The Veiled Threat Read Online Free PDF

recommend something?”
    The man’s hands fumbled at the iron grip holding him by the throat. “Hey, leggo of me! Are you out of your …?”
    A strong feminine voice interrupted. “So, Seymour, what’s this? Is there a problem?”
    Still maintaining his agent’s grip on the customer’s neck, Simmons looked over and down at the compact diesel of a woman who had come up beside him. “This guy’s a wiseass. Ordered pastrami with mayo.When I called him on it, he switched it to hot corned beef with mayo.”
    The dark-haired woman made a face at her son. “When you ‘called him on it’? Listen to me, boychick: this isn’t Washington. It isn’t even Virginia. You’re in charge of the register now, not national security.” She turned her attention to the struggling customer, whose face had begun to turn red. “You want pastrami with mayo?” The man hesitated, eyed the resolute Simmons, then nodded. “You’re an idiot,” Mrs. Simmons told him flatly. She turned back to her son. “You also are an idiot, Seymour.
Nu?
Idiot number one, give idiot number two what he wants.” So saying, she turned and headed back to the kitchen and the never-ending battle to make sure that part-time employees were not pocketing her sugar and other condiments.
    Simmons did as he was told. In his years as a senior Sector Seven operative he had grown used to giving orders. Well, he could take them as well as dish them out. Straightening his shirt, the customer looked quietly triumphant. Simmons ignored him. What did the fool know? As he rang up the order he let his gaze rove over the busy restaurant. What did any of them know? A few images from nearly a year ago, splashed across the media. Brief images of rampaging robotic lifeforms meting out a limited amount of urban destruction. Then—nothing. Secrecy had descended around the entire incident, just as the world’s political and military establishment had closed ranks around hard knowledge of what had really happened.
    Alien machines had come to Earth. There had been a couple of incidents. That was in the past and theywere being intensively studied by the world’s best engineers and scientists.
    Not a word about the fact that the alien machines were also studying Earth. Or that some of those machines’ intentions were less than altruistic.
    Stories selectively planted with the pulp news magazines, gossip sheets, and rumor-bloggers on the Net gave the impression that the whole business was nothing more than another political cover-up for another military foul-up. A few reports insisted that all the widely seen images of explosions and damaged buildings were publicity for upcoming films about giant alien robots invading Earth. When he came across a cover story in
The National Enquirer
insisting that Elvis’s robot alien offspring were behind the whole thing, Simmons had thrown the scavenged newspaper against the wall of the building he’d been passing. That had resulted in an on-the-spot fifty-dollar littering fine written out by an alert New York cop. The incident had done little to improve the ex-agent’s mood.
    Ex-agent. Of all the iniquities that had been visited upon him since the existence of the Autobots had been revealed, from being deliberately oiled by one of the mechanical monstrosities to being slapped by a delinquent of a teenage temptress, losing his job and its perks had been the hardest blow of all. Despite his earnest entreaties he had not been recruited to join NEST, Sector Seven’s replacement. He had accumulated “too much baggage,” they had politely informed him.
    “Baggage.” How could any undefined “baggage” outweigh his intimate and personal knowledge of theAutobots and their enemies the Decepticons? He knew the real reason he had been dismissed from service, albeit with his pension intact. It was that kid, that smart-ass Witwicky. The aliens’ friend, their good buddy. Him and that—girl. Okay, so maybe he could have been a little nicer to