In this revised and BETAed chapter, Larry Sizemore's grip is slowly increasing on the burned spy, while Fiona Glenanne begins her search to find Michael's family.
TWO HOURS TOO LATE
Chapter Two
"Oh, you should probably keep a low profile. That surveillance team, I did what you asked me to…I shot 'em and set 'em on fire. The Feds are probably gonna want a word with you. Well, you have a good day. Michael. Call me later."
Michael was too stunned to move at Larry's whispered words. Then, as his old mentor sauntered away, he felt an icy rage begin to build.
Larry had killed the two federal agents sent to watch him…. Correction, Larry had deliberately killed two federal agents and then set their car on fire to make things difficult for him. It was his own fault… If he had been thinking clearly, he would have never asked Larry Sizemore for help.
But this was what he was reduced to, accepting favors from a sociopath.
He opened the roll of bills Larry had handed him… three thousand dollars and the man had just pulled it out of his pocket like it was spare change. Killing those agents was going to cause him an endless wave of grief. His anger over that hadn't dimmed, but the grim reality of his situation meant he needed money and probably sometime soon he was also going to need tactical support.
And nobody else was going to step up to help him out.
With his bank accounts frozen, he needed to earn cash to live. But with no job history, he would be lucky to find anybody prepared to hire him. His only other choice was to offer his skills to the other side. China or North Korea would jump at the chance to get their hands on him. But he didn't fancy ending his days in prison marked as a traitor waiting to get a lethal injection. So it looked like he was going to take a giant step back nearly fifteen years and start taking his orders from Larry again.
For a spy, the worst thing that can happen is to become someone else's asset. You do anything you can to avoid it, making sure there's nothing people can grab on to and use as leverage. You move through life unattached, keeping the world at a distance. It's a hard way to live but there is a cold logic to it. Love nothing and nothing you love can be used against you. Once you violate that rule and make that connection with someone, you've handed your enemies the key to destroying you.
The words of his old training officer floated through his subconscious mocking his present situation.
Thanks Tom, Michael muttered under his breath. But you should have added it also leaves you with no friends to reach out to when you're disowned by your own government.
With a shake of his head, Mr Westen picked up the receipt Larry had left beside his cup, realizing he had been left to pay for the undead spy's lunch. Snatching up the piece of paper, the younger man made his way over to the cashier. Sitting around brooding about the unfairness of it all was not going to help him find the people or person who had burned him. He had to find a place to stay and then read up on the job he had just been offered. He needed money and working for his former mentor, however unpalatable, was the only offer on table.
Twenty minutes later standing on Collins Avenue, Michael watched the people who were walking in and out of the various four star hotels.
The burned spy spotted his problem straight away. From what Larry had told him, the FBI would have every single lawman out hunting for their prime suspect. Which meant that any one of the dozens of forty something year old businessmen going in and out of the various four or five star hotel doors could be a federal agent.
He needed contrast, a background that would make any surveillance team stand out. A FBI field office was filled with sober individuals dressed in off the rack suits, so he needed to find some place where everybody was just a jello shot away from alcohol poisoning. Heading towards the part of South Beach where the younger, drunker and semi naked hung out, he knew that once he arrived, if he spotted anybody who could walk a straight line then that would be the fed.
Michael found what he was looking for at the Miami Sands, a cheap rate motel that looked like it was hosting a girls gone wild party. Throughout his long career, the Company man had never found a successful way to hide a gun in a bathing suit. If he couldn't do it, he doubted some fed stuck in the Miami field office would be able to either. Smiling at his cunning, the dark haired former government operative made his way through the rowdy crowd of partiers and up to his room.
Safely inside, he locked the door and pulled the curtains shut. Turning on the bedside light, Michael opened the folder his one-time partner had left with him. Inside he found two photographs, the first showed a well-groomed middle aged man with the word "Pyne" scrawled across the bottom. The second was a heavy build blond haired man a bit younger than the first. He was apparently named Vincent. Putting the pictures to one side, Michael started to read through the second sheet of paper.
Pyne had made his money during the boom in real estate. When the boom went bust, he borrowed heavily from some shady individuals, one of whom wanted his money back. Larry's client wanted his twenty million dollars back and several pieces of art work in Pyne's possession, which he called a late payment charge.
Vincent was the reason Larry's rich and powerful client hadn't got what he wanted the first time he had requested the return of his investment. The guy was ex-special forces and a former mercenary. He had apparently killed the two men the client had sent and that was why he had hired Larry.
So, they needed to neutralize the bodyguard, Vincent, which didn't seem to be much of a problem, and then talk Pyne into paying his debts. Rubbing a hand over his eyes, Michael tried to work out why the mystery client had hired Larry in the first place.
It was like using C4 to open a box of eggs, expensive, unnecessary and ultimately messy.
Turning to the third sheet of paper, Michael saw the problem and the ultimate reason for Larry being involved. A month ago, just after the client sent his own men to negotiate getting his money back, Pyne had reported a break in and the theft of twenty two million dollars of jewellery and the coveted art work.
Attached to the third sheet were several newspaper clippings. The burned spy quickly scanned the headlines. The police however did have a lead: the operations manager, a Cuban exile called Javier.
Larry's contract was to either get the money from Pyne or kill him and get the paintings from the thieves – by whatever means necessary.
Sitting back, Michael thought about what he had read. There was nothing about this that warranted a visit from Larry or himself. Pyne was a greedy rich guy, as was the mystery client, and from what he had just read the only person who going to suffer in all of this was Javier. The former operative couldn't see how an operations manager would have the contacts to get rid of the stolen paintings.
No, Pyne had probably arranged the burglary himself and was using Javier as a fall guy.
Reaching over the bed to the phone, Michael dialled Larry's number.
"A debt collector for some spoiled rich guy, that's a bit below you, isn't it?" the younger man asked as soon as the call was answered.
"My client is a powerful man who is used to getting what he wants and right now what he wants is the money he's owed and some paintings for his trouble. Taking out a washed-out special forces, meat-head mercenary is just a bit of fun I added to the deal. You know how I feel about leaving witnesses," Larry told him. "Now, if you want in, your cut will be twenty grand. You do a good job and we'll negotiate future contracts."
Michael thought about it for a minute. "It's twenty two million worth of art, Lare… Make it fifty grand and you have a deal."
"Thirty five and you do all the leg work."
"Deal…" The burned spy snapped it up. Thirty five grand would buy him a lot of answers.
"Good. Now I'll tell you the same thing I tell all my clients and employees. You do the job, get out clean. If my name comes up or if I see the police sniffing around, I step in and clean up. And you know me, Kid, I really do mean clean up."
"Seriously, Larry…? You set me up with the feds and now you're going to kill everyone if the cops start sniffing around?" Mr. Westen complained.
"Oh, come on, Kid, don't underestimate yourself. You moved through Moscow like a ghost with half the FSK out looking for you. You can do this... Oh and for god's sake get yourself a phone. The next time you call me on a public phone, I might just decide to add you to my list of deadees."
Michael dropped the handset back onto the cradle when Mr Sizemore hung up. He would find out where the paintings were being held, and convince Pyne that it was in his best interest to hand them and the insurance money over. If Vince got in the way, the former Ranger was confident he could deal with him – and Javier…? Well, the operations manager wasn't his problem.
Contrary to popular belief, the little guy rarely got a break.
He would check out Pyne and the suspected thief Javier in the morning. For now he was going to stay out of sight and rest up. Having spent a fair amount of his adult life trying to sleep in war zones, the partying outside didn't bother him. After a shower, he lay down resting his sore ribs and dreaming about who he was going to bribe in his quest to find out who had issued the burn notice.
ooo BN ooo
After settling into her small room at the Courtyard Motel, it had taken the petite Irishwoman only an hour to track down the most likely address for Michael's mysterious family. Sitting on her bed with the local phone book on her lap, it had at first come as a shock how little she actually knew about the man she had thought she had loved and believed he had loved her.
In the eighteen months they had been together, Fiona had learned nothing of value about his personal life. Oh, she had known about his job, eventually, or at least the little bits he had told her. She had accompanied him on several assignments as 'his tactical support' as he liked to call it.
But whenever she had tried to get him to open up about anything to do with his real life, the dark haired man would shut down, give her a dazzling smile and change the subject. However, that wasn't going to stop her from looking. She knew he had been born and raised in the family home and that he had a younger brother. It wasn't much; but for a former IRA guerrilla, it was enough to give her a start on hunting down her target.
Luckily, there were not that many Westens in the Miami phone book. On her third phone call pretending to be a market researcher, she discovered a likely candidate in Mrs Madeline Westen, a widow for eight years who had two adult sons.
With a few probing questions, Fiona learned that neither son was married or lived at home and that Madeline liked to keep herself occupied by attending various functions at a nearby seniors center. By the end of the conversation, she was satisfied that she had found Michael's mother.
After thanking the woman for her help, she had ended the call with a warm happy glow of anticipation filling her tiny frame. She was positive she had found his family, which meant she was one step closer to confronting tha bastid himself.
To celebrate, the petite Irishwoman spent the rest of the afternoon and evening reinventing herself. Gone was Fiona Glenanne, the tough, trigger happy gunrunner/terrorist/bank robber who had abandoned a successful business in New York. Now to all outward appearances, she had become a new version of herself. This Fiona Glenanne was an American South Beach party girl.
High heeled wedges and short designer summer dresses replaced the boots and jeans she had worn upon her arrival at MIA. She had even found the time to hide her naturally pale skin behind a spray-on tan to suit her new persona and a wonderful stylist in Alejandro, who gave some layers and highlights to her long auburn hair to complete her external transformation.
ooo BN ooo
Four AM was Fiona Glenanne's preferred time to commit crimes. She had discovered over the years that in the hours before dawn, people were most likely to be fast asleep and if they did wake up, their senses were so dulled a quick blow to the head was normally enough to put them back to sleep.
Dressed in casual jeans and a dark-colored top, the former guerrilla parked her 'borrowed' car a block away from her destination. On soft soled laced boots, she made her way over to the house that backed onto her target's home and skilfully climbed the fence.
After cautiously checking out the perimeter, Fiona was surprised when she hadn't found even a simple alarm system and then only old easy to pick locks on both the front and side doors.
What on earth was Michael thinking leaving his family so unprotected?
It took the experienced thief less than thirty seconds to pick the lock on the kitchen door. Stepping inside, she closed the door silently behind her and began her search. The place stank of stale nicotine and seemed to be stuck in a time warp of seventies décor and appliances. The coffee maker looked ancient as did the refrigerator. Out of curiosity, the redhead took a look inside a couple of the cabinets and wished she hadn't when she pulled out a can of peaches that went out of date in 1998.
Moving into the lounge, Fiona ran her finger tips across the back of the couch, noting the worn spots which told of its age. Then she spotted a high backed chair next to a small table covered with a variety of medicine bottles. Examining each bottle in turn, it appeared Madeline Westen was being simultaneously treated for every known disease known to man.
Fiona was beginning to think she had the wrong address. There was nothing here that made her think Michael had ever lived in this place. It was then that she noticed several photographs on a shelf. Picking up one showing two teenage boys, she recognized Michael's features, a surly expression on his face. Smiling that she had indeed got the right place, the one-terrorist went looking for something she could use to help strike up a friendship with her former lover's mother.
Lying on the dining table she found what she was looking for: a hospital appointment card for two thirty this afternoon. It was ideal. She would go back to the motel, get a few hours sleep and she'd still have time to go down to the pool to work on her tan before meeting up with Mrs Westen.
On the way out, Fiona took a long look at Madeline's car. She would wait for her to go into the hospital and disable the vehicle. Then all she would have to do was be on hand to play the Good Samaritan. From what she had gleaned from her earlier conversation and from the aura of neglect in the house, Michael's mother would be craving a bit of attention.