“Not really.”
“Good.” Then Franks looked down at the dead reptoid and frowned. “I was gonna take it prisoner.”
“Then you should have got here sooner. It didn’t give me a lot of choice in the matter. But on the bright side, PUFF on these assholes is like fifty grand a head.” I discreetly keyed my radio so that everybody else would know who had shown up, and that I was probably going to be indisposed for the rest of the chase, because our working relationship with the MCB was contentious at best, and Franks was seldom what could be described as helpful. “What are you doing here, Agent Franks?”
Earl’s voice was in my ear. “Z’s out. Somebody call the lawyer.”
But Franks didn’t respond to my question. He just went over to the downed monster and thumped it with his shoe. The robe fell open, revealing that the thing was wearing a bulletproof vest beneath. My bullets were mushroomed against it. No wonder it hadn’t gone down when I’d shot it. I hated when monsters took advantage of modern technology.
Speaking of which . . . I went to retrieve the creature’s phone, but Franks beat me to it. He snatched it up, glared at me suspiciously. Then he checked the blinking dot on the screen, then looked at the bag, which had ended up on the floor during the struggle. Franks went over, rifled through the pack, and then pulled a little electronic gizmo out of one of the pockets. That must have been the bug.
“Whoever stole this assaulted my men.”
“I saw that. I don’t know who she was.”
“What was Stricken buying?” Franks demanded.
So the MCB hadn’t known what the deal they’d been staking out had been for after all. Since MHI really wanted that device, I sure as hell wasn’t going to tell the government so they could just seize it and stick it in some crate in a giant dusty warehouse next to the Ark of the Covenant.
“Did you catch Stricken?” Of course, he didn’t give me an answer. That didn’t even rate his usual cursory response of classified. “Is this the part where you can’t tell the difference between the good guys and the bad guys and waste a bunch of time messing with us instead of them?”
Franks just glared at me because he was the living embodiment of unhelpful grumpiness.
“Fine. We got a tip the auction was some dark magic cult stuff. You know, the usual.”
Franks—who had always been super good at telling when I was lying—cracked his knuckles.
“So this is where you say let’s do this the hard way and beat it out of me? Just like old times . . . Just kidding!” I held up my hands in surrender. I’d just gotten my ass kicked by a lizard man. I really wasn’t in the mood to catch a beating from Agent Franks, but who am I to spoil our traditions? “I’ll cooperate. But before you arrest me, can I at least get some medical attention here?”
“No.” Franks gestured for the door. “Let’s go.”
* * *
Some of Agent Franks’ little Fed minions had arrived to clean up the dead reptoid and spin a cover story to the cops and news. Other agents had cuffed my hands behind my back, patted me down, taken my weapons, phone, radio, wallet, and keys and put them into a plastic Ziplock bag, poured some iodine and slapped a bandage on my arm. Then they’d locked me in the back of a black government SUV, where I’d waited, with the windows up and no air conditioning, for about twenty miserable, hot minutes until Franks had come back.
When he got into the SUV, he looked grumpy, but he always looked grumpy, so I couldn’t really tell what was going on. “I haven’t seen you in forever, and this is the greeting I get? Are these handcuffs really necessary?”
“Policy.”
“Am I being detained?”
Franks didn’t bother to state the obvious. He started the engine.
“What for? I haven’t done anything wrong. We were just doing our jobs. Can I at least have the Cookie Monster head back as a souvenir? I paid an absurd amount of money for that.”
“Shut up.”
Franks seemed angrier than usual. We drove in silence for a while. Thankfully, Franks turned the air conditioner on but I was still pretty miserable. I think I might have pulled a muscle in my back when the reptoid had slammed me into the wall. But even in my discomfort, the longer we drove, the more sure of it I became: Franks really was seething about something. It said a lot about our relationship that I could tell the difference between regular angry Franks and extra angry Franks. But what could be infuriating him this time? There was one thing sure to piss him off.
“Please tell me you guys didn’t let Stricken get away?”
“Classified.”
I laughed at him. “You dumbasses! Are you serious? There were like a hundred of you there. You’re the friggin’ MCB. You’ve got satellites and shit! How could you lose an albino scarecrow?”
Franks didn’t say anything, but his meathook fists were squeezing the steering wheel so tight I could hear the plastic creak.
“Come on, Franks, after everything we’ve been through together you can level with me. I mean, seriously, we blew up a squid god together. That’s pretty hard core for a team-building exercise. Way better than a ropes course. And remember that time you had a falling out with the government and they put the biggest PUFF bounty ever on your head, and I specifically said nope, MHI’s not touching that.”
“Because I would’ve killed you all.”
“Maybe.” He had done a real number on Grimm Berlin and Paranormal Tactical during his vigilante rampage though. “But then we stitched your happy ass back together after you got ripped to shreds. Hell, we’re practically friends.”
Franks grunted.
“You know how I can tell you like me? You haven’t even punched me once yet today. Admit it, we’re like BFFs.”
Either that was way more persuasive than I thought, or Franks was just
