Jessica Andersen - Skykeepers

He compromised by standing ready, a balanced position drummed into him by a long line of martial arts instructors who’d attempted to teach him to channel his aggression, with varying degrees of success. “I’m Stone. Who’s asking?”

“I’m Maxwell Bryson. I want to talk to you about your psych tests.”

Shit , Michael thought, disgusted. A shrink . But behind the disgust was fear that he’d blown it before he’d really gotten a chance to prove himself. He’d done his damnedest to skew his test answers toward the norm, responding based on the surface part of himself, not the fighter within, figuring the safer part of him was the one they’d want in the bureau. He’d tried to be so careful. Apparently, he hadn’t been careful enough. “What about them?”

“Don’t bullshit me. It wastes both our time.”

Inwardly, Michael cringed. He hated the idea of washing out of the program, not just because of the embarrassment factor, but because there were parts of it he really liked, aspects of the training and the job he thought would suit him better than anything else he’d tried so far. But beside the dismay rose a twisting curl of anger, and a parade of sensory flashes kaleidoscoped through him: the sensation of gripping the guy by his black fatigues, putting him up against a wall, getting in his face, taking it further. He’d have to deal with the backup he could sense in the shadows on the opposite side of the street, and the camera footage, but . . .

Knowing it was exactly that sort of thought process that’d gotten him into this mess, Michael cut it off midstream, even though it was tempting. Damned tempting. But at the same time his less reactive, more rational self had caught a piece that didn’t fit, making him think there was something else going on. He met Bryson’s eyes. “You didn’t have the boss’s boss e-mail me to meet you out here so you could kick me out of the program for fudging psych results. So what’s the deal?”

“Then you admit you answered dishonestly?”

“My answers were honest to a point,” Michael hedged, figuring the guy already knew that much, if he was asking.

Finally, Bryson’s expression changed from cool blankness to a flash of satisfaction. “Now we’re getting somewhere. Does this honesty-to-a-point have anything to do with all the fighting you did during your first year or so of college?”

Something stirred in Michael’s gut; he wasn’t sure if it was warning or interest. Wary, he said, “Shouldn’t there be an office and a couch involved in this session?”

The older man made a face. “I’m no shrink. I’m the guy who can give you what you want.”

“What do you think I want?”

“Tell me about the fights.”

They stared at each other for a long moment. Michael broke first. Telling himself it was no big deal, he shrugged. “They were just fights. Too much alcohol, not enough supervision. You know the drill.”

Without Tomas around to nag him to hit the dojo daily, the aggression had all but taken over. He’d tried to control it and failed, tried to drown it in cheap beer and found that only lowered his inhibitions.

“I’m not talking about thrashing a couple of frat boys. I’m talking about the fight club you got into after that thrill wore off. You came close to killing a man, didn’t you? Scared yourself straight back to martial arts and mind control . . . but that’s wearing thin now, isn’t it?” Bryson’s eyes bore into his.

“The further you get into the academy training, the more the monster wants to come out, right? You can tell me. Trust me, I understand. And I can help you.”

Michael went very still as his overdeveloped fight-or-flight—emphasis on fight —response threatened to kick in, and his dominant self struggled to control the impulse. He counted his heartbeats. When they slowed slightly, and he could hang onto his grip on himself, he glanced at one of the cameras covering that portion of Hogan’s Alley. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Tape’s not rolling,” Bryson said succinctly. “It’s just you and me.”

Oddly, Michael believed that. “What about the guy across the street?”

“He’s one of mine.”

“Who the hell are you?” This had to be a total put-on, a trap conceived by the psych types, maybe even a training exercise for the Behavioral Sciences Unit, or some such shit. But even as Michael told himself that, part of him was thinking, What if it’s not a put-on? What if it’s real?

“I’m your best chance at using your natural talents to their fullest,” Bryson answered. “I run a small, select unit of men that at present operates under an arm of Homeland Security, although we work outside the scope of the more official paradigms, and have persisted through various administrations, often invisible to even the president. We’re . . . let’s just say we keep the peace in ways the other branches won’t touch.”

“You’re talking about black ops.”

“Among other things.” Bryson’s expression returned to relentless neutrality. “Ever since the attacks on New York and the Pentagon, we’ve been looking to expand our ranks, but we require a . . . certain type of individual, so to speak.”

And there it is , Michael thought. “A man with the potential to become a killer.”

Ever since childhood, he’d been aware of the urges. He’d never acted on the impulses, hadn’t done anything on the watch list for serial killers—but there had been times he’d wanted to. Badly.

Bryson shook his head. “Anyone can become a killer, given the right circumstances. What I need is someone who can do the work this country needs him to do, then put it aside and function normally otherwise.” He paused, eyes locking with Michael’s. “I need a fighter with a borderline dissociative personality, if not full-blown schizophrenia.”

Michael swallowed hard, knowing his FBI training was over, one way or the other. “What’s in it for

. . . for this person? If you found him, I mean.”

“I’ll teach him to control the impulses, how to use them to be a better man. I’ll program him so he can put that part of himself away, and take it out only when and where it will do some good.”

“How?” The word escaped before Michael could curb it, or hide some of the desperation he knew had flashed in his eyes.

“The same way I’ll blank your memories of this entire meeting if you turn me down.” Bryson motioned, and the second man detached himself from the shadows across the road and crossed the street to join them. “Dr. Horn will take care of it.”

The doctor wore the same black fatigues but no jacket, and had wisps of white-blond hair crowning his otherwise shiny scalp. His features were pinched and rabbity, and he didn’t move at all like a fighter. When he dipped into one of his thigh pockets and came up with a pair of preloaded syringes, though, his movements carried the grace of long familiarity. “Your call, Mr. Stone,” he said, his voice surprisingly deep given his unprepossessing exterior. “You in or out?”

Michael locked eyes with Bryson. “If I refuse?”

“You’ll wake up in your room tomorrow morning and remember nothing. The e-mail’s already been purged from the computer systems, so as far as you’ll know, you slept through the night uninterrupted.

When you get to your first class, you’ll learn that you’ve been bounced from the program based on your psych profile.”

Michael could picture it all too easily; he’d been projecting exactly that scenario ever since he’d been pulled out for a third round of personality tests that most of the others hadn’t been subjected to.

“And if I agree?”

“Then you receive a very different injection, you come with me, and your training begins tonight.”