The Athena File

by Jennifer Haynie

  Wait. Something wasn’t right here. She fanned through the rest of the Bible.

  Since it was the family Bible, Mama and Daddy had kept it clean and free of any pen marks, instead preferring to mark up their personal copies. Yet in chapter 8, someone had underlined three verses, 18, 23, and 26.

  She frowned and sat back on her heals. Why were those underlined? Jonathan used his own Bible. He always kept it on the kitchen table during his morning times with God.

  She read through the verses. Paul’s words echoed in her soul, and they must have resonated with Jonathan as well for him to underline them in a family keepsake.

  A memory teased the edges of her mind like she was in a darkened room searching for a light switch.

  Then it came to her.

  One day over the holidays, she’d been chatting with Jonathan about something while they shared hot chocolate in his study. He’d just finished balancing his checkbook. Then he opened his desk drawer, pulled out the safe key, and inserted it into the safe in the closet. Preferring to enjoy the taste of the hot chocolate and the Christmas music coming from the computer’s speakers, Abigail had remained where she was. Six beeps echoed in her memory, followed by the click of the door.

  “That’s it!” She didn’t care if she spoke those words aloud. Using a pen she’d stashed in her pack, she scribbled the verse numbers on her hand.

  She was about to jump to her feet when a shadow blocked out the porch light.

  Adrenaline rocketed through her body. She cut off her penlight.

  A uniformed patrolman approached the front door and rattled the knob.

  She scurried behind Jonathan’s recliner and huddled in the shadows.

  The bright beam of a flashlight cut through the glass.

  She drew her knees to her chest and hugged the Bible tightly to her. Her breath came in short pants.

  The beam moved closer. It brightened the chair, then moved past it.

  She closed her eyes as it stopped and arced toward her again.

  She didn’t move.

  The flashlight clicked off, returning the room to darkness.

  She remained where she was as the cop moved down the porch steps, then eased around the recliner and huddled against it. The beam flashed through the windows beside the fireplace. A few minutes later, the back doorknob rattled. She remained frozen as she carefully listened to the police band. None of the chatter indicated the cop had found her.

  Several minutes passed. Finally, she rose and crept up the stairs to the study as fast as she dared. With her penlight once more glowing red, she opened the closet door and crouched in front of the safe.

  With the key in the lock, she peered at her hand and silently recited the verses, ordering them in her head like she thought Jonathan might. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. Verse 23.

  Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. Verse 26.

  For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. Verse 18.

  The lock clicked, and she turned the handle. The door popped open slightly.

  I’m in!

  For the first time, she allowed herself a smile as she surveyed its contents. Most of it seemed to be files laid flat. Two objects resting on top beckoned to her.

  A jump drive and another safe key

  She slid both into an inner pocket of her backpack.

  She picked up the files and fanned through them.

  She couldn’t take them, especially since Nick would have the safe drilled within hours.

  Who cared? She could photograph them.

  She turned the blinds of the windows overlooking the backyard so they would hide any incidental light. Then she put the small desk lamp on the floor and turned it to shine on the stack. Since the file was thick, she didn’t waste any time. With her camera in hand, a rhythm developed.

  Click. Turn. Click. Turn.

  Three beeps sounded on the alarm pad in the study.

  Oh, no! She drew in a sharp breath, shoved the files into the safe, and cut off the light. Darkness enveloped her, leaving her night vision temporarily useless.

  “Thanks for calling. Now what did you see?” A voice reached her from the foyer.

  Nick.

  She grimaced and scowled.

  “I thought I saw a red glow from inside,” another man stated, most likely the uniformed cop.

  “Red glow?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Where?” Intensity filled Nick’s voice.

  “Inside. Downstairs in the living room. That’s why I called you since you said you wanted to be notified on the down-low of anything amiss.”

  “You did the right thing. Stay here, and I’ll check.” The door shut.

  Abigail rose and replaced the lamp on the desk. She stepped closer to the door for a better listen.

  “It doesn’t look like anything has been disturbed,” Nick said, this time sounding like he stood near the hall leading to the kitchen. “Did you see anything upstairs?”

  “I didn’t come in and check.”

  Abigail’s pulse began thudding in her ears as her mind raced in all directions. Automatically, she withdrew.

  Her elbow bumped into something.

  She whirled.

  Almost in slow motion, a plastic margarita glass full of coins that Jonathan kept on the corner of his desk wobbled.

  She grabbed at it. Her fingers brushed smooth plastic, sending it over the edge.

  About five dollars’ worth of pennies crashed onto the hardwood floor and rolled all over the place.

  Footsteps thundered across the floor below and echoed on the stairs.

  Abigail rushed to the door and slammed it. She pressed the lock just as something big crashed into the wood. It shuddered.

  Nick.

  “Abigail, I know you’re in there!”

  She cringed and pressed into it as he slammed his shoulder against it.

  The door bounced again, threatening to give way. She glanced down.

  A wedge.

  Without hesitation, she shoved it under the door with her foot.

  Grabbing her backpack and swinging it across her shoulders, she bolted across the room and slipped on the pennies. She caught herself on the desk and staggered to the window behind it. She yanked up the blinds.

  The door threatened to give way.

  “Abigail!” Nick’s bellowed.

  She threw open the window and climbed onto the credenza.

  Frames and a plant toppled over.

  With a loud crack, the door gave way.

  Abigail hurled herself through the window and bolted toward the edge of the screened-in porch’s roof. Without hesitation, she leapt into the air. Her heart plummeted as time hung suspended almost like she did. She hit the soft lawn and rolled to dissipate some of her energy.

  She didn’t look back as she fled into a neighbor’s yard. Darting into the neighborhood bordering Dogwood Hills, she took several deep breaths and walked a couple of blocks south.

  As she cut west toward downtown, her breath eased.

  She’d made it.

  Then she sucked it back in.

  Had she?

  Time would tell.

  18

  Raleigh, North Carolina

  No lamps glowed in the hotel room. Only a pale, sickly fluorescent glow peeked from the cracked bathroom door. An ice bucket sat on the dresser with a companion cup of water on the nightstand. Dressed in her nightshirt, Abigail hunched on the mattress of the king-sized bed. The file of Bryson’s notes from the investigation of the attack on the convoy, courtesy of the drive she’d pilfered from the safe, glowed in a cold light from the laptop’s screen.

  She stared at the contents. Her former sergeant�
��s notes filled the screen and contained almost a blow-by-blow description of how things had gone down the day the Taliban hit the convoy. An IED marooned the lead Jeep. Under fire, Chip Johnson had radioed for help. Five minutes later, all were dead, sixteen clients and eight security personnel. The photographs of the dead bodies didn’t move her. After all, she’d seen her share of crime scene photos on the past.

  Then she came to the description of what Bryson thought had happened to Christine. She’d fought, taking out one Taliban at the Jeep. She tried to escape. The result? Five more Taliban dead. Somehow, they’d caught up to her. Then they’d brutally ended her life in a completely different manner. Rather than death by gunshot, someone had sent a knife into the hollow of her throat. Cause of death? The blade had pierced her carotid artery, and she’d bled out. Poor Jonathan must’ve been dying inside, knowing Christine had been singled out like that.

  The gunrunners had used the hit on the convoy and the murders of twenty-three others to eliminate the one person who could have stopped them. She read the end of the notes Jonathan had made that had drawn those conclusions with her jaw clenched.

  She watched the video Bryson had taken of the gun trade between Nicole, Roy, and Cal with a man whose name she knew all too well. Shamal Khan, a poppy grower and a known leader of the Taliban. Also the man responsible for the annihilation of the Mighty Men, a fact Jonathan hadn’t missed.

  Problem was, it didn’t seem like things had all gone as planned. Shamal Khan had wanted the Athena file, something now in her brother’s possession. Why remained a mystery, one she had to figure out because it somehow stretched further into her brother’s past than his last few days at the compound. And because she, Abigail, didn’t have the file in her hands, she still had no jurisdiction.

  She remained only the sister.

  Her lip curled at the way Nick had needled her with that.

  She closed the video and the Word file and opened up the directory on the jump drive again. She began reading through the Mighty Men’s operational plans and after-action reports, including her own investigation of the battle that had wiped out everyone but David and Jonathan.

  As she perused them again, her phone began ringing.

  She checked Caller ID.

  Nick. For the third time.

  Like the other calls, she let this one roll to voicemail. During her foray to the house, she’d left her phone in the hotel room on the pretext that she’d been sleeping. It was best to continue the charade.

  She scanned the op plans and reports a third time. A theme emerged. She pulled out a notepad and jotted down her thoughts. The Mighty Men had taken up residence at a village in the Ghazni Province in eastern Afghanistan. They’d been tasked to develop a relationship with the local chieftain and train the village men to fight the Taliban. They’d succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. Then the chieftain’s daughter, home on leave from university, joined the local militia with her father’s blessing and even trained alongside her twin brother to the point where she went out with the Mighty Men on direct action missions to assist with gathering intelligence from the local women. From what Abigail could tell, David and Jonathan had taken the lead in training her, especially David. He’d seen potential in her and had recommended that she come to the States for more specialized training.

  “Wait, something’s not right,” she muttered and tore through the reports again. Heavy black lines marred every page.

  Abigail opened the file containing her own investigation years before. The same result. No name for the young woman. She searched for the photo she’d taken of her. Gone. Her report told of the carnage the young woman had witnessed, of how the Mighty Men had fought side by side with the local militia, only to be slowly picked off.

  She closed her eyes and shivered. She’d mentioned that Shamal Khan had most likely received intelligence from an inside source. Who, she’d never discovered, and in the overload of work she’d had, she never had the chance to pursue it.

  Something else teased her memory. She hopped up and paced as she swept her hands through her disheveled hair. “Think, think, think! You’re missing something, Abigail.”

  It teased the edges of her consciousness. She closed her eyes as she stretched her mind back to that fateful day. Then it hit her. The woman she’d seen twice the day before was the very same woman who had been with Jonathan. She had to be the chieftain’s daughter. What was her name? She couldn’t remember. But she’d written a profile about her based upon her interviews with her, David, and Jonathan. She logged into the server at her workplace and searched for the file. “I don’t believe it!”

  She couldn’t find it, not where she’d filed it on the server, and not in the back files. Someone had totally removed it from the system. It was as if the woman had never existed.

  A loud knock on the door exploded through the room.

  Abigail jumped. She shut the laptop and shoved it under the covers along with the notepad, then fluffed the pillows and blankets to make it look like she’d slept.

  “Abigail!” Nick’s voice and more pounding gave her an indication of his mood.

  One hundred percent foul.

  “Nick?” Abigail tried to sound bleary. She rubbed her eyes to make them red as if he’d disturbed her slumber.

  She undid the chain lock and the deadbolt.

  Despite his height being almost equal to hers, Nick loomed over her. Dark stubble coated his jaw, and his shirttails hung out while his tie remained loosely looped around his neck.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked.

  He shoved her aside and stomped into the room. “Where were you at eleven tonight?”

  “What?”

  “You heard me.” He forced her up against a wall as the door thumped closed behind him.

  “I was sleeping.”

  “Then why didn’t you answer my calls?”

  “Because I muted the phone.” She slipped away from him and picked up her phone. “You called?”

  “Like three times.”

  She muted her phone while pretending to thumb through her calls menu. Just in time because it lit up once more with his call. “What…You don’t trust me?”

  “Nope.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Because someone broke into your brother’s house tonight. No, they waltzed inside like they had the key and the fob to the alarm. And you, as co-owner, have both.” He ripped open the dresser drawers and shoved her clothing around. “Where’s the hoodie?”

  “What hoodie?”

  “The one you were wearing.”

  “I don’t have one.” She’d tossed the hoodie into a dumpster somewhere near Fayetteville Street.

  “Ah. Backpack.” He knelt beside the dresser and yanked open the zipper. He pawed through it before turning it upside down. A book, a couple of magazines, and her small travel Bible tumbled to the floor, all items she’d replaced upon her return.

  The drive resided with the computer under the covers. Paranoia had gotten the best of her, and she’d taped the safe key to the underside of the nightstand drawer. “Do you mind? C’mon, Nick! Because I have a key, I would have shown up and asked for entry, don’t you think?”

  “Nope. You were there. I know it.”

  “No, I was here. Someone else was there.” Her pulse pounded. She had to distract him, to dissuade him away from his theory. She gently tugged him away. “I promise I was here. I’m exhausted.” She softened her tone as he faced her. “I came back here after I had coffee and chilled for a bit with some ice and water before trying to grab some rack time.”

  “The hotel reported a key entry at 11:45.”

  “That was me getting the ice because I couldn’t sleep.” She conveniently left out the fact that she hadn’t let the door close when she’d slipped into the hall.

  The tautness in his shoulders finally relaxed. “Okay, okay. I guess I’ve got no choice on the matter.”

  He ran his hands through his dark hair, mussing it like she
remembered from their marriage. She’d always teased him and woven her fingers through those locks. A hated blush began. She could only hope he didn’t see it in the dim light emanating from the bathroom. She leaned against the wall and studied his face. “Are you sure that’s all? You seem really stressed.”

  He sighed. “Sorry. It’s been a bad night made worse, and it’s not even half over. And I hate myself for reacting so badly when I know you’re stressed as well.”

  She shrugged.

  He finally undid his tie all the way. “I’ve also wanted to…well, to…”

  “What?”

  He stepped close to her. “I’ve missed you.”

  Surprise stole her voice.

  He placed a hand on either side of her head and leaned toward her so she fell into his sphere of influence. “I know we parted on bad terms, and I know that it was pretty much all my fault. We had something good, don’t you agree?”

  No, we didn’t. We were not a match at all, she wanted to tell him. The words remained stuck in her throat as his cologne brought her under his spell again. It was as if its musky scent had paralyzed her muscles.

  He skimmed her cheek with his thumb. “You seem surprised.”

  “I’m…I’m…floored, to be honest,” she finally said. Goosebumps popped up along her arms.

  “I’ve learned a lot since then.” His fingers skittered down her arm.

  So have I, like to stay away. Again, his touch stole her voice.

  “Like how to treat the woman I care about.” He nuzzled her hair back as he closed the gap between them.

  “Nick.” She choked out his name.

  “Let me take care of you tonight.” He murmured the same words that had landed them in bed together in the first place. His lips brushed her neck. Then he cupped her face in his hands and kissed her.

  His touch weakened her resolve.

  “You could use the company tonight, and quite frankly, I could too,” he whispered. His arms tightened around her, and one hand drifted toward the hem of her nightshirt.

  “Nick, I—”

  His phone began chiming.

  He pulled back, muttering something about calls coming in at the wrong time.