The Informationist: A Thriller (2 page)

The effervescence in the voice on the other end brought the crack of a smile, and Munroe said, “I just got your message.”

“I know that you aren’t looking for new work for a few months,” Kate said, “but this is an exception. The client is Richard Burbank.”

Munroe paused. The name was familiar. “Houston oil?”

“That’s him.”

She sighed. “Okay, fax me the documents, I’ll take a look.”

There was an awkward silence, and then Breeden said, “For a hundred thousand dollars, would you be willing to meet in person?”

“In Ankara?”

“Houston.”

Munroe said nothing. Simply let the silence of the moment consume her.

Breeden spoke again. “It’s been two years, Michael. Consider it a good omen. Come on home.”

“Is it worth it?”

“You can always go back.”

Munroe nodded to empty space, to the inevitable that she’d so far managed to postpone, and said, “Give me a week to wrap things up.” She dropped the phone into the cradle, lay back on the couch, and with an arm draped over her eyes inhaled long and deep.

There would be no sleep today.

…

F
OR THE FOURTH
time in as many minutes, Munroe checked her watch, then the length of the line ahead.

Stamps hammered into passports. The irregular beat created a distracting rhythm, a cadence that patterned the background of her thoughts.

She was going home.

Home. Whatever
that
was supposed to mean.

Home. After two years of shifting time zones and Third World countries, of living a nonstop clash of cultures through places alien and alive. These had been worlds she could feel and understand—unlike home.

Teeth clenched, Munroe shut her eyes and exhaled softly, tilted her head upward and took in another drink of air.

One more person moved through passport control and the line crept forward a few inches. She drew another breath, an attempt to invoke a temporary calm, to relieve anxiety that had been building over the last few hours, and with that breath the tumult inside her head increased volume.

The land shall be emptied, and utterly spoiled …

The transit had shifted through two sunrises and a sunset. Her body said 3:00 in the afternoon yesterday, and the clock on the far wall said 6:48 in the morning.

 … The haughty people of the earth do languish …

Another subtle glance at the time. Another breath. A few more inches forward. She hovered on the brink of panic, keeping it at bay one breath at a time.

Home.

 … The earth is defiled under its inhabitants …

Minutes passed, the line remained stationary, and her focus turned to the front, where the man facing the immigration officer stumbled through a few words of English, unable to answer the basic questions asked of him. Six feet tall, with perfect posture and jet-black hair, he carried a hard-shell briefcase and wore a dark maroon trench coat.

Another three minutes that felt like a painful thirty, and the immigration officer sent the Trench Coat to a separate room at the end of the hall.

 … They have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance …

She tracked his path and pushed her bag forward with her foot.

 … Therefore has the curse devoured the earth …

Each of his steps brought back the dread of her first entry into the United States. Similar doors and a similar experience—how much could have changed in nine years?

 … and they that dwell therein are desolate …

The Trench Coat was now a silhouette behind a translucent window. She checked her watch. One more person in line. One more minute.

… The mirth of tabrets ceases …

She stood in front of the booth, passport and papers in hand, the mental noise now reduced to a whisper beneath the surface. Perfunctory questions, perfunctory answers. The officer stamped the passport and handed it back to her.

 … The noise of those that rejoice ends …

She had no luggage and nothing to declare, and with a final glance at the Trench Coat’s shadow, she left the area through opaque sliding doors that opened to a waiting crowd. She scanned the faces, wondering which, among the expectant eyes and attentive glances, waited for him.

 … Strong drink will be bitter to those that drink it …

On a far wall was a telephone bank, and she walked toward it.

 … The city of confusion is broken down …

She dialed and then angled herself so that she could watch the opaque doors.

 … All joy is darkened, the mirth of the land is gone …

Passengers exited sporadically, smiling as they made contact with loved ones who stood waiting. That was how it should be coming home, not sending packages and gifts ahead to estranged family and a few strangers called friends, dreading the reconnection that must inevitably take place.

Kate’s answering machine picked up, and Munroe disconnected without leaving a message. The Trench Coat exited the glass doors.

 … In the city is left desolation, and the gate is smitten with destruction …

He was alone. There was no girlfriend with flowers or any happy faces waiting—not even a somber suit holding a placard with his name.
He passed within a few feet of where Munroe stood, and her eyes followed. On impulse she picked up her bag and trailed him to the ground level, keeping just close enough to avoid losing him in the crowds.

The Trench Coat boarded the shuttle for the Marriott, and she stepped on behind him. He nodded once in her direction and paid no attention beyond that. Dressed as she was, it was to be expected. Cropped hair, lightweight cargo pants, a linen shirt that had once been white, and thick-soled leather boots: to all but the most observant, she was every bit as male as he.

At the hotel Munroe trailed to the front desk and stood in line. Noah Johnson. Room 319. Such an American name, and yet he struggled with rudimentary English. She knew the accent: the French of high-society Morocco.

When he had finally completed check-in, she booked a room, then placed several calls, and finally, getting past Kate Breeden’s voice mail, arranged to meet for dinner at the hotel’s restaurant.

O
UTSIDE
, M
UNROE HAILED
a taxi and twenty minutes later stood in a parking lot on a semideserted industrial strip. Far down the street on either side and in both directions were squat cement structures, businesses divided one from the next by narrow windows and truck bays.

Munroe watched the cab drive away and then climbed the steps that led to the closest door. The signage scripted in large metallic block letters read
LOGAN’S
.

The front door was locked. She pressed her face to the glass and, seeing no light, rapped on it. A few minutes passed, a light came on from the back, and Logan approached in sweats, barefoot and with a sheepish grin on his face. He unlocked the door and let her in, and then, scanning her up and down, said, “You look like shit.”

She dropped the duffel bag on the entrance floor and let the door close. “Glad to see you, too,” she said.

His smile broke first, and they both laughed. He wrapped his arms around her shoulders in a hug and then held her at arm’s length. “Welcome back,” he said. “God, it’s good to see you. How was the trip?”

“Long and tedious.”

“If you want to crash, the couch is available.”

“Thanks but no thanks,” she said. “I’m going against the jet lag.”

“Coffee, then?” He turned toward the small kitchen. “I’m just getting a pot on.”

“Caffeine I could use. Thick and black.”

Nothing he could conjure in his kitchen would come close to Turkish coffee; the caffeine withdrawals would follow on the heels of the anxiety and jet lag. One hurdle at a time.

The office portion of the building had four rooms. Logan used one as an office, another as a conference room, and the third and fourth as living quarters. In the back the warehouse doubled as repair shop and storage area. He wasn’t supposed to be living in the building, but he paid his rent on time and thus far no one had complained to the property managers. The arrangement had been going on as far back as Munroe had known him—that muggy summer night seven years before, when prejudice in a hole-in-the-wall bikers’ bar had turned to violence and she’d thrown in her lot with the underdog. They’d laughed when it was over, sitting by the edge of the road, under the blackened sky, making introductions like star-crossed soul mates.

Munroe walked the hallway slowly, following a row of poster-size frames that adorned the walls, stopping for a moment in front of each. Most contained photos of motorcycles on a speedway, Logan in the races he competed in, split-second snapshots of his professional life.

Logan was thirty-three with dusty blond hair, green eyes, and an innocent smile that placed him closer to twenty-five. Over the years the impression of childish innocence he gave had drawn in a succession of boyfriends who each in turn had discovered the reality of a dark and hardened soul.

Logan had been on his own since he was fifteen, had started by scraping together an existence fixing cars and motorcycles part-time from a repair shop owned by his best friend’s father. Everything he had he’d earned by clawing his way to it one exacting day after another, and he was, by Munroe’s judgment, the closest being she’d found to perfection in the nine years since she first set foot on American soil.

Logan joined her in front of the last frame and handed her a steaming mug. She nodded thanks, and they stood in comfortable silence
for quite a while. “Two years is a long time,” he said finally. “There’s a lot to catch up on, Michael.” He turned toward the back door. “You ready?”

She didn’t move and in a voice laced with confession said, “I might be taking another assignment.”

He stopped.

“It’s why I’ve come back.”

Logan studied her. “I’m surprised you’re even giving it consideration. I thought you’d told Kate to turn down all incoming requests.”

Munroe nodded.

“You already know what I think,” he said. If he was upset, he hid it well. “If you decide to take it, I’ll be there to back you up.”

She smiled, reached for his hand, and in his palm placed the medallion. “It was perfect,” she said. “Thanks.”

He nodded and with a half grin said, “I’ll add it to the collection.” He put his arm around her shoulders. “Come on, let’s go.”

They exited the office and living area through the back door that opened to the warehouse and workshop, and halfway to the end of the building they stopped. Munroe reached into a set of stacked plastic drawers, retrieving a backpack and a few personal items while Logan let down a ramp and rolled the Ducati from its storage space.

The bike was sleek black-on-black, a thing of pure beauty, and Munroe smiled as she ran her fingers over the custom race fairings. “I’ve taken good care of her,” Logan said. “Took her out for a spin last week just to make sure everything’s tweaked and peaked.”

If it were possible to love a machine, Munroe loved this one. It symbolized power, life broken into split-second intervals, calculated risk. Few things were capable of providing the same adrenaline rush that the horses between her legs delivered as they tore down the roads at over 150 miles an hour. The rush had become a form of self-medicating, a narcotic sweeter than drugs or alcohol, just as addictive and equally destructive.

Three years prior she’d totaled the bike’s predecessor. Shattered bones and a head injury had kept her in a hospital for several months, and when released she’d taken a taxi direct from the hospital to the dealership to pick up a new machine.

Munroe straddled the bike, sighed, and turned the ignition. She felt the surge of adrenaline and smiled. This was home: running along a razor’s edge of self-induced terror, calculating mortality against probability.

Assignments were the reprieve. When she was abroad, although she would do whatever was necessary to get the job done, there was a degree of normalcy, sanity, purpose, and the destructive forces propelling her to gamble with her life were dormant.

Munroe nodded a helmeted good-bye to Logan and, with the screaming whine of the engine, shot forward. Returning home was an eventuality, but if she planned to stay alive, perhaps not all that smart.

I
T WAS EARLY
evening when she returned to the hotel. She had spent the day at the spa, had been soaked and wrapped, peeled and painted; they had given her back her dignity and femininity, and she had loved every moment.

She now wore clothes that hugged her body, accentuating long legs and model height. Hers was an androgynous figure—boyish, sleek, and angular—and she walked through the lobby with a sensual stride, subtly provocative, fully aware of the surreptitious glances coming from the mostly male guests.

 … When I would comfort myself against sorrow, my heart is faint …

The attention amused her, and she took her time.

 … I hurt; I am black; astonishment has taken hold …

Now, on her eighth trip back to the United States, each return more of the same and with anxiety continuing to crest wave upon wave, it was time to find a distraction. A challenge. A game.

He was in Room 319. But first there was business to attend to. Munroe glanced at the clock. Breeden would already be waiting.

S
IX YEARS AGO
Kate Breeden had a thriving law practice in downtown Austin and was married, with a daughter in junior high, an eight-hundred-thousand-dollar home, three luxury cars, and yearly trips to faraway places. Then came the messy divorce.

The house, the cars, the vacation and investment properties were all sold off, and Texas’s community-property law split twenty years of earning down the middle. Her daughter chose to live with the ex-husband, and Breeden took what was left, put it into an investment fund, packed up, and moved to Dallas to start over.

They’d met on the Southern Methodist University campus, where Breeden had returned for an M.B.A. and Munroe was in her sophomore year. The relationship began as a cautious mother-and-daughter surrogacy at a time when people still called Munroe by her given name.