smoothed over and the details are usually the things that are useful.” Sam was complaining now about the time that was spent trying to get good staff who wouldn’t drink too much or smoke pot too much and and and…Max finally touched her forehead again and she stopped.
“You work for Avery-you’ve been having an affair with him-and you’re sleeping with Pietr as well,” Renn said, like they were facts.
“I thought you couldn’t read anything in their headquarters,” I said.
“No,” Sam said. “I flirt with Jim all the time but he’s never made a move. I don’t know why. Do you think I’m past my prime?”
“Absolutely not,” Max answered, giving her a quick appraisal, then back to me. “I didn’t have to-it’s how Pietr works,” he replied. “He uses her to monitor Avery, to make sure Avery’s not looking too deeply into what he’s up to.” He returned to Sam. “What about Pietr? What is he up to?”
“I can’t tell you. He’s locked me up so I can’t tell you anything about him.” There was a note of pride in her voice. “He figured you might want to talk to me and I’ll tell him you did as soon as I come out of this.”
“Who says I’m letting you out of this?” Renn said. And waited. It took a few seconds for this thought to penetrate and then Sam’s composure visibly faltered. “I need information out of you now. After that, I don’t need you.”
“You-” Sam’s voice wavered and then stopped. Her expression hadn’t changed, neither had her anesthetized tone of voice. But there was no mistaking the alarm in her all the same. “-you wouldn’t. Pietr said you didn’t-”
“That was then,” Renn answered and the chill in his voice made me tremble. “This is now. Pietr’s trying to kill or capture me. He’s already killed my friend. All bets are off.”
“Pietr would hunt you down,” she vowed. “Forever. He would never rest-”
“Pietr would forget you in five minutes,” Renn answered harshly, cutting her off hard, “and you know it. He likes that girl in Asian section, the one he takes to lunch all the time. She’ll be sympathetic when he remembers you later.”
“Don’t try that shit with me!” Sam insisted, her voice suddenly taut. “I know your tricks! Pietr told me about your problems with women!”
Max’s eyes lowered at this and came up dark. “Well, it doesn’t really matter,” he said, “what you think of me, does it, as long as you don’t give me your password?”
There was a pause then, for just a second, and the air freshened, like someone had thrown the window open in winter. I saw a look of recognition pass through Samantha’s eyes to Renn’s.
“ Barbie’s Dream House,” he said quietly and she slumped in the chair. Tauber grinned ear to ear. I must have been giving him the eye because Max turned to me to explain. “Like I said, trying not to think about something makes you think about it. I remind her she’s not supposed to think of her password so it’s the next thing she thinks of. Like sticking out your arm when you’re falling.” He turned back to Samantha, breathing quietly and peacefully now in the chair. “ Barbie’s Dream House. What is the plan?”
“Which one?” she asked, drowsy.
“The one Pietr’s keeping from Avery. Or the one Avery’s using you to keep track of, the one he doesn’t admit knowing about.”
“Pietr doesn’t talk about it much,” the blonde answered, now slouching across the couch, looking very sweet in her filmy blouse and panties, “and I don’t ask questions when he doesn’t want to tell me. He scares me. He’s made people squawk like chickens and lick the dust off the floor in front of me, just for fun. His fun. He’s not a nice person, really. I guess I like guys who scare me.” She looked at Max now and suddenly she didn’t seem anesthetized at all. “You’re a scary guy,” she told him. “I saw that when you first came in this morning.”
“What do you know about the plan?” Max persisted. She smiled hopefully and he offered a sad-eyed smile in return.
“Do you think I’m pretty?” she asked, her voice gone girlish.
His face was almost tender-as close as he let himself get. “You’re very pretty. And much smarter than you let yourself be. Pietr could benefit from the advice you avoid offering.” His expression faded. “ Barbie’s Dream House. What do you know about the plan?” Tauber returned from the fridge with a couple bottles of water-he kept one and handed the other to Sam, who chugged it like she’d been traipsing the Sahara for a week.
“It’s soon,” she said finally, after belching and smiling like a child, “and it’s a big deal. He’s got a group of six training for it here. They’re not like the others; they’re the scary guys, throwbacks like the old mindbenders, I guess-no offense. There’s Marat-you know him-a Russian, an Israeli, along with two Americans. And a Jamaican guy with dreads and the best weed in the world, Jesus. He gets his own room ‘cause nobody can think once he lights up.”
“What’s the objective?” Max asked. His voice had gotten quieter but more distinct.
“They didn’t say and I didn’t ask. I don’t want to know.”
“You know more,” he persisted. “I know you do-and so do you.” She continued with her blank silence for about ten seconds, like she didn’t hear him.
“You live in Pietr’s world,” Renn said, “and Avery’s. You like being in between-you like the danger. You think they don’t know about each other. I assure you they do. They’re both comfortable using you to watch the other. They both trust you to keep the confidences they actually want you to keep. Frankly, they both take you for granted. Their trust in you is justified by the fact that you’ve never used your position to play one against the other.” He looked at her searchingly, which seemed kind of comical, what with the dazed look on her face. “You could, you know,” he said and she nodded like a marionette.
“I could,” she mumbled, half a second behind him. “I know.”
“You know more. You know something you’re not supposed to know, that you didn’t even intend to find out.” As he said this, his voice deepened again, taking on that echo chamber sound. “Share that with me.”
Samantha sat up and motioned as though writing on a pad. Tauber grabbed a pen and paper immediately off the table and put them in Sam’s hands-and she started writing strange. She started writing upside down, is how it turned out. When I looked up at her, her eyes were closed. And some of the letter forms were a bit garbled. But there she sat, writing it.
“She saw him write it,” Max whispered, “across the desk.” He waited until he was sure she was finished and then took the paper from her. Turning it around, we all read: Sun 1230 IAD-CIA
“ ’Sun’ — It’s Sunday?” Tauber said. “Day after tomorrow?”
“Yeah,” she nodded her head.
“You’re working with CIA?” Max asked.
Sam shook her head. “That’s what he wrote but it doesn’t make sense. Jim always says we can’t work with the agencies because that would put us on the radar, up for investigations. I don’t know who the client is.” She thought about it for a moment. “Actually, I don’t even know if there is a client. The other night, Pietr said-he’s a man, you all boast in bed-he said, ‘When this is done, we’ll be in the driver’s seat. They’ll dance to our tune.’
“Who will?” Max asked. “ Who’ll dance to our tune?”
“That’s all he said.” Max and Tauber exchanged looks, perplexed and concerned. But they looked like they were going to stop there. I leaned forward.
“What did he mean?” I asked.
“He didn’t tell her,” Max hissed in my ear. “She has no facts.”
“You said everybody mindreads,” I told him. “She’s been sleeping with him.” I turned back to Sam. “What’s your intuition tell you? What did he mean? Who’ll dance to our tune?”
She stared blankly for just a moment and then, something inside her seemed to gather itself. She cleared her throat and said, “Everybody.”
“What’s that mean?” Max asked.
“ Everybody,” she repeated, but now like she knew, certainty without proof but certainty nonetheless. “Governments, Business-Everybody.”
And then it was quiet, for what felt like a long time. We waited to make sure she had nothing more to say- and to let it all sink in.
“Okay,” Max said in his echoey voice, “you fell asleep while preparing to go out. You were stressed from the events of the day. Do you understand?”
“Of course. I’ll tell him you were here,” she said cheerily.
Max smiled. “Of course you will,” he replied respectfully. “But I didn’t get anything out of you because I
