Bone Music (Burning Girl #1)(94)

There’s an e-mail from Dylan, which surprises him. He knows the package was received at four o’clock that afternoon, but he expected the guy not to let him know out of mere defiance.

From his pocket, he pulls out the digital key Julia Crispin provided him with, uses the current code to log in to the portal for both feeds.

If one screen is black, he can use the archive link underneath it to access the most recent four hours of footage. But the screen for DC—Dylan Cody—is black and there’s no link below. So Dylan received the package, but he hasn’t activated his TruGlass yet. Maybe defiance is still in play.

CR’s also black, but in her case, there’s archived footage.

He watches her slide the lenses in, takes in the startled expressions of the men with her, the cop, Luke Prescott, and the long-haired contractor with the dishonorable discharge from the marines and the brief stint in jail for aggravated assault, Martin Cahill. If there’s an odder crew out there, they’re probably on a sitcom. The lack of audio is frustrating, but he’s still stunned by how clear the images are. A few notches below high-definition TV.

Charlotte and the cop head outside, get into the guy’s sheriff’s cruiser, drive through that little town, then into the mountains.

Could they have taken off in search of a target that soon?

No way, he thinks.

When they park on the side of Pacific Coast Highway, he realizes they must be testing the thing’s range. Based on their expressions, they’re as impressed as he is.

The voyeurism of it all is distracting, and he finds himself enamored by the fairly ordinary sight of them descending a set of stone steps to a windswept, rugged beach below; he’s so enamored, he misses Dylan’s feed coming to life, until the word live pops up next to a green dot just underneath his screen.

At first he’s not sure what’s he’s watching in the second panel.

Blurs of movement. Maybe it’s the packaging being torn away.

A black T-shirt hits tiled floor next to bare feet.

A hand turns a shower knob.

The image seems to jerk a little.

Blinks, Cole realizes. Lots of them. Dylan must be getting used to the way the things sit in his eyes.

Suddenly Dylan’s staring right back at him, through a small mirror that’s about to fog. He douses his head under the shower’s spray, makes a kissy face and sleepy eyes. Then he looks down, giving Cole a perfect view of the water sluicing down his muscular body as he grabs his cock and balls from below and starts soaping them like a porn star.

Cole slams the screen of his laptop shut, cursing under his breath.

When he calls Ed Baker, his director of security, the man answers after one ring.

“How’s our girl?” Cole asks.

“Had to bring the microdrones down at dusk, but ground teams A and B both have eyes on Cahill’s trailer.”

“She inside?”

“Nope. And she’s got guests.”

“Outside?”

“Yep. It’s a cookout.”

Is Ed joking?

The sustained silence tells him that’s not the case. The man’s tone is certainly frostier than usual; it has been since they flew to meet Dylan in Arizona. If Ed had his way, they’d clear the warehouse of all the surveillance equipment tracking Charlotte Rowe and use the space to waterboard Dylan into revealing whether or not he’s altered Zypraxon’s formula.

Note to file: don’t put Ed Baker and Julia Crispin in the same room together. He might have an insurrection on his hands that ends with Dylan’s balls being electrocuted.

“So that’s what she was planning?” Cole finally asks. “A cookout?”

“I’m gonna go out on a limb and say no.”

“Then what the hell is she doing?”

“Everybody needs downtime.”

“She’s had two days of it. And she’s the one who just told us she’s planning something. Was she messing with us?”

“We need to find out more about what Dylan said to her during that call,” Ed offers. “Whatever it was, it made her destroy that disposable phone.”

“Dylan claims he gave us a full account of his call.”

“We can’t know that for sure. It’s reckless, letting him talk to her.”

“We’ve got better eyes on him now. He just activated his TruGlass.”

“Yeah. About that.”

“Yeah, I know. He’s showering.”

“Sort of. Look, we don’t know how much he’s told this girl, and we can’t let him be the only one communicating with her.”

He isn’t, Cole wants to say. But he’s not telling Ed about the purchase he made that afternoon, or the jobs he’ll be able to bring back to Altamira after a few phone calls. He’s communicating with Charlotte Rowe, all right, but in his own way. And damn if he’ll run any of that by Ed, who has begun talking out of school because he hates being cooped up in warehouses overseeing outside security contractors.

“Let’s bring him in,” Ed says. “Have a conversation where he doesn’t set the terms. Find out how much risk he’s really put the company in.”

“He hasn’t been on the payroll for two years.”

“Yeah, but he’s been making choices that endanger the company for three now.”