Pt. 4

Miriam walked slowly through the gathered press of humanity, tuning out the nervous chatter of curious on-lookers. Caine was right, her prey was here, probably waiting to leave as soon as the crowd had grown too big for him to see his handy work. Flashing her ID at the uniformed officers, she slowly walked up the alley to where the latest unfortunate had been found. She could here the ambulance's siren in the distance, racing against time to save another life. "Who found the body?" she asked, moving gracefully around the forensics team.

Peter frowned back at her, momentarily distracted from his conversation. "She's not a corpse yet. Her name was Ann Marsten and she was a visitor here. She was suppose to meet her friends for lunch around the corner and when she didn't show up they went looking for her. Uniforms found some shop keepers who talked to her about an hour ago. Seems she has a college roommate who lives here in Chinatown with her parents. Both women were attending some sort of reunion and had been going to all the different shops, preparing for a party they were throwing at the college."

"Was she pretty?" Miriam asked, examining the bloodstained door a technician was dusting for prints.

"Does it make a difference?" Peter asked bitterly.

"It makes all the difference in the world to him. He did her hurriedly, with none of his usual attention to detail. Something about her must not have pleased his sense of esthetics." The low buzz of her cell-phone interrupted the conversation, giving her an excuse to turn away. "Yes?" she whispered, moving imperceptibly out of earshot of the others.

"Nightbird." A familiar voice replied.

Miriam frowned, recognizing the call sign by which the Section alerted her to their presence. She turned back to Peter, her face impassive. "Sorry, it's a personal call. I'll catch up with you in a moment." She turned away and moved into the shadows, away from prying ears. "So, you've found me." she sighed into the phone, wishing it were anyone on the line but Michael.

"Operations has heard from Oversight. They want a progress report." Michael's French accented voice replied calmly.

"Oversight should know better than to rush me." Miriam replied, frowning. "Did they tell you to prepare to assist me in my search?"

"No. It's not considered a Level 5 matter."

"Nothing is these days." Miriam sighed, her eyes scanning the scene of the crime. "Then send your little protégé. What's her name again? Nikita?" There was dead silence on the other end of the line. "Michael? Answer me, mon ami."

"Now is not the time for this conversation." Michael replied, coldly.

Miriam snorted in amusement. "Michael, there is no conversation to be had. Jurgen is dead and I'm well aware of the part you played in that. Fortunately for all of us, I never was the type to hold a grudge. I need someone to act as lookout while I follow this trail."

"Ask Operations yourself."

"Can't do that. You see, my old friend, I'm not exactly performing the duties for which I was recruited. Operations thinks I'm in Cairo, tracking down a member of the Abu Nidal organization. Oversight thinks I'm in Pakistan, following a lead to bin Laden. So you see, asking for backup from either of them might be a little tricky. Jurgen is dead so all I have left is you." The silence from her associate was becoming annoying. "Michael if you can't think of something witty to say, then just say good-bye."

"Bon Nuit, ma belle." Michael replied, then with a click severed their connection.

"Your friend is troubled." Caine's commented, appearing out of nowhere to stand beside her.

Miriam blinked in surprise. Very few men were silent enough on their feet to creep past her hyper vigilante senses once. That he had done it twice was becoming a problem. It seemed that the descriptions of some of Caine's exploits weren't exaggerated after all. "He's not the worrying type."

"Your friends do not know you are here."

"Hasn't anyone ever told you, Mr. Caine, that it is not nice to listen to other peoples conversations." Miriam glanced back at Peter Caine, who was comparing notes with a member of the forensics team. She looked back at the older man and quickly came to a decision. If Michael wouldn't send backup then perhaps she could acquire it from the local talent. And Caine, according to his file, had just the kind of talents she could make use of. "It seems I am going to have a problem where you are concerned. Honesty is not something I practice regularly, so please excuse me if it the words do not come naturally to me. No, I'm not here at the request of my organization. This is a personal matter. I thought I had killed that loathsome worm stalking your community five years ago. But it seems that my "associates" were more interested in him than I gave them credit for. I won't make that mistake again."

"You will kill him?" Caine asked somberly.

"He's already dead, Mr. Caine." Miriam replied, tucking her phone back in her pocket. "He just doesn't know it yet."