Through her studies, Nicole came across descriptions of people who possessed eidetic memories – memories that were highly visual in nature. These memories tended to degrade very slowly over decades, not hours, with amazing recall clarity. Cole had told her during their first evening together that he never finished high school -- yet he reads Shakespeare. She felt a low, deep sadness that Cole's life hadn't allowed him to make use of a gift like his, if he in fact possessed such a gift, and the odd connection between them was telling her he did.
Cole had quit eating halfway through the plan, falling into a state of pure mind power as he concentrated on what Brian was laying out for him. When Brian finished, she watched Cole's eyes as they continued to move around the table, as if he were replaying it and studying it from different angles. "Shit, Brian,” Cole announced after a few moments,” Jim sold you short. That's fucking brilliant."
"Thanks," Brain said and calmly took a sip of his coffee while Cole got back on the phone and told Mark and James the plan, and their parts in it.
When that was done, they paid the check, but were set to wait for twenty more minutes.
"Cole? What was I wearing for our first ride together?" she asked, unable to control her curiosity.
Cole recited her outfit without hesitation and from what she remembered, which she felt was fairly accurate since she spent a lot of time picking out her clothing, it was near perfect. In fact, she felt he was dead on. "What color were the eyes of the first man you saw on the boat that day?" she pressed.
"Green," he said, "You going someplace with this?"
But Nicole noticed that Brian was suddenly very interested, as well. How he might have picked up on where she was going with this, she didn't know. Fucking brain trust in this group of motor junkies. "That car across the street, did you see it at the hotel?" she asked.
"Yeah, just where Brian said it was, but I didn't notice it here until he pointed it out," Cole explained.
"What's the license number?" she pushed.
Cole, again, told her without a second of hesitation. There was no brain searching. It was just there, in his mind, like magic.
"Wow," Brian said, not bothering to hide his amazement and sat back looking at Cole, "Eidetic memory?"
"What's that?" Cole asked, looking from Brian to her and then back again.
Nicole walked him through what she knew about eidetic memory, admitting that the subject, at the time she came across it during her research, didn't hold much interest for her, so her understanding was limited. "No one has ever brought that up to you?" she asked him with slight wonder.
Cole shrugged, "I get the visual part. I use that a lot and certainly during every fight I'm in." Then Cole ran a play by play with the boat ambush he walked into, even moving pieces like the salt and pepper and sugar packages around as he explained how he knew where the attackers were behind the curtain, or at least the couple of places physics would allow them to be and used that to aim.
"Again, wow," Brian said with a little more wonder in his voice. "I've heard about it, too, but listening to how you use it puts chills in my spine knowing I was so close to going up against it."
Cole checked his watch, "It's time. We can talk about my brain after we take care of this little chore."
"No we won't," Nicole told him, "You're going to avoid the subject like a plague." She smiled teasingly while she rose from her chair and shrugged into her jacket, "aren't you?"
Cole grimaced at her.
"I don't know what impresses me more, your memory or how well she knows you," Brian laughed. "You two have quite a connection with each other."
Cole looked at him, "Buddy, you have no idea."
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The only thing Cole didn't like about this plan was that Nicole would be riding behind him. But, there was no way not to tip their hand if she didn't get back on the bike. He noticed a tremble in her hand as she strapped on her helmet. He wanted to say it was going to be fine, but that felt kind of silly coming from the man who was about to ride her into battle. Then he noticed the expression in her eyes. They were alight with the fierceness of a small Valkyrie whose wrath was barely contained by her glowing blue irises. "Ready?" he asked.
"Ready ten minutes ago," she told him with a smile. "Let's get them."
That was probably the moment, the moment he fell in love with her. He wasn't sure now, though, if he hadn't fallen in love with her before this and just now realized the depth of his feelings for her. It felt like he had always loved her and was just now catching up. If it wasn't the moment, it should have been, he decided and got on his bike.
He started the engine up and came off the kickstand just as he saw a flash of red movement in the reflection of the diner's window. In that brief flash of reflection, he recalled with pure clarity the Charger coming up behind them and a large gun in the passenger's hands as he was making his way out of the window to sit down on the opening, preparing fire across the top of the car. They were going to strafe them, right here, right now.
"Down! Gun!" he shouted, and came off his bike, pulling Nicole with him.
His bike fell as its center of gravity was pushed the other way during his hurried dismount. There was no time to look to Brain and he hoped his brother heard him as he rushed Nicole, nearly carrying her, behind a parked car a few feet away. Brian showed up at the back of the car a breath later, his twin guns out and ready. Then Hell hit the other side of the car with a fury of lead and tearing explosions.
There was nothing Cole could do except wrap Nicole up in his arms, and cover her with his body, which he did. He expected her to be screaming, but she wasn't. Cole guessed they were about half way down the side of the car, turning it to junk with the automatic weapon when Brian suddenly stood leveling both guns at their attackers with a smooth, graceful motion that made Cole think of a ballet dancer and pulled the triggers of his hand canons -- once.
In fact, it sounded like only one shot and the effect was as if Brian just turned Hell back off, like he might turn off a radio. The gunfire was gone and he heard nothing on the other side of the car. Then Brian holstered his nickel-plated guns and looked to Cole, "I think there was a small hole in my plan."
Much too curious to lay there any more, both he and Nicole got up, and peered over the hood of their shield. The Cougar was against a parked car across the street, coming to rest there, because the driver was dead and so was the gunman. Both were shot in the head, from what Cole could tell.
Cole was too experienced with violence to be in shock for very long. He left Nicole's side and ran across the street to the car, yanking the dead driver back from his dead-weight slouch against the wheel. A quick search rendered him a new 9mm, a cellphone, and the driver's wallet from the inside pocket of his suit jacket, which felt very expensive.