Terrorbyte Read Free

dinner. It was amusing but possibly necessary.
    â€œWill do.”

Chapter Two
Someday I’ll Be Saturday Night
    Mac lifted his head, his hazel eyes meeting mine with the determination of a man searching for an out.
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œBecause we are required to attend.” I tugged my tee shirt free from my waistband, letting it hang over my jeans. The early evening was warm, bordering on muggy. I felt hot and tired, and my mood teetered on the edge of nervously peeved and ornery bitch. I pulled the tie from my hair and shook my head, ran my fingers through the length of my hair and massaged my head with my fingertips. Even my scalp felt irritated.
    Irritated was the new happy.
    I could still smell the dead guy, even after showering at work and changing into clean clothes. The clothes I’d worn all day were in the garbage. I felt like I needed to shower again.
    He shuffled papers across his desk, without looking up at me. “I have a lot of work to do.”
    â€œI know.” I steeled myself for the string of excuses that seemed ready to fall.
    â€œDo we really have to?” he implored, looking up at me through the dark hair that fell over his eyes.
    â€œYes, we really do,” I replied, weary beyond belief.
    â€œYou know I hate this …”
    â€œYes … I know you hate this.”
    I remembered exactly what I was doing the day the publisher rang to tell me our book made the New York Times bestseller list. I dropped one of the crystal glasses I was washing and it smashed in the kitchen sink. I never dreamt the book would sit at number three for two months and I still hadn’t found a replacement glass.
    We have to do this.
    FBI agents who write poetry: we were big news, especially after the Son of Shakespeare case and the whole world found out about the sucky little poems he left for me, artistically stuck to dead bodies. Personally, I think people only bought the book to check out my warped mind. I hoped they were disappointed but sales indicated they weren’t. I think I’m fairly twisted. Finding parts of people in your car and bath tub and hanging from the ceiling will do that to a person.
    â€œWho’ll be there?”
    The answer rambled in my head: about two hundred people we’ve never met; half the FBI; all our family; most of Mauryville. Mauryville is the small town I’d lived in before moving north to be with Mac.
    â€œPeople.” I crossed my fingers and hoped my next comment sounded convincing. “It’s a dinner function, so probably not many.” I was trying hard to make it sound like a small intimate gathering, the sort that wouldn’t require a microphone.
    Mac’s eyes met mine. “You’re a terrible liar, Ellie.”
    He passed me a pile of papers. Flipping through them, I realized they all said similar things : ‘Congratulations. See you at the dinner . ’
    â€œThere’s even one from that friend of Simon’s and dad’s, GW.”
    â€œSo is it that GW?”
    â€œI think so. Look at this.” He handed me the email. I glanced over the contents and noted the Secret Service brief at the bottom.
    Just when I thought I’d taken his mind off things, he snapped at me, “I cannot speak in front of people … with a microphone in my face.” Mac’s eyes shifted back to the paperwork on his desk. A thin scar from a knife fight ran along the side of his face, almost obscured by his hair. A scar on the bridge of his nose, from a maniac with a baseball bat a few months ago, was still pink. A reminder that Mac wasn’t afraid of wading into trouble even when there was a real possibility of physical injury and yet, here he was about to bury himself in work rather than face a microphone. The Son of Shakespeare had really screwed him up. I saw the little lost boy behind his eyes. Before I realized what had happened I found myself wanting to smack him good and hard upside the head and