by Vanessa Muir
Memory Deception
Book Four of the Charlie Spade Series
Vanessa Muir
Copyright © 2019 Creative Brand Ventures, LLC. All rights reserved.
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, organizations, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, organizations or persons, living or dead, is fictionalized or coincidental.
This book is a Hidden Sphinx production. For inquiries regarding this book, please email [email protected].
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author or publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
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Hidden Sphinx Book Club
1
Charlie moved through the interior of the Stormshield Services Group building in Corden Prime, her heart thumping out a pattern against the inside of her throat. The lights were low, but the cameras were still on, and that meant she was already out of time.
Didn’t make a difference. She’d come to do this, and she wouldn’t pull out now.
Charlie strode through the bullpen, the desks lined up, chairs empty at this hour. All of the tablet screens fixed in the desks were darkened. The hair on the back of her neck stood on end. The desk nearest the front, overseeing the view of the city, was empty, as well, but it had been hers. And Eli’s. Before she’d killed him.
Head on, focus. Let’s go.
Charlie entered the hallway that led from the bullpen to the central offices, one of which belonged to Boss Ink, now just Ink. Named for his tattoos, since naming him after his propensity to smoke cigars and turn red with anger had been a more difficult task for the rookies at the Academy when he’d first joined.
The light in his office was on, glaring through the crack between the bottom of his door and the floor.
Charlie stopped in front of it.
She took a breath, grasped the doorknob, and let herself into his office.
Ink sat in his executive chair, his tattooed arms, leading to tattooed hands, were planted either side of his face. His elbows balanced on the desk, he stared down at the tablet affixed to it, the blue light washing over his face.
“Ink,” Charlie said, getting the word out past the lump in her throat. She shut the door with a curt snap.
He lifted his head, saw her, swallowed audibly. “What are you doing here?” he croaked. “I could have you arrested, Spade. I could have your head on a platter in two minutes flat. Did you come in through—”
“The main entrance,” she finished. “I don’t have much time.”
“They’ll already be on the way.” He didn’t sound satisfied or upset by the fact. “What the hell are you doing?”
“I need information, and I know you have it.”
Ink straightened, the leather of his chair creaking. “Why’d you do it, Spade?”
“Do what?”
“Kill Eli, for starters. Betray the State.”
“The State betrayed us,” Charlie replied evenly. “And you know it, too. You’ve seen what’s going on out there.”
He waved a hand. “It’s just a crime spree. It’s under control.”
Charlie considered the possibility that Ink had been brainwashed by her father, one of the unofficial heads of the State. But no, his eyes were bright, and he had the look of a man who’d lied to himself.
“Like hell, it is.” Charlie drew a pistol from the waistband of her jeans and aimed it at him. “Didn’t want to do this, you know. I just need answers, and if you give them to me, shit, I’ll be out of here before you can blink. Either way, I’ve got to leave soon. I’m going to get what I want.”
“So, that’s it. You’re going to kill me, now? Kill me like you killed Eli?”
Charlie ignored the jab. Eli had met his fate because of his betrayal. She was “0 for 2” in the partner department—both had let her down. Jones had gone homicidal; Eli had decided that the State was on the right track—the same governmental institution that wanted to either brainwash its citizens or use them as weapons.
“I can’t tell you anything,” Ink said and looked down at the screen. He cleared his throat. “They’re already on their way, you know.”
“I know. And you’re lying. You can tell me what I need to know.” She clicked the safety off. “And you know what I’m capable of, too.”
Ink’s hands twitched like he wanted to lift them but couldn’t bring himself to do it. Like the thought of supplicating was foreign to him.
“Tell me what the Council’s planning,” Charlie said.
“No idea.”
“Oh, come on. There have been rumors, Ink.”
“What rumors?”
He was still, now. Not daring to breathe, and she got the vibe that it had nothing to do with the gun aimed at his head. Aiming at the chest was pointless—all SSG operatives wore vests.
“Rumors that they’re ‘handling’ the unrest in all the sectors.”
All except for Corden Delta, which had been closed off from the others at the start of the “outbreak.” An outbreak of anger and aggressive behavior rather than disease.
“Speak.”
“Do you really think you’re going to change anything?” Ink asked. “Do you think it makes a difference what you or your little friends do? The State is everywhere. It’s all of us.”
“Cut the shit.”
Ink swallowed. He tapped an icon on the tablet screen, then looked up at her. “Turned off surveillance in here.” Sweat beaded on his forehead. “I never wanted things to go this way, Spade. You were my most promising—”
“Get to the point, fast.”
Sirens had started up nearby.
“They’re inviting ambassadors from the other regions. The other countries. They’re doing damage control. Turns out, grand-scale unrest in our country is something that’s of great interest to other political powers. They’re going to set everyone at ease.”
“Forward me the information I need.”
“You know I can’t do that.”
Charlie lifted the pistol and squeezed the trigger. The slug struck the wall behind Ink’s head.
“Christ!” Ink yelled and covered his ears. “Are you insane?”
“Forward it to me, or I’ll put one between your eyes.”
Charlie didn’t want to do it, even though she’d have to if he didn’t comply. Ink was a lackey, but he was harmless. He wouldn’t attack her. He would do his duty, and she respected that. She’d been that not too long ago.
Ink scrambled onto the tablet and tapped on the screen.
Charlie’s email notification blipped in her ear.
“This is all I know,” Ink said. “I can’t give you any more, Spade. You’re going to have to be happy with that.”
She tapped her temple and viewed the email. It was basic security detail instructions for SSG operatives at a certain time on a certain day.
“Good.” And then she was out the door and down the hall.
The alarm in the building wailed.
2
&nb
sp; Charlie jogged through the corridors of SSG HQ, taking lefts and rights, following the path to the exit, effortlessly. She’d discovered her secret “break spot” years ago and kept it that way, a secret.
Back when she’d started as an agent, she’d been full of excitement and hope for the future. But the wear and tear of being underestimated, condescended to, and eventually doubted completely, had worn on her.
Charlie had started taking longer breaks. She’d found her little slice of quiet time away from her ex-partner, Eli, on the roof.
The agents, the State cops, and perhaps even the Council’s own security forces would expect her to escape out of the only exit to the SSG HQ. One opening in and out, to ensure that security threats could be minimized if there was ever an attack on the building.
She wound between the bullpen’s desks a second time, brushing past her own, just as a bang sounded from the other side of the room.
Charlie dropped to her knees and crawled. She reached the end of the row of desks and peered around them, toward the entrance to the room.
SSG operatives filed inside, accompanied by other men and women in black uniforms, some of them wearing gas masks.
“Spread out,” one of them said, in a voice that was icy as a new winter’s morning. “Between the desks. She’s somewhere in here.”
“Sir, the feed. We’re losing the feed.” Another agent lifted a tablet and tapped on the screen, frowning. He showed it to the leader. “It’s fuzzing out. I don’t understand what’s going on.”
“It’s not your job to understand. Find the supervisor. Bring him to me.”
“Yes, sir.”
Charlie was done watching.
Agents were already walking between the desks, pausing and peering underneath them. They would see her the minute she moved. She was within spitting distance of her goal—the doorway that led to a set of stairs. The stairs that led to the rooftop.
Move. You’ve got to move. You got what you came for.
If there’d been an easier way to get into Ink’s head, she would have done it. But the SSG were locked down tight. Hacking their database had been impossible, even for the superior rebels at Black Mars.
Go. Go. Go.
Footsteps drew closer. A few more seconds and they would be on her.
Charlie burst out from her hiding spot at the end of the row.
Shouts sounded immediately. “There she is!”
“After her.”
“We’ve got her.”
“Don’t shoot, idiots. The Council wants her alive.”
Charlie thundered toward the door, grabbed hold of the handle and wrenched it open. She sprinted up the flight of steps to the second door above. She kicked it once, hard, at the base, as she’d done countless times before, under mundane circumstances, and bullied her way out onto the rooftop.
Almost. Keep moving.
Charlie ran to the edge of the roof and lowered herself at its edge. Her feet dangled over the side.
Quickly.
She removed a pair of black gloves from her pocket and put them on, praying that Levi had given her the right ones and that they would work. Thoughts muddled through her brain. The street below was clear of vehicles—the side of the building unguarded as there were no exits here, no possible escape points for her.
“There she is!” The cry was guttural.
Charlie didn’t look back. She slapped her hand down on the windows below her, against the side of the building, then hopped off the roof.
The glove stuck and held her in place, tightening around her wrist. She hung for a second, then started the slow slide down the building’s side. Windows flashed by, affording her views of the offices in the HQ. They were empty, mostly unlit except for the odd shimmer of light from the hallway.
The wind rushed through her hair. She slowed near the base of the building and landed on both feet. Her knees bent and her free hand hit the concrete. It stuck fast.
“Shit,” Charlie muttered and wrenched it free, glancing up. She couldn’t make out the roof but was certain that the silhouettes of heads would be there, peering down at her. The shouts had silenced. How long before they came down?
“Spade.” Levi stepped out of the darkness. “Quickly.”
She shoved the gloves into her pockets and followed him into the alleyway between the building and the one next to it. It led to a dead end and a grate in the concrete. Levi bent, his dark hair blending in with the night, and extracted a silver implement from his pocket.
He clicked a button on the device’s side and the ends extended, presenting a crowbar. “Help me with this,” he said, as he hooked it into the grate’s top.
Charlie positioned herself next to him, and they leveraged the grate from the ground together. The metal scraped and clanked loud in her ears.
“Down we go,” Levi said, much too merrily for her liking.
He offered her a hand—like she needed help—to lower herself into the abyss below.
Charlie clambered into the hole and waited for Levi at the base of a metal ladder nailed to the wall. He came down, step-by-step, dragging the grate into place above his head. Shouts echoed in the distance, the constant wail of an alarm, the sirens.
Levi dropped down beside her, brushing off his dark turtleneck.
“What have we got?” Levi asked.
3
They stood behind the bank of computers in the underground, waiting as the email Charlie had received from Ink was downloaded and displayed on one of the screens. The other screens showed tormented views of Corden Prime. People running through the streets pell-mell in areas with no law enforcement present. In other places, crazed people being brought down by the cops.
Martial law had been implemented in every region except for Corden Delta—the sector that had been abandoned years ago. Just the normal criminals and no police force there.
Cole, one of the technicians Levi seemed to rely on the most, sat in front of the desk tapping his fingers. “It’s not much,” he said. “We’ve got a date and a time, no place.”
“Security detail.” Charlie grasped the back of his chair and leaned in.
Levi stood next to her, arms folded. He looked down his refined nose at the screen. “Seven high priority targets,” he said. “That’s an interesting way to phrase it.”
“Targets,” Charlie muttered. “What do we know about this?”
“Nothing.” Levi was monotone.
“Something,” Cole put in. “Remember those rumors I told you about? Well, there are various versions, right now, and most of them revolve around the same thing.”
“And that is?”
“Ambassadors are coming from the other countries. Their heads of state are getting involved. It makes sense to me that outsiders would start taking an interest here. If there’s unrest, they can take advantage of the situation.”
“And that’s what they’re doing by coming in? Confirming the unrest? To see for themselves?” Charlie asked. Didn’t make sense to her—why not send spies to find out the truth?
“I don’t know why they’re coming,” Cole said. “But I think I know someone who might. Someone who can help us figure it out.”
“Who?” Levi asked and raised an eyebrow.
Cole spun around in his chair and wheeled backward until the chair hit the desk. He was a messy dude, the counter itself covered in spent bottles and coffee cups. There was an ecosystem down here, people who had come from every profession to join Black Mars and fight against the State.
Refugees had flooded into the underground over the past few weeks, while Charlie, Levi, and the rest of Black Mars tried to find a way to solve the problem. To bring the State and the Councilors to their knees, to rid the world of the deceptive Memory Machines and volatile MemXor for good.
Nothing good could come from saving memories now. It had been proven. The drugs and the machines were a power trip for those in control, and death and madness for the common man.
“Speak, Cole.” Levi had
grown impatient of late.
The worse things got out there, the more the tension escalated underground. People lived their lives as best they could, but supplies were difficult to get a hold of down here.
“You’re not going to like it,” Cole said.
Levi raised an eyebrow.
“An SSG operative. A guy I’ve had on the inside for a while who might be able to help us.”
“Absolutely not,” Charlie said. “There’s no way he hasn’t been compromised.”
“He hasn’t.” Cole gripped the arms of his chair. “I can guarantee it, and I can organize a meeting between you two and him. He’ll have the info we need on who’s coming and why.”
“Ink was supposed to have that information,” Charlie grunted. “Why do you think he’ll have it? I assume he’s lower on the food chain than Ink.”
“He’s been working the other side for quite some time. He’s a plant,” Cole said. “One of our plants. He can be trusted.”
“No.”
Cole licked his lips, gaze shifting from Levi to Charlie and back again. “It’s not up to you, Spade. What do you think, Levi? It’s the only way we’re going to find out what we want. He can’t contact us directly, send us messages or emails or anything else. We’ve got to do this in person.” His hands jerked up in frustration. “Look, what other shot do we have? We’ve got to do something.”
“Levi, don’t do it,” Charlie said. “We don’t know—”
Levi raised a palm.
Charlie silenced, biting on the side of her tongue. She hated being treated like this, and for the longest time, it had felt as if Levi was on her side. That he cared for her in some capacity.
