Free 06 - Vengeful by Robert J. Crane

as I recovered my composure.
    “At some point you’re going to have to reconcile your feelings about that,” he said, “because—”
    My phone chirped at me, and like Phillips before me, I was the asshole that answered it trying to find a way out of this uncomfortable conversation. Zollers’s face registered a note of surprise that he concealed expertly before I spoke. “Hello?”
    “Hey,” J.J. said, a little tentative. “I have something for you.”
    “Let it be a face to punch.”
    “Uhh … not mine, I hope?” J.J. asked, sounding a little worried.
    “I don’t punch your face,” I said, “I just hover over it ominously until you wake up screaming while looking into my angry, sensual eyes.”
    “Uhhh …”
    “J.J.,” I said, dropping the smartassery. “What?”
    “Those emails,” J.J. said, “I’m not done sorting yet, but I got a fresh contact on something that just came through. A bartender as near as I can tell, someone who’s doing some ongoing work for your Brain—”
    “The Brain employs its own bartenders?” I paused, eyes flitting around as I processed that. “It must have a hell of a drinking problem—”
    “—and he’s got, like, spy reports,” J.J. went on, apparently knowing when to ignore me, “about you.”
    I paused, letting that sink in. “Spy reports?”
    “Yeah,” J.J. said. “Like, real intelligence gathering stuff. I searched back through the history of emails from this guy, and this bartender has been sending some real nasty nuggets to the Brain, stuff she’s been sending to reporters everywhere—”
    I saw red, and I knew by the look on Zollers’s face that he knew that crimson was my color today. “Oh, my,” he said.
    “Hey,” came a voice from outside the door. “Anyone in here?” Augustus Coleman peeked around the corner and looked straight at me, then Zollers. “Sorry. You left your door, uh … on the floor.”
    I looked down at my hand, which shook, and I knew in that moment that the frosty cake of my emotions was definitely hiding veins of anger throughout, like chocolate. Sweet, vengeful chocolate. “Name and address,” I said, and my phone beeped before I even finished saying it, the map popping up automatically.
    “Way ahead of y—” J.J. said as I hung up.
    “Sienna—” Zollers started to say.
    “Don’t.” I breathed in through my nose, out through my mouth. I came up with a solution before I’d even had time to think it through. “If you’re that worried, you can come with me.”
    “Is this a field trip?” Augustus asked, his head sticking out from behind the scuffed wall. He looked better without the cervical collar. “Because I need to get out of here for a little while. Think those pain meds made me all itchy inside.”
    “Sure,” I said, stalking my way around the corner and out the door. I could sense Dr. Zollers following me, and Augustus behind him, could hear their footsteps even as they tried to be quiet enough not to waken the furious crazy that was leading the procession. “The more the merrier.” Even though I knew that when I found this bartender, there damned sure wasn’t going to be much merriness to be had for anyone but the funeral parlor that got to bill for overtime after scraping him back together.

16.

    I broke down the door without regard for property, or a warrant, or public safety, or … well, much of anything, really. It busted inward, swung on a shattered frame, and hung in my way until I just ripped it off with a second hit and sent it spiraling into the drywall behind it.
    “Honey, I’m home,” I said as I pushed my way inside and saw someone spring up off a couch to my left, coughing on a cigarette that dangled between astonished lips and that flew out on the next good hacking. It gave the room a stink, that lit cigarette, reminding me a little of when I’d breathed in the toxic burning of a car’s interior a few hours earlier.
    The smoker in question was a shade under six feet,