Bishop stands just outside the food court in the Renaissance Mall. Two hours have passed, and she’s frustrated and just a bit angry about how totally wasted those hours turned out to be. She’s wandered through six women’s clothing stores plus an upscale department store, and so far she’s managed to come up empty.

‘Not for lack of trying,’ she thinks bitterly. ‘Or of choice. How many different kinds of clothes do women wear, anyway? It’s crazy. And when I did take something to the dressing room to try it on, it didn’t look right. It all looked too old, or too young. Some of this stuff makes me feel like a clown. Worse, some of it makes me look like I’m for sale. God, I HATE this. I feel so helpless ... useless. Bateau said I used to walk into a room like I owned it. Now I can’t even pick my own clothes?’
 

by Randalynn

 

---

 

 
Lou Rossi sits at his extremely expensive oak desk and looks over a mountain of paper at Donnie “Three Fingers” DeLuca. Donnie, no stranger to Rossi’s cold stare, looks back at his boss for a while, then shrugs and waves a hand at the desktop.

“I don’t know what you want from me, Lou,” he says, “but I can’t change what’s what. I sure as hell don’t want you pissed at me, but you told me to check, and I did. It’s not my fault the answer isn’t what you wanted.”

DeLuca points to the stacks on the desk. “I got reports from a dozen tame PIs, three police departments, Interpol, and two federal agencies. They all say what you don’t wanna hear. The Arab was a lying scumbag, and that the guy the boss put in the ground isn’t who Khaleel said he was. It isn’t my fault we got conned, but if you want to beat on somebody about it ...” Donnie shrugs again.

Rossi looks at him a second, then waves a hand and shakes his head.

“I know you’re not the problem, Donnie,” he says. “After all, you just did what I told you to do. It isn’t your fault you had to tell me somethin’ I didn’t want to hear. I know Gino isn’t gonna want to hear it, either — not with all the bragging he’s been doing, talking about how he finally took down the one guy who crossed him and made him look stupid.”

“Fucking Magdalene,” Donnie says aloud, like the entire phrase is a name. Rossi nods. They’d heard it all before.

He picks up an 8x10 photo of the man Khaleel sold them, something shot with a telephoto, of a guy crossing the street. He was supposed to be the thief everybody wanted dead. Mark Allen Bishop.

“He didn’t look like much, this Bishop guy,” Rossi thinks out loud. “Not bad looking, built like a swimmer. Broads like that. Probably got his share of babes and then some.” He looks up at Donnie. “Still, a guy could pass him on the street every day and never look twice. But Khaleel said he was Magdalene, and he had proof. So people listened.”

“You and the boss weren’t the only ones he conned, Lou,” Donnie says. “He showed everybody proof that Bishop was in Marseilles at the same time that painting disappeared. Videos and everything.”

The older man grunts and stares at the picture some more. When Fiorentino’s Deposition disappeared from Nicolas Gaultier’s high-security vault in the basement of his mansion, nobody doubted it was Magdalene at work. Once the painting was gone, the thief set off the off-premises alarm at the local police headquarters. They responded quickly, with at least three cars arriving at Gaultier’s mansion above the vault. The thief kept the alarm from going off in the mansion itself, so their arrival took Gaultier completely by surprise.

The theft gave them the right to search his premises, supposedly for the thieves. But instead of villains, they found victims -- two young children naked and handcuffed in the French mobster’s bedroom. The torture implements spread out on the dresser along with Gaultier’s extensive collection of videos of past “playtimes,” made the theft a secondary priority as far as the police were concerned, and further searching uncovered evidence of years of criminal activity, resulting in a wave of arrests of Gaultier’s associates.

“The Arab said Bishop was there the same time Magdalene was.” Rossi tosses the photo on top of the pile of papers. “And it was definitely Magdalene who fucked up Gaultier. Hell, Donnie, it’s what he does when he pulls a job -- makes a profit and a point at the same time. Like some kind of freaking avenger. He finds out Gaultier tortures kids for kicks, and the thief ripped him up while he ripped him off. Tore him apart and took his empire with him.”

“Just like with the boss,” Donnie says slowly. Rossi’s eyes narrow and Donnie raises both hands. “Hey! I’m just sayin’ it’s how the guy works. I mean, when he robbed that casino, he musta known that was where the boss shacked up with his teenaged bimbo on Tuesday nights. But setting it up so his wife and the cops found him on top of a sixteen-year-old at the same time? Man, the balls this guy musta had.”

“Still has, if what you found is right.” Rossi takes a cigar out of the humidor on his desk and lights it.

“Well, what Khaleel had was pretty solid, or so we thought.” Donnie lowers his hands and sticks them in his pockets. “Bishop really had no business being in Marseilles. He was some kind of consultant, and he didn’t know anybody in France. Yet the photos showed him there, and Khaleel had airline and passport records to prove it.”

“Only they aren’t there anymore. If they ever were.”

Donnie nods. “When I looked at the airline and passport records — the ones still sitting on the company and state department computers, they said Bishop never left the country. He was home the whole time. All the PIs say the same thing — that Bishop was just another guy, going about his business, and that according to phone, Internet, credit card and video records, he never went anywhere.”

“So either what Khaleel showed everybody was fake, or somebody went through all those secure databases and rewrote everything to take Bishop out of ‘em. And why would anybody do that, when the guy is stone cold dead? It isn’t like they’re protecting him or nothin’.”

“So Khaleel gets this guy to come to Bay City.” Lou taps the photo with his fingertip. “And everybody decides to go hunting. Gino gets a hair up his butt, and when the dust clears, it’s Gino’s guys who track this Bishop guy down and shoot him stone dead in the back of some strip club in Bay City. The guy’s heart barely stops beating, and suddenly everybody and his brother starts hearing from the boss about how he took down ‘Fuckin’ Magdalene,’ the annoying bastard who had caused everybody so much grief for so long. Magdalene is dead. Long live Gino ‘the Bear’ Brunetti.”

Donnie smiles slowly. “And anybody trying to push back on Gino gets told to shut up, or he’ll wind up just as dead as Magdalene. At least, that’s how he’s telling it, and damn if some of his friends are starting to tell their people the same thing, just to keep ‘em in line.”

“Only now, you’re finding things that make us both think it isn’t true.”

Rossi rubs his eyes and turns his custom-made desk chair towards the windows behind him. As usual this time of day, the Dallas skyline cuts an angular chunk out of a deep blue sky, but Rossi doesn’t see any of it. All he sees is Donnie’s reflection staring at him, and that same damned pile of reports.

“Records could be faked,” Lou says, to both Dallas and Donnie. “Both the ones Khaleel showed us and the ones you just found. But the thing that throws the whole thing over for me is that Khaleel goes missing right about the same time Bishop gets dead. The Arab’s people don’t know where he is. Nobody knows where he is.”

“Khaleel earned some serious green for turning over somebody like Magdalene.” Donnie walks over to stand beside Rossi’s chair. “You think maybe it was a setup?”

Rossi nods. “That’s what it’s startin’ to look like. The Arab gave us Bishop for his own reasons, whatever the hell they were, and it’s starting to look like he wanted someone else to pull the trigger on the guy. So he set it up so that Brunetti and everybody else who was hunting Magdalene did the dirty work, while he cut and run with the cash.”

“But Gino isn’t the only guy who got suckered by this stunt, Lou. Everybody looks bad.”

Brunetti’s lieutenant shakes his head.

“I don’t have to worry about the reputations of every other clown Khaleel conned. All I got to worry about is Brunetti’s. But with Gino shooting his mouth off everywhere about taking out Magdalene, that’s more than enough.”

He turns his head and looks up at Donnie. “Nobody else knows about this, right?”

“Just you and me, Lou.”

Rossi lets himself relax, just a little.

“Let’s keep it that way. Maybe in a little while, this’ll all go away.”

“You know, there is one guy who would benefit if all Khaleel’s evidence turns out to be fake.”

Lou looks at Donnie and makes a face like he’s just bitten into a lemon. “Magdalene.”

Donnie nods. “Khaleel rigs up some evidence and makes it look legit, and then Gino kills Bishop. If Bishop wasn’t who the Arab said he was, the real Magdalene might want to make Gino look bad for claiming he killed Magdalene when he didn’t. So he erases what Khaleel rigged up and leaves Gino looking like a fool.” He thinks about it some, and shakes his head. ‘Hell, maybe he’s just pissed off because Brunetti’s running around claiming he’s dead when he’s not.’

Lou chews on his cigar and thinks, and after a while, it begins to make a little more sense.

“It could be somebody else trying to paint Gino as a peacock, but we’re not at war with anybody, and there isn’t anyone else out there with a grudge against Gino. And Magdalene is the kind of guy who would take the death of some innocent mook kinda personal, right?” Rossi sighs. “It’s gotta be Magdalene, if he isn’t dead. And that’s just what I need.”

Lou looks out over the Texas town and wishes he was in Vegas, or Chicago. Even Atlantic City. Gino came out here to start over after the bimbo thing, and Rossi came along because he’d been Gino’s right hand for longer than he liked to remember. And even though they’d been in Dallas for more than a year, it still feels wrong to him, somehow. It’s always felt off. It’s the rhythm of the place, maybe. Whatever it is, it makes Rossi’s skin crawl. Because to feel a threat coming, you have to know what your city feels like, so you can sense what doesn’t belong. In Dallas, it’s Brunetti, and Rossi, and all the crew that doesn’t belong.

So how the hell can Lou protect everything and everyone without being able to feel what’s coming?

‘If Bishop wasn’t Magdalene, then Magdalene is still alive, and pissed as Hell about what Gino’s sayin’,’ Rossi thinks, looking back to the piles of paper on his desk. ‘He isn’t gonna let it slide. For all we know, he’s the one who made Khaleel disappear for trying to use him to con ... well, everybody. He’s gonna come for Gino, somehow. I know it. But when? What’s his plan? What the hell is he gonna do?’

“Where IS he?” Lou mutters out loud, taking Donnie by surprise. “Damn it, you bastard. Where the hell are you, right now?”

 
Bishop stands just outside the food court in the Renaissance Mall. Two hours have passed, and she’s frustrated and just a bit angry about how totally wasted those hours turned out to be. She’s wandered through six women’s clothing stores plus an upscale department store, and so far she’s managed to come up empty.

‘Not for lack of trying,’ she thinks bitterly. ‘Or of choice. How many different kinds of clothes do women wear, anyway? It’s crazy. And when I did take something to the dressing room to try it on, it didn’t look right. It all looked too old, or too young. I looked like I was wearing my Mom’s clothes, or my baby sister’s. Some of this stuff makes me feel like a clown. Worse, some of it makes me look like I’m for sale. God, I HATE this. I feel so helpless ... useless. Bateau said I used to walk into a room like I owned it. Now I can’t even pick my own clothes?’

Bishop walks over to an open chair in the food court and sits down, noting with the back of her mind how gracefully Moira’s body does it. The amazing thing is, even sitting like this, posture perfect, shoulders back and knees together, she’s almost as comfortable as she would be collapsing on a sofa back at the hotel.

‘Still driving, I see,’ she thinks, then gives herself a half-smile that quickly becomes a frown. ‘You’d think I’d be happy not to have to learn how to move and sit the way a woman should. But every time my body does something I know it shouldn’t, I feel less and less like I’m me. I keep wondering how much of the man I used to be will still be around in a week, or two, or three.’

‘I wonder how much of the old me is still here now. If there’s anything’s left.’

Bishop blinks her eyes quickly, to keep the tears that rise from falling. Part of her is still working on closing the gap between the man she was and the woman she sees in the mirror, but another part still resists and she knows the reason why. As much as she knows she has to, she doesn’t want to give up the man she was, and the perfectly feminine movements and mannerisms that came with Moira’s body seem to make holding onto who she was harder. Whenever her new body takes over, she feels anything but empowered, and not at all like herself.

Of course, this trip to the mall isn’t helping at all. She’s walked for a few hours around the shops since Bateau dropped her off, and the more she moves, the more comfortable this body becomes — and the harder it is to take back control.

To remember how things used to be.

‘Another part of me gone. And damn it, I LIKED me.’ Bishop frowns and shakes her head. She almost puts her shoulder bag on the table before she realizes what a temptation it would be to a thief.

‘Well, another thief,’ she amends quickly. The smile grows before she can stop it, and she shakes her head again, leaving the strap around her body. ‘Thank God I can still laugh.’

“That’s the first real smile I’ve seen on your face since you walked in here.”

She looks up into the eyes of a tall slim black woman, standing near her table holding two tall paper cups of coffee from a nearby coffee shop.

“I swear, I have never seen anyone have less fun shopping in my life.” The woman smiles, and it’s full of warmth. “I mean, I’ve seen men dragged in by their girlfriends for an afternoon enjoy themselves more than you did, and that’s saying something.”

“You’ve been following me?” Bishop curses inside, wondering why she didn’t pick up on it. At the same time, part of her is oddly flattered by the attention, and wonders why this woman would want to follow her.

“Sort of.” The woman seems a little embarrassed. “I was making my rounds this morning, checking out all the stores for new acquisitions. Soon after I started, you showed up, and for a while there, we were heading in the same direction and visiting the same stores. You looked lost and a little confused, but you turned people away when they asked if you needed help. And in every store, you looked more depressed than the last. Anyway, I figured if anyone could use a latte right about now, it would be you.”

She holds out the cup and Bishop takes it, their fingers touching for a brief instant. That one touch sends a spark of ... something ... to her very core, and the thief brings the cup to her lips and takes a sip, trying to hide her body’s reaction.

Of course, she doesn’t count on her body having another reaction, this time to the latte. She never liked lattes before, but this time the smooth sweetness sweeps over her taste buds like an invading army, and she closes her eyes and feels herself shudder from the attack. Part of her hates how her new body reacts, but the rest of her clings to any pleasure she can get from being who she is now ... and thinks of how it felt when they touched ....

Bishop opens her eyes to find the other woman looking at her with a touch of a smile on her lips.

“That good?”

“Oh, yes,” the thief replies, her tongue darting out quickly to capture an errant bit of foam on her lips. She removes the plastic top and takes a longer sip. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” The other woman holds out her free hand. “Amy Tilton.”

Bishop reaches up and takes her hand, remembering at the last second to be gentle. “Maggie Bishop.”

“Pleased to meet you, Maggie. May I join you?”

Bishop only hesitates an instant, then waves Amy to the seat across from her. “God, yes. Please do.”

Amy lowers herself onto the seat, leans over the table, and brings her coffee to her lips for a quick sip before looking Bishop in the eye.

“Before we go any further, I have a confession to make.”

Maggie feels her lip twitch, and looks up at Amy through her eyelashes. “Well, I am a Bishop, so I guess that’s okay, then. Hardly a father, though, but I guess in a shopping mall, you take what you can get.” She dips her finger in the latte and makes an abbreviated sign of the cross in the air in Amy’s general direction. “Okay, ‘my child.’ Confess away!”

Amy lets a small smile cross her lips, then holds her cup with both hands and sighs. “When I brought you the tasty coffee beverage, I had hoped to get you to tell me … what was bothering you earlier.”

The thief cocks her head to one side.

“You didn’t need to bribe me for that, although I’m grateful for the attempt,” she says, a touch of a smile in her voice. “But why are you so interested in a frustrated stranger?”

“Partly because I’m hoping I might be able to help,” Amy replies. She takes a sip from her cup, her eyes still fixed on Bishop’s. “When I saw you shopping ... well, I couldn’t turn away. You were so frustrated, but you looked so lost, so alone. Oh, you were trying to hide it, but I could feel it in you. As you moved from store to store, it almost seemed you were always just a few seconds from crying, even though you were trying to put a good face on.”

Amy sees the shock and surprise in the other woman’s eyes, even as Maggie struggles to bring her response under control.

“I was ... drawn to you, somehow.” Amy looks down, and Bishop wonders why. “I could feel you hurting. It’s like you’re fighting something inside you, all the time, and I just ... I couldn’t let it go on. I know it’s weird, but ... I just needed to make it all better.”

She looks back into Maggie’s eyes, then reaches out and touches her hand. The warmth of it spreads clear through them both, and Bishop gasps in surprise.

“Truth is, I have a good feeling about you, Maggie Bishop. I’ve always been a good judge of people, and I can tell you’ve got a good heart under all that hurt.”

The thief blushes and looks away.

“I’d like to think so,” she whispers.

“I can’t stop myself from wanting to help. I don’t want to stop myself.” Amy pauses, and then wraps her fingers around Bishop’s and gives a soft squeeze. “What I do want is to get to know you better, if you’d let me. I’d like to help if I can. I think you could use a friend, and I’d like to be one ... if that’s okay?”

She looks down at her hand in Amy’s, and suddenly her insides feel like she’s melting. At the same time, her thoughts spin too quickly to catch and hold. The Mark still inside her screams that this is all wrong, it’s happening too fast, while the Maggie she’s becoming wants nothing more than to reach over and hug this woman until the mall closes.

Or is that the Moira she was?

‘What the hell is wrong with me?’ She screams inside.

At first, there’s nothing. And she hears it. Almost a whisper, almost an echo. Moira’s voice fills her head.

‘Nothing and everything. You need to trust yourself again, or you’ll never be the man you were — or the woman you could be.’

Then it’s gone, and Bishop is alone once more.

Alone with a beautiful woman holding her hand, and asking her to be her friend.

“It’s ... it’s the weirdest thing,” Bishop whispers, looking up at Amy’s face while a tear slips down her own. “I feel like ... like we’ve been friends for years. But that makes no sense at all. Does it?”

Amy laughs, and reaches up with her other hand to touch the tear away.

“Girl, friendship is about as logical as love,” she says softly. “When two people click, they know it. Friends or lovers, it happens or it doesn’t. And sometimes, when it happens, it runs a lot deeper than you ever would have expected. You just feel the click, and something inside you knows it’s right.”

Bishop nods, thinking of the two friends she already has ... and the one she just acquired.

‘I’ve got to trust my instincts,’ she thinks, ‘and now’s as good a time as any. If I can’t make this kind of judgment anymore, I need to know now, before I get all of us caught, or killed.’

“Friends, then,” she says with a smile, taking Amy’s other hand in hers and squeezing them both.

Amy smiles and squeezes back, and Bishop instantly feels just a little better.

“So tell me, Maggie,” she says, letting go of both hands and picking up her coffee. “What’s twisting my best girl up inside?”

The thief stares down at her own cup, wrapping her hands around it and thinking hard. If Amy is a friend, she deserves the truth. But the truth is unbelievable, and even if it wasn’t, it could put Bateau and Finn in danger if her feelings about Amy have led her to trust someone she shouldn’t.

So how much truth can she share ... without lying?

She takes a deep breath.

“I was ... attacked, last week,” she says slowly. Amy stiffens, not expecting such a revelation. Bishop looks up at her, into her eyes. “This man ... he stole my life from me. He ... took my body like it belonged to him. I feel like everything that made me who I was, he stole. Well, almost everything. I mean, I’m still here, right?” Bishop smiles, but it’s fragile, and Amy doesn’t know how to respond. “But when he was done, he left me ... broken. I’m not right inside. It’s like I don’t know who I am anymore ... like the woman who bought the outfit I’m wearing doesn’t exist.”

She feels her voice start to shake, and realizes she’s letting out more truth than she had wanted to — or even that she thought she knew. “And I feel like an imposter trying to replace her.”

Maggie pauses, and she sighs. “That’s why I was frustrated earlier. I’m living out of a suitcase. It’s all I have left of who I was. But I can’t shop for clothes to replace what I lost, because I lost so much more than clothes. I mean, where do I begin? I wander through the stores and try things on, but I don’t know what’s right or wrong for me, because I don’t know who ‘me’ is now. The things I still have, the pieces of who I was? They scare me, too. I do things without knowing why or how, and it scares me. Like sitting in a short skirt, or walking in four-inch heels, or putting on make-up. My hands and fingers pick and choose and paint and draw, but I couldn’t tell you how my face wound up looking like this to save my life. I just ...”

She trails off, and shakes her head again.

“Honestly, Amy, I don’t know how you could help me.” Bishop lifts her cup and takes a drink, then looks down at the lipstick barely staining the rim. “But please don’t take it personally. I don’t know how anyone could help me.”

There is a silence, and the two women share it for a moment. Then Amy speaks.

“Maggie,” she says, then stops for a second before continuing. “I can’t begin to understand what you’ve been through. But I think … I think maybe there is something I could do, if you’re willing to let me try.”

The thief’s sculpted eyebrows rise, and she sits up a little straighter. “Oh?”

“Well, the reason I was wandering around the stores this morning is because ... I’m a personal shopper.” Maggie looks confused, and Amy realizes that the woman in front of her has absolutely no idea what a personal shopper is. She takes a deep breath and tries again. “What I do is, people, mostly women, come to me to, well, figure out who they are, really. Most people wander through their lives and sort of stumble into a personal style without really thinking it through. But when someone comes to me, we work together to find out who they really are and what sorts of clothes are right for them. Once we work that out, I help them choose outfits that bring their real selves forward.”

The thief just stares, and Amy sighs. “Do you get it? You can’t shop because you’ve lost the woman you used to be. I’ll just ... find the real you ... just like I find her for any other customer. I can try, anyway.”

“It can’t be as simple as all that. Can it?” Bishop’s tone is slightly confused, but Amy hears a note of hope. She smiles and shrugs.

“We lose nothing by trying, right? Worst case, we’re back to square one. Best case, you get your ‘youness’ back. What do you say?”

Bishop looks at Amy for a moment, then turns and looks at her reflection in the glass window next to her. Moira stares back, and just for an instance, Maggie peeks out ... and smiles.

She turned back to Amy.

“I may not know who I am anymore,” she says, “but I know the kind of woman I want to be, and that’s not someone who surrenders without a fight. So I’m in ... girlfriend.”

That last endearment sort of slips out, and Amy smiles when she hears it.

“Okay, then,” the shopper responds, rising to her feet. “Come back to my office and let me show you my scrapbooks.”

Maggie rises, too, and shakes her head.

“That sounds suspiciously like an old-fashioned pick-up line,” she says, half-joking.

Amy laughs, and it touches something deep inside her. “That’s ‘cause it could be, if you want it to be. Do you?”

Maggie freezes, and Amy’s smile fades. She reaches up and touches Bishop’s cheek, and Maggie trembles, just a little. She lets her hand fall.

“I’m sorry, honey. I didn’t mean to scare you. The last thing I ever want to do is scare you.”

Bishop opens her mouth to speak but Amy holds up her hand. “How about we help you figure out who you are, and then we’ll figure out what makes you happy, okay?”

Bishop nods, and Amy grins again. “Although judging from the way your body reacted when I touched you, I think we’re halfway to figuring out the second question first, don’t you?”

Maggie blushes a deep red, and Amy takes her hand and squeezes.

“Come on, girl. Let’s get you sorted.”

 
Finn sits in the van outside a branch of a fast food franchise that offers free Wifi access. After he and Bateau dropped Bishop off at the mall, he had knocked out the Internet access just long enough to intercept a call to the provider for service, then came back and put his own secure wireless tap on their router before pronouncing it “fixed.” Now he has high-speed Net access over secure military radio channels, with a range that includes a fifty-mile radius from the burger palace.

The only thing that could possibly reveal his “borrowing” of official channels would be if the U.S. Navy built a base on the town reservoir and wanted their communications frequencies back for the aircraft carrier and fighter squadron they would put there.

‘Not bloody likely,’ Finn thinks with a smile. He has multiple installations like this in every town the trio has ever stayed in for more than a day or two, and some places they were just passing through if he had enough time. In a tight spot, the hacker can tag a military satellite for web access from anywhere on the planet, but the time delay from a satellite hack is usually too long for Finn to be able to do what he does best.

Which is, of course, to pick virtual locks and go where he’s not wanted.

When they had first reached the hotel the week before, Finn went back and looked for places Khaleel might have inserted “proof” that Bishop was Magdalene into established records. After all, the underworld wouldn’t just take Khaleel’s word for it, and however he found out Bishop’s true name, it wouldn’t have been enough on its own to set that kind of manhunt in motion.

Almost immediately, Finn found both the passport and airline records that said Bishop was in Marseilles during the Gaultier job, as well as the doctored video recordings. Of course, Bishop was there, but Finn would never have been so sloppy as to ever leave records like that where anyone could find them. Insulted, he removed the hacked files and made sure all was as it had been before Khaleel’s tampering.

A meticulous man is our Mister Finn.

Finn is dressed for success ... at least for his success. Comfort is his watchword, since the one thing he needs in his line of work is to be able to focus, and ill-fitting clothing would break his concentration as sure as a passing freight train. He wears one of a large collection of bright Hawaiian shirts, a pair of old blue jeans that fit like a second skin, and a vintage pair of Keds canvas sneakers. He’s worn the shoes for so long that the outline of his toes shows through the fabric at the top front of each sneaker, and years of pressure have sculpted the bottoms of his feet into the padding that separates skin from sole.

In preparation for the time they will eventually wear out someday, he has a single back-up pair in his luggage at all times ... and four more pairs just like them in a hermetically sealed vault full of inert gasses in Zurich.

A peculiar man is Finn. But very, very good at what he does. For example, let us take a look at the preparation for the job at hand ...

When Harlan Straker’s entourage arrives from London at Miami International, Finn has already hacked into the airport’s Wifi and security surveillance systems. He identifies each one of them by linking the feed from the security cameras with the information from each man’s passport as the data from its RFID chip is read into the U.S. passport control system. Within minutes, Finn has compiled detailed dossiers on each member of Straker’s crew from all of his usual sources — addresses, bank accounts, hobbies, personality quirks. The files also include the make and model of each individual’s cell phone and respective carriers.

Before they reach baggage claim, Finn hacks the cell phones of each member of the entourage and installs two programs they will never know are there. One is a locator program that will broadcast their precise location to Finn whenever he activates it, and until he tells it to stop. It is accurate to within a foot of their actual location, both vertically and horizontally, and involves a triangulation matrix Finn developed that combines military GPS signals with wifi hubs, cell towers, and sub-frequency pings off of any random radio transmitter/receiver in the area.

The other program allows Finn to listen in to every conversation the user has — not just on the phone, but also in the phone’s immediate vicinity. He can turn on the speaker phone in every unit and bug any room the phone is in instantly, without anyone being the wiser.

He hears Keene Curtis, Straker’s number one, coordinating the entourage’s arrival with the hotel manager. Finn traces the number from Curtis’s phone and discovers they are staying at the Fountainbleu, one of the grand old ladies of Miami hotels. Supposedly, it's about as secure as the box of Whitman chocolates Granny leaves in a box next to the bed when her grandchildren are in town, but there have been rumors this might be just what the hotel wants people to believe. He reaches out remotely to some sources he knows, to see if the rumors are true. Texting the phone number and length of stay to Bateau, he leaves the hotel to him for a while. Straker himself is still unaccounted for, as is the emerald and the rest of the collection.

From the conversation in the limo on the way to the hotel, Finn knows Straker is already in the States and flying into Miami from Boston later today, so he launches a sub-program to rip through the ticketing computers of every airline flying from Boston to Miami looking for Straker’s first-class ticket. When that comes up negative, he doubles back and does a flight plan search for Straker’s private jet. He takes note of its arrival in Boston last night, and checks to see if Straker had flown in to Boston to meet it yesterday.

His name shows up on the manifest for the last plane in from Denver the day before.

Finn posts a reminder to use the hacked airport security cameras to check the unloading of the private jet in Miami when it arrives. The assumption is that the private jet will hold what they’re looking for, either the whole collection or just the Perenchio Emerald, but a good hacker (and a good thief) knows better than to count on an assumption, so he will check. And check. And check again.

He hacks into Straker’s files to find the name of the company where the shipment cases for his collection were purchased, then hacks the company’s database for specs for each custom-made case sold to Harlan Straker. All to identify what, if anything, will be offloaded in Miami from the private jet.

Very thorough is our Mister Finn.

While he’s waiting for the computers to do a CGI mockup of each case for comparison, he checks the blueprints on file for the Fountainbleu hotel and reviews each electrical and security upgrade filed since the hotel was first built back in 1909. None of the rooms Straker could conceivably hold his party in has any serious electronic security, other than motion sensors and hidden cameras that could be monitored from the small guard station in the offices behind the lobby.

When there is something of value to be protected, the hotel has relied on private guards and off-duty police officers to provide physical security. Checking the records for previous events at the hotel in the security officer’s “secure” desktop system, Finn finds that the default security setup once the event is over is for the motion sensors to remain active, the cameras to be constantly monitored, and the room’s perimeter to be constantly guarded from outside. The motion sensors inside each ballroom prevents the hotel from putting security personnel inside the room unless they choose to turn the sensors off, and Finn knows that the hotel’s insurance company would have several litters of kittens and deny payment in the event of a loss if they did.

Finn sends a silent prayer to Nicholas, the patron saint of thieves, and throws a snarky thank you in the insurance company’s general direction for their blind faith in technology. After all, tricking the motion sensors is a whole lot easier than dealing with a single rent-a-cop only a few feet from the target.

To his left, Porky Pig exclaims, “Th-th-th-th-that’s all, folks!” Finn turns to see his CGI renderings of the collection’s travel cases rotating slowly for his review. The hacker checks on the progress of an earlier program, and a window opens to reveal the flight plan for Straker’s private jet, gently liberated from the secure computers at General Edward Lawrence Logan International Airport in Boston. The plane will be wheels up at approximately 12:04 p.m. and the clock on the screen says it is currently 11:47 a.m. in Miami, just like it is in Boston.

“Flight time will be ...” Finn enters a few commands and numbers fly up onto the screen. “ ... three hours and twenty five minutes.” Just enough time to take over the hotel’s security system and hack the security cameras in the hangers at the airport where Straker’s plane would most likely come to rest after its flight.

But first he’ll duck inside and grab a burger and fries ... and a Coke ... and maybe a shake and an apple pie, if there’s time.

After all, we’ve all heard tales about starving artists — and after everything he’s done this morning, you can be sure our Mister Finn is a very hungry man.

 
Amy Tilton’s office is in an area near the food court, one of a row of offices off of a hallway that leads out to the parking garage. It is neat and well-furnished, with a place for everything and everything in its place. When they first arrived, Maggie looked around, then looked back at Amy with a question in her eyes.

“This place doesn’t look like you at all,” she said, smiling. “Are you sure this is your office?”

“Oh, it’s mine,” Amy replied. “Don’t be fooled by what you see. An office is where you do business, and the sort of people who hire a personal shopper want someone they think is far more together and organized than they are. That’s why this place has all the personality of a model home in an upscale neighborhood.” She grins. “If you want to see the real me, go check out my apartment.”

Maggie blushed and looked away. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

Now it’s two hours later, and Amy sits back with a soft sigh.

“We’ve been through the style books, and nothing jumps out at you,” she says softly. “Truth is, nothing jumps out at me either. You’re a puzzle, Maggie. You don’t seem to fit any of the established looks. No wonder you couldn’t find anything out in the mall.”

“Looks like I’m one of a kind.” Bishop smiles, but there’s no humor in it. Amy reaches out, puts her hand over Maggie’s, and gives it a squeeze.

“That’s not a bad thing, honey. It just means we have to look a little harder, that’s all.” The shopper thinks for a moment, then stands up and moves to a chair next to the sofa. “We’re going to have to try something new. Lie down, Maggie.”

Bishop looks up at her, confused, and Amy smiles back. “I’m going to ask you a few questions, and I want you as relaxed as you can be when I ask them. I don’t want you to think about them. Just answer them as fast as you can, as soon as I ask. Can you do that?”

Maggie nods. She senses that she’s being mothered by someone who should be a peer, and it makes her feel weaker somehow, and a little uncomfortable. But at the same time, she knows there’s no malice in it. It’s just Amy’s way of showing she cares.

With a sudden chill, Maggie realizes she’s accidentally wandered deep into unknown territory. For the first time since her transformation, she is alone with a woman ... with another woman, in that shared space that every woman knows, and where no man has ever been. In the life before her transformation, Bishop had watched women together, in pairs or groups of three or four or more, and had sensed something between them from a distance — a closeness, an easiness, that faded whenever a man entered the picture.

This was “womanland,” a place where the landscape seemed much less defined than the world she used to know. That little bit of Moira inside her whispers without words, reminding her that here, emotional barriers can be as thin as tissue paper between friends, and even the strongest woman can ask for help from someone close without feeling diminished by it.

Moira’s voice rises from her subconscious. ‘Just like you could ask Bateau or Finn for help and get it, no questions asked. You’re not as far from what you were as you think. With men, it takes longer to reach that place, that’s all.’

Maggie smiles, this time for real. Maybe being a woman isn’t quite as alien as she thought. She lies back on the sofa, folds her hands across her stomach.

“Good girl,” Amy says softly, and Maggie grins.

“Thanks, ‘Mom,’” she replies, and the other woman laughs out loud. Bishop closes her eyes and waits.

“I want you to think back, Maggie.” Amy’s voice is measured and calm. “Think back to before what happened last week. Think back to the woman you were. Can you see yourself?”

Bishop nods. “Tell me something about the woman you see.”

“She was strong, self-assured.” The thief speaks slowly, but Amy can hear the truth behind the words. She knows Maggie isn’t holding back. “She knew she was beautiful, but didn’t care. It didn’t define her. It just was. She had dreams, and plans, and she knew that she could get what she wanted, if she wanted it bad enough.”

Amy saw Maggie smile. “She was so confident and in control, she could walk naked through the middle of a crowd of men, and they wouldn’t dare touch her, or even speak to her, unless she allowed it.”

“Until one did.”

Bishop sees it all again, the look on her face when the jewel touched Moira, the glow as it traced her outline and sucked her into it. She gasps and shudders, and Amy’s hand reaches out and touches her shoulder.

“I’m here,” she whispers. “You’re safe.”

“Am I?” Bishop replies, her voice shaking. “I don’t know. How can I be safe when she’s gone, Amy? I’m here, but she’s gone. I’m gone, too, or going. Will I ever be who I was again?”

“Who was that, Maggie? Who did you used to be?”

She gives a shuddering sigh. “A friend told me, not too long ago, that I used to live each moment as I wished to live it. He said that I defined myself not by how others saw me, but by the choices I made. He told me I was someone who chose to make the world what ... what she wished it to be, and others saw that, and helped make my world real because they believed my choices.”

Bishop felt the tears start to flow, but did nothing to stop them. “But I didn’t choose this, not really. I couldn’t stop it from happening. There was one point, maybe, where I could have changed things ... but that choice was taken from me, too, because people I cared about were in danger and so I couldn’t turn back.”

“So he ... took me, and when everything was over, the part of me that felt like the world was mine was gone. I can’t choose and make other people believe in my choices anymore, because I know that control is nothing but an illusion. If he can do what he did to me, how could I ever believe I have control over anything again? I don’t believe in myself, anymore, and maybe that’s why I’m gone. And I’m still losing myself, a little bit at a time, every day, more of me disappearing into this thing I’ve become, and I can’t stop it, because there’s no way back! Oh God ... Amy, I’m lost ... I’m so lost!”

Amy kneels next to the sofa and takes Maggie in her arms as she finally lets go of her fear and frustration and cries — great body-wrenching sobs that shake Amy as well when the other woman’s arms wrap themselves around her. Eventually the crying ends, and Maggie looks up at Amy, her face streaked with tears.

“I guess we went a little farther than finding something for me to wear,” she says, her voice trembling as she blushes slightly.

“I guess we did,” Amy replies, smiling a little. “But that’s okay. We needed to. You needed to.”

“What do you mean?”

“Damn, girl, didn’t you hear yourself? It’s no wonder you can’t shop. You had such confidence before, Maggie. You believed you could do anything. It was just a part of you, and you grew up with it and lived your entire life absolutely sure you had a handle on how your world worked. Then, in an instant, everything you thought you were was ripped away, and all you had left to replace it was the knowledge that, in the end, you were as weak and powerless as everybody else. That bastard convinced you that you had no control over anything, anymore. Oh, you tried to keep going as best you could, but your mind held tight to that one damning conclusion, and you let it redefine you. Stupid girl.”

Maggie’s eyes widen, and she sits up suddenly. “What?”

“Honey, you were raped! It doesn’t matter what he did to you, but when he had power over you, you couldn’t fight him. You couldn’t take yourself back from him. You had to let it happen, whatever it was. But it’s over now. He’s gone. And he can’t really change who you are inside. Unless you let him.”

Bishop’s mind reels as she struggles to put what Amy is saying together with what happened. “No, you ... you don’t understand how it was ... what he did ...”

“The hell I don’t.” Amy stands up, and Bishop sees her eyes flash. “I’ve been there, too, Maggie. I was raped once. Bastard held a knife on me and threatened to cut me up. He used me and beat on me for hours and hours ... and then left me on the floor, sobbing, as if I was nothing. He nearly made me believe it, too. I hid away for weeks, frightened of my own shadow, until I got angry enough to see the truth.”

“The truth? What truth?”

“That if I let him define me, he would win, and I’d never be anything more than what he made me. I couldn’t let that happen. I wouldn’t. I used my anger at him to take back my own life. Don’t you see? It’s the same for you. He took control away from you, and when he did that, he stole your confidence as well. You couldn’t choose anymore, because he made you think you had no choice ... but he only controlled you while he had you in his power. He’s gone — but you’re still here.”

Amy sits down next to Maggie. “And you were you long before you ever met him. Now that he’s gone, you can be YOU again. You have to be.”

“How?”

“You have to choose, Maggie. Redefine yourself. Choose to be the person you used to be again, or as close as you can get after what you’ve been through. Even back then, you didn’t control everything. Nobody can. But you believed in yourself enough that you could handle whatever came along. That’s why you have to believe in yourself again. Because if you don’t, you’ll be letting him tell you who you are and who you’re supposed to be, for the rest of your life.”

“You need to believe in yourself ... to know in your heart that you’re better than him, and you always have been. Because it’s true. I see the person you used to be, looking back at me through the pain. She’s afraid, but I believe in her. Because I believe in you. And even though I barely know you ... I believe in us.”

She takes Maggie’s hands in hers and looks into her eyes. “There’s something here between us, Maggie. You feel it, too. It’s strong, and I want it to go further, but only on your terms.”

“You need to believe you have control of your own life again,” she whispers. “That’s why I’m going to give you a choice. I’m going to do something now, and you can turn away, or you can let it happen. The choice is yours. I know what I want, but this has got to be your decision, because this is about us, not just me. No matter what happens next, I want you to know ... it’s entirely up to you.”

Then Amy leans forward and her eyes close oh so slowly. Bishop’s heart starts beating wildly, and her whole body suddenly warms in that timeless instant before their lips meet ...

... and in the heat of a gentleness that kicks like an exploding star, Maggie makes her choice.

 
The sound of the door opening causes both men to turn towards it. Neither one wanted to say it out loud, but they’d both been worried for hours, and the sound of the lock disengaging makes them both sigh an instant before it swings open.

Bishop stands framed in the doorway.

“Hey, boys,” she says, and to Bateau’s ears, it almost sounds like she’s teasing. “Miss me?”

“Hell, no, Your Worship,” Finn replies, leaning back in the sofa and crossing his legs. “We’ve been way too busy finding something interesting for us to steal ... once you’ve finished shopping, that is.”

Standing by the projection of the Fountainbleu floorplan, Bateau notices that Bishop is wearing something new — and radically different from what she had been wearing when they dropped her off that morning. Her top is a sort of understated medium blue cashmere, a very thin fabric with a wide neckline and three-quarter-length sleeves. It’s tight enough to provide an understated emphasis to her breasts but loose enough to drape just so below them. The blouse ends just above her navel, accentuating how her firm her waist is and how it narrows before it flares moves outwards to meet her hips.

She wears a pair of dark blue slacks that almost (but not quite) cling to her curves like a second skin, all the way down to a pair of ankle-high black boots that have just enough heel to notice but not nearly enough to make her hips twitch more than they should when she walks.

Silver accents are everywhere, bracelets, necklace, and earrings with just enough dangle to flash slightly when she turns her head. Her makeup is understated, but applied with a sense of how much is just enough. She catches Bateau looking, and strikes a model’s pose.

“You like?”

The Frenchman smiles slowly and nods. “Very much, mon ami. So feminine, and yet ... so you. I am impressed. Truly, I did not expect for you to find a personal style quite so quickly.”

Bishop grins and ducks her head. “I have to admit … I cheated.”

Bateau’s eyebrows raise. “Oh?”

“I followed one of my oldest rules.” She stalks over to the bar like a cat hunting prey and pours a glass of bourbon, then turns around and leans against it while she sips. “Know your limitations, and how to overcome them. When you need an expert ... find one.”

“And did you?” Finn asks, tilting his head. Bishop looks at him through her eyelashes and shakes her head.

“I did better than that,” she replies. “I found a friend. And maybe ... something more.”

Finn looks at Bateau, and he gives the hacker a tiny shake of his head.

“I seem to make a habit of that, actually.” Bishop takes another sip.

“A habit of what?” Finn turns back to Maggie, and she laughs. It’s almost musical, and takes both men by surprise.

“Finding friends when I start out looking for experts.” She looks at them both, and they can see the emotion in her eyes. “Thank you both, for standing by me through all of this. It’s got to be almost as weird for you as it is for me.”

“It’s not like we had a choice, Your Eminence,” Finn declares, standing up. “After all we’ve been through, we’re more family than friends. And family sticks together — especially the family you choose, yeah?”

“Agreed.” Bateau smiles, crosses his arms and cocks his head. “And from what I see, it is not as weird for you as it was, I think?”

“Not as,” she replies. “I’m still working on what it means to be who I am now, but I think I’m past the worst of it. I have to remember that it’s still me in here, after all. Amy helped me do that.”

“Oh? I shall have to thank this ‘Amy’ when I meet her.” Bateau notices a flash of uncertainty in Bishop’s eyes, but when Maggie realizes that Bateau saw her hesitation, she straightens her shoulders and nods.

“I think I’d like her to meet you both. In fact, I’m looking forward to it.”

The Frenchman briefly inclines his head towards Finn, who is oblivious to the interplay. “It should be ... interesting.”

“Speaking of interesting,” the thief says, putting down her glass and walking towards the floor plan projected on the wall. “What’s this I hear about a possible job?”

“Oh, it’s not much.” Finn’s grin belies his words. “It turns out Harlan Straker is throwing a shindig in Miami. He’s bringing his entire collection to town, just to show off his newest acquisition ... the Perenchio Emerald. We were talking it over, Bateau and myself, and we thought you just might — might, mind you — enjoy taking his latest pretty away from him and rubbing his nose in the fact that Magdalene is back. Interested?”

“Maybe,” she mutters, her attention drawn to the wall. “Tell me about it.”

Bishop listens carefully while she looks at all the information Finn has put up on the hotel room walls. She weighs options while Finn and Bateau lay out what they’ve found — personnel, security arrangements, and potential guest lists. Finally, the explanations run down, and the two men look at her from behind. She is focused intently on the projections, her hands on her hips, and finally Finn can’t take it anymore.

“Well, your Holiness,” he asks. “What do you think? Shall we take the Emerald to announce Magdalene’s return?”

She freezes, just for a second, then shakes her head.

“No, gentlemen,” she replies, “I’m sorry, but I’m afraid that’s not nearly big enough.”

For a second they look at her in disbelief. Then she turns and gives them a smile that lights up her face.

“We’re going to have to take the whole collection. After all, Harlan went to all that trouble to bring it along. It would be a shame to leave any of it behind, don’t you think?”

###

© 2011. Posted by the author.