“Can I know what that is now?” Jill asked. We both looked at her, but neither responded. “This Phase Three. I think I’ve proven my worth around here. You got your stupid box, so what’s the deal? I can’t believe what you went through to get it, either. Not that it hasn’t been fun, but I would like to get back to someplace without terrorists and mercenaries and crazy people.”
I had been giving this some thought, and now was as good a time as any. “Okay, but do me a favor first. There’s a big freezer in the garage. Could you get me an ice pack out of there first? My face really hurts.”
“Okay, sure,” Jill said as she left.
Carl raised a single bushy eyebrow as I rolled out of bed and winced as my feet hit the floor. “Are you crazy?” he asked.
“Well, I’m thinking about offering her a real job. We need to see if she’s up for it,” I explained as I walked gingerly to the mirror. My equilibrium was off, and it hurt to inhale. “I think she’s tough enough. Dude, just trust me.”
“Okay. Whatever. But I’m getting worried. Lately you’ve not been yourself. This job’s affecting your brain. We’re not in the helping business. Survival first. Everything else, second. You can do good deeds on your own time. I’m here to keep Big Eddie from skinning me alive. Other than that, I don’t give a shit.”
I examined my battered face in the mirror. I had really taken a beating. Nobody would ever accuse me of being pretty, but once the swelling went down, I would probably be back to my forgettable average self, just how I liked it. “Have I ever been wrong, Carl?”
“Constantly,” he replied. There was a frightened scream from the garage. “See.”
So Jill had found the freezer. “All part of my nefarious master plan. Come on.”
I ran into her on her way out of the garage. Jill nearly took me down as we collided, causing me to wince in pain. “Somebody want to tell me why there’s a dead guy in the fridge?” she shrieked.
She was actually taking it pretty well.
“Why is there a dead body in the freezer?” Jill shouted. “That scared me!”
Taking it well . . . relatively speaking.
“Hey, it worked for Walt Disney.” I opened the freezer door wider. Carl and Reaper were leaning on the van, enjoying the show. “Jill, allow me to introduce you to Ali bin Ahmed Al Falah, terrorist financier, evil genius, slave trader, gun runner, and huge Streisand fan. Seriously. I can’t make this stuff up.” Falah’s body had been crammed into the freezer. Skin gray, beard flecked with ice, his frozen eyeballs were staring at us.
“His pictures are all over the living room,” she asked suspiciously. “What kind of sick game is this?”
“Mr. Falah here was a very bad man. I’ve got pictures of him hanging with Osama. Phase One of this job consisted of me following him, watching him, learning his habits, how he talked, how he sounded. I took on the persona of a man named Khalid. I actually bought Falah’s social club so I could get into his circle of friends.”
“Why?”
“Because I need to be able to impersonate him so well that people who’ve known him for years wouldn’t be able to tell. Freeze pop has a standing appointment for a party that I need to crash. Plus, we needed his cash. This James Bond crap is expensive.”
“I do like my toys,” Reaper explained. “It is hard to hack half of the Zubaran government with sucky equipment.”
“Did you really need those big speakers, though?” Carl asked him.
“Helps me get in the mood.”
“Anyway, I arranged a meeting between Falah and some imaginary Russian arms dealers to take place at my club. The plan was to get him inside, make him disappear, and I replace him. Nice and simple.”
The idea didn’t seem to shock her. “And that got screwed up when Dead Six assassinated him?”
“Exactly. When they put a bullet in his heart, we had to improvise. Luckily, all of his guards got killed, too, so though there were witnesses to the shooting, none of them were real chummy with Al Falah.” I gestured at the dead fat body wrapped in plastic. “I had planned on making him go away, nice and quiet. The ground work was already laid—now it was just messier. I made some calls as if I was him, telling his associates that I had faked my own death to go into hiding.” I left off the fact that I had even sent hand-forged letters to his children and wives. That seemed a bit grim. “Reaper had already taken command of all of his e-mail addresses—”
“I’m like the grand pimp mack daddy of identity theft,” Reaper said proudly.
“So as far as the terrorist world knows, Al Falah is alive and well and living incognito, hiding from the Americans. Since he was in such mortal danger, he asked for his dear old friend, Adar Al-Saud, to come and assist him. Adar’s a psychopath, but he’s one very special psychopath.”
On cue, Carl reached into his shirt and pulled out the key. It was still riding on Sarah’s chain. It spun, reflecting the light. “Adar’s daddy was an important man. Not many folks get access to the place we’re going. They sure don’t make them like this anymore.”
Reaper took the key from him. He twisted the base slightly, causing dozens of perfectly carved, delicate pins to extend in various directions. It was remarkably complex. “They never made them like this. I’m telling you guys, man didn’t have the mechanical ability to design something like this a thousand years ago. This would be tough to do with modern CNC machining.” Carl quickly took the key back before Reaper could suggest something about space aliens.
“So, you need to pretend to be Al Falah for Phase Three? Do you really need to keep him in the freezer, though?” She looked ill. “That’s just gross.”
I nodded. “All part of the plan. Mr. Falah here still has one last job to do.” I patted him fondly on his frozen shoulder. “He’s going to throw the hounds off the scent long enough for us to get away.”
“Okay, I get it. I get it . . . That’s a lot of effort to steal . . . what?” Jill asked. “What could possibly be so important? Zillions of dollars? Somebody’s Faberge’ egg collection? The Holy Grail?”
My crew traded glances. This part was hard to explain. “We don’t actually know what it is, just where it is,” I said slowly.
“Look, if you feel the need to keep me in the dark still, that’s fine, but don’t treat me like I’m stupid.”
“No, really.” I raised my hands in surrender. “They said that it would be the only thing there, it’s portable, and that we couldn’t miss it. They drew a rough sketch of it, but I don’t have any idea what it’s supposed to be.” I held my open hands about two inches apart. “All I know is that Eddie wants it very badly.”
“I can’t even find it on the Internet,” Reaper exclaimed, because, you know, that’s the source of all knowledge in the universe.
Jill was incredulous. “All this . . . and you don’t even know what you’re stealing? You guys are nuts.”
“No, Eddie’s nuts. We’re just too good at what we do.”
“Man, close the fridge. That’s freaking me out,” Carl said.
After briefing Jill on the highlights of the utterly insane and possibly suicidal plan, we took a little drive in the van the next morning. I did not tell her where we were going and once again made her wear the blindfold so that she would not be able to lead anyone back to our hideout. She was quiet as we drove through the streets of Zubara, probably thinking about what I had told her. I didn’t speak either, mostly because my face still really hurt. Carl was a decent medic, but having a mercenary smash your nose back into place and pull a broken tooth with a pair of pliers didn’t exactly qualify as quality medical care.