The Bureau, page 19
“I’ve lived in LA my whole life.”
“Los Angeles. I’ve been there. I expect it’s changed since then, but I remember the palm trees. You could walk out of your house every day and feel like you were on holiday in a tropical paradise.”
“Palms are still there.” Kurt had never imagined himself on vacation as he drove around the city. He wasn’t at all certain what his idea of a vacation would be, since he hadn’t taken a proper one in years.
Silence reigned for countless miles, until Kurt’s stomach began to complain and his bladder chimed in. He took the exit for the next town.
“There’s a frontier prison museum here,” Des said cheerfully.
“You want to tour a prison?”
“Not really. I expect it’s not as posh as mine anyway.”
Kurt snorted.
He found a Denny’s just off the freeway and decided that was good enough. He felt the stares of staff and customers as he took a seat inside, but he’d expected that. Not many brown faces in this part of the country. Nobody was openly hostile, in any case, and the waitress was pleasant as she took their orders: a hamburger for Kurt and a huge breakfast-for-lunch extravaganza for Des: pancakes, sausage, eggs, and potatoes. “You’re going to make yourself sick eating like that,” Kurt said.
“It’ll be worth it. I’m trying to get as much decent food as I can, while I can. And coffee.” He sniffed happily at his mug. “Lovely, lovely coffee.” He didn’t seem to notice the way everyone kept looking at them, or maybe he just didn’t care. He’d tucked his long hair behind his ears, but it kept escaping. Nice hair, now that it was clean: thick, and the type of dark blond that would probably lighten if he spent time in the sun. At which point his pale skin would likely go red, and perhaps freckles would sprout across the bridge of his nose.
Grumbling under his breath, Kurt glared at his paper placemat. When he got home, he really needed to have a good long fuck session with Vaughn. Or maybe even hit a club or two despite the alcohol temptation he’d face there. Why wasn’t there an easier way to get laid, especially for men who collected AA pins? LA was a big city. Surely there were plenty of others out there like him: gay, sober, not exactly young, and looking for nothing but a satisfying roll in the sheets.
“What scared you last night?”
Kurt snapped his head up. “What?”
“In your sleep. You were…. Something was after you, I think. You made some noise.”
Shit. Maryann used to complain he’d wake her with his dreams, and nowadays the worst ones sometimes brought Jason running in to check on him. He hadn’t thought about how Des might react.
Undeterred by Kurt’s silence, Des leaned forward and dropped his voice. “I guess a Bureau agent has seen plenty of things to haunt him. Lots of monsters.” He wasn’t mocking. Just interested and maybe even a little sympathetic.
“I don’t dream about the Bureau.”
“Then, what?”
“I was in Nam.” Kurt didn’t know why he admitted the truth. Maybe it wasn’t worth the effort to avoid it.
“Oh. Dreaming of being shot at, then.”
“Yes,” Kurt lied.
“I expect I was lucky. Too busy running around to get drafted. If I’d stayed back in Belfast, I might’ve been caught up in the Troubles instead.” He frowned. “How did they end, then?”
“How did what end?”
“The Troubles.”
Kurt paid less attention to international politics than he should, but he caught the news now and then. “They haven’t ended. People there are still fighting.”
“But it’s been so long!” Des shook his head and then tucked his hair out of the way again. “That’s a bloody shame. My family were nationalists, you know. My dad died during the Border Campaign, when I was hardly out of nappies. At least, so my mam said. Her stories tended to change. All I remember is a man who drank and shouted a lot, and then he was gone.”
Although Kurt had read some of this in Des’s file, it was different to hear it from the man’s own lips. It wasn’t merely intel; it was his life. A young boy deprived of his father and shortly after shipped across the ocean to live with relatives he’d never met. According to the file, Des’s mother had later died—Des would have been in his teens—and his siblings had scattered across the United Kingdom. None had ever tried to get in touch with Des.
The waitress brought their food and they both dug in, Des with more enthusiasm than Denny’s usually engendered. He poured a lot of syrup onto his pancakes and sausage and smacked his lips over the eggs. “They’re real, from real chickens. Not powdered chemical shit.”
Kurt ate his hamburger and tried to update his calculation of when they’d reach Florida.
* * *
Of course they didn’t make it anywhere near Florida that day, but they did manage to get halfway through Nebraska before Kurt grew too exhausted to continue. He checked them into a chain hotel and fell asleep while Des was still in the shower.
Kurt woke before dawn the next day, but again Des was awake and ready, sitting at the little table and leafing through a magazine he’d picked up somewhere. That day Kurt pushed his limits, taking them almost a thousand miles to the outskirts of Nashville. He was glad to be covering the distance, but the farther south he went, the less comfortable he felt. He kept remembering his parents’ stories about having to see each other in secret back in Arkansas, where their relationship would have brought violence and prison. Hell, his father’s uncle, who was a sharecropper, had been lynched in Arkansas shortly after World War I.
But Kurt had little choice—he needed to get Des to Florida—so he gritted his teeth and reminded himself that this was the nineties and things had likely changed.
Oddly, Des’s company helped him feel better. Happy to have anyone to talk to, Des chatted as he rode, sharing memories from his youth and observations about everything they passed. Despite all that had happened to him and everything he’d done, Des seemed an optimist at his core, a man who could find delight in something as small as a misspelled sign or a pair of large dogs hanging their heads out the window of a small car. Kurt didn’t do much talking himself, but Des nattered on regardless. The one subject he never broached was his time with Larry.
After Nashville, the route took them almost due south through Georgia and then finally over the Florida border. But that still left them with a distance to go. “Why the hell did you go to Orlando?” Kurt asked. He’d been wondering that for days.
Des’s expression grew grave. “Larry said it was a good place to hide. So many tourists that nobody would pay us any attention. Which was true. I know this sounds silly, but I wanted to go to Disney World while we were there. It’s such an American thing to do, isn’t it?”
Kurt had taken Jason to Disneyland many times. “Did you go?”
“No. Larry said I was being stupid. We weren’t there for very long anyway. Three weeks, I think. I mostly stayed in our motel room, where it was nice and cool. Florida’s too hot for an Irishman.” He laughed humorlessly. “I’m more suited to desert nights, I expect.”
“But those are dry. Isn’t Northern Ireland damp?”
“I think so. I don’t remember, really. But have I told you about my Aunt Molly? She was a mermaid.”
Chapter Eleven
They reached Orlando far too late to search for boxes, so Kurt simply found a convenient hotel and checked them in. It was quite fancy, with a large swimming pool surrounded by sculpted shrubbery, and a lobby gift shop full of souvenirs. The hotel also boasted two restaurants, and after stowing the luggage in their room, Kurt and Des headed to the nicer one. “I’m tired of hamburgers,” Kurt explained.
Des didn’t mind the food he’d been eating on the road, but he wasn’t about to complain—especially when he saw steak and seafood on the menu. “It’s expensive,” he commented. Prices for everything nowadays shocked him, but this place ran especially dear.
“Bureau’s good for it. Order what you want.”
Nodding, Des reached for the wine list, but Kurt stopped him and pulled it away. “No alcohol.”
“Bureau rules?”
“My rules.” Kurt’s usually generous mouth pinched tightly. “Eleven years sober now, and I intend to stay that way.”
Interesting. Kurt didn’t speak very much, and when he did he was terse and distant. An agent doing his job. But every so often he let the man show through, almost as if he couldn’t help himself. Des imagined the real Kurt Powell as a prisoner trapped within the body of a federal agent. Desperate to get out yet allowed only brief appearances in the world. At first Des had assumed the professional shell was a matter of necessity, owing to the nature of the job and the fact that Kurt was transporting a murderer. But now Des wasn’t so sure. It seemed to him that the real Kurt, vulnerable and human, had been locked away even before the Bureau had swallowed him up.
Kurt surprised Des by ordering salad, broiled fish, and rice. “Not very hearty,” commented Des, who asked for the biggest steak on the menu. God, he’d never dreamed he’d get to taste steak again!
“I haven’t been getting any exercise these past few days.”
“There’s probably a gym here.”
“I’m too tired to use it. Anyway, I like to run, but it’s too muggy.”
“How about the pool?”
Kurt shook his head. Then he seemed to consider for a moment. “You could go for a swim if you want.”
“Naked?”
“I’m sure they have trunks in the gift shop.” He looked so serious that Des realized the offer of the pool hadn’t been merely a tease. Kurt honestly meant it.
The enormity of it all hit Des as hard as a blow, and he dropped his head into his hands. Soon enough he’d be back in a cell; all of this would seem like a dream, and nobody would speak with him the way Kurt was.
“You all right?” Kurt’s voice was low and urgent. He touched long fingers to Des’s forearm, not quite brushing against the bracelet with the tracking device.
Des looked at him. “Why are you doing this?”
“What?”
“Granting me so much.”
Kurt looked bewildered. “We made a deal.”
“You didn’t promise me anything about steak and swimming pools. You didn’t have to. You could have told me you’d keep me locked in the boot of your car when you weren’t needing me, and I’d have agreed. I’d have said yes to anything just to see daylight.” His throat felt as raw as if he’d been screaming for hours.
“Has nobody ever showed you kindness?” Kurt’s brow furrowed.
The waiter appeared with their food before Des could answer. He didn’t know what he would have said. Kindness was relative, wasn’t it? His mam, unable to care for him, had sent him to the States instead of an institution. The Chicago relatives had taken him in when his mam insisted and had let him go without a fuss when he ran away. Larry had paid his way and shared a bed—as long as Des remained useful. The Bureau had let him live. Someone might have considered any of those a kindness.
But no use ruining a fine meal over those memories. The steak was more delicious than he had imagined, the potato rich with butter and sour cream, the vegetables exactly tender enough and bright with freshness. Kurt urged Des to order dessert, and so Des enjoyed the tang of Key lime pie while Kurt sipped a decaf.
As they walked toward the elevators, Kurt paused in front of the gift shop. “Swimming trunks?”
“Nah,” Des said, smiling. “I don’t know how to swim.”
For some reason that made Kurt laugh—one of the few times he’d done so in Des’s presence. There was nothing cruel in it, just honest amusement. “I have another idea then.” Those hazel eyes were sparkling. He walked into the shop and Des followed.
They went straight to a wire rack stuffed with paperbacks. “Help yourself,” Kurt said.
“I can buy a book?”
“Buy a bunch if you want. Bureau’s paying.”
Des had never been much of a reader before going to prison. He’d dropped out of school at fourteen—he hadn’t been a diligent student even before then—and when he’d first landed in his cell, he’d struggled to get through a single page. But with little else to do, he’d persevered and gradually increased his proficiency. Before long, reading had changed from a chore to a delight, his way of escaping from misery, in mind if not in body.
But he’d never been able to choose what to read, and now he could.
The rack held the types of books that, he expected, people wanted to read on holiday. Spies, romances, and wizards, with a few old classics thrown in for good measure. Des found nearly all of them appealing and ended up grabbing almost at random, avoiding only those that looked to feature killers or monsters. He’d had plenty of that already. He ended up with over a dozen titles, almost too many to carry. Undaunted, Kurt paid for them all, buying nothing for himself except a pack of mint gum.
Up in their room, Des arranged himself on the bed with his reading material at hand, feeling like a prince. Kurt sat at the desk writing, as he did every night, in his black-covered notebook. He never explained what he was doing, and Des hadn’t asked. Work, presumably. Kurt didn’t seem the type to scribble poetry or dash off short stories in the evening.
“Do you travel a lot?”
Kurt shot him an annoyed look. “Sometimes.”
“Do you like it?” When no response came, Des continued. “From the time I was fourteen until I got caught, I never stayed anywhere for long. I saw a lot of the country. Didn’t sleep anywhere as posh as this, of course, but that’s not such a worry when you’re young. Loneliness is, though.” Damn. Why had he said that last bit?
“Is that why you took up with Krane?”
“I explained that before. He was pretty and smart, and he had a little money in his pocket. That was all I needed.”
That wasn’t exactly the truth. Des remembered the solitude of his early vagrant life, where he sometimes went days without exchanging more than a few words with people, where everyone was a stranger. Even when he’d pick up a bloke in a bar, it had been nothing more than a quick fumble and poke. He usually never even learned their names. He’d told himself then that this was freedom, but he hadn’t truly believed it. And later, confined within stone and iron, he’d thought that in some ways things had been worse while on the road. Which was less grievous to a starving man: to remove all food, or to keep a feast within his sight but never let him taste it?
Kurt grunted and turned back to his notebook.
Des picked up and opened one of the paperbacks, but his eyes focused not on the pages but on Kurt. He had a long, lean body tight with wiry muscles, and even at his most relaxed, he retained tension around his shoulders. He looked taut even while he slept. His hands moved gracefully, however, and sometimes he licked his lower lip in concentration. He didn’t seem a happy man, but he wasn’t angry either. Des wondered what he’d been like when he used to drink: loud and heavy-handed, like Des’s father, or quiet and withdrawn, a turtle pulled into its shell.
Eventually Kurt finished writing. He tucked the book into his jacket pocket, grabbed a few items from his bag, and went into the bathroom. Des hoped that he wasn’t changing clothes in private due to discomfort at being seen naked by a gay man. Kurt emerged not long afterward, smelling of hotel soap and fully dressed, as usual—wearing flannel pants and a T-shirt, even here in Florida, where the air conditioning struggled against the heat.
Des took a shower next. Oh, and it was lovely, with all the hot water he wanted and shampoo that left his hair soft and smelling of berries. As he had the previous nights, he soaped up the bracelet and attempted to pull it off. He knew he wouldn’t succeed, but he had to try anyway.
When he got out of the shower, he spent time with another part of his routine: staring into the mirror. He didn’t look as old and decrepit as he’d feared, which was good, but his face still seemed unfamiliar.
Deciding it was too warm for any clothing, Des came out of the bathroom naked. The main room was dark, so he stood in the doorway for a moment to get his bearings. Before he turned off the bathroom light, he saw Kurt looking at him. Staring. There wasn’t enough light for him to read Kurt’s expression, but something about the angle of his head on the pillow made Des’s breath go shallow and caused heat to pool in his belly.
Hurriedly, he switched off the light and stumbled to his bed.
“Is it hard on your family, you being gone so often?” Des truly wanted to know but didn’t expect an answer.
“I’m divorced. My kid is almost grown. They do fine without me.” There was something rote about the way Kurt said this, as if he’d rehearsed it. As if he’d said it to himself many times. Had he been trying to reassure himself or… prepare for something? Being a Bureau agent was not always a safe job.
“Do you date much? Maybe it’s difficult for you to find the time, but I expect many women would be thrilled to go out with an agent. It would be exciting for them.”
“I’m not interested in those women.” With that equivocal statement, Kurt rolled over, and Des recognized the too-rapid breathing of feigned sleep.
* * *
Des remembered being in Florida with Larry eighteen years earlier. He remembered the rainstorms and the lizards, the swampy-looking ponds among stands of trees, the tacky shops selling cheap T-shirts and beach towels. What he didn’t remember was the name of the motel where they’d stayed for two weeks.
“So bloody many of them,” he complained as they rolled by yet another unfamiliar structure. Kurt had a list of properties that had existed in 1975, but it wasn’t entirely helpful. Some hotels had changed names while others retained their original names but had been entirely remodeled or demolished and rebuilt. And everything looked wildly different from what Des remembered, partly because Disney World had been only a few years old when he was last there. Both the park and the city had grown considerably in the interim.
