62

Parkerson drove north up Interstate 95 until he hit Savannah, Georgia. Then he made a detour.

He’d spent the night thinking about the asset, about the Miami job. He kept seeing the target’s head explode, the asset’s blank eyes. The kid was a genuine killer. A credit to the Killswitch program, and he’d gotten out of state clean. There were still too many new applications, though, for one asset to handle. It was time to expand the program.

He turned east onto Interstate 16, bombed across Georgia through Macon to Atlanta, where he found a cheap roadside motel with a vacancy sign, and parked the Cadillac for a few hours’ rest. It was nearly five in the morning; the eastern horizon was just starting to show light. Parkerson had been surviving on Red Bull and adrenaline for the better part of two days.

He slept until nearly noon, and when he woke up he showered and drove to a shopping mall, where he bought fresh clothes and a toothbrush and changed in the mall bathroom, splashed cold water on his face, and examined himself in the mirror. His eyes were bloodshot and sunken, his hair unkempt; he needed a shave. He was starting to look like one of the assets himself.

Parkerson dried his face and walked out of the bathroom. On the way out of the mall, he bought a pair of cheap sunglasses and a Braves hat—a ready-made disguise. He drove the Cadillac into a leafy suburb in the northeast part of town, found a back road office complex, a couple of restaurants, and a sketchy talent agency. He parked across from a nondescript commercial low-rise and watched the building’s front doors from inside the car.

It was a busy day, and Parkerson watched people walk in and walk out for a couple of hours, listening to more Bach and fighting the exhaustion and adrenaline that seemed to come at him in waves.

THEY BEGAN TO ARRIVE a little before three. Men, mostly, a couple of women. Most of them were still young, in their mid-twenties or so. Veterans, all of them, come for counseling or medication or simply a place of refuge. All of them potential new assets.

Parkerson knew that the average American citizen would find his actions reprehensible. The patriots would froth at his exploitation of traumatized veterans. Frankly, he didn’t care. These soldiers were his best workers. They trained better, they killed better, and they didn’t make mistakes.

As far as Parkerson was concerned, this was capitalism. This was no different than the railroads’ employing Chinese laborers because they worked harder, or Andrew Carnegie’s fighting the unions in his steel mills because they wanted unfair concessions. This was the pursuit of productivity, the American way. Soldiers made the best assets, morality be damned.

Parkerson watched the veterans arrive. Some came with friends and family; they were dropped at the doors out of minivans and midsize sedans, the drivers waiting until they’d disappeared inside the building before they idled slowly away. Parkerson ignored these candidates. He didn’t need nosy relatives asking questions, pushy mothers, fathers, wives. He waited, and focused on the young men and women who came alone.

It was five minutes past three when Parkerson saw him. As young as the rest, and solitary. He walked across the parking lot, slow, from the road. Like he didn’t realize he was late.

He had long, greasy hair and a peach-fuzz chin. Circles under his eyes, as though he hadn’t slept in weeks. Just looking at him made Parkerson feel tired again. The kid crossed the lot, glanced in the Cadillac as he passed it. Parkerson met his eyes and knew in a split second that this was the one. He wore the same blank expression as Lind.

The kid walked to the low-rise and paused at the doors. Stood there for a moment, not looking at anything. Then someone opened the door and came out of the building. The kid hesitated, and then slipped in through the open door.

Parkerson stared after the kid and saw dollar signs. That’s the guy, he thought, his adrenaline ramping up again. That’s my next asset.