Lori Armstrong: Merciless

The third book in the Mercy Gunderson series, 2013

I blamed my unrealistic expectations of becoming an FBI special agent on The X-Files.

Granted, Mulder and Scully were fictional characters, but working in the FBI was nothing like portrayed on any TV shows. Disappointment made me want to crawl inside the TV and kick some ass.

Figuratively speaking, of course.

So far my new FBI job hadn’t entailed chasing down aliens-either illegal or the bug-eyed, misshapen-headed types.

I hadn’t been assigned a trippy private office that I could decorate with funky, yet prophetic posters.

I hadn’t met a weirdly wise, hip, confidential informant.

I hadn’t participated in a raid where I got to yell, “Federal agents! Everyone on the ground!”

The brass hadn’t issued me a shiny badge or one of those rocking black jackets with FBI emblazoned in big white letters on the back.

Heck, I hadn’t even been saddled with an official partner.

I was damn lucky I’d gotten a gun.

Not that I’d gotten to shoot it yet.

Instead of chasing down bad guys and busting heads, I was trapped in an overheated office building in Rapid City with other agents, flipping though a stack of paperwork, listening to Director Shenker drone on.

And holy J. Edgar Hoover, did the man love the sound of his own monotone.

I sighed. A boot connected with my ankle, and I sucked in a quick breath at the sharp pain.

Of course, Director Shenker chose that moment to pause his lecture. He peered at me over the top of his cheater bifocals-leopard print cheater bifocals, no less.

Peered was too bland a word. Glared was more fitting.

I fought the urge to squirm.

“Have something to add, Agent Gunderson?”

“No, sir.” I pointed to my empty water glass. “Just a dry throat.” I reached for the water pitcher-we’d been in meeting hell so long the ice had melted. When I thoughtfully refilled my tablemate’s glass-oops, water splashed on his notebook, obliterating the elaborate doodle he’d been working on for the past two hours.

Served the bastard right for kicking me.

“Take ten, people,” Shenker said, leaving up the PowerPoint presentation.

Didn’t have to tell me twice. I was out of the room and down the hallway before my seatmate quit scratching himself.

Or so I thought.

A hand on my shoulder spun me around so I was nose to nose with Special Agent Shay Turnbull-my unofficial trainer, my doodling seat-mate, the disher of a daily dose of snark that made me snicker like a teenage girl in spite of myself.

I shrugged him off.

“Follow me.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m the senior agent, that’s why. Do you have to make everything so damn difficult?” Turnbull headed for the door marked STAIRS, assuming I’d follow.

Another ass-chewing session. I grudgingly admitted I preferred Turn-bull’s private approach rather than our boss’s public browbeating-not that I’d been on the receiving end so far.

We entered the small concrete landing to the stairwell. I rested my shoulders against the cement-block wall, half wishing I smoked. Would I look tough and cool if I flicked my Bic and squinted mysteriously at Turnbull through the smoky haze?

No. Turnbull would see right through me. He had that uncanny ability. Which sort of sucked ass for me.

“Would it kill you to look alive and at least partially interested in this training session, Gunderson?”

“Yes, it might kill me, because it’s boring me to death. I don’t see the importance of knowing riot procedure. There’s not enough population base here to even have a riot. And historically, the guys in charge call the National Guard.”

Turnbull lifted a brow. “Has it somehow escaped your notice, Sergeant Major, that more than half the South Dakota National Guard troops are currently deployed?”

I scowled at his pointed reminder of my army rank. “Doesn’t matter. Training assignment is busywork. I wanna be out there doing something. Not sitting on my ass.”

“The FBI’s success rate is based on ninety percent office work and-”

“Ten percent fieldwork, yeah, yeah, I recently lived the manifesto.” Standard training time for new FBI agents was five months at Quantico. I fell into the “special exclusion category” since at thirty-nine I was older than the federal government’s mandated final hire age of thirty-eight for federal employees. With twenty years’ service in Uncle Sam’s army, and a pension in place, I’d been allowed to skip the firearms portion and specialized tactical maneuvers of the training program, allowing me to shave off four weeks in Virginia.

Agent Turnbull studied me in his usual fashion. Not looking me in the eye, because engaging in a stare down with me was an exercise in futility. And Special Agent Turnbull hated losing. So instead, he gifted me with the half-exasperated/half-amused look of superiority he’d perfected in his ten-plus years as a G-man.

“What? You can’t fault me for hoping for something-anything-to happen.”

“I’ll say it again. Act like you give a damn about these training assignments. You’re new. You should be enthusiastic. Rah-rah! Go FBI! and all that shit.” His pocket buzzed, and he fished out his cell phone. He said, “Turnbull,” and exited the stairwell.

I didn’t move. Instead, I closed my eyes, still unsure if I’d made the right choice joining the FBI.

When I’d snapped out of the haze following the death of my former army buddy Anna, a death in which I’d pulled the trigger, I realized I needed more out of my life than being a retired soldier, part-time rancher, and full-time drinker. Since my skill set had been honed behind the scope of my sniper rifle, there wasn’t much in the way of career opportunities in western South Dakota. I was zero for two on the attempted-career front; I’d made a lousy bartender and had lost when I ran for my dad’s old job as Eagle River County sheriff. When the FBI had set their sights on me, it’d been a boost to my ego-although I’d never publicly admit that.

But again, I hadn’t found out the job offer hadn’t been about me personally until after I’d signed on the dotted line. The Rapid City FBI office was short on agents because no one in the vast resources of the FBI wanted to fill the agency opening in our state capital in Pierre, which meant the head of our division, Director Shenker, had to divide his time between that office and ours in Rapid City.

Since our district covered such a large area, and our staff was on the smallish side, we weren’t a specialized unit like in more populated areas. We handled all the federal cases: everything from homicide to artifact theft. We weren’t even partnered with other agents, although Turnbull was tasked with showing me the ropes as my unofficial partner.

Served him right, being saddled with a rookie, after flashing his specialized FBI badge at me, denoting him as part of the Indian Country Special Crimes Unit. What Turnbull hadn’t told me? There was no such division within the Rapid City FBI unit.

After some kind of hush-hush dustup, he’d been transferred from the ICSCU in Minneapolis to “train” the agents of this smaller outlying FBI office in how to deal with Indian Country crimes. Which had pissed off the agents who’d been serving the Rapid City FBI office for years, dealing with Indian crimes without the official federal ICSCU moniker-or the funding-because for all of Turnbull’s supposed training, he hadn’t seen or done half the shit in his ten years as an agent that the Rapid City agents dealt with each year.