away from you.” And Jack had. Why? Because it got Jack the hell away from Michael, too? Or had it been more, perhaps?
“You scrawny little nothing!” Michael hit the chain link, and Peri’s eyes flicked to the wiggling door. “You will die here, Reed. You will die in agony. I’ve seen the med wing, and they all died in agony. How long until your next shot? Hours?”
But his fury only filled her with calm. She might die before the sun came up again, but it wasn’t going to be in this cruddy cage. “I told them to run because I already know where the accelerator is, and it isn’t at WEFT.”
He turned his vehement expression to her, dress shoes scraping. “Lies don’t work anymore.”
“Oh, get over yourself.” Peri sauntered closer, feeling powerful despite being in socks and having nothing in her pocket but a sharpened piece of metal. “I told you before, string bean. I don’t care if you get accelerated or not. But asking me to believe that you were going to let Harmony walk away after she made the drop was insulting. I bought her freedom with a few hours is all. I’ll take you there now.”
Michael’s lip twitched. “Where is it?”
Smiling, Peri brushed her coat off. “The same place it’s been for the last twenty-four hours. Get me to my car, and I’ll take you there.”
He laughed, but it wasn’t a pleasant sound. Turning his back on her, he picked up the camera, dropping his briefcase in its place. The snap of the fasteners opening was loud, and she wasn’t surprised when he took out a pair of cuffs.
“Put them on,” he said, throwing them to her. They hit the fencing and dropped.
Peri stood unmoving. She’d caught a glimpse of a packaged syringe and a vial in there as well. Evocane. One more dose, and he’ll need it for the accelerator. None for me . . . A sliver of need rose and fell, but it was only a memory—so far.
“Put them on . . . or you don’t get out,” Michael reiterated.
She was going to get access to her car and, if she played it right, to Silas. And with that, she had another twenty-four hours to kill Michael and end this. There was no way in hell she was going to let him live.
Peri rolled her shoulders, stretching them. With a single foot, she reached out and pushed the unlocked door open.
Michael snarled, reaching behind his coat for his Glock. “Let me rephrase. Put them on, or you die. Right in the head.”
Sighing, Peri went to the cuffs, leaning over to angle them in through the holes. “Chicken ass,” she grumbled, the need to get to her car an ache. The cool steel ratcheted about her wrists, the alien feel of them never becoming familiar.
“Where is the accelerator?” Michael put his Glock away, and feeling as if she were still in a cage she stepped out, her feet cold on the bare cement.
“I’ll take you there,” she said. “You still have my car, yes?” God help her, if he didn’t, this was going to be the lamest jailbreak ever. His eyes lit up, and she added, “You wanted the pass code. I’ll put you into the system myself.”
A sly grin stole over him. “I’m driving,” he said as he snapped his briefcase shut and gestured for her to go first.
Stocking feet silent on the grimy cement floor, Peri proudly walked through the defunct manufacturing plant, through the break room with its posted signs about employee rights five years out-of-date, past old offices with computers bigger than a microwave . . . all the way to the covered garage. She couldn’t help her smile at the sight of her car parked sideways to the lines, a power-saving white this far away from the sun, but a frown took its place at the marring scratch on the bumper. “You towed it?” she asked incredulously. “You towed my car?”
Michael shoved her toward the passenger side, and she stumbled to catch her balance. “I didn’t have a choice. Someone locked it down in their efforts to shut off the alarm system.”