Spectre of Intention Read online

“Stay the hell away from me,” I yelled.

  The look on Mak’s face darkened murderously. He knew exactly what I was doing and right now there was nothing he could do to stop me.

  I fell in with the technicians, clipping my own purple badge on the lapel of my suit.

  Amidst alarmed stares, Mak fell back, conceding the field.

  It wouldn’t last.

  Paula and Jessie looked back at me as I slipped into the office. After Paula’s confession yesterday, I almost slipped back out again. The air had a definite charge to it and the way they discreetly stepped apart didn’t help.

  Paula smiled softly at me.

  “Come on in, Kaitlin.”

  My return smile was strained as I closed the door behind me. I couldn’t help but feel a quick spike of jealousy, which was ridiculous because it had been my idea in the first place. It gave me desperate thoughts of going back to bed until I could wake up as myself again—whoever in the hell that was.

  I dropped my bag by the door and forced myself to join their little coffee klatch.

  “J.C. has moved our tour up to 9:30. Cam will be joining us. I know six months is a ways off, but have you had a chance to draw up our bid for that casino project that starts at the end of December?”

  I looked blankly at Jessie. He tried prompting me.

  “The Shahrazad? In Vegas?”

  “I saw you working on it before we left,” Paula offered.

  I turned my blank stare toward her.

  I watched as Jessie pulled my coffee from my hand.

  “Let’s step outside.”

  The room swayed a little as I lead the way back toward the door. If my first wind had run out, shouldn’t my second wind be kicking in soon? And if it did, would it last through 9:30? Maybe I could curl up under the table and take a nap. Would that be unprofessional?

  We reached the hall and Jessie turned me to face him.

  “Did something happen with Cam last night?”

  Beer maketh best mates.

  “You’re keeping track of my sex life?!”

  “You said sex, not me.”

  Gerard settled in against the glaring white wall and took a drag from his coffee. “Who said sex? Are we having girl talk? Pretend I’m not here. Tell him everything.”

  “Fuck off, Gerard,” I snarled.

  Gerard grinned as he pushed off the wall. “Promises, promises.”

  “Threats, Gerard. They’re threats.”

  “Ya look like shit, Osgood. Let’s all quit pretending I don’t know what’s going on here. What happened?”

  Sure, fine. Whatever Jessie had or hadn’t told him, Gerard was startlingly smart. He would have pieced most of this together. I turned to include him in the conversation.

  “They have—had—an insider. The insider got scared off by some report Cam got.”

  “And you got this information how?”

  I stared at Gerard, waiting for him to answer his own question. Unlike him, I didn’t rat my friends out.

  Finally, Gerard raised an eyebrow. “You’re kidding.”

  I did a quick perimeter check with my brain, then gave it to him straight.

  “He cracks safes for a living. Did you really think a sawed-off chair and a curtain rod were going to keep him out?”

  “You used to date a safe-cracker? You might just be interesting after all, Osgood.”

  Jessie held a hand up between us. We shut up. He held one finger in front of Gerard’s face.

  “We will talk later.”

  Gerard rolled his eyes.

  Jessie turned his drill sergeant gaze to me.

  “The fingerprint didn’t get anything?”

  “No, he has switched identities with some totally harmless farmboy. Must have cost him a fortune. It’s a really close match, really professional job.”

  “Then we get the insider to turn on them. It’s a much cleaner solution.”

  I bit at my lip. Cleaner solution. How many weeks would it take to pick out the turncoat and then turn him on the others? One, two? Three, four?

  Jessie reached up and lifted the side of my neatly pinned hair. I looked away. My little goose egg throbbed with the attention I’d so carefully withheld. Jessie’s desire to reach out and shake me warred with his equally strong need to pull me in, hold me tight, keep me safe. He did neither.

  “You will not be in that room tonight. Not a word. Now both of you get in there and get to work.”

  I turned and obeyed, but all I could think was…

  Not enough time. Not enough time.

  While Gerard took his turn reviewing the schematics, Paula and I attempted to turn a junk heap into an office. In our zeal to assemble our tools, the boxes, containers, and packing materials had taken over the small space. We sorted and flattened and stacked up the recyclables, set aside permanent containers to be stored. I still felt pukey but moving around made it easier to ignore. I didn’t know what I was going to do when it came time for the tour.

  “I need to pop down to the ladies room,” Paula said as she dropped the last box on the pile.

  “Alright, I’ll call and make an appointment with facilities to get this all carted away.”

  I removed my mini from its energy bar wrapper in my bag—one day I really was going to throw that away—and started tracking down who was in charge of what on this half of the ship. So much more complicated over here. On the other side, you said, Hey, get rid of this. And someone came and took it away. On this side, even garbage was bureaucratic.

  I stood listening as each progressive person passed me on to the next even greater denial of responsibility. I wandered over to the upended container where Gerard had arranged his precious power drill. I lifted the flathead bit and played it between my fingers. Men and their tools. Stephan had had his own over-coddled array of gadgets: screwdrivers, pliers, drills, little wads of stuff that went boom.

  Drills and screwdrivers.

  “No, they don’t fit down the recycling chute and actually we’d be happy to haul them down ourselves if you can just get someone to let us in.”

  “If you can bring them yourselves, I’ll just prop the door open now,” the woman replied.

  I set down the flathead, trailed my fingers across the selection of miniature weapons.

  “Okay, and where am I going?”

  “The canister loading facility.”

  The canister loading facility.

  I swept my open hand across the implements. When my hand returned to my jacket pocket, the Phillips, the flathead, and the sharpest drill bit were missing from Gerard’s beloved tool set.

  I smiled grimly to myself. No, Stephan, I haven’t forgotten everything you taught me.

  “Alright, I’ll be right down.”

  I wasn’t prepared for the punch of seeing him again.

  Neither was he.

  Cam’s intention swept over me, seized me, the second he stepped into the room. I flushed with it. I turned to face him. The crisp white business shirt, unbuttoned with rolled up sleeves, emphasized his athletic tan, emphasized the sense that he’d just stepped away from some flurry of activity that he would soon be returning to. That shock-blue gaze locked on mine. His intention stilled, slowed, became more deeply intimate.

  And then the tangle began to twist…out from him and into me.

  A painful, horrible drilling into my chest.

  My eyes began to tear. I looked away.

  I saw Paula watching as she switched off her equipment and I gave her a weak smile. She looked over my shoulder. The drilling dulled. But the tangle remained, writhing over my skin like a mass of invisible snakes.

  Paula gave my arm a quick squeeze as she passed. The concern and the caring caught me by surprise. But I savored it to ease the ache in my heart.

  Maybe men had beer and women had powder rooms.

  I picked up my own workpad from next to Paula’s cameras. He touched me.

  “You alright?”

  Suddenly, Kaitlin fit brilliantly. I bli
nked fast, then turned with a smile plastered from ear to ear.

  “Great! Is this everybody?” I felt a bitter snarl walk in the room. “Oh, Davina’s joining us. Good, maybe she can introduce us to some of her people.” So, they can hate us, too. That should be fun.

  Cam’s look became watchful. “How did you know she was here? You got eyes in the back of your head?”

  Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck! I never did that. Ever.

  Kaitlin pulled out a grin. “Can’t everyone feel when that much joy walks into a room?”

  Kaitlin marched right past the Director of Port Security and made a straight line to poor J.C. where he was absorbed once more in the disaster of the moment on his workpad. She gave his shoulder a squeeze to bring him back to Earth.

  “Shall we?”

  J.C.’s head snapped up. It gave him a start to see all eyes focused on him, but he quickly gathered himself.

  “Yes, let’s make this quick.”

  That tangle moved over my skin; those eyes drilled into my back.

  Yes, let’s.

  There was nothing quick about a tour of a ship with twenty decks.

  Even Jessie with his unbelievable stores of self-discipline had a glazed look in his eye by the time we reached deck ten. And lord, my feet hurt! But we all had our workpads out. Most of my notes related to staff we’d met so far. I’d add it to Paula’s interview prep notes when we got started tomorrow. Which reminded me, as much I’d rather not, I had some things I needed to ask Davina now that no staffers were around.

  I made my way through the little group to walk next to her.

  She glanced toward me.

  Oh, feel the love.

  “Ms. Soto, we’ll be ready to start compiling files for the interviews by tomorrow. Who do I contact in your organization to get access to the employee files?”

  “Do you even have clearance for that? That’s private information, some of it is even classified. I haven’t seen any kind of—”

  “Davina, they all have clearance. You were there in the meeting with Will, Arlen, and I when we discussed this.” Cam turned to me and put out his hand. “You have your badge?”

  I pulled my badge from the pocket where I’d stashed it after my escape from Mak. I dropped it into his waiting hand, careful not to let my skin touch his. Cam took my card, nudged J.C. to the side, and swiped it through the card reader at the door. Three green lights.

  Cam returned to us.

  “Full access to all parts of the ship, Davina. Full access to all ship’s data, including personnel records.” She looked away and I was surprised the whole hall didn’t spontaneously combust. Jessie, Gerard, Paula, and I all held very still. This didn’t bode well. Cam was going to have a problem on his hands.

  I jolted with surprise when Cam grabbed my lapel. The back of his hand brushed my breast; his fingertips pressed into the skin above my camisole. My stomach clenched. I looked up and caught his gaze for a split second. A different kind of heat. The kind that made my throat too tight.

  Would you make up your fucking mind!

  He released me. I looked down and my badge dangled crookedly from the lapel of my suit.

  I followed the others into the room, staying near Davina. I knew most of her anger was directed at Cam. But I still had to work with her. And primarily with her specifically as the employee records were under her jurisdiction. Arlen dealt more with guest issues on his side of the boat. Summoning my best Kaitlin, I steered her away from the main group.

  “I know you are unhappy with this arrangement. Is there something I can do to make this easier for you? It’s certainly not our intention to make your work environment uncomfortable.”

  Oh, could I ever feel how much she wanted to slap me in the face at that exact second. But she hadn’t become head of Operations Security through pure chance. She took a deep breath. The tang of artificial calm filled the air. She turned to me.

  “Ms. Osgood, my staff will be happy to assist you in any way you need. I report in at 7:00 a.m. and punch out at 10:00 p.m. Anyone on my staff can locate me, if there is anything you need that they don’t have access to.” She closed the statement with a deafening, Are you happy?

  “Thank you.” I shot her a grim smile. As I turned to catch up with the group, I gave her arm a quick rub. “Hang in there.”

  Her confusion pinged at my back as I walked away, but finally she settled and her constant state of rage cooled a bit. Only a few degrees, but it was still a relief.

  I drew up beside Jessie as we walked through a narrow warehouse row.

  J.C. waved his arm around ahead of us.

  “This is where all the materials for packing the canisters are stored. If this was a regular canister, this shelving would rotate as the technicians stripped them clean of the essentials the colonists will require once they reach their designated planet.”

  The canister loading facility.

  Behind J.C. we emerged onto a platform facing an enormous metal, well…can. It dangled on a rail from the story above and tugged at a tether on the rail a story below. A large loading ramp led up to the sealed door on the can’s side. Wheeled bumpers lined the edge of the platform.

  As a unit we moved forward to get a closer look. The simple enormity of the thing boggled the mind.

  “Hey, can we get a look inside?”

  Gerard jogged up the ramp, bubbling curiosity keeping his feet light on the ground. J.C. glowered at him. Gerard flipped the protective cover up from the keycode pad. Now it was J.C. who was jogging.

  “Don’t touch—”

  Gerard took a step back.

  “Dude, looks like somebody already tried.”

  I vaguely felt the jostle of Cam shoving past me. A hundred times more consuming was the blast of cold terror that sent me stumbling forward a pace.

  I spun around.

  Bloodless lips, pale cheeks, Davina stared back at me. Her body tilted to run—maybe that was just force of her intention—but her feet stayed rooted to the tire track-streaked tile.

  “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. Already? They must’ve panicked. They fucking mutilated this thing.” Cam muttered. I heard him spin around on the grate of the loading ramp. He was looking for a camera with a clear shot of the door. He wouldn’t find one. “The loader is parked…seriously?”

  Yes, seriously. Parked right in front of the camera.

  Beside me, Jessie glanced over my shoulder to follow my gaze back to Davina. He understood.

  Cam rumbled down the ramp. He paused to look between Davina and me, then I let the poor woman go.

  “Davina, this ship goes into lock down. Now.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  She turned and fled.

  “Jessie, I have a small investigative team, but I really need all the equipment and the setup your people—”

  “I think the first thing we should uncrate is the trace wands, make sure we’re not dealing with any explosives. We don’t know for sure if they managed to get inside, but they could just as easily have planted something on the exterior of the canister. Most terrorists target the elevator, trying to detonate it just high enough to damage the platform when it falls. I assume you’ve got an explosives expert onboard?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Jessie nodded. “We’ve got one blast suit, if it comes to that.” We were marching at a fast clip out the nearest exit. Jessie called over his shoulder. “Kaitlin, you know where all that equipment is, move out.”

  I hopped on one foot, pulling off one pump, then the other. Then I ran down the hall toward the stairwell. Only when she caught the door, did I realize Paula was right behind me.

  “Well, this is new. I am so glad Brian isn’t on board yet,” she said.

  Apparently, the thought of it had just occurred to her, because her anxiety burst free and flooded over me like water from a decimated dam. Shore it up. Shore it up. No reason for her to worry unduly.

  “Just because someone tried to break into a canister doesn’t mean t
hey’re aiming to blow up the whole ship,” I reminded her.

  “Trace wands and blast suits—”

  “—are an excellent ass-covering strategy. What did you tell me that one time Brian wandered off at the mall? You weren’t thinking about all the terrible things that could have happened to him…”

  One after the other we hit the fifth narrow metal landing. Only eight more flights to go.

  “…because I needed my whole mind clear and focused on finding my boy.”

  “There you go.”

  Five more to go.

  “Besides, isn’t it just the tiniest bit exciting, the thought of catching an actual bad guy versus picking up somebody who’s just thinking about it, planning for it?”

  Paula’s laugh was breathless.

  “This is why he put you in charge of sales, isn’t it?”

  “Are you kidding? I put me in charge of sales. That first sales call he brought me on? Oh, lord, I think you can imagine. That was the end of that. Now, I play chatty dumb blonde,” I hit the last landing, punched open the door, “and he plays calculating ruthless warlord and we actually land clients.”

  “The more fools they.”

  We jogged down the hall, wheezing like a couple of asthmatics. I unclipped my badge from where Cam had fastened it to my lapel. We came to a halt in front of our office door. And I couldn’t get the damn card in the slot.

  I pressed the heel of my hand to my mouth to suppress a giggle.

  “Oh, jeezus, coffee, adrenaline, and ten flights of stairs. Okay, one more time.”

  “Not sure I trust you with a box knife at this point.”

  I had to use both hands, but I got it in there. We burst into the room.

  “Jessie, Box 10.”

  We surveyed the remaining wall of boxes, things we hadn’t planned to unpack for another two months, possibly three. No point in training people on equipment if they weren’t going to be around to use it.

  “Box 10. Of course.”

  Paula pointed to a wide hardcase, four boxes down in the center of the wall. I groaned in deference to my already wobbling muscles. Each of us took one end of the conference table and hauled it out of the way. Then we got to work saving the world.