Kim Oh: Real Dangerous Ride Part 9

"We think," said Jerry, "that we've found a loophole. In the rules "

"Rules? What rules?"

"The contest. The way Dalby set it up. Contests have rules, right? So you have to play the game the way the rules are given."

"If you say so." I laid the .357 in my lap again. "I kinda got the impression, from both you guys and Stinson, that the rules were pretty much anything goes."

"Nope." He gave an emphatic shake of his head. "There are two big no-no's. Two things that Dalby told us we definitely could not do."

I raised an eyebrow. "And they were . . . ?"

"First one was no guns. We couldn't take a shot at you. I mean, like a gunshot."

That cleared up another small mystery for me. In my experience, when a person really wants something, the first thing they do is get gunned up. The world I come from, people do most of their negotiating while squinting over their gunsights at each other. Maybe not these Beta guys, but I couldn't imagine Stinson would've had much of a problem with drilling me through the head, just to get the right backpack from me. I wouldn't have been any more dead than if I had landed under the wheels of one of those Challengers he drove.

"Dalby's got a thing against guns?" I just wanted to know.

"I don't think so," said Jerry. "Probably he just thought it would make the contest more interesting. So we would have to be more creative, about what we came up with."

"So . . . what were the other rules? Besides no guns."

"No money," said Jerry.

"Pardon me?"

"No money." Simon smiled when he repeated the two words. "In other words, we couldn't just buy the package off you. We had to, like, find a way to get it from you. And not just make a deal with you for it."

"Okay . . ." I nodded. "Fair enough. Hey, it's Dalby's contest he can set it up however he wants. But " I tapped a fingernail on the gun's crosshatched grip. "You're trying to make a deal with me now. What happens when Dalby finds out? Aren't you out of the contest then? For breaking the rules?"

"I told you." Jerry's voice took on that insufferably patient tone that people get when they think they're smarter than you. "We found a loophole. At least we think we have. So we're not going to offer you money."

"What the h.e.l.l else do you think I'd be interested in?"

"A job."

That took the air out of the van at least, for me it did. Jerry and Simon seemed pleased at the suggestion having been made.

"Um I've got a job, remember? You know, the one that Dalby hired me to do." I tugged one of the backpack straps so it rose higher on my shoulder. "Deliver this. In San Francisco. And, as a matter of fact, that's what I should be doing right now. Instead of sitting in the back of a phony paramedics van, wasting time, listening to your weird ideas."

"Yeah . . . about that." One side of Jerry's face twisted, as though he were trying to sort out the right words. "When you think about it you kinda got screwed. By Dalby. I mean, the job he told you he was hiring you for, that's not actually what you've been doing. Delivering that package " He pointed to the backpack behind me. "That's what you thought you were doing but you weren't, not really. That was just an excuse, for the contest to go on."

"Well." Now I was really getting annoyed. "When somebody hires me to do something, I generally just go ahead and do it. No matter what it takes. What other people do isn't my business."

"That's exactly what we want to change." Simon leaned forward, gazing straight into my eyes. "We do want it to be your business. That's why we're offering you the job. Of chief financial officer."

ELEVEN.

Whoa.

It'd been a while since I'd heard those words. A long while.

Being a CFO that was something from somebody else's life. That was what another girl had wanted. A girl who had been me. Then a lot of things had happened, and some of them had been things that I had made happen. Like my old boss McIntyre the one who'd promised to make me the CFO of his company . . . and then he didn't.

Like I said things happen. That was what he'd found out, all right.

And now these guys were going to find out the same.

"Funny you should say something like that." I lifted the .357 from my lap, settling its grip in my hand. I leaned forward, pointing the gun straight between Jerry's eyes. "I mean C . . . F . . . O." With each of those three letters, I tightened my finger around the trigger. "In fact it's hilarious."

"Hold on wait a minute." Jerry's eyes went wide enough that I could see the .357's muzzle reflected in his pupils. He scooted away as far as he could go, bringing himself against the back of the driver's seat. "Somebody offers you a job I mean, a really nice executive position this isn't the way you should react. Normal people don't react like that."

"Normal . . ." The gun didn't waver in my hand. "That's been a while for me."

"Maybe you don't understand." Simon looked equally panicked. "We're talking an initial salary in the mid-six figures. With automatic escalator clauses. And stock options you know those are good. Don't you?"

I gave him a half-lidded gaze. "They can be. But the salary would be enough, thanks."

"Then . . ." Jerry pointed a trembling finger at the gun directed at him. "Why . . ."

"Because what I don't get is how you'd know to offer me a CFO position. Because that kinda means something to me."

"It's what you always wanted." The tone of Simon's voice turned hopeful. "Isn't it?"

"At one time, it was." I s.h.i.+fted the .357 toward him. "But how do you know that?"

"Well . . . how else?" A nervous shrug. "We did our research. About you."

If there was one thing I didn't like, it was people knowing stuff about me.

"We managed to hack into Dalby's email." Jerry didn't wait for me to ask. "Some of it, at least. His communications people have got some major security protocols in place all kinds of layered encryption. But that's what you'd expect with somebody in his position, right? But he had one account that he was running on his own, outside of his corporate streams. We couldn't get into it from his end, but we were able to trace back to the person he had been going back-and-forth with. And it turned out to be the resource he was using to set up the contest."

"Resource? Wait a minute. This wouldn't have been somebody named Morton, would it?"

"Yeah, that's right." Another nod from Jerry. "We figured out that he's like your agent or something. He sets you up with jobs like this one. So there was some bio stuff in the emails. About you, your background, and all."

"Even some photos," said Simon.

Those had probably been why this bunch had figured they could take me on. I don't photograph as deadly as I am in real life.

"Anyway, there was some stuff in there about your having gone up for a position as a chief financial officer one time, at some company you had been working for. But then something happened, and it didn't come through "

"You could say that."

"That's why," continued Jerry, "we figured you'd be interested in being our CFO. For our start-up company. Once we get the financing capital from Dalby, you'll be in on the ground floor. Complete with MFN most favored nation status. n.o.body would get better compensation terms than you would."

"Because that's the loophole we figured out." Simon leaned toward me. "At least we think it is. The rules that Dalby set up for the contest they only say that we can't offer you money. We can't buy the package from you. But an employment contract a top position with the company we'll be setting up the rules don't say anything about that."

I wasn't convinced at least, not yet. "Seems to me you're splitting some pretty fine hairs here."

"Hey if Dalby didn't want us to do something like this, he should've spelled it out in the contest rules. We made a deal with him when we got into the contest, and we're sticking to it. Not our fault that we're being more creative than he was expecting us to be."

"And," added Jerry, "maybe this is what Dalby wanted us to figure out. Maybe the whole point of the contest was for us to prove that we're smarter than Stinson, the action guy. And that there are ways of getting things done that don't involve muscle cars and getting people killed."

"Sure." I had laid the .357 back in my lap. "But what if you're wrong about that? What if Dalby just decides that you're cheating, and this job offer is the same as money? Because let's face the facts it just about is. I give you the backpack . . ." I used the gun to point to it, behind me. "And I wind up as CFO of your new corporation. That's quid pro quo, right? One thing of value exchanged for something else of value. Dalby is just as likely to say that's the sort of thing he was ruling out when he set up the contest. It's his finance capital we're talking about, so he gets to decide. Who are you going to complain to if you don't like it?"

"All right." Jerry sighed; he knew I had him there. "Maybe so maybe that's what Dalby decides "

"Not maybe. Probably."

"So we're not any worse off than if we don't offer you the CFO position in exchange for the backpack. Because . . . frankly . . . we don't have any other way of getting it from you."

"We kinda shot our wad, already." Simon sounded glum. "Back on the freeway. With the drone and everything."

"That was your Plan A? And you don't have a Plan B, I take it."

"Not really," said Jerry. "I mean . . . we're pretty smart about a lot of things. This start-up it's going to make us all billionaires. You, too, if you finally decide to get in on it with us. But this action stuff?" He grimaced as he shook his head. "Not really our thing, if you know what I mean."

"Don't beat yourself up over it." I was actually starting to feel sorry for them. "You did the best you could."

"We don't have any other option," said Simon. "This is our Plan B it's the best we could come up with. If it works, and Dalby gives us the money, then great. If he doesn't . . ." A shrug. "That's the way it goes. Because . . . let's face it . . ." Simon gestured toward me. "You're the one with the gun. And you seem pretty good with it."

I didn't say anything. This was all seeming pretty strange to me. Like the interior of this phony paramedics van was a little bubble, separated from the rest of the universe. Sitting here with these guys every once in a while, I could hear some late-night traffic, a delivery truck or something like that, go rumbling by on the street where we were parked, as though to remind me that there was another world out there.

Sitting here, mulling over a job offer . . . a big money one, stock options, all that good stuff . . . yeah, that was definitely strange.

"Hey . . ." Jerry read my thoughts. "When are you going to get another offer like this?"

"We're ready to go." Simon held up a thin sheaf of papers, which he took from a manila envelope that had been sitting on the van floor beside him. "Contract and everything."

"Really you've got the paperwork ready?"

"I told you," said Jerry. "This is our Plan B. We had it ready all along. The whole bit with the drone and everything, out on the freeway frankly, we had our doubts about whether we'd be able to pull that off."

"Worth a shot." Simon fanned through the pages, giving them a final look-over. "But now we need to get down to business. Real business." He held the papers out toward me. "There's a couple of blanks you'll still need to fill in. Social Security number, that sort of thing."

I took the pages with my free hand, the one not resting the .357 in my lap. Setting them down in front of me, I turned them over, one by one.

"Need a pen?"

Jerry's voice intruded on my musings.

I held my hand out, and Jerry laid a cheap ballpoint in my palm. My knees were getting creaky from sitting cross-legged for so long on the floor of the van. Holding the ballpoint pen, I went on looking at the employment contract's last page, the one with the signature line and my name printed underneath.

"Okay . . ." I spoke at last. "You know, it's not as easy as you're making it out to be."

"It isn't?" Jerry frowned. "What's not easy about it? You sign, you've got the position as CFO soon as the start-up is fully funded by Dalby, that is and right now, all you've got to do is give us the package you're carrying."

"Actually," said Simon, "you can have it back when we're done, if you want. We only need it for a minute or two. Just long enough to bring it up close to the proximity trigger " He pointed to his stomach. "And then we're done. That's all we need to do, for Dalby to get the signal on his phone and know that we've won the contest. Then we go back down to L.A., we have a meeting in his office his real office, not the one you met him at and we get the ball rolling with the access to the start-up financing. That'll be a lot more paperwork you'll need to be in on that."

"Yeah, great that's fine. If it happens."

"Why if?" Jerry looked puzzled. "Why wouldn't it happen? We've told you what's going on, about the contest and everything. And we've made you our offer, and it's a good one you know it is. The numbers are fantastic. You're getting in on the ground floor of what'll be the biggest tech start-up of the twenty-first century "

"So you say."

"So what if it isn't?" He spread his hands wide. "With the kind of money Dalby is going to be pouring into it, the whole thing could go bust, and we'd still make out like bandits. Guaranteed. That's how these venture capital operations work at least at this level."

"Sign the agreement," added Simon, "and you're an instant megamillionaire. And a CFO. Just pull the trigger. So to speak."

"What you've always wanted . . ."

"No." I shook my head. "I mean, yeah, it is what I wanted being a chief financial officer for a big company but wanting it was a long time ago for me. It was different then. I was different." A little key had turned in the lock of a door somewhere inside my head, and once it had, I couldn't stop what I said, even though some of it maybe all of it surprised me. "And I've done a lot of other things since then, and none of it was CFO-type stuff. And . . . maybe I like doing that other stuff." I picked up the .357 again, turning it slightly in my hand, as though it were on display. "This kind of stuff."

There it was all out on the table now. Where even I could see it. I b.i.t.c.h a lot about what's happened to me, the things that should've happened but didn't, and what I have to do for a living now. Some of it's not fun perhaps even most of it. But maybe there's just a little bit . . .

That is.

Cole was right. A long time ago, when we were getting ready to kill our old boss McIntyre, who'd screwed over both of us. Cole had been doing his weird psychological stuff he wouldn't have called it that, though about getting me ready for that. For the whole killing trip. And he had said there was something different about me, that I wasn't like other girls. There was something wrong inside my head, the same way there was something wrong inside his, which made it just a little bit too easy for me to learn how to kill other people. I had sort of known he was right. That I was too suited for this kind of work, in a way that normal people weren't. I had known, but I hadn't wanted to think about what it meant Until now.

The job offer the whole CFO thing, the employment contract lying before me on the floor of the van, with all the pretty numbers on the pages in the middle, and the signature line on the last page, that a ballpoint pen would fill in just as well as a fancy Montblanc that pretty much made it real. More real than it ever had been when there hadn't been anybody handing me an offer like that. The great thing about not having options is that you don't have to decide about what you want to do you just take what life hands you, and you shut up about it. Unless you enjoy the sound of your own b.i.t.c.hing and complaining which, like most people, I have to admit I sometimes do.

"Okay, Kim you like the job you got. The one you do now." In a soft voice, Jerry played the best and last card he had. "But what if something happens?"

"Like what?" I looked up at him. And asked the question, even though I already had a good idea where he was going with this.

"You've got a brother, don't you? Younger brother."

"Yeah." I supposed this had also been in the bio material, that they had gotten out of Dalby's emails with Morton. "Donnie."

"That's right," said Jerry. "What happens to him? Where does he go, when something bad happens? To you. 'Cause it's not a matter of if it happens. The type of job you do, it's a matter of when it happens. Those are the odds, aren't they?"

I didn't have an answer. And didn't need one the guy had me there, and he and I both knew it. This was something that my old killing mentor Cole had warned me about, when he'd first gotten me started. You want to do this, you can't care about anybody. Which was easy advice to follow when you're just talking about yourself. Put another person in the equation, one you do care about then it gets rough. That was why Cole had been a loner for most of his career. Everybody in his life had been disposable. I haven't been that way, at least when it comes to my little brother . . .

So now I was on the hook.

"All right." I didn't make any more fuss. Thinking about it wasn't going to turn it into something better. I leaned down and signed the last page of the employment contract. When the financing capital rolled in from Dalby, I could have whatever G.o.dd.a.m.n fountain pen I wanted, and my little brother wouldn't have to worry about seeing me laid out in a box. At least, not for a long time, when I finally died of terminal boredom. As much as I'd ever wanted to be a CFO, there was no way I could see it turning out to be as interesting as the life I'd been living the last few years. "Here you go." I shuffled the pages back together, then handed them over to Simon.

"Thanks." He slipped the signed employment contract back into its manila envelope and held his empty hand back out toward me.

I was still mired in the remnants of what I'd been thinking about it took a moment for me to realize what he wanted.

"Oh, yeah right." I reached behind me, slid the backpack straps off my shoulders, and handed it to him. "Per our agreement."