Killing Time by Linda Howard Page A

his shoulder. “Please.”
    His gaze was flat and remote, his face expressionless, all hint of affability gone. “Why?”
    “There are some things in there I want to tell you about. Handcuff me to the chair or the desk if you’re worried I’ll try to bolt. I promise I won’t, but you might feel nervous.”
    “Nervous?” he asked, briefly puzzled and his attention caught. “How’s that?”
    “Because I have training that you don’t.” Maybe this was working. She could see the flicker of interest in his eyes.
    “If you were a real FBI agent, I might believe that.”
    “I
am
a real FBI agent, just not . . . now.”
    “Maybe you can convince a judge you’re delusional, but I’m not buying it. They have no record of a Nikita T. Stover as an agent, former or otherwise.”
    “I didn’t say ‘former.’ Please, just empty my purse on your desk. I’ll tell you about everything that’s in there.”
    For a moment she thought he’d refuse, but in the end his curiosity won out. He didn’t take chances; he made her sit down, and he used a second set of cuffs to attach one of her ankles to the chair. Being cuffed was very uncomfortable, the way it pulled her shoulders back. Experienced prisoners didn’t try to keep their shoulders balanced; they dropped one and let the cuffs ride more to the other side, which effectively relieved the pressure on both shoulder joints. She tried that, and almost sighed as the pain instantly faded.
    Picking up her purse, he dumped the contents on his desk. After a moment he frowned at the array of gadgets. “What’s all this?”
    “First, look in my wallet. In the zippered compartment, there’s a card. Take it out and look at it.”
    He unzipped the section she indicated and pulled out the card. It was thicker than most cards, about the same as three personal cards stacked together, and made of a lightweight, translucent compound that was virtually indestructible. It wouldn’t burn, and she herself had tried to hack it to pieces just because they’d told her it couldn’t be done. They’d been right.
    On the left side a gold shield with an eagle on top had been laser-embossed, a shield that was similar but not identical to the one she’d showed him earlier. The shield read “Department of Justice” on the bottom and “Federal Bureau of Investigation” on the top. That hadn’t changed, but the shape of the shield differed, being slightly more rounded, and the eagle looked more fierce. On the right side was a three-dimensional holographic photo of her, and below was her name and serial number.
    “Cool,” he said, holding up the card and tilting it so the hologram flickered. “What’s it supposed to prove? That you know someone who can make 3-D pictures?”
    “Try to destroy it,” she said. “Go ahead, try anything you can think of. Cut it up. Melt it. Pour acid on it. See what happens.”
    “I don’t have any acid with me today,” he said, but he took a pair of scissors from his center desk drawer and tried to cut the card. Then he tried again, a look of concentration settling on his face. “This is thicker than a normal card,” he said, bearing down with all the strength in his hands.
    The rivet popped out of the scissors and the two pieces fell apart in his hand.
    “Shit!” he said in surprise, and examined the card with more interest. “What’s it made of?”
    “If I told you, I’d have to kill you,” she said, trying out the old joke. When he didn’t laugh, she shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s called poly-di-something-something; I’ve never been able to pronounce it. The trade name is Ondite, for reasons I don’t know. NASA developed it for spaceships about, oh, a hundred and twenty years ago. Sort of.”
    His gaze went flat again. “Stop fucking with me, lady. If this wild story is all the explanation you have, you’re wasting my time.”
    “Because NASA didn’t exist a hundred and twenty years ago? It didn’t, counting from now. Try