PROLOGUE
Kylie glanced over at the bench. The strange man still—he was there before she arrived to work this morning.
“Is that mine?”
Kylie turned her attention away from the bench and its strange occupant. She smiled and handed the guest his latte. This one, like so many other middle-aged men who passed through the subway terminal every day, thought it would be charming to call her sweetheart instead of by her name, despite the fact that her name was clearly printed on her nametag. At least this one didn’t also feel a need to ogle her breasts before walking off.
Kylie didn’t mind the job so much. She got to work by herself, which suited her just fine. She worked the morning shift, which meant her day was exceedingly busy during the morning rush and very busy during the lunch rush but fairly slow in between. With no supervisor to invent work for her and a very small coffee cart that was easy to clean and maintain, the work wasn’t all that hard, and so far, none of the men had done more than ogle her, which was annoying but not bad enough to ruin the job for her.
And the terminal was a great place for people watching. Someone had once called the city a great melting pot, and she found that to be true. People of all shapes, sizes, colors, and creeds passed by every day. Kylie wasn’t some great social activist, but she found the eclectic mix of travelers entertaining.
Today, her entertainment was provided by the older man sitting on a nearby bench. He wore a trench coat and an old hat like the ones detectives wore in those old crime movies her grandparents liked to watch. He wore round sunglasses with gold wire rims and sat with the hat pulled down low and the collars of his coat turned up. He looked like a caricature of a spy.
What caught Kylie’s eye wasn’t his fantastic dress but the way he held his right hand. It rested against his shoulder with the palm lifted up and his fingers curled as though he was holding a martini glass, although his hand was empty.
She watched him for a while, but he stayed where he was. Maybe he was sleeping.
The day wore on, and Kylie forgot about the man. She cleaned the cart, stocked the condiments, and when that was done, worked a little on her homework while she awaited the lunch rush. The lunch rush came, and with it the only slightly smaller crowd of businesspeople and students navigating the underground routes between the city and the spiderweb of urban and suburban sprawl that surrounded the city center.
She finished her shift, and just as the lunch rush was winding down, Louis arrived to take over for her. They exchanged the usual pleasantries and then Kylie left him and started toward the platform.
She glanced over at the bench and saw that the strange man was still sitting there. Exactly there. His hand was still casually holding his invisible martini. She stared at him incredulously. How could he still be asleep? She had been here for eight hours! It was like he was …
She felt a chill creep through her, and she turned quickly away. She walked to her platform, but the chill spread until it became an icy hand that gripped her heart. She wanted desperately to ignore it, but she couldn’t push it away.
She glanced at the clock. One fifty-two. Her train would arrive in three minutes. She didn’t have time to deal with this.
Then again, it didn’t make sense for him to sit at a bench across from her cart all day. He could be hurt or sick. Or he could be stalking her. She stared at him over her shoulder, but he continued to stare straight ahead, his hand held at that awkward angle.
She started to walk away again but stopped. She tried to tell herself that she should just ignore him, but the nagging in her mind had become a dull roar that grew less dull and more of a roar every second.
Heart pounding, she turned and walked slowly back to the stranger. When she approached him, she swallowed and called, “Hello? Sir?”
The stranger didn’t so much as twitch. She called again and got the same answer. Then she called a third time. Then a fourth.
He’s sleeping, she told herself. He’s sleeping, and I should leave him be.
But she couldn’t leave. She had to know. She reached forward, hand trembling, and called a final time, “Sir?”
She shook him gently. His hand flopped to his side. His head lolled forward, and his sunglasses fell off. He stared ahead with vacant, glazed eyes, and Kylie knew.
She jumped backward, shrieking as the dead man slid lazily off the bench and fell face first on the ground.
CHAPTER ONE
Faith thought for a moment before answering. The question was one she had asked herself many times, but now that someone else asked, she was no longer sure of the answer.
Doctor West waited patiently, his piercing, gray-blue eyes moderated by his soft, kind smile. Faith took a breath and gave it her best shot. “Umm … I think the worst part was that I couldn’t help but scream. I mean, I knew I was caught, and that was terrible. I knew I was going to die, and that wasn’t fun, obviously, but I thought that I could at least keep from screaming. I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of hearing me react to the pain.”
“Hmm,” Doctor West said, “so, it was the loss of control that you found the hardest?”
Faith stared at Doctor West in amazement. She had played that scene over and over in her mind at least a dozen times a day since Trammell had captured and tortured her, to say nothing of her near-constant nightmares, and not once had she thought of her reaction in that way. Hearing him say it made her realize that he was exactly right. For the first time in her life, she was in control of nothing, not even her own mind.
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, that’s exactly it. I mean, I was a Marine. Not to perpetuate a stereotype, but Marines really do believe we’re the toughest and strongest people in the world. Not to perpetuate another stereotype, but as a woman, I had to be tougher and stronger than the men I was with. I had to fight harder, push further, and give less, and I did. I was the first one to the fight and the last one out of it. That didn’t change when I joined the FBI. I had to push so hard to get any kind of respect as a field agent, and I earned it every step of the way. Any challenge I faced, I overcame, so finding myself in a situation where I just couldn’t overcome, where every ounce of toughness and resilience and strength I had was utterly stripped away, and I was …”
Her voice trailed off. Tears welled in her eyes, but she fought them back. “I always imagined that if I died in a situation like that, I would die with my head held high and a snarl on my face. Instead, I died—or nearly died—screaming and weeping like a little girl.”
Doctor West regarded her a moment, then said, “You mentioned twice that you believe you had to work harder to achieve success than your male colleagues. Do you feel you are or were treated differently because of your gender?”
“Oh, constantly,” Faith said. “Not by everyone but by most people. There’s the typical testosterone-fueled bullshit, especially in the Corps: men trying to impress me by saying they’ll take care of me or showing off how tough or strong they are. That doesn’t bother me too much. Men are notoriously awful at behaving around a woman they’re attracted to.”
Doctor West smiled at that.
“What does bother me is when people assume that I’m less capable or less emotionally stable because I’m a woman. I still deal with colleagues talking—not down to me, but like they have to change the way they phrase things so that my female mind can grasp it or being extra sensitive about certain subjects because I can’t handle the nitty-gritty stuff. Even friends will behave like I’m some emotional basket case they need to manage, or I’ll screw everything up with my emotionality.”