After the Fall Ch. 07

Jack laughed. "Yvonne's just bitter because they don't cater to women."

"Damned right I am."

Michael cleared his throat. "So, back to Quinland. Why would he go through Hawley's gang to spy on us?"

Everyone was quiet until Andy spoke up. "Maybe there wasn't any connection before now. Maybe Hawley's gang was just the only way to hide someone."

Ezra nodded. "Yeah, that could be. It begs another question, though. How did Quinland know about Hawley's gang? There's no reason he should have any specific knowledge of Ashland. Michael, do you think your father ever mentioned Hawley's crew to any of the Elites?"

"I really don't know. I'm not sure he was even very aware of Hawley's group. Even though my father was fanatical about knowing what was going on in town, he was really only interested in anything likely to be a threat to the compound. I think we should hold it open as a possibility, but also be alert to other ways Quinland may have been getting intel. Couriers are the obvious avenue, but their guild keeps a very tight leash on that sort of thing. I've never heard the slightest hint about any courier ever spying for anyone. I don't expect to come up with the answer today, but I'd like everyone to give it some thought."

Mariah spoke up again. "What impression would you like for Quinland to have?"

"I'd prefer him to see strength and stability. I don't want him to think he has an opportunity to gain a foothold."

"He probably knows how many security people you've hired from The Center, right?"

"Definitely."

"What if you made him think you've got security people you've hired locally? You could get Amy, Daniel, Marcus and Seth to wear security uniforms and let Carruthers see them before he goes. If the number of security people he reports is higher than the number you've hired from The Center, Quinland's not going to know how many more people you might have hired."

Ezra turned to Mariah. "You are as devious as you are sneaky, and I mean that as a compliment."

"Don't encourage her," Michael griped.

"You don't want to do it?" Ezra asked.

"Of course I do."

"I was wondering," Andy started tentatively, "is it better to try to spook Fred Lansing into leaving, or are we better off with him here because we at least know who he is?"

Michael considered the idea. "That's a good question, I could probably figure out a way to get Quinland to recall him -- maybe report him to Quinland as if I thought he'd gone rogue or something -- but would that leave us any better off?"

Nate shook his head. "Better the devil you know."

"There's another factor you guys don't know about yet. I'm going to get everyone together for a meeting tomorrow and I was going to tell you then, but it's relevant to security planning. Mariah and I are working on a project that's going to dramatically affect all of us. We are going to build another wall outside the existing compound wall, and inside that wall, we are going to build some homes for people from town to move in. It will be the first stage in a process to establish a decent standard of living for people here.

"There's a whole lot more detail to go into, but that's the gist of it. I wanted to give you a chance to be thinking about that. One thing that I was already planning to do is hire additional security from The Center. Now, I'm not sure whether I would be able to trust new people from The Center. We might have to employ people from town."

Mariah studied the security team during the silence that fell after Michael's announcement. Nate was frowning. Jack looked pleasantly surprised. She couldn't tell what the rest of them were thinking.

The silence was becoming uncomfortable when Ezra finally spoke. "I don't like the sound of relying on untrained civilians. What if we can find trained security from The Center we're confident we can trust?"

"If you can find them, that would be great. If not, I don't see another option."

"Either way, it sounds like a trip to The Center is going to be necessary pretty soon," Ezra said.

"Agreed. I'd been putting it off, but it needs to happen. There's a conference coming up, anyway." Michael glanced uneasily at Mariah. He had serious reservations about taking her to The Center. "For today, let's focus on getting Carruthers out of here. Go ahead and work with Amy, Daniel, Marcus and Seth on making appearances in security uniforms. When you're done questioning him, just contact me and I'll bring Mariah down to sweet talk him."

When the meeting broke up, Michael brought Mariah back to the lounge upstairs. He sat her across his lap and paused with the air of having something ominous to say.

Mariah frowned. "What's wrong?"

"About The Pit..."

She laughed, "The Passion Pit? Who names these things?"

Michael didn't even smile.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt. What about The Pit?"

"I just... I thought... I used to go there. Until recently."

"Okay." She waited for him to get to the point. When he didn't say anything else, she asked, "But what were you going to say about The Pit?"

"That was what I was going to say. I thought you might be upset."

"Oh! I'm sorry. I didn't understand where you were going with it. Why would I be upset? I didn't think you lived like a monk. It's nice to know I don't need to feel weird around any former lovers in the household." She paused. "Or do I? Wait -- don't answer. I don't want to know. It's none of my business."

Michael took her hand and kissed the palm. "No former lovers in the household. I told you that it's you I've wanted for a very long time. There haven't been relationships. Maybe that's why I keep walking into landmines."

Mariah smiled. "Blaming it on lack of training?"

"Yep. Speaking of training, time to help you learn what happens to teases."

He unzipped the back of her dress and slipped it down her shoulders to fall around her waist. With a little fiddling, he had her bra unclasped and pulled it off. He squeezed and kneaded each breast in turn. He guided one nipple to his mouth, captured it between his teeth, and sucked firmly. He rubbed his thumb back and forth across her other nipple.

Mariah had not entirely calmed down from what he had done to her before the meeting. It felt like he was starting the race already halfway to the finish. Except, she reminded herself, he wasn't going to finish. Not until her spanking tonight. She worried she might be starting to look forward to the spanking. It was a disconcerting thought. It wasn't as if the spankings were truly painful, except for that last one. That one hurt more than she wanted to admit. But it wasn't pain that bothered her. It was the idea that she was being punished, and of course, the embarrassment.

Michael let her nipple slip from his mouth. "What are you thinking about?"

"Nothing in particular."

"That makes thirty-nine spanks." He tweaked her nipple harshly.

"What? Why?"

"Because you're lying. The only time you're any good at lying is when you've convinced yourself of your own story." He pinched her nipple, squeezing harder as he spoke. "You might as well go ahead and tell me. I'm going to find out."

Mariah tensed and sucked in her breath as the pressure on her nipple increased. Then he began twisting it. "Come on, kitten. Tell me what I want to know."

"I was just thinking about later."

He eased the pressure on her nipple. "What about later?"

"About the spanking."

"I like the sound of that." He tugged her nipple and released it. "Were you looking forward to your spanking?"

"No!"

He pinched her other nipple and squeezed. "No lying."

"I wasn't exactly. I just..."

"You just what, sweetheart?"

"I was thinking about the rest of it."

He eased the pressure on her nipple and fondled it gently.

"The rest of it? Does that mean when you get to come? Or when I fuck you afterwards?"

A shiver ran from the back of her neck all the way down her spine. She nodded.

"Out loud."

"Both."

"It's a package deal, you know. I'm going to make you come on my hand while you get your spanking. Then I'm going to fuck you. It all goes together."

She shuddered.

"Open your legs for me, kitten, nice and wide."

"Michael..."

"Do it, sweetheart."

"But Ezra will be calling us soon."

"Forty."

She moved her farthest leg to the side. It wasn't far enough.

"I think you know that's not enough, but since you're being difficult, I want you to turn so you can lay back against my shoulder, and I want you to hook your leg over the arm of the couch. If I have to start counting, it's going to be more than one at a time."

He spent the remaining time alternating between stroking her clit and finger fucking her. She was panting lightly when Ezra radioed Michael.

"Okay. We'll be there in just a minute."

When Mariah moved her leg, he lightly smacked the inside of her thigh. "Stay still until I tell you, sweetheart."

He swirled his finger in her pussy, then tasted her from his finger. "Okay, you can get up now."

She dressed herself as quickly as she could and was ready to leave, but Michael made no move to go anywhere.

"Aren't we going now?"

"Yes, but before we do, I want to make sure we are very, very clear on what's going to happen when you talk to Carruthers. He is going to be restrained. Before you go in the room with him, I'll arrange a seat for you. You are not to get any closer to him than that seat. I'm trusting you to do this. If you get any closer to him than that seat, if you move the seat, or if you do anything to risk your safety, it's going to be a very long time before I trust you to do anything like that again. Understood?"

"You think you're in a position to lecture me about trust?"

He crossed his arms and leaned back, waiting.

"Understood."

They were both quiet on the way down to the basement. Michael got a golf cart to shorten the trip to the holding area. It was the first time Mariah had seen any of the basement except the garage and the adjoining mechanical shop.

"How big is this place?"

"I don't know how many square feet it is, but it's quite a bit bigger than the house. It was already huge when my father bought it, and as soon as he bought it, he expanded it further. A lot of this basement is actually built inside of a cave. We could expand further into the cave if we wanted to."

"What are all the rooms we passed?"

"Storage rooms. There's all sorts of stuff in them: household supplies, furniture, food, construction materials, tools, spare parts."

"What else is down here?"

They pulled up outside the armory and Michael turned off the engine. "We call that room over there the armory because it's our storage for weapons, ammo and gear. You know, in case of a zombie apocalypse. The garage door next to it is a wide hall that goes much further back into the caves. That's where the shooting range is. The first three rooms on the other side are the holding rooms. The next door goes to an office, and the doors after that are bathrooms and showers. Past the turn, there are more rooms, but they haven't been set up for anything specific. After all that, there's a long hall that goes to a room where we store things like fuel and batteries and anything incendiary."

Michael took a deep breath. He wasn't looking forward to letting Mariah near Carruthers, even if he knew she would be safe.

"You ready to do this, babe?"

She nodded. "Ready."

They got out of the carts and walked over to Ezra. Amy, Daniel, Seth and Marcus were standing against the wall, looking ill at ease in borrowed uniforms. Mariah waved to them.

"Did you get anything useful out of him?" Michael asked Ezra.

"Not much more than we already knew or suspected. He confirmed everything Lundgreen said. He only knows Fred Lansing as 'Dave.' He doesn't know how Hawley knows him and he doesn't know where Lansing came from, or even how he got there. He knows Hawley personally brought him back to the lake house, but that doesn't tell us whether he came by a courier route or if someone 'coptered him in. It does tell us that Hawley knew Lansing was coming, though. There must have been some communication in advance of his arrival, and I think that can only have come by way of a message sent by courier. That means Quinland must have known who Hawley is, or he wouldn't have known who to send the message to.

"Carruthers confirmed that Lansing assisted Hawley with the plan to nab Mariah. He provided the telescope, the walkie-talkies and a whole lot of advice. That means we should assume Quinland is aware of who Mariah is and that she has some connection to you."

Michael's jaw tightened, but he didn't comment on it.

"Mariah's ready to see if she can convince Carruthers to keep his yap shut about our questions about Sarah. Is there anything else that needs to happen first? Has he seen the rest of the gang in uniform?"

"He's seen Seth and Daniel. Their uniforms fit the best, so I had them bring me things while I was in there with him. I thought we'd just let him see Amy and Marcus on the way out, so he doesn't get a really good look at their uniforms. There's nothing else we need to do. We're ready for Mariah to give it a shot."

"Okay. Before she goes in there, I want him patted down again, ankle-cuffed to the bench, and both hands cuffed to the ring on the table. I also want to turn the one-way audio on and test it."

Ezra nodded. "I'll take care of it right now."

On his way into the room, Ezra flipped a switch on the wall. A green light came on to indicate the audio was active. Ezra closed the door behind him, but Michael and Mariah could see what was going on through the one-way glass window. Ezra's voice was clearly audible as he gave Carruthers instructions. Once he patted Carruthers down, he cuffed him as Michael had requested. Carruthers was becoming agitated and seemed fearful of what the preparations might signify.

Carruthers' anxiety ratcheted up another notch when Michael stalked in, glared at him, and pulled the chair back to a distance he felt was safe. Michael sat down in the chair and tested the distance by leaning forward and reaching toward Carruthers. Carruthers cowered back against the bench he was sitting on. Then, without saying a word, Michael left, shutting the door behind him with a bang.

"Okay, sweetheart. Remember, no further than the chair is now. We'll be right out here if you need anything."

Mariah nodded and forced a smile. She was suddenly nervous. The task had seemed easy enough, but now that such a big production had been made of it, she felt less sure of success. She took a deep breath, pushed down the doubts, and opened the door and slipped in, closing it behind her. She slid into the chair opposite Carruthers and smiled apologetically.

"I'm sorry about all that." She gestured to Carruthers' cuffs.

Carruthers shrugged. "What's going on?"

"I asked to talk to you."

Carruthers waited for her to continue, but she didn't. A couple of seconds later, he asked, "Why do you want to talk to me?"

Mariah smiled. "Because there's something you can do that's good for you and good for me, but you need some information to do it. I want to give you that information." She paused, letting his curiosity get to work. "They're about to let you go. When you get back, I think Brad Hawley's going to have a whole lot of questions for you. I imagine he'll want to know everything you were asked about here and all the information you gave."

Carruthers winced. She had hit a nerve.

She continued. "Now I understand you've got to tell him what he wants to know, at least for the most part. But I think Mr. Hawley's going to ask you a few questions that aren't in your interest to answer. In particular, I think he may ask you what you told us about Sarah and what you told us about the lake house. Now, ordinarily, you'd probably be better off just telling him the truth. But what you don't know is that Sarah was rescued from the lake house last night. So, it might not be a good idea to tell him you gave us any information about that. He'd probably be pretty mad"

Carruthers' eyes widened as he worked out the implications. He looked ill.

"I can tell you see what the problem is, but don't worry. There's a way out of it." Mariah smiled conspiratorially. "You see, the other thing that you don't know is that when Sarah was rescued, they made it look like she got away on her own. They snuck out without anyone seeing them."

Mariah paused to let Carruthers' catch up. When she had his attention again, she continued. "So, you see, there's absolutely no way for them to know for sure that she was rescued, unless you tell them that you gave us the information about where she was."

Carruthers really looked alarmed now, so she gave him a few moments to collect himself before she went on. "Now you may be wondering why they'd ask you about Sarah if there's no way for them to know we used your information to rescue her."

It was clear from the expression on his face that he hadn't gotten around to wondering that, but he was now. "Why?"

Mariah smiled. "Because there's something else you don't know, but I'm going to tell you so they can't trick you. This morning, some of the compound's security team took Sarah to her house to get her stuff. There were a couple of guys there that Mr. Hawley had sent. They ran off, but they'll know Sarah was with someone from the compound because of the vehicle."

Carruthers' face fell. "Then they are going to know you guys rescued her!"

Mariah shook her head. "See, that's why I wanted to make sure you had all the information. They'll know Sara got help after she left the lake house. That's not really surprising. They know she's my friend. Naturally, she would come here for help. But for all they know, Sarah got lose by herself. Right?"

Carruthers nodded along.

"All you really have to do is just act surprised that Sarah is gone, and you won't get blamed for Sarah disappearing or for telling anyone about the setup out there at the lake house. Now, you may be wondering what I get out of this."

"Yeah, what's your angle?"

"You know Mr. Hawley doesn't like me, right?"

Carruthers nodded. Hawley had been very clear on that point.

Mariah smiled, looking pleased with herself. "Well, I don't like him very much, either. And you know what would bother him? If a girl escaped from his hideout all by herself. I bet he'd hate that, wouldn't he?"

Carruthers eyed her. "Yeah, I imagine he would."

She grinned triumphantly. "So, you see? You don't get in trouble, and I get the satisfaction of making Mr. Hawley mad because he thinks another girl made a fool of him."

He thought about it and nodded. "Okay. I can see that. But what about them?" Caruthers tilted his head toward the door.

"Oh, you mean why would they let me tell you all this?"

"Yeah, what's in it for them?"

"I don't think they care much one way or the other. But they said it's not a bad thing to keep Mr. Hawley in the dark about how much they know about his lake house."

Carruthers nodded thoughtfully. It made sense to him.

"Okay!" She stood to go. When she got to the door, she looked back at Carruthers and said brightly, "See? Told you I was going to help."

She stepped out. When the door closed behind her, she let her breath out with a whoosh. Yvonne had joined Ezra and Michael just outside the holding room. They were all smiles and grins, but Mariah felt drained.

Michael put his arm around her. "Good job, sweetheart."

"That was quite a performance," Ezra said. "I think it worked."

"Well, it actually is in his best interest to keep his mouth shut," Mariah pointed out.

Yvonne snorted. "I don't think he was going to figure that out on his own."

Mariah winked. "That's why a dumb girl had to help him out."

"Do you need anything else from us right now?" Michael asked.