An Aria for Nick (Christian Romantic Suspense) (Song of Suspense)

by Bridgeman, Hallee

  He stared at her as if inspecting her. Finally he smiled and shook his head. "That's pretty incredible."

  "I used to focus only on music. When I was a senior in high school, my brother taught me how to do it with chemistry. Once I realized it was all about the patterns and formulas, I started applying it to other disciplines."

  Nick nodded toward her laptop. "Go ahead and get in. Let me know when you're there."

  Aria went back to the kitchen, poured a fresh cup of coffee, then sat down at her computer. She could feel her neck tensing up, and took a deep breath. She'd never broken in to NWT's computer system before. Knowing how to hack in and actually doing it were two different things. It had been years, since college, really. She wondered if she could still do it.

  While she worked, she caught herself muttering to herself a couple of times. She even caught herself humming out loud to the tuneless "tune" she created with her code. Twenty minutes later she shifted in her chair and her voice broke the quiet of the room. "I'm in," she announced.

  "What was that song you were singing. Some kind of grunge thing?"

  Aria shook her head. "It's nothing. I didn't mean to hum."

  His expression didn't change but he tilted his head a little to the right. She could tell Nick knew there was more to it and realized she wasn't ready to share. "Go ahead and go to Harrington's files and try to break in there," Nick directed.

  "I'm already there."

  Nick stood and came up behind her chair, looking over her shoulder. "You're pretty good at this."

  Aria felt a little shiver run up her spine at his words, then stood and let him sit in her chair. "Go ahead and look around, but try not to stay on for more than fifteen minutes. I don't want them to be able to track us."

  "If he logs on, will he be able to tell I'm here?" Nick asked her, accessing a file.

  "Not unless he tries to get into the same file you're in. You'll get a little warning of a sharing violation, then all you do is close the file. He should think it was a glitch in the system. That happens occasionally. But the IDS will log it and security will be able to tell we're on. I hid this computer so they may not be able to trace it, but they'll definitely get a report of a remote access, so work fast."

  Aria paced behind him for a while then stepped over the stuff on her floor and sat at the couch. She kept expecting a black sedan to come screeching up outside of her home, unloading men in dark suits to arrest her. She rubbed the back of her neck and picked up her dog-eared and highlighted Bible from the table in front of her. She opened it and started reading Psalm 59. "Deliver me from my enemies, O my God; Defend me from those who rise up against me. Deliver me from the workers of iniquity, And save me from bloodthirsty men."

  She couldn't help but think how fitting that verse was to her right now in this moment of her life and whispered a prayer of thanksgiving for God's provision in the gift of His Word.

  ¯¯¯¯

  Chapter 14

  NICK could find nothing in Harrington's computer. He didn't think that he would to begin with. The man was pretty good at covering his tracks from what Nick could tell so far, and to store something on his office system would be foolish. Nick didn't like to leave any stone unturned and he knew that the most insignificant looking items sometimes revealed the key to malicious intent. Aria was no longer watching what he was doing, so he accessed her personnel file. He was reading her list of merits when the bottom of the screen he'd just switched to caught his attention. Under employment status, it read "terminated." The date was today.

  He felt a cold chill run through his body and his instincts told him to get her out of there. Immediately. Instead, he backed out of the NWT computer system. It was time to check in.

  He went to his duffle bag and rooted around until he found a small black box. He disconnected the cord from the base of the phone and connected it to the box, then ran a line from the box to the phone. Following the feeling in his gut, he engaged the scrambler, which would prevent anyone on the other end from determining his location, and dialed a fourteen-digit number from memory. When a recording asked for the extension he wanted, he dialed another twelve-digit number, then had to enter a pass code. He wasn't expecting Jennifer Thorne to answer the call. "Dove this is Nighthawk hacking away."

  Breaking protocol because she knew the connection was secure, Jen said, "Good heavens, Nick. Charlie's been asking every twenty minutes if you'd called in yet."

  "I didn't know this was a priority task," Nick said. "Why are you answering?"

  "He's on his extension, talking with the other agents in Portland."

  "Oh? Who else is here?" He knew. The blood in his veins felt frozen, icy with fear.

  "Balder and Hecate. Look, Nick, that Suarez is a real number. We've been researching her. Where are you calling from, anyway?"

  "A pay phone not far from her current location. I decided to scramble in case they have this booth tapped." He found a paper and pen in the top drawer of her desk. "When did Balder arrive?" He glanced at Aria, who was watching him with a confused look on her face.

  "About ten minutes ago. Hang on a sec, Nick, I think Charlie just hung up." While Nick was put on hold, he scribbled a quick note for Aria:

  Go pack 1 backpack with essentials and get ready to leave right now.

  "Nick, where have you been?" Charlie asked.

  "Enjoying the sites of beautiful Portland. Do you have any idea how many varieties of coffee they serve here?" Nick watched Aria move quickly to her bedroom, not questioning him. He knelt on the floor and began to very quickly and efficiently re-pack his bag.

  "Don't play games with me. You don't drink coffee. You're supposed to check in every eight hours."

  "I'm not some newbie, Charlie. When did this case elevate above code blue protocols?"

  "We're dealing with something bigger than we first thought, and that Suarez girl is at the center of it all. She has a genius level IQ and she's the one doing the deal making. It's pretty clear she decided to turn in a coworker to cover her tracks. I don't know what kind of evidence, and I use that term loosely, she's shown you, but you can bet your life it's all faked. Trust me, Nick. This girl is a puppet master."

  "She hasn't shown me anything substantial yet. I've been working on researching the guy she's pointing the finger at."

  "Find anything?"

  "Nothing worth talking about." Aria walked into the room and gathered her laptop and power adapter. She put them into her backpack, then stood at the door watching him. "He looks pretty clean to me." Nick finished packing his bag and zipped it up.

  "I dispatched Hecate and Balder. They just called in from the airport. I want the three of you to interview her vigorously. See what you can get out of her."

  Nick stalled, "Want me to involve the locals or coordinate with any other agencies on this? The FBI field office…"

  "No. Definitely not. Her target objective has to remain confidential." Nick guessed Charlie didn't want any other agencies to learn about the summit he had set up, though they likely already knew. Treasury ran the Secret Service and Homeland and FBI would be all over it this close to the date. "Let's keep this in house for now, Nick."

  "If they just arrived at the airport, they'll be here in about twenty minutes," Nick calculated.

  "You guys call me as soon as you've taken her into custody. And remember, she's more dangerous than she appears."

  "I don't need a baby-sitter, Charlie. And really, there was no need to bring Balder in." He stood and slung the strap of the bag over his shoulder, and grabbed up the other one.

  "We didn't know what had happened to you, kid. You didn't check in, and like I said, she's a feisty one. I didn't want another Nigeria."

  Nick closed his eyes and forced unpleasant memories back. "I'll call you when they get here." Nick hung up and disconnected the scrambler box from the land line. He turned toward Aria.

  "Leave your phone. It's definitely compromised. Let's go," he ordered, grabbing her arm and propelling her
out the door to his car, where he opened her door and practically pushed her inside. He threw his bags into the back-seat, not wanting to take the time to open the trunk, then started the car and backed out of the driveway.

  "What happened?" Aria asked.

  "The tables have turned on you. You're being set up for this whole thing." Nick maneuvered his way through her neighborhood. After a few minutes of moderately light midmorning traffic, they approached the interstate, and at the last minute, Nick headed north.

  "Can't we show them the evidence I have against Peter?"

  "They dispatched Balder and Hecate. I've worked with them a few times before and they have a reputation. Trust me. They're not at all concerned with your evidence." Nick merged with the traffic and kept the speed within the limits. He didn't want to risk a traffic stop.

  "Who are Balder and Hecate?" Aria asked in a tight voice.

  "Balder is an assassin. His second best specialty is water-boarding. His first is long range sniper tasks. Hecate's a tracker like nothing you've ever seen before. It doesn't matter where we go, now, or how we try hide. She'll eventually find us. We need to dump this car."

  ¯¯¯¯

  JUST before they left the city, Nick got off the interstate and turned back toward town. "What bank do you use?" he asked.

  She told him and directed him toward the main branch. "I don't want to run the risk of using my card. Balder might have already made it to your house. Do you have any money in the bank?"

  "I still have most of the money you left me in a savings account." She leaned her head back on the seat and closed her eyes. Since meeting a dead man at a coffee shop yesterday, her life had become one more surreal event than the last. Could any of this actually be happening to her?

  "What money?" Nick asked, pulling into the bank parking lot.

  "You named me as your sole beneficiary, including your life insurance. I also got the money you had in your checking account."

  Nick stared at her for a moment. "I'd forgotten about that. How much do you have?"

  Aria shrugged. "I don't know. A little over two hundred thousand left, I think."

  Nick blinked, twice, and realized that sometimes things actually did work out in his favor. He did a quick mental calculation. "Go ahead and get fifty thousand out if they'll let you. The main branch will have that much in small bills on hand. I'll wait out here for you."

  Aria pulled her savings book out of her purse and went inside the bank. Twenty-six minutes later, she got back in the car carrying two rather full medium sized rectangular faux leather bank bags with zippers on one of the long sides. "I got sixty thousand."

  Nick nodded. "I don't want to get back on the interstate. They know we're gone by now. We'll drive east through town," Nick told her before starting the car.

  "You're the boss," Aria asserted, then closed her eyes again.

  Nick hardly spared her a glance, but he began to seethe inside. How? Who? What had tipped Harrington off? It would take everything in his power to help Aria, and he thanked God Charlie had handed him this assignment.

  About twenty miles outside the city, Nick spotted a rest area and pulled in, parking way in the back near the dog walk. He turned and knelt in his seat, rummaging through his bag, finding the supplies he needed, then sat back down facing the front.

  Aria rested her back against the door and watched him. He had a long flat box and she snuck a peek when he opened it. Inside were dozens of little compartments, each containing a pair of contact lenses in every color imaginable. She watched as he selected a dark brown pair and popped them into his eyes, then tilted his head back with his eyes tightly closed. She saw a tear escape and run down the side of his face, and resisted the urge to wipe it away.

  "I hate these things." His almost absentminded admission surprised her. He wiped his eyes then restarted the car. "We're going to find a hotel and lay up, then I'm going to go back and break into NWT."

  "Isn't that risky?" Aria asked. Her voice sounded a little bit panicky to her, and she tried to stifle it before she decided that she should be allowed to feel a little bit panicky.

  "They won't expect me to go there. I'm supposed to be meeting up with Balder and the security at NWT is pretty tight, so it seems risky for me to tackle it alone — even if that were the plan, which it never was. When I don't meet up with Balder or Hecate, they'll start looking for me. So tonight will probably be the only chance I'll get," he explained. "We'll need to leave immediately afterward, though. Once I'm out, they'll know it was me and we'll have a hard time getting out of the city."

  "Then don't do it. Let's just go somewhere and hide," she suggested. Unexpected and unwanted tears filled her eyes and she angrily wiped them away.

  Nick put the car back in park and turned to her. "Listen to me, Aria. I don't know who's behind this, but someone wants to get at you so much they sent in Balder and Hecate. If they told him to, Balder would murder his own mother and sleep like a baby. He's like a machine. Hecate looks like an innocent school girl but she's more like a vampire. There's no telling how many men died with her face being the last thing they saw in life. You stumbled onto something big here, and I don't have anyone else I can trust right now. We need to find out what we can while we still have the chance."

  Aria lifted her chin and fought back the emotions that threatened to consume her. When this was over, she promised herself she would find a dark room and have a good crying fit. "Some friends of my parents from when we were stationed here at Lewis-McChord retired a few years back. They bought a cabin near Mt. Hood not long ago. They gave me a key hoping I would use it and check on their cabin a few times a year. No one else knows about it."

  Nick looked at her for a few seconds, watching her keep a tight grip on her control. "Good girl. Where to?" Aria gave him directions, then leaned back in her seat and tried to relax.

  ¯¯¯¯

  AFTER several turns, each road becoming more rural and narrow than the one before, they finally drove onto a climbing dirt road that twisted and turned through the Oregon woods. Nick had to navigate the car carefully over one particularly bad patch of road, then they rounded a curve and suddenly came upon the clearing and the cabin. Aria released a breath she hadn't been aware she was holding when she saw that it was empty. She dug around in her purse and found the key.

  "I was almost afraid they'd be here," she acknowledged as she got out of the car and grabbed her backpack and her laptop. Nick accepted the offered key from her and opened the front door, then did a quick search inside with his pistol at the ready.

  It was a relatively new nicely built cedar log cabin with a kitchen, a main room, and a bedroom with a full bath. One wall in the main room was all glass and faced the view of the mountains rising up around them. The kitchen had obviously been designed for a cook and boasted state-of-the-art appliances. Aria inspected the kitchen and found a pantry filled with canned food and some dried goods. She gathered supplies and started putting together a light meal. It was already four, and the bowl of cereal she'd eaten at noon was long gone.

  She started heating up a pot of water for some pasta and opened a jar of spaghetti sauce. It dawned on her as she stirred the sauce that she had started to feel relaxed. The shock of the events which had transpired over the last twenty-four hours and the situation in which she'd found herself for the last two months felt unreal right now. She realized that she completely trusted Nick to take care of this for her. He would find out who was behind this, she knew. He would stop the plan to detonate a nuclear device and he would clear her name.

  ¯¯¯¯

  NICK felt trapped by the almost overwhelming longing that swept over him as he stood in the doorway of the kitchen and watched Aria prepare the meal. He finally gathered up what strength he had and turned around, silently going back to the main room. Now was not the time.

  No matter how cozy and intimate their surroundings felt, it was not the time to explore the feelings he had always had for her. Somehow his emotions were no long
er manageable and wanted to come to the forefront of his mind. He couldn't let his guard down now and having that conversation with her would certainly require his complete attention. He paced the main room, shutting his eyes and forcing himself to think, desperately searching for his lost self-control. Finally, he turned and headed back to the kitchen, making as much noise as possible along the way.

  Aria looked up from the sink where she was draining the pasta and gave him a small smile. "I figured you were hungry, too, and a can of soup just didn't sound very appealing," she said to him.

  Nick lifted a lid from a pot on the stove and inhaled the fragrant spices coming up with the steam. "Spaghetti's fine."

  "We're only about an hour outside the city," she said. "We kind of came in a roundabout way, so that's what took us so long to get here."

  In an effort to break the relaxed and intimate mood, he said, "Aria, when I leave tonight, if I'm not back in six hours, I'm probably not coming back."

  "If you're shooting for a way to make me wait up for you, you just hit the bullseye," Aria said. She pulled two plates out of the cupboard.

  Nick ignored her attempt at lightness. "We need to plan what to do if that happens."

  He watched her hands tremble and heard the plates clank together before she set them on the counter. "I don't want to think about that. Can't we just assume that nothing will happen?"

  "You wouldn't last a day on your own, Aria. These people do this for a living. You need to have a plan if you want to survive." Nick sat at the table and watched her mechanically fill plates.

  "I could go to my brother in Atlanta. He'll know what to do next," she said. Her brother, John Suarez, was a Detective with the Atlanta Police. Aria carried the plates to the table and sat down. "I forgot forks," she whispered as she turned to get them.