Kyle heaved a great sigh as he stepped outside. He enjoyed training with Foss because it kept him sharp and focused, but he preferred to be around his family, his friends, and especially Amanda. With a bounce in his step he walked home. It no longer mattered how the heaviness in his heart felt; he thought it would resolve itself in much the same manner as his sense of smell had.
To Kyle, time was a concept that was constant, static. It never slowed, never increased its pace, but kept a steady rhythm through the day, all day long. At any time he could tell what time it was to the second, though he didn't often bother with seconds because they would pass by the time he'd finish saying them. His training session with Foss had been an unusually long one and they'd even had a good lunch together in the middle. It was 4:13 pm.
In fact, he was hungry again thanks to the work he'd been put through that morning. He'd levitated stones and even levitated Foss from across the warehouse once, though only barely. A large grin split his features as he thought of practicing that skill further. He nonetheless knew the limits of his brain most of the time and could stop before he did any damage to himself.
His thoughts turned to Jessi. She commonly overtaxed herself, in the name of competition. He was about to examine the emptiness inside him but he stopped before he even started.
He pulled out his cell phone and saw a text from Amanda, inviting him to come to the pool. Now that his sense of smell was fixed, he could enjoy her company without troubling her. She was remarkable; it never ceased to amaze him. She had a wonderful talent with the piano, her personality fit him well, and she was beautiful too. Her acceptance of all that he was made her even more special.
No longer wishing to walk, he started running home.
He locked the door as he left the house, thinking for the eleventh time of surprising Amanda with his newfound control over his nose. He got into a quick rhythm and started for the pool. At his current pace, assuming he didn't have to wait for any traffic lights (of which there were two) he would be there in 12 minutes.
His reunion with Amanda was cut short with four minutes and thirty-two seconds to go, despite having had to wait at both lights for more than a minute each. He suddenly stopped when he saw a dozen males walking in a semi-circle in front of him. He took a quick breath and could tell they meant trouble. He turned around and noticed a dozen more bringing up the rear.
It was then he chastised himself for not paying adequate attention. In his eagerness to get to Amanda, he'd ignored the four heavily tinted vehicles parked in an otherwise vacant parking lot to the right of the small street he was using as a short cut to the pool. Three in front had clubs but otherwise all of them appeared unarmed.
They were walking slowly, and all smelled confident and in control. They were sure they had him cornered. He wouldn't betray the truth with a smile though; instead, he made himself look worried.
He immediately sent out a warning message to Jessi, remembering too late that the connection was gone so she might not receive it. Digging his right hand into his pant pocket, he grasped his cell, opened it, and single-handedly typed a quick message to Amanda to leave the pool immediately. Before clicking send however he realized that his phone was likely compromised. He cleared the message with his thumb and closed the cell. Almost immediately he heard the nearly inaudible chime – certainly inaudible for regular human ears – so he pulled out the phone a few inches out of his pocket and stole a glance at the message displayed there. As he did so he walked toward the tall wooden fence to his right. The scents from the men around him were growing stronger, the hostility clear in their bearing.
He looked more intently at the message on his cell, "Give up."
That was something he would never do to the likes of Latnok, or any other company or organization who sought to control him or endanger his family and friends. Knowing now that his phone was useless, he took it firmly in his right hand and threw it at one of the men holding a club. With his superior strength the phone struck and broke the left knee of his target. He didn't enjoy hurting people by any means, but knew he had to get away. He knew that if they were all unarmed he could probably take care of all of them, despite the melee that would ensue, but he knew that he'd likely hurt several very badly in such a battle.
Because he preferred the quick escape to the bloodbath, Kyle smiled grimly as he jumped over the ten foot tall fence, landing at a full run, heading to the pool. He'd warn Amanda himself. He ran to the pool at a frantic pace, his mind focused on the task at hand.
Like Foss had taught him: look first for threats, then for civilians, then your goal.
The pool was nearly empty and the main building seemed to be closed. Yet six people were swimming, none of them a girl even remotely like Amanda, and five others were standing around. There was no lifeguard anywhere. He also noted that he couldn't hear Amanda's heartbeat either.
Taking a short deep breath he noticed everyone's attention was turned to him. The nearest man in the pool waved to him, "Come on in, it's really warm." Even with the smile, he could tell these people didn't belong here. He didn't recognize any of them. Then he saw the chain link fence cut in the far corner. That was how they'd gotten in.
Could they all be Latnok? He started to tense. This wasn't just a small operation, this would be life or death. It was a second trap!
"Cassidy," he muttered angrily. Without answering the people in and around the pool he turned around, heading for home. He only couldn't go directly.
***
Josh couldn't believe it. He waited eagerly for his dear Andy to land from her surprise flight from Connecticut, even though one of her moms had texted him about it just a few minutes ago. He was so surprised to learn they even got her a fancy hotel room which he'd also been registered as a guest. He'd left work early at Rachel's insistence to spend quality time with his girlfriend. He hadn't seen her face to face in months! He missed her so much.
His face couldn't hurt any more than it already did from his smile. It didn't really matter that her plane was delayed by an hour or two, he had plans to shock her out of her clothes.
***
"The target has evaded capture as anticipated. One non-life threatening injury to report. Step 3 complete." The dark skinned man closed his cell and turned to his team, "Clear out."
***
He couldn't go directly home, he had to evade or mislead whoever might be following him. As a result, he carefully glanced around periodically looking for anything out of the ordinary, and jumped over fences and hid in the tops of trees whenever it was necessary. When he was close to the Rack he bolted to the back door and forced it open, breaking the locking mechanism.
He muttered to himself, "I'll fix it later."
Crouching, he peeked into the main dining room of the Rack and saw the new employee Rachel. She was cleaning tables, her cell phone in her hand. Seeing no one else inside, he emerged and said, "Hi Rachel." She jumped at his sudden appearance. Her heart was beating rapidly. Of course she'd not seen him come in from the front door so she'd thought she was alone. Without waiting for her to calm down, he continued, "Is Josh here?" He listened intently for Josh's heartbeat, or for his smell. For the most part he could only smell the strong disinfectant in the spray bottle in her left hand, though he thought he could smell a little of Josh.
She seemed to recover quickly, and smiled back at him. "Oh hi, I didn't see you come in." She smelled uncertain, which made sense considering he was still at the entrance to the back room when he should have been nearer to the front door. She appeared not to have heard him, "Did you want to order something?"
She smelled really nervous, unsure. "No, is Josh here," he asked again, taking a few steps forward.
"Shawn? I don't—" she started to lie and it irritated him.
He yelled, "Josh, your boss, where is he?" Despite being only her direct supervisor, he wasn't really her boss. He pushed the thought away. Her cell rang and he realized it was a particularly fancy model. She took one glance at it and closed it without answering. He didn't have the time for this. "You're good at ignoring questions and phone calls," he said, emphasizing the conjunction.
"He left early to see his girlfriend." Finally, the truth.
"Andy?" She nodded, smelling of uncertainty and anxiety. She seemed scared.
"You want a drink? On the house, for my poor performance and my poor memory?" She smiled at him, but her scent screamed deception. He couldn't fathom why. She started walking to the bar to start a smoothie. "How about strawberry kiwi," she asked.
With an unfixed menu where you could have just about any of their 15 ingredients in any combination, how likely was it that she'd pick his favorite out of the blue, regardless of its popularity? Any hint of a smile disappeared from his face as he quickly made the calculation. It was ridiculously low.
She was Latnok too, and surely she was stalling for backup to arrive. Did they know he could smell their deceit, their lies rolling off their tongues like toxic waste? "Sure, I'd like that; I'll just go to the washroom for a sec."
He strolled to the men's room door, pushed it but didn't enter. Instead he quietly ran back the way he'd come, noticing she'd never turned back to him. His stealth training was really proving to be useful.
Outside and hidden in relative safety, he allowed himself to think. Josh was with Andy. At least that was good. He continued to move. He heard two vehicles turning harshly into the Rack's parking lot and stopping immediately. He had left just in time.
He dropped behind some bushes, stopping dead in his tracks. She might have thought it was the truth, but his phone might have been compromised as well and he could be at risk of getting captured by Latnok too.
Was Nicole even at a Conference in San Francisco? Latnok had already deployed 38 people to capture him. Where could Josh be? If he thought Andy was coming to town, he'd probably be at home washing up.
He wasn't particularly far from home but he didn't want to walk – or run – into another trap. There was a park between the Rack and home, the same he'd waited in for Amanda with a nose plug on his nose, he remembered. If anyone there had a phone he'd ask them to borrow it to text Jessi and Foss. He needed their help above all.
With a plan in mind he jumped a little higher than he'd wished and realized he was seen by a toddler playing inside his house but thankfully not by his mother, or anyone else. He was out of sight when he heard the toddler call his mom by name.