Psycho Within Us (The Psycho Series Book 2) (13 page)

This was an opportunity that could not be missed.  Coordination would be necessary to connect these dots in a manageable timeline, and the information that might be gleaned from this convergence
was potentially fathomless.

The FSB liaison
sighed.  “You understand what hold the
vory
have over Russian police agencies, government buildings, even politicians, yes?  If you go there asking questions, and any
one
of the
vory
’s bought officers gets word, it will get to Shcherbakov.  And that could be very dangerous for you.  I understand he’s killed an Interpol inspector before?”

Detective-Inspector
Aurélie Rideau nodded.  Yes, she was well aware of the dangers, and she was also well aware of what Shcherbakov had done to Detective-Inspector Jacques Dubois.  Not a close friend, but a colleague.  One that had gone searching for Steege and Heesters.  The journalists were never seen again.  But Dubois had been.  He’d been seen just fine.

“It’ll be
safe,” Rideau told him.  “I know some of the people down there.  They’re good officers.  Safe, professional, and trustworthy.”

As soon as he left Rideau’s office, Metveyev was searching his phone.  Even though he knew there was little use until he was well outside of the building—its walls contained piezoelectric oscillators and radio saturation emitters, to keep eavesdroppers out of their operations, but it also prevented most cellular singles from escaping.  Only the landlines and direct satellite links worked.

When he stepped out of the building, a driver was waiting on him.  The black sedan was just one of a fleet that Interpol agents and personnel were permitted while on the clock. 
One of the perks of accepting this post in France, on behalf of the Motherland.

Metveyev got inside, and immediately told his driver to take him to
Les Café des Fédérations, which wasn’t unusual for him.  It wasn’t fine dining, but it was the best, hearty French food to be had in the city.  He ordered the pig’s cheek stew, a single glass of wine, and then asked the waiter to leave him alone for the duration of his meal.  “
Je ne vais pas avoir besoin de vos services
,” he said.  “
Merci
.”  The waiter bowed and turned to leave.

Metveyev took out his phone and punched only one key, automatically dialing the number he had ready.
  One ring, that was all.  “
Bonjour?
” said the voice at the other end.  The FSB liaison had never met the owner of that voice, and if God was good, he never would.

“
Vous pouvez dire à votre homme qu'il a raison
,” he said.  “
Pelletier est là
. 
Mais ils savent aussi votre homme arrive là
. 
Il est sur le point de devenir très chaud à Chelyabinsk, il serait sage de dire à vos gens de sortir
.”  Translation: 
You can tell your man he’s right
. 
Pelletier is there
. 
But they also know your man is coming there
. 
It is about to get very hot in Chelyabinsk, it would be wise to tell your people to get out
. 

The silence held
.  Then, “
Merci
.”  The line went dead.

Metveyev looked at his phone, thinking.  He then replaced it in his coat pocket and took another sip of his pig’s cheek stew, turning it over in his mouth, ruminating.  A degree of guilt had begun to eclipse his heart, but like most Russians, and most men in his situation, he had learned to live with pain.  It only made good sense to do what he’d done.  If not…

If not, they will have my family
. 
If not, they’ll do to my brother and two sisters what they did to the others
.  Ambassador Gregori Metveyev knew those names better than Detective-Inspector Aurélie Rideau: Jacobus van den Broek, Aldo Daalder, Willeke Ommen, and many others.  Almost two dozen victims that were never reported by Moscow Police, by orders of FSB.  The Mafia had grown strong, with various arms spreading across the globe, merging with other syndicates.

What the United Nations had done to bring together countries, and what Interpol had done to bring together police agencies, organized criminal syndicates were also managing
to do the same.  They were still working out the kinks, but soon, probably within the next decade, they will have set the new standard.  Something even more powerful than the Five Families in America, something even more far-reaching than the many cartels in South America.  Something else was emerging, some new, dangerous creature.

Evil is on the rise
.  Those were the words of his father, who gave his entire life to public service, and who never once was forced to succumb to the corruption he saw in his fellow officials all around him.  “All over the world,” his father had said.  “Evil is on the rise, and it cannot be stopped.  That is what keeps me up at night.  That is what has me most afraid.”  Metveyev had disagreed with his father, saying that nothing has changed. To which his father replied, “No?  A global economy that ensnares us all, makes us so dependent on each other.  You don’t see it growing? 
Capitalism
.”  The word was venom when he said it.  “What about the rise in gun violence in the U.S.?  School shootings, workplace shootings…they have
more
gun laws than they did in the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s, yet gun violence is on the rise.  One never heard about such school shootings as those of Columbine and Newtown, Connecticut, not when I was younger.  The Americans and the British attack al-Queda and other networks, yet terrorist attacks are more frequent now.  And the
vory
…”

Gregori Metveyev remembered that discussion with his father quite vividly, just six months before he died
from a sudden malady.  There was some discussion of poison, but the illness had been of a nature no doctor had been able to identify.  Metveyev had forgotten that conversation for some time, but it came back to him more frequently these days.  “Evil is on the rise.”  He spoke the words without knowing it, after he finally swallowed his mouthful soup.

Metveyev did not have a large family, but he had enough that he cared for their safety.  It meant he was compromised.  It meant that they had gotten to him.  It meant that the
Mafia had found just one more way into Interpol and its operations, the same way that nations were able to turn informants inside the ranks of their enemy’s intelligence agencies, so too had the criminal syndicates found this useful.  It had always been this way, but now they were becoming more sophisticated doing it.

Gregori Metveyev had never seen himself as one of those easily manipulated, and would never have guessed he would be the one to betray his people, to betray his
brothers and sisters in law enforcement, or to betray the trust of his friends and family in the Motherland.

I am no longer functioning as a man of the law
, he thought, taking another sip of soup. 
I am not even a worthy criminal, not one to be trusted in the ranks of the
vory v zakone. 
I’m a tool to both sides, no longer operating as an individual
. 
I straddle the line to keep my family safe
.  He took a sip of wine, looked out the bay window, onto a street bustling with activity, with tourists and locals on a leisurely stroll.  Metveyev could see them, but he could never be one of them again.

The soup was good.  Resigned to it all, he took another slurp, finished his wine, and returned to the office.

3

The school was an alien planet, and Kaley still had
n’t charted all the dangers.  The double doors were directly ahead of her, but getting to them meant navigating through various herds of animals she was unfamiliar with: the white goth kids, the black boys who had aspirations of thug life, the rich kids with tucked in Polo shirts and Ugg boots, the poor kids with their matted hair and faded shirts (washed and rewashed too many times), the jocks in their jerseys, and of course, the “stragglers,” the ones that had no affiliation, and sometimes had no aspirations to merge with any group, or else hadn’t found one that would accept them yet.  Awkward nerds, kids recently moved from some other school, kids too ugly to be loved; all of these fit into the last group.

Like Mom with her job applications
, she thought. 
The stragglers wait and wait, hoping that someone will call them over for an interview, and, if they answer all the questions exactly right, if they give off the right vibe, their applications will be accepted and they’ll have a group to protect them
.  The waves of emotions poured out of all of these groups; the hope of acceptance, the fear of rejection. 
Pathetic
.

Kaley had no room to speak, though.  She belonged to this latter group, and not by choice.  Well,
perhaps
partly
by choice.  She certainly hadn’t done herself any favors by going the quiet route.  She kept her head down for the most part, and on the days she wore a hoodie she always pulled the hood up over her head to avoid eye contact with anybody.  Today, though, she had no hoodie, yet still she cast her head down at the floor, at the cracked brick tiles that led up to the doors, across from which someone had hung posters with school spirit, things like ’CANES GONNA TRAMPLE THE COLONELS THIS WEEKEND!  Kaley had come to the party too late to care about the Cartersville Purple Hurricanes and their never-ending struggle against the Cassville Colonels.

Kaley stepped through the front door, and as she did she also stepped inside the lodge, following in Spencer’s wake.  The monster was moving about the house with vehement purpose.  He’d already fired a couple of shots at the door’s locks, but once the wood had splintered away he’d found a tougher frame underneath the wood veneer, one made of steel.  “Fucker knew how to keep his little toys in the toy box,” he muttered as he set about looking for tools.  Kaley followed him.

Through the doors of her school and into its surprisingly opulent atrium, she paused to gather herself.  There was water around her feet, a foamy sludge that no one else could see.  The same as in her dream.  To her left was a girl wearing a black skirt and neon pink stockings.  She carried a black purse that had tiny fake skulls stitched alongside tiny chains holding My Little Pony figures.  The sludge was foaming around the ankles of those neon pink stockings…
She has no idea
.

Kaley looked to her right.  A pair of girls were texting back and forth, either with each other or someone else.  Kaley stared at them, and one of the girls caught Kaley staring and gave her the stink eye.
  The water was flowing down the stairs with great purpose, foaming and swirling, yet it had a trickling speed. 
Like a happy little brook
, she noted.

She stared at it all quite dumbly, unable to form a coherent opinion about any of it.

“
She’s here
,” someone whispered.  That familiar voice again.  “
She’s somewhere close by, I can feel it
.”  It was him, the one conducting the Others, the one organizing their search.  Kaley didn’t know what they wanted but she intuitively knew that the longer she remained in this state, somehow in two places at once, the easier it would be for them to find her.

“
Yes
…
yes, she’s close by, close by!
” it hissed.  Those whispers carried down the halls of her school, echoed up from the basement in the lodge, and carried well out into the blizzard.  Indeed, the whispers found a mode of transportation on those winds, and were soon carried away.  But Kaley knew they would return.  They had nothing else to do but search for her, and wait for an opportunity.  Whoever they were, whatever they were trying to escape from, they only needed to wait. 
An’ they have the patience of Job from the Bible, chil’
.  That was Nan again, her words returning to Kaley through some similar corridor as the Others, perhaps half imagined, half remembered from a conversation long ago. 
Evil is persistent
. 
It’s got nowhere else to go, nothin’ else to do
. 
Nothin’ but sit, an’ wait to come back
. 
S’why we got to be vigilant, ya hear?

Spencer was rummaging around in the various drawers in the
bedroom down the hall.  She walked over to the door, paused, and looked at him.  He was grumbling frustratedly under his breath.  “What are you looking for?” she asked.  He didn’t respond, just kept rummaging.  He tossed a bunch of underwear out of a drawer, some long johns, a wooden box that clattered to the floor and spilled out some fancy silver spoons, a Rubix cube, and then—

“Shoelaces
,” he said, unraveling a long red strand of them.  Spencer smiled, pocketed them.

“You’re looking for shoelaces?”

“No, but those are handy things sometimes.”

“For what?”  Spencer didn’t answer her. 
Now he moved across the hall to the bathroom.  “So, what are you looking for?” she repeated, following him.

“Somethin’ to pick the fuckin’ lock with,” he growled.

“Don’t you have—”

Someone bumped into her from behind, jarring her.  It was the Mondo Bitches.  Nancy paused
, looked at her.  It was her shoulder that had not-so-accidentally smacked up against her.  “Oops!” she laughed.  “Sorry, Kaley, I thought I smelled your sister, got me all off-balance.”  Laquanda snickered.  Laquanda was a head taller, but she was skinny and just a little awkward, and Kaley sensed immense insecurity inside her concnering her long face, which a couple of boys had said resembled a horse’s.  Laquanda followed Nancy closely, out of what Kaley sensed was a need to be near someone who could supply her with things she couldn’t otherwise get, namely clothes and friends.  Nancy was prettier, richer, had more things than the other girls and sometimes gave away her old phones whenever her parents bought her a new one, and shared alcohol from her parents’ secret stash on the weekends.  It bought her friends that weren’t really friends.

“You need to stop talking about my sister like that.”

“What?” said Spencer, stepping out of the bathroom and passing right through her.  The foaming water was all around him too, trickling down the walls and pooling at his feet, only he didn’t see or hear it.  In his hands, he had a pair of what looked like hairpins, and a paperclip.  “You say somethin’?”  He knelt in front of the hallway door, slipped the paperclip into the bottom lock.

“Excuse
me
?” said Laquanda.  “Who the fuck you think
you
is, lil’ skank?”

“I wasn’t talking to you,” she said.

“Then who were you talking to?”  The question echoed simultaneously between Laquanda and Spencer.

Kaley
was suddenly dizzy from the overlap.  She didn’t know why, but it caused a severe and powerful cognitive dissonance, one that made both worlds lurch for an instant.  She blinked, tried to clear her foggy mind.  “Never…never mind,” she said.

Spencer grunted.  Back at school, Nancy pinched Laquanda on the shoulder and said, “C’mon.  To hell with this stinky bitch.”  She pronounced it more like
stanky
.

The school bell rang.  It was the first bell, the three-minute warning.  That put the time at exactly 7:57
AM
.

Nancy and Laquanda retreated into the hastening throng of students that were
being funneled through this same artery.  With a dull, distant look, Kaley watched Laquanda give her the finger as she and Nancy stepped through the swirling pools of foaming water.  Back in the log cabin, she was staring equally dully at Spencer.

Shannon’s “laughing man” had many skills, many of them Kaley had gotten a brief glimpse of during her time in that basement with Dmitry, Olga, and the others.  His skills at lock-picking were something she’d actually
used before, by peeking into his mind, by the maniac’s own invitation.  One might even say she was forced inside of him.  Even now, she could feel a sliver of that connection, feeling the sensitivity in his fingers transmitted to her own.  She felt the vibrations of every tumbler pin in that lock, and felt every nudge that Spencer gave to those tumbler pins with his makeshift rake and torsion wrench, as if she were making those nudges and decisions herself.

Maybe I am
.

Kaley’s powers—if they were indeed
her
powers—were vast beyond her own reckoning.  There were so many avenues unexplored, so many parts of it she didn’t understand.  The best she had figured it, she was touched by an uncanny connection to the barriers between this world and some other.  She hesitated to call it Hell, but she’d done some reading on it in an attempt to come to some understanding, to give it all a
word
.  Words helped the mind gain a grip.

Over the last few months, Kaley had searched for books on the topic.  There were the usual books by a bunch of kooks claiming to make contact with the spirit world, but everything they mentioned didn’t sound even remotely like what she was going through.  A bunch of books on heaven and hell,
near-death experiences, even parallel dimensions.  But the one that helped her come to terms most, and gave her words to perhaps understand a little more, came from Carl Sagan.

Spencer had said Sagan’s name to her on that fateful night.  He had made some quote to her about how if you wanted to make an apple pie from scratch, you first had to create the universe.  A Google search had brought his name up, and she’d found videos of Sagan on YouTube.  One in particular discussed how human beings exist in a three-dimensional world, and how
they, as animals, developed to understand that world in those three dimensions.  But Sagan hypothesized what it might be like to discover that there was a fourth dimension, and how it would not be possible for a human, as three-dimensional creatures, to understand it.

Sagan said that a three-dimensional creature would have the same experience seeing a four-dimensional object as a one-dimensional creature would have seeing a two- or three-dimensional object.  He said, “Let us suppose that we are flat—I mean, absolutely flat—and that the whole universe was flat, too.   We would have evolved with flat eyes that could only see along a constant, flat surface.  We could not look up, or down, only straight ahead on a perfectly flat surface.  Now, if a three-dimensional object were to somehow come into our flat universe
and land right in front of us, we would only be able to see a
sliver
of that object, a ‘flat slice’ directly in front of us, and not the rest of the object above or below us.  We would be physically incapable of looking up at the rest of it, our eyes and brains only developed to see and comprehend all objects in the universe in a perfectly flat picture.  Also, though, the three-dimensional object would be incapable of interacting with we one-dimensional creatures in any meaningful way.”  Sagan had waxed philosophical about what might happen if humans could somehow see beyond the dimensions they were bound to.  “What might we see?” he asked, again and again, with almost regret that he would never know.

Sagan was a smart man, but Kaley figured he didn’t know how lucky he was that he couldn’t see it.

So that was it.  It was as close to a word as Kaley could pin to it.  It was another dimension—not another world, not another planet or universe—but another fact of the reality she was already familiar with, just another slice of the Great Big Everything we all inhabit.

“But you have to be careful ’bout all o’ that talkin’ an’ them words,” her Nan had once told
her, when on the topic of attention deficit disorder, something that had bothered Nan since first hearing about it.  “They sometimes give a name to somethin’ because they don’t unnerstan it, an’ a word can trick the mind into thankin’ it knows somethin’ it don’t.”

There was a soft, inaudible click, and Kaley felt Spencer was successful with the first
lock.  Indeed, he removed the lock picks from the bottom lock and began addressing the lock above it.  “Talk to me,” Spencer finally said into the deafening silence between them.  “Let’s pass the time a little while I work.  How’ve ya been, sport?”

“What do you care?” she said.  All around her, kids were scuttling faster and faster, fearful of being late.  Well, all except a few lost souls who couldn’t care less about their grades or how their lives would turn out because of their absenteeism.  She became caught up in the forward movement, propelled by that bell like all the others, a cattle call of sorts.  The water foamed a little more, flowed a little faster around her ankles.

They don’t see it
. 
None of them do
.