Chapter 3
Chapter 3
T hey seemed to have no idea what to do with her, no idea what she was capable of. In a world where everything was known, Esther was a question mark. Leo was strangely proud of that, of her, especially after the discovery that blew their ongoing investigation to smithereens, turning it on its ear. They weren’t looking for two men; they were looking for the same man playing dress up. That was how he kept evading them, by pretending to be someone else so elaborately they had bought it, hook, line and sinker. The suspect had gone so far as to create a second online persona for himself. Somehow he must have known he was being hacked and watched online. He had counted on the facial recognition software and all the other tech the team could throw at him. What he hadn’t counted on was the human element; he hadn’t counted on Esther.
If the new job didn’t know what to do with her professionally, they had even less idea what to do with her personally. They found her odd, off putting, uncomfortable, never knowing what to make of her alternating cool silences or blurted statements. Leo was used to being an outsider. It was strange to have someone else now inhabiting that space along with him. And it was stranger still how much it bothered him for her sake. She was young, na?ve, and clearly sheltered. This seemed to be her first time away from home, first time in a city. Of course she was unprepared for socialization, for being a spy. But Leo, who saw more of her than anyone else, knew she was a nice kid, deep down. Maybe it was the daily breakfast and coffee she plied him with, maybe it was because she was his assignment, or maybe it was because they shared their outcast status. Whatever the reason, he was on her side, fully and completely. As far as he was concerned, it was an us-versus-them scenario.
And he knew something else about Esther: she had a crush on him. Perhaps “crush” was the wrong word. She wasn’t the type to fawn, flush, and giggle like a schoolgirl. But they spent ten to twelve hours a day together in tight spaces. He had made a study of her expressions, limited as they were, and he understood her feelings ran deeper than professionalism. It was only natural, he supposed. Not that he was a catch by anyone’s definition. He’d never had trouble finding a woman, but the quality of woman he usually attracted didn’t stick around much longer than the next free meal. So he was especially careful not to do anything to encourage Esther’s mislaid crush. She was new, young, and impressionable. In many ways he was her caretaker. It was a classic setup for mislaid admiration. He was certain when something newer and shinier came along, she would forget her feelings for him. In the meantime, he was thankful he didn’t return the sentiment. Not that she was wholly unattractive. The raw material was rather pleasant, and he didn’t mind looking at her when she was lost in work, as she almost always was. But she was so wholesome, so pure and untouched. It gave him the heebie-jeebies. Women in his world were fast, hard, and experienced, and that was how he preferred them. Esther was like a little rosebud at first frost. She made him feel strangely protective of her innocence, a fact he sort of hated and resented. He was her keeper at work. Did that have to mean he was her keeper in all the other parts of her life? No. He refused. That was why he’d been careful to keep things purely professional, to learn as little about her as possible.
It was growing harder, though. Not because she revealed things about herself, but because, the more time they spent together, the more curious he became.
“Esther, how old are you?” he asked during their second week of work. Currently he stared at the top of her head as they sat across from each other in a conference room. A series of pictures was spread in front of her. Ridge wanted her to look at them and see if she could find any correlation or pattern. They’d already been scanned by a computer but, as they were learning, having a human computer was an added bonus. So far Ridge had been tossing her little bits and pieces of things, trying to figure out how best to employ her unique gifts. To Leo’s satisfaction, she hadn’t failed at anything, always finding something their precious computer had missed, much to Blue’s stupefaction.
“Twenty four,” she said without looking up. Absolutely nothing would take her focus off the job until Leo declared it was time for lunch and peeled her away. Then they would eat a hurried lunch in the break room and she would scurry back to the task until it was finished.
He whistled softly. “I have guns older than you.”
That earned a look. She peered up at him, squinting, trying to read him the way she read her puzzles and pictures. What bugged Leo was how often she succeeded. “You don’t strike me as a collector.”
“I’m not, but I enjoy them. Maybe someday when I’m old and have time and money.”
She was still doing the narrow eyed gaze. “If you don’t begin making yourself what you want to be now, you won’t succeed in doing it when you’re older. Age isn’t a magic formula for achievement and intelligence.”
He blinked at her. “Wow, that was some kind of deep wisdom.”
“I’ve got a million of them,” she said, her tone deadpan as she dropped her head and returned to her work.
He studied the top of her head some more, strangely averse to the end of conversation. Perhaps it was boredom. For the last few weeks, he had done nothing but sit and watch her work. The inactivity was killing him. How long was he going to be an overpaid, underworked babysitter? He had tried asking The Colonel and gotten a grunt in return, meaning The Colonel probably had no idea, meaning his life was now at the whim of whichever bureaucrat thought it would be a super neat fantastic idea to bring on a civilian with no training, based on her ability to solve a puzzle.
“Give me a word,” he demanded. Esther, he discovered, was a logophile, a lover and collector of words. Leo had come to enjoy the words, too. It was like having a human word of the day calendar at his fingertips.
“Zemblanity.”
“What’s it mean?” he asked.
She made a little shooing motion with her fingers. Sighing, he reached for his phone and looked it up. Zemblanity: an unhappy surprise or discovery, the opposite of serendipity.
“Well, that’s depressing,” he said.
She glanced quickly up, bestowing one of her half-quirked smiles. Unconsciously, he reached out and began drumming his fingers on the table. Esther’s hand reached over and flattened them. She didn’t like repetitive little noises, couldn’t stand them, in fact.
“I’m bored,” he declared.
She moved aside and patted the space beside her. Relieved, he angled his chair beside her, turned it around, and straddled it as he sat backwards, leaning over to inspect the pictures before him. They were a series of executions, gruesome in the extreme. He had the sudden thought that she shouldn’t be seeing these and turned to inspect her instead.
“These don’t bother you?” he asked.
She didn’t answer. He faced forward again, frowning, resisting the urge to gather the photos, stalk down the hall, and shove them in Cameron Ridge’s face. Why would he foist such gruesome photos on such an innocent kid? It was wrong and gross. If it were anyone else, Leo might wonder if he was purposely trying to drive Esther away. But, much as they didn’t get along, Ridge had never been the type to fight dirty. He was too squeaky clean for that. His by-the-book rule following nature was one of the reasons he annoyed Leo so much. Opposites in every way, oil and water, the two of them were.
“We could ask them to put you on something else,” Leo said.
“Leo,” she replied, not looking up.
“What?” he asked.
“Please.” She touched her finger to his, softening the word. She couldn’t stand extraneous noise while she worked, the reason they were in the conference room. The cubicle was too noisy for her to concentrate. That was how Leo knew she had a crush on him, because she allowed him to accompany her to the work room instead of remain in the cubicle, banished and waiting. “There.” She sat back and rubbed her eyes.
“What? Where?” He looked at the pictures, a dozen scenes of death that seemingly had nothing in common, minus the fact that all the subjects were corpses.
“These five were done by the same hand.” She tapped five pictures. Leo leaned in for closer inspection.
“What am I missing?” The pictures looked nothing alike to him; the manner of death wasn’t even the same.
“It’s the tilt of the head. They’re positioned the same way. And in these two the, ah, skin flap has the same signature.” She was no longer looking at the pictures. Instead she sat back, head tilted away.
“Esther, are you okay?” he asked.
She nodded. “We should get this information to Ridge.”
“Hmm.” He regarded her as he reached for his phone, firing off a short text. Ridge arrived a short time later, Ethan at his side. Ethan wasn’t usually in the office, only popped in occasionally. Leo breathed a sigh of relief. Ethan was more his style, much more relaxed than their uptight boss. With him there as a buffer, the meeting would undoubtedly go better.
“Esther found something,” Leo supplied. Somehow he had become the spokesperson in this weird little scenario. He didn’t like it, but he saw no way around it. Esther was clearly uncomfortable with new people, men especially. She tended to blurt things worse if she tried to talk to them directly. Leo knew they saw her as an oddity, perhaps even as a freak, someone to do unusual work and remain silent. It bothered him that they didn’t see what he saw. She was quirky, yes, but sweet and thoughtful, kind and funny.
“Sweet,” Ethan said, plopping into a chair and propping his feet. “Watcha got?”
Esther glanced at Leo before answering. He gave her an encouraging nod. She cleared her throat. “These five were done by the same person.”
Ridge and Ethan leaned in to make their inspection. Ridge’s expression was serious, imperative. Ethan’s was interested, fascinated. Ridge reshuffled the pictures, putting the five together, pushing aside the other seven. “How certain are you, Esther?”
“If she wasn’t certain, I wouldn’t have called you,” Leo said, resentful on her behalf.
Ridge tossed him an annoyed look before quickly smoothing it away. Leo took more than a little satisfaction in that look. It was always so fun to ruffle the unruffleable. “Lives depend on this information. It has to be infallible,” Ridge said tightly.
Everyone turned to survey Esther while Leo edged protectively closer. “I’m certain,” Esther decreed.
Ridge gave a little nod and made eye contact with Ethan. “Strike team?” Ethan asked.
“Strike team,” Ridge agreed.
Ethan stood and ghosted from the room, already in stealth mode. Or maybe he was in it so often he couldn’t turn it off now. Leo itched to go with him, to join the action, to remove the threat. His hands flexed and he rubbed his palms together. He’d been in a lot of lousy situations over the years, but playing nursemaid might actually break him.
“Thank you, Esther. I appreciate this. You’ve saved a lot of lives today,” Ridge said. Grudgingly, Leo admitted it was decent of him to thank her, something he likely didn’t do for everyone. Perhaps it was a sign that he realized how untouched she was.
Esther gave a little nod. “Excuse me. I’m going to,” she pointed out the door, toward the restroom and disappeared, almost as silently as Ethan, leaving Leo and Ridge in awkward silence.
“How’s she doing?” Ridge asked. Since she was clearly doing well at the job, Leo understood it was a question about her emotional wellbeing.
“It’s hard to tell. She’s untouched and self-contained,” Leo said.
Ridge nodded. He glanced at the door and took a breath, as if gearing up for something difficult. “We’re on the same side here, Leo. I care about my team, all of them. The past, it’s that: the past. As far as I’m concerned, you and I have a clean slate.”
“I’m not certain I can say the same, but I’ll try. Esther is the job and therefore my priority. Anything personal doesn’t get in the way.” He wanted to mean it, but theirs was a murky history.
Ridge nodded and let himself out of the room. Leo waited a couple of beats and left as well, letting himself into the women’s bathroom without knocking.
As he suspected, Esther was in a stall, heaving into a commode, pale and sweating. He wet a paper towel and applied it to her forehead, laying his palm reassuringly in the center of her back. After a few shaky breaths, she stood and leaned hard on the side of the stall, resting her cheek against the cool metal.
“Which is worse, seeing men who’ve already been killed or knowing lives now rest on your work?” he asked.
“Dead men,” she whispered, face and lips pale. “My work is solid.”
He laughed, earning the half smile from her. “Cockiness is important in this world, kid. I think you’re going to do just fine.” Even so he put out his arm and pulled her against him, letting her lean on his chest instead of the wall. She did so, leaning into him without embracing him in return, as he somehow knew she would.
“Thanks.”
“My job,” he said.
She pulled away and peered up at him, big eyes serious. “I know. I know this is a job to you, Leo, that I’m a job to you. I don’t delude myself. But I’m still ridiculously grateful. I don’t know what I’d do without you, what I’ll do without you when your part in this is over.” She bit her lip, the first sign of worry or nerves he’d ever witnessed from her.
“Then let’s make sure and get you ready to stand on your own,” Leo said. “You’re smart and capable, Es. Just a little untested. You’ll get there. Everyone starts somewhere.”
She nodded, believing him completely, merely because he was the one who said it. Had anyone ever had that much faith in him? It was unnerving because there was nowhere to go but down. In Leo’s experience it was usually better to start at the bottom and work his way up, to take people by surprise rather than let them down. He felt the viselike grip of panic edge up his throat. “Let’s get out of here. You’ve been working like crazy. We’ll go out for lunch today, okay?”
“I packed lunch for us,” she said.
He rolled his eyes. “Of course you did.” She packed lunch for them every day, and brought him breakfast and coffee in the mornings. He had probably gained five pounds in the last two weeks, but it was weight he needed. He had become too rangy after too many missed meals and too many liquid lunches. His brain felt sharper after so much sustenance, his body less sore. Another couple of weeks under her careful ministration and he’d be back in fighting shape. “Bring it and we’ll have a picnic in the park.”
“Okay,” she said, cheeks flushing with pleasure. He wanted to warn her away from him, to tell her to hurry up and get over her crush already. He wasn’t worth it, would let her down and hurt her, sooner rather than later. On the other hand, it was nice to be someone’s hero for once.
“Esther.”
“Hmm?” She was doing the doe-eyed thing again, twisting her long braid between her fingers.
He reached in his pocket and withdrew a tin of Altoids. “Have a mint. Your breath smells like puke.”
“I guess you’d know,” she said, accepting the proffered mint.
He was hung over nearly every Monday, something he didn’t think she realized but apparently did. “Is that why you bring me food?”
“Among other reasons,” she said, popping the mint between her lips.
“What reasons?” he asked.
She shook her head.
“For a puritan, you’re kind of a mystery,” he noted.
“For a spy, you’re kind of transparent,” she returned.
“Okay, let’s get you out of this office. The sass is apparently seeping into your brain.” Clasping her hand, he led her out of the bathroom.