11 - Brose
I t’s a gray day .
I’m sitting in our quarters, waiting for Olive to finish up with Shep. Whatever that entails. Of course, we have cameras everywhere. Not physical ones, though. Not out in the open in Trinity County. It’s mostly satellites, so the audio is sketchy, at best. But I know Olive well enough to read her body language. I can tell what’s happening without hearing her.
And what’s happening with the Shep guy is plain old attraction.
She likes him.
And why shouldn’t she? There’s a lot to like there. He’s good-looking—I’m good-looking too, but in a different way. Shep has that soldier look to him. Like he’s seen things.
Of course, I’ve seen way more than he has, but I look… not soft, exactly. Just… better managed, I guess.
I look down at myself. I’m slumped in a chair in our living room, laptop balanced on my knees. My tie is loose, but still around my neck, and my shirt is untucked. I don’t have my suit coat on, it’s draped over the couch back. That’s where I dropped it when I came in.
This is the second time I’ve walked away from Olive in the field and it’s sort of a turning point, I guess.
My phone buzzes and I know who it is before I even take it out of my pocket. “Grandfather, what do I?—”
But he cuts me off. “Set her loose, Ambrose.” The typical spotty connection is even more sketchy than usual.
“What?” I say. “We’re totally on track here and?—”
“Set. Her. Loose.”
“But why?” I say quickly. “Everything’s going according to plan.” This is a lie. It’s not going to plan at all, but his answer is even more surprising than my lie.
“You’re right. It’s going perfect. Fifty-five years I’ve been working on this project and now it’s time to set her loose.”
Fifty-five years? What the hell is he talking about?
“Do you hear me, grandson ?”
He says the word grandson like it’s a slur. “I hear you.” I don’t understand him, but I definitely hear him. “Nothing’s messed up, grandfather. She’s doing?—”
But the call ends. There’s nothing but silence.
I look at the phone in shock, only looking away when my attention is drawn to the voice of Olive coming from my laptop. My eyes find the video and despite the unsettling conversation with my grandfather, I smile. This is her intake interview. She was eight and a half that spring CORE brought her back into the fold. The same spring her older brother, Collin, left Trinity County with Amon Parrish to join the Marines.
The Creeds are not CORE, but through a string of weird chance happenings, Olive landed with them as a newborn. Her pregnant teenage mother escaped from Blackberry Hill. Not the one on the actual hill, but the one underneath.
This was way before Ike Monroe took over and the place was a mess down there. Of course, it’s always been run by a Monroe, but Ike’s father died young, and it was his uncle, Zeb, running things at the time. He was a terrible city manager. That’s how Olive’s real mother got out. Came up some secret elevator and just took off running through the woods.
I’ve read this story hundreds of times, but it’s been a while. So I pause the vid of Olive, age eight, and open her written file up, scrolling down as I skim the report of that inciting incident. Her mother gave birth at the Creed house, then took off, leaving Olive behind.
It was a good plan because there are a lot of governing documents related to who can do what inside Trinity County, and Disciple, West Virginia, specifically. That’s why no one came for Olive. Zeb Monroe declared the girl dead. But when your daughter runs away with your first and only grandchild, there are residual feelings about that. Olive Creed’s mother was the daughter of one Pike McGill. That’s who came for her on that fateful New Year’s Eve. That’s who Collin killed. Pike tried one other time when Olive was very young, about eight months old, but he was caught before he got out of Blackberry Hill and Zeb had him locked up.
Good ol’ Pike, though? He never did forget about his granddaughter. He was released from prison New Year’s Eve day and that very night he made his move.
His last move, as it turns out.
A move that flipped Collin Creed’s plans of playing college ball at Ohio State upside down and six months later he was an intelligence operative for SILENCE, the black-ops side of the US Marines.
It had been over two decades since anyone in Trinity County was conscripted into the dark military. There was a formal exit from the program after Jim Bob Baptist completed his mission and was rewarded with a new contract for the trio of towns.
To say that CORE was surprised when Collin Creed ended up as covert intelligence operations would be an understatement. They had underestimated Jim Bob.
I guess CORE decided that if SILENCE was going to put Collin on the game board, they would counter with Olive.
I press play on the laptop vid and listen as Mrs. Creed cries hysterically. They’re at an intake facility not far from where I’m sitting, actually.
In another room sits Mr. Creed. Pastor Creed. He’s not crying, he’s angry. As any parent might be, I suppose, upon hearing that the baby they kinda-sorta stole eight years ago belongs to a covert military operation. He’s yelling.
In a third room sits eight-year-old Olive. She’s cute. Thin and a bit gangly. Not graceful like a ballerina, but lean like a runner. She looks like any other kid her age, wearing jeans, and a t-shirt, and sneakers. The chair is just high enough for her feet to skim the floor as she kicks them back and forth. She’s unaffected by the development, chatting happily with her intake officer as she is told that these people are not her parents.
She takes it all in stride. She’s kind of excited. So when the intake officer asks if she’d like to see where she comes from, Olive is more than willing to go.
There’s no footage of this visit to the underground version of Blackberry Hill, but there are notes and I’ve read them all.
The mind control started that very day. She was behind. In CORE, they start the kids around age two for the most part. There are some exceptions, but two is standard.
Olive was very behind, but so well adjusted to the real world that this sparked a revamping of all the internal protocols when it came to how to bring the children up.
Olive Creed is more than a CORE operative, she’s a test case.
And she’s failing.
All because of a man called Shep.
It’s a bit ironic, I think. Considering who he is, not to mention what he’s done.
And I don’t really understand how it happened. I don’t get it. She did everything right. It should not have turned out this way. But it was like… she took one look at him and all those tight stitches that were holding her together over the years started unraveling. For no reason at all.
It’s bizarre.
But also very serious.
I’m losing her.
And if that call from my grandfather is any indication of what comes next, I’ve already lost her.
And honestly, it hurts.
Olive and I were supposed to be together forever. At the very least, until someone killed her in the field. She wasn’t supposed to flunk out! She’s SIO 2.0. The mistakes of the past were dealt with. Fixed.
But I missed something.
Somewhere along the way, I missed something.
Letting out a long breath, I start thinking back on my own childhood. My training began at the standard age because I was born into the Sinclair family and there were no runaway daughters in that mansion. My mother was a high-ranking, dedicated officer in CORE. My great-great-grandfather was part of the initial CORE Directive back in the forties. My great-grandfather ran hundreds of operatives in the sixties and my grandfather did the same in the eighties and nineties.
Fifty-five years. I guess it adds up but what the hell was he talking about. SIO 2.0 is my project and we certainly haven’t been working on it for fifty-five years.
My father didn’t make it very far—he was killed in the field on a job when I was four. By that time, I’d been living at CORE for two years, so I didn’t even miss him. Didn’t miss my mother, either. CORE parents have children for the mission. It’s got nothing to do with family.
I think that’s where it went wrong for Olive.
She wasn’t CORE. She didn’t grow up with our values. She says she’s part of the mission, but those years she missed as part of her CORE training—between the ages of two and eight—those were… critical.
I can see that now.
So can my grandfather.
Soon everyone will see it.
And then… well, the protocols will be adjusted, of course, but as far as Olive goes? She’s done.
I ponder this. Not just the regrettable outcome of something I’ve heavily invested in, but also in the possibility that she might be saved.
She’s out of the program. This is her last SIO mission, that’s unavoidable.
But she’s not useless. Not at all useless, actually.
She might not be Collin Creed’s genetic sister, but that’s just a technicality. Surely, even though Collin knows the truth now, surely he still loves her. And even though I’ve turned off Olive’s feelings for Collin, that was mostly about loyalty. I can manipulate this. There are ways to turn these feelings back on.
The big test for a SIO operative is stress. It’s the only test, actually. The only one that counts. We stress them, and stress them, and stress them. And then we send them into a situation.
And might this scenario playing out here with Shep, in the general vicinity of Collin, be such a situation?
An… opportunity, maybe? To make lemonade, so to speak.
If I end this operation, what would happen if CORE didn’t come in and scoop her up? What would she do?
I smile here, because I know exactly what she would do and it’s a way forward that I can live with.
I love her. I do. We have a very twisted relationship, but my feelings for her are genuine. I don’t know what life looks like without Olive. The idea that we’d fail never entered my mind.
Overconfidence has brought down more than one mission, but everything was going so well.
Still, this new way forward would keep her alive. At least for a few more weeks. And I could talk to a lot of people in a few weeks. My grandfather being one of them. He’s old now, retired. But he’s still got pull. He’s still got power. I could make a deal. Keep her for myself. We could move to the family mansion and even if I had to lock her up in the basement, she’d be alive. She’d be there for me when I got home every night.
We could have a few kids to give to CORE. Surely her bloodline is good enough? Even if it wasn’t, they wouldn’t turn down kids. Every operation needs new recruits. Maybe we could even keep one?
I smile, thinking about that. How bold of us. To raise a child together.
Maybe we could mold it into the perfect operative?
In fact, this is more than a dream, this is a solid plan. I could come up with a whole new protocol for training children from birth.
My mind begins to race with the possibilities. Of course, this has been done before, but it’s been decades. The mothers were the problem. The idea of ‘breeding’ might work for dogs, but women aren’t dogs. They have opinions.
But Olive and I would be both parents and trainers.
Yes. It could work.
I just need to buy myself some time to set it up.
The door rattles, then opens. And then there she is—the love of my life.
“Hey,” she says, her voice soft.
I focus on her lips. Those perfect, plump lips. Then I look her in the eyes and smile. “Hey.”
She shuts the door and walks over to me, stopping a few paces away because she’s unsure about what’s going on. Which is fair. I’ve sent her some weird signals over the past couple of days. “Why did you leave?”
I shrug. “You had it handled. And the waitress was side-eyeing me. I should’ve ordered breakfast, I guess, but only got a coffee. I could tell she wanted the table.”
“Oh.” She lets out a long breath of relief. “That’s all?”
I chuckle. “Were you expecting something more?”
“I just… you were… there . And then you weren’t. It threw me.” She lets out another breath, this one longer than the last. “Do you wanna know what happened? Or were you watching?”
I put the laptop aside, setting it on a small round table next to the chair. “Come here,” I say, patting my lap, inviting her to position herself across it.
She smiles, shyly. “OK.” Then she closes the distance between us. I look up at her as she looks down at me. “Now what?”
I tsk my tongue. “You know what. You get a reward. You’re such a good girl, Olive.”
She smiles again, not shy this time. Relieved. She knows this Shep guy has ruined everything, but she wants to believe my lie and so… she does. Slowly, she positions herself in front of me, then gently eases her body over my lap. The chair arms are kind of in the way, making this position awkward, but that’s part of the fun, if you ask me. Her shoulders and head are dangling over one side, her breasts are pushed up against the inside of the arm, her legs bent over the other one at a weird angle.
But none of that is the point.
The point is her ass, which is dead center over my dick.
She’s wearing opaque black tights and a flirty miniskirt. I push the skirt up so I can rub her ass cheeks. She relaxes. She likes this. We do it all the time. It’s a reward for her. Like a good steak given to a dog after a day of training.
“Does it feel good?” I ask.
“Yes.”
I slip my right hand down into her tights while the left hand squeezes her cheeks. She’s already breathing heavy. Usually, at this point, I warn her not to come. But this time, I don’t. I want her to come as many times as she is able. I want her to think about this day after it’s over. I want her to remember what it’s like between us when things are good.
I want her to crave me when I’m gone.
My left hand grabs her tights into a bunch and then I rip a hole in them. She gasps and then does it again when I slip my fingers between her legs. She’s so fucking wet, they slide all over the place. “You like this?” I ask.
“I do,” she whispers back.
I bring my hand up and then smack it down on her bare cheek. The sound of this slap fills the room and she moans.
But I don’t do it again. Not right away. I want her to enjoy this. So I finger her some more, forcing two fingers up inside her as another one finds her sweet spot.
She comes, biting her lip to hold it in, but failing.
I smile, enjoying her uneasiness.
Then I caress her and lean down to kiss her ass cheek. It’s a bit red from the slap, and warm too, because I hit her hard. But she likes the kiss. She moans.
“Get up now,” I say.
She doesn’t want to, I know this. She’s addicted to spankings. I’ve had her kneeling for hours, begging me to spank her. And it was real . She was dying for a spank. So wet just thinking about my hand making red prints on her ass cheeks, she would just spontaneously come without me even touching her.
It was definitely an experience I’ll never forget. Easily the best sexual encounter I’ve ever had. I doubt anything will ever come close to that day.
She stands before me, a questioning look in her eyes.
“I’ve got a bottle of champagne in my closet,” I tell her. “Second drawer down, below my belts. Get it and bring two glasses.”
She nods her head, bowing it slightly. “OK.” Then she does as she was told and returns a few minutes later, handing me the bottle and sets the glasses down on the little table, right on top of my laptop.
Then she bends down between my legs, looking up at me like I’m her god.
I pop the cork, letting the bubbly liquid spill all over my lap. She leans in, licking at it, which is a nice touch, I think. Then I hand the bottle back to her and she pours us each a drink, offering me a glass.
I take it, she takes hers, and we hold them together, just barely touching.
“To our brand-new future.”
If she had any doubts, they are gone now. She is fully invested in my lie. She takes a sip, then goes to set her glass down.
“No,” I say. “Drink it all. I want you… pliable.”
This makes her happy. She likes being pliable. She likes when I take control and force her to be uncomfortable. Like that time I had her on her knees. So she downs it and tilts her head at me, flirting. “There. I’m buzzing already.”
“Perfect,” I say. “Now… go over to the couch—behind it—and then bend over and pull your tights all the way down to your knees.”
She doesn’t even hesitate. But she does wobble a little. I get an embarrassed glance over her shoulder as she rounds the back of the couch, which separates the living area from the bedroom area. She ends up facing me, since I’m on the opposite side of the room.
“Bend all the way over, I tell her. With your face in the cushion.”
She does this, sighing, like she’s tired.
“Good girl,” I say.
Then I get up and walk around the couch behind her. I slip her skirt up. My dick is already hard, but the sight of the ripped tights—the almost perfectly round hole exposing her ass—makes me throb with anticipation.
I grind against her, my dick safely tucked away.
I won’t be fucking her. Not because I don’t want to, but because she’s going to be unconscious in a matter of seconds. The champagne was drugged. Placed in that drawer for the end.
And this is what that is.
The end.
Her breathing becomes very heavy, so I grab her by the hair, bend over, and lean in to her ear, just to make sure she hears me. “You failed. I’m very, very sorry, Olive, but you failed. And now, my dear, you will have to pay the piper.”
“Whaa… what?”
“Shhhhhhh,” I whisper, then bite her earlobe. “I’m leaving now, Olive. I’ve been summoned to DC. You can’t come. I’m going to be reassigned and you’ll be collected soon. Today was your last chance. I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to add any pressure, but it’s over now, Olive. We’re over.”
She starts freaking out, struggling beneath me, But I have her pinned to the couch with my hips and my hand is firmly wrapped around her hair.
Anyway, the drugs in the champagne were very powerful, and it’s only a matter of seconds before she’s passed out cold.