Dylan's Dilemma

Chapter 3-2

Is Alastair right? Mars pondered the question on his ride back to the city. Dylan definitely isn’t the sort of guy we usually try to recruit. His killing Samson was unplanned, done in a moment of panic and self-preservation. I suspect he’s never in his life even considered murdering someone, much less carrying through with it. He was damned lucky we had Samson under surveillance. If we hadn’t, he’d be sitting in a jail cell right now. He smiled dryly. But then, so would I if Alastair hadn’t worked his magic.

Mars had been a petty thief in what he thought of as his misspent youth. Coming from a lower-middleclass family—in a large eastern city—he’d resented the richer kids he’d gone to school with. His career in crime had started when he stole from their lockers and backpacks. After dropping out of high school, he’d moved on to bigger and better things, finding a couple of pawnshops willing to take what he had to sell.

Then came the night when he broke into a house while the owner was there—much to his surprise. Caught in the act, and definitely not wanting to end up in jail, he’d picked up the nearest object and coldcocked the man. Mars got away, but the incident taught him a lesson. From then on, he never went out on a job without being armed.

Three months later, he used his gun. It was, in his considered opinion, self-defense. One of his less-than-reputable acquaintances wanted in on the action. Mars had reluctantly agreed to bring him along on his next job, once he learned the man had been doing the same thing, if not as successfully as Mars. After returning from their housebreaking expedition, the man decided he wanted all the goods and pulled a gun to reinforce his demand. Mars retaliated by pulling out his own weapon. Luckily, he was a much better shot. Unluckily, someone heard their gunfire and called the cops.

“Of course, the ‘where’s a cop when you need one’ axiom didn’t apply. I was barely out the door when they pulled up,” he told the public defender who was assigned to him after his arrest. Caught dead-to-rights, not only with the items he’d taken from the house, but also the gun he’d used on his dead confederate, he faced a long stretch in prison if he was convicted.

He was sitting in his cell, awaiting trial, when one of the guards came to get him, telling him he had a visitor. That surprised him, since it wasn’t visiting hours, so he presumed it was his lawyer. He was correct. The lawyer was there, along with another man—Alastair.

“You seem to be in trouble,” Alastair said after the lawyer introduced him to Mars.

“That sort of covers it,” Mars agreed dryly.

Alastair nodded. “I have a proposition for you. One you might want to consider.” From there, he went on to lay out exactly who he was, and who he worked for.

When Alastair finished, Mars’ first question was, “Why me?”

“You have talents we can put to use.”

“You know this how?”

Alastair smiled knowingly. “Let’s say, I’m not without my resources and leave it at that for now.”

Mars didn’t have to think long and hard about Alastair’s offer. Join C21, or possibly spend the rest of his life in prison. It was obvious which was the better option and he took it.

That had happened eight years ago. Now, he was going to try to return the favor by helping keep Dylan out of the clutches of the police—and maybe convince him to join C21.

Mars parked behind Dylan’s apartment building, using the back door to go inside. He walked boldly around to the lobby, as if he belonged there, while scouting out the location of the fire stairs. Taking the elevator to Dylan’s floor, Mars moved with caution in the direction of the apartment. The last thing he wanted was to run into a cop assigned to watch Dylan’s place in case he was stupid enough to return. He saw the hallway was empty when he turned the corner.

When he got to Dylan’s door, he unlocked it, pushed it open sharply, and stepped inside, immediately sliding to one side. With his hand on his gun, hidden at the small of his back, he silently scanned the living room. No one was there, and no one burst into the room through the doorways to what he presumed were the bedroom and kitchen. Deciding it was safe, he closed the door to the hallway.

Ahead of him was a desk. There were two pictures above it, which he put into his backpack. If Dylan’s laptop had once been on the desk, it wasn’t anymore. Mars figured the cops had probably taken it to see if it contained anything of interest. Still, on the off chance they hadn’t, he checked the desk drawers. Nothing.

Giving it up as a lost cause, Mars went into the bedroom. Nice. Great bed. It was a king-size with a brown headboard and a comforter in shades of brown to match. A picture flashed through his mind of him and Dylan putting the bed to good use. Where the hell did that come from? Yeah, it’s been too long since I’ve had s*x, but holy s**t! He shook his head to clear it and set to work packing as many of Dylan’s clothes into the backpack as possible, thankful once again he’d opted for a large one.

Still, there wasn’t room for everything, so he went into the kitchen in search of a plastic bag or two for the rest. “Bingo,” he muttered when he saw the laptop sitting on the kitchen table. He found the bags he needed, picked up the laptop and its power cord, and returned to the bedroom to finish up. At the last moment, he remembered Dylan’s heavy jacket and got it from the hall closet.

Then, after checking the hallway, he left the apartment. Using the fire stairs so he wouldn’t run into anyone who might question why he was carrying everything, he made it back to his bike, stashed the bags in the saddlebags, and took off for the cabin.