Page 50 of Duke

He finished one sandwich and started on another, answering without looking up. “Practice at the shooting range. Read books. Track down my enemies and eat their hearts.” He glanced up and winked at Temple. “The usual.”

I boggled at him for an entire half-minute. “Holy shit, was that a joke?”

“I don’t know, was it?” His grin was subtle, but it was there. “That is the Boogie-man,ja? He eats the hearts of his victims?”

I laughed at that. “Fuck me, Anselm, what kind of Boogie-Man stories didyougrow up with?”

His grin vanished abruptly. “I was sent to a private military school when I was fourteen, so, for me, the Boogie-Man was thekommandant. He was the most frightening and unpleasant man I have ever known, and I have been acquainted with professional torturers. Children who infracted the rules would go to his office and never return. Some of the children at the school whispered rumors that he ate the rule-breakers, and others said that he did things far less savory than mere cannibalism to them.”

“Well that’s…fun,” Temple said. “Aren’t you just a ray of sunshine?”

“I have never been accused of being jovial,” Anselm said, and went back to making sandwiches.

“Yeah, I guess not,” Temple said.

“I think you’re getting a little too much me-time, Anselm,” I said. “You’re going stir-crazy. This is the most I’ve heard you talk about yourself in the entire time we’ve known each other.”

Anselm brought two paper plates with cold cut sandwiches and corn chips, carrying those in one hand and two cans of light beer in the other.

“Harris does not believe in soda, it appears,” Anselm said. “So you drink beer.”

I cracked open the beer and crammed half the sandwich into my mouth. “Soda is bullshit,” I said, around a mouthful of food. “Cancer juice. I never drink soda.”

“Why not?” Temple asked, biting into her sandwich with a little more delicacy than I was displaying.

I nodded. “Had this buddy in the Army, he was a mechanic, worked on the deuce-and-a-halfs. He’d clean parts with Coke. Like, he’d scrub dirt and rust and shit off the metal with Coca-Cola, and it’d be shinier than new. If it doesthatto fucking steel? Hell if I’ll drink that shit.”

We all ate in silence then. Anselm finished his food first, somehow, and went about making more sandwiches, bringing me another and one for himself. When we were finished, he took our plates and disposed of them.

“I must return to the nest. Your information is worrisome.” He indicated a large, blocky cell phone on the island counter. “A sat-phone, with Harris’s terminal number programmed into it. Call him, tell him you are alive and what you told me about Cain.”

Temple stood up. “Is there a chance I could shower? Things have been…yucky.”

Anselm nodded, his eyes going to the bloodstain on her skirt. “Of course. I think Layla has some clothing to possibly fit you, if you would like.”

“That would fantastic.”

Anselm went into Harris and Layla’s room, and emerged a minute later with a pair of black yoga pants, a T-shirt, a hoodie, and a pair of flip-flops.

“I do not know if the sandals will fit, but they might be more appropriate under the circumstances than your current footwear,” he said.

“Better than nothing,” Temple answered. “Thank you.”

He nodded and then from a counter in the kitchen, he grabbed a military grade long-range two way radio with an earpiece and throat mic and handed the set to me. “Keep in contact and be alert. I’ll be watching, but at this point in the game, I think perhaps anything is possible.”

“I might try to pop over to the HQ. I’ve got some spare gear over there.”

Anselm shook his head. “Nein. You stay here. This is the safest place on the compound, and you haveFrauKennedy to worry about. You need BDUs, I assume,ja?”

I nodded. “Yeah, and some extra hardware. All I’ve got is those scrounged pieces, my HK, and a couple of pistols.”

“I will raid your quarters and bring you what I find.”

“Great.”

Anselm gestured at the sat phone. “Now call Harris. We have to be coordinated.”

“Yes sir,” I said, mocking a salute.