didn’t answer him. He shook his head and gestured for me to follow him, which I did. The truth was, I didn’t need anything from my house. When we got there, I was going to load up as many weapons as I could carry from the basement, but I didn’t really need any of them. And it’s not like any of my clothes were so amazing that I couldn’t live without them; nor personal items, none of it.
I wanted to go back because I thought Wolfe would be there.
I hated the way I felt after our last fight, that sick feeling in the pit of my stomach thinking about it – about how he beat me down, made me fear him. I wanted to run into him. This time I’d be ready. Mobility and agility were my weapons. I couldn’t beat him for strength, but I moved faster than him last time and if I hadn’t rammed my head into the iron wall of muscle that was his stomach…I think I could take him. I wanted to. I was faster than him, I knew it. Not by much, but enough. I just had to aim for the weak points – eyes, groin, kidneys.
At least it would be better than sitting around the Directorate for tests I didn’t really want to do, waiting for a mom who probably wasn’t going to show up.
I followed Zack to an underground parking garage where I found ten guys, all dressed in suits, carrying rifles and shotguns. Kurt was standing there waiting and he greeted me with a scowl and a grunt that bordered on rude. I waved coquettishly with a big, fake smile. “I should get a gun too,” I said as Zack and I walked up to their car.
“No,” they both chorused. I shrugged; I hadn’t expected them to say yes and I didn’t press the point. If I was facing off against Wolfe and needed one, I’d take it from an agent. When Wolfe showed, I knew I was going to have to move fast; I didn’t want any of these guys to die, after all.
We drove to a gate that opened for us, the entrance to the Directorate compound, which was surrounded by a high brick wall. I counted three security cameras without difficulty and I had a suspicion that those were for show; I would have bet the real cameras were much smaller.
We drove down straight roads in a convoy, empty fields of rolling hills on either side. After about twenty minutes we hit a major highway and followed it for another twenty minutes until we hit a suburban area replete with malls, stores and retail outlets. Another few minutes and we exited a freeway into an area of older homes that looked familiar. I couldn’t be sure, but I thought it was the same cross street where Reed and I entered the freeway a couple days before.
A few streets later I found myself staring at the front of a house that should have looked familiar, since I lived in it, but didn’t because I hadn’t seen the exterior in over a decade except while fleeing from it in a rush.
“We’ll wait here until we get the all-clear,” Zack told me, leaning over the seat to talk to me. A few of the cars parked in front of us emptied and the agents were all wearing full length coats to conceal their weapons. They streamed across the street in a mass.
“Um,” I said with amusement, “shouldn’t we have parked a few streets away if we’re afraid Wolfe is watching the house?”
“Wow, you’ve outsmarted us. It must be our first day on the job,” Kurt answered with a snotty air of aggravation. “We are a few streets away. They’re going to walk the three blocks to get to your place.”
I looked at the house I had thought was mine. I tried to reconcile the facade with the brief glimpse I had gotten of my home as I fled into Reed’s car days earlier. I shook my head. They were all snow covered, blotting out differences between them. I gave up and looked at Zack, who was shaking his head at his partner.
We sat in silence for the next few minutes. Tempted as I was to make smartass comments to annoy Kurt to the point where he’d get out of the car, I restrained myself (not sure how). We waited, tension filling the air as mundane reports from the agents came across