Page 80 of Conrad

“We need to get out of here,” he said. He keyed his mic, but the comms had gone down. The other screens, however, showed his team still engaged.

“Clearly not through Brazil.” She pulled out a small tablet, studied it. “We’re going to need to get creative.”

He glanced at John. The man stood less than six feet, skinny, all brains, no body. A cut over his eye had dried, and he’d been banged up, limped. “He can’t move fast.”

She repocketed the tablet, velcroing it into her vest, and picked up the handgun. “I found a way out, but you have to trust me.”

“I don’t even know who you are.”

“I’m one of the good guys.” She winked then and gave a hint of a smile, more of a smirk, maybe, her green eyes almost daring him. “Are you with me?”

He should have trusted her. The sense of it sank through him as time slowed, as memory dissolved through him, into his bones, left her smile imprinted in them.

Phoenix.

His eyes opened, and he stared at the coffered ceiling of the deluxe room. Early sunlight streamed in through the gauzy curtains, and he got up, stared out the window at the red-tiled roofs, the ornate buildings, the boulevard that stretched through the city.

Four more days and they’d be moving on to Declan’s resort-like estate on some Caribbean island.

Four more days, and no trouble so far, so maybe he could stop letting the nightmares find him.

He made coffee—an espresso shot, because, you know, Europe—and took the tiny cup outside. His balcony butted up to Declan’s next door, and he stepped out in his pajamas. The temperature hung in the low sixties, balmy for Minnesota but maybe nippy for Barcelona. Traffic moved four stories below, and he leaned on the cement railing, staring down at the city.

The trees were still prebud, and the air smelled of winter—crisp, bearing a hint of chill. He preferred the cold, frankly, his breath caught in the morning air, his body waking with the chill.

“You too, huh?”

He looked over, and Declan sat on one of the wooden outside chairs in his plush hotel bathrobe, also drinking an espresso, a tablet on the round side table. He had bedhead and a five-o’clock shadow. A regular guy. Could be a friend, if he wasn’t his boss.

“Sir?”

“The brisk mornings. I thought about going for a run, but I didn’t want to wake you.”

Stein raised an eyebrow. “I can be ready in five.”

A moment. “Your knees up to it?”

Gauntlet thrown. He smiled.

Ten minutes later, they were garnering a little attention—not threatening, just curious—as they ran down sidewalks along the Passeig de Gràcia, past closed high-end shops, a few open bakeries and cafés, the intricate, old-fashioned streetlights flicking off as the sunlight bathed the city. Their feet slapping on the pavement, in rhythm.

“Maybe we should have stayed in the gym,” Stein said as they waited at a stoplight. He wasn’t breathing as hard as Declan, but he kept his fist pump internal. A woman with a tiny white Havanese on a leash eyed them even as the dog snarled.

Declan shook his head. “I’ve been trapped in there for three days. No, thank you. I need to clear my head for my talk today.”

The light turned, a green man icon flickering to let them walk. They took off, landed on the other side, and ran the length of the block, stopped at the next light. “What talk?”

“It’s an interactive workshop called ‘AI-Driven Decision-Making in High-Stakes Environments.’ It’s all about how artificial intelligence can help make quick, smart decisions during intense situations, like in military or defense. I’m going to show that these AI systems have actually been used to do things faster and more accurately than humans could.”

“Maybe. But AI can’t consider all the variables to human emotion, human panic.” Stein didn’t know where that’d come from, but . . . okay, he’d blame the dream.

The memories.

“Agreed. I’m working on those nuances. But you’re right. A back door is always needed—something to override the AI programs, interject them with the human element.”

Like instincts? Experience?

They took off again, and when they reached the next block, Declan checked his watch. “We should cross and head back.”

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