“Nikki.” Her throat was so dry that speaking caused a coughing fit.
“Jackson?”
“Nikki, I need your help.” Jackson tried to calm down. Panic wasn’t going to help anyone. “Some guys grabbed Elle.”
“What?”
“Our car was forced off onto the service road just before the bridge.” Jackson tried to check her position. “I think I’m at the shore, somewhere near the foot of the bridge. I can hear traffic.”
“I’m on my way.”
“Bring the tracker. I still have my PTD and so does Elle.” Thank God for small favors.
Jackson clicked off and stowed the phone in her pocket. She checked the doors. The roof of the vehicle was against the ground making it impossible to open the doors. The doorframes were probably bent from the inverted weight of the car. She crawled back to the waterlogged front seat and opened the console in the dash. Various items spilled out, splashing into the murky water. She felt around until she found what she was looking for. A hammer with a sharp point meant for just this purpose—breaking a window in the off chance your car became submerged in water.
Within minutes, Jackson crawled out the rear side window, careful to avoid the confetti of glass on the ground. She crawled to a spot on the dry grass, dragging the duffel behind her. She searched in the bag for an inhaler and took two hits. Her lungs felt instantly soothed. Too much unprotected time in the open made her lungs ache. She squinted at the sky trying to decipher the time of day.
Hang on, Elle. We’re coming.
* * *
Elle woke with a jolt.
She was lying on her side on a thin cot in a dimly lit room. There were no windows, but there was a metal door in one wall with a small rectangular opening rather than a window. She sat up, swinging her feet to the floor. The sudden repositioning made her head swim. She pressed her fingers to her temple. A low wattage light came on overhead. She blinked into the glare.
The door opened and a man in a suit walked in. He dragged a chair from across the room and placed it a few feet away. He took a seat, facing Elle.
He looked more like a banker than a gangster. His fine clothing seemed an odd contrast to the dinginess of the room. His gaze was intense and made her skin crawl. His jacket was dark and so was the dress shirt and tie underneath, making it hard to tell where one ended and the other began. He was probably Liam’s age, with close-cropped gray hair.
She waited for him to speak.
“We have a problem, Dr. Graham.”
She didn’t respond.
“You see, we’ve leveraged ourselves against the future sale of phytoplankton.” He paused. “And now, it seems, we’re empty-handed.”
Still, she said nothing.
“You’re going to explain to me what happened.”
“What do you mean?”
“I find it impossible to believe that you came back with nothing.” He dusted some tiny bit of fuzz from the sleeve of his suit jacket. “I think…no, I know, that you’re a very smart woman. And when you found out what was happening, you found an alternative way to transport samples.”
“You’re mistaken, we—”
“No one is coming to save you, Dr. Graham.” His eyes were shadowed. “I’m your best hope of survival here. You help me and I help you.”
These people had to be the they that Ted had alluded to. Ted, Harris, and Nunez were all dead. And if Jackson hadn’t surprised Harris and then overtaken Nunez, Elle would be dead too. In desperation, Liam had been willing to shoot her. Now she had some idea why. Liam wasn’t pulling the strings, he was simply the front man. There was no way this guy was her savior. He was right. She was smart. Too smart to fall for these lies.
“Where are we?”
“This is how things work.” He paused, his voice unnervingly calm. “You tell me something and then I tell you something. That’s how we’re going to play this game.”
His patronizing tone fanned her anger.
“Your men drugged me and brought me here against my will.” An image of Jackson being hoisted into the car flashed through her mind threatening to upend her. She needed to stay focused and remain calm. “Why would I trust you?”
“You have no other choice.” He didn’t apologize or make excuses for his methods.
He stood and slid the chair closer, then sat down.
“Now, let’s begin again.”
The door opened and a creepy looking man walked into the room carrying a small case under his arm. He was wearing gray slacks and a white oxford shirt buttoned all the way to the top, but without a tie. He wore dark framed glasses and had short, unruly brown hair. His back was toward them. He unzipped the case and let it fall open on the narrow table against the far wall. Then he turned to face them. His hands were casually clasped in front. He seemed to be waiting for further instruction. This was quickly turning into a scene from a horror movie.
“You will tell us everything, Dr. Graham.” He motioned toward the other man. “Or my associate will force you to tell us everything. We’ll let you choose.”
A cold chill ran up her spine and tears threatened her precarious composure.
The anguish of not knowing what had happened to Jackson further threatened to capsize her fragile state. She’d somehow wrongly, naively imagined that bad things only happened to bad people. But it seemed that there was no guarantee from the universe of the existence of some moral order to the world. It seemed now the world was indifferent to individual destiny. The good were swept along with the evil, both hurtling toward the inevitable demise of the planet.
What did it matter now if she told him the truth, or not? She assumed she was dead either way. Jackson was probably dead already too. A world without Jackson was a world she had no interest in continuing to inhabit.
Chapter Thirty-four
Jackson climbed the embankment to the edge of the service road to wait for Nikki. There was nothing she could do except wait and the waiting was making her crazy.
If anything happened to Elle she knew she wouldn’t survive it. Meeting Elle had been like looking through a window and getting a glimpse of a better world. Everything looked different since they’d made their return jump. Everything felt different with Elle. She wasn’t ready to let that go.
She saw the car approach and paced at the side of the road.
Nikki pulled to a stop and opened the door.
“Don’t get out.” Jackson held up her hand and rounded the SUV to the passenger side. “You drive. I’ll read the tracker.”
Nikki handed her the device when she got in.
“Jackson, you look like hell. Are you sure you don’t need a medic?” Nikki reached in the back and then offered Jackson a small towel.
“What’s that for?”
“Your head.” Nikki motioned with the towel.
Jackson touched the place where the bandage had been. It was long gone and the cut had reopened. Her fingers were red when she looked at them. She accepted the towel and pressed it to her temple.
“I don’t need a medic. Just go, just go now.”
Nikki did a three-point turn and drove back the way she’d come.
The tracking device rebooted and Jackson set it to search for Elle’s signal. Her heart beat painfully fast until a flashing blue dot appeared on the GPS screen. Finally, a fucking break.
“South, go south.” She pointed and Nikki turned right and hit the gas.
“Liam is dead.”
“What?” Jackson wasn’t sure she’d heard correctly.
“Liam is dead.” Nikki glanced over. “He was being transferred to await a hearing. There was an ambush. Liam and the two guards with him were gunned down.”
“Fuck.” Jackson’s mind raced. “Liam’s dead and someone kidnapped Elle. There’s got to be a connection. I just don’t know what it is yet.”
“It makes sense.”
“What do you mean?” Jackson’s eyes had been glued to the tracking screen. “Turn left here.”
; “There was no way Liam was the only one in on this, right? There was just no way.”
“Yeah.” She felt stupid. How had she let this happen? How the fuck had this happened?
“We’ll get her back, Jackson.”
Jackson nodded, but doubt and worry crowded her mind.
“Jackson, look at me.” Nikki grabbed her arm. “We’re going to get her back.”
“Did you call this in?” Jackson wasn’t waiting on backup, but it would be nice to know if it was on the way.
“Yeah, I called it in right after I spoke to you.”
“Good.”
* * *
Twenty heart-pounding minutes later, Nikki slowed and parked in an alley. They were close. Elle was somewhere nearby in one of these abandoned factory buildings. Water was halfway up the tires when they parked. Jackson’s pants were still wet from earlier. She sloshed from the SUV to the back side of the nearest concrete building. This had once been an industrial park and was now being slowly reclaimed by the sea. A couple of the structures were on a slight rise so they were practically an island, surrounded by shallow tidal seep.
Jackson checked the magazine and jammed it back in. She’d put an extra full clip in her pocket. She adjusted the straps of the Kevlar vest over her damp T-shirt and then switched the tracking device to silent mode. Nikki was at her shoulder.
“It looks like she’s in that one.” Jackson motioned toward one of the two structures not standing in water.
She eased to the corner of the building and surveyed the empty street. The air quality was crap down here. This wasn’t going to work. She’d be coughing her head off and give their position away. As if reading her thoughts, Nikki trotted back to the vehicle and returned with masks with side mounted re-breathers.
“Thanks.”
“I’ve got your back.”
Jackson paused before slipping on the headgear and looked at Nikki.
“Thank you.”
“Hey, you’d do the same for me.” Nikki touched her shoulder.
Jackson nodded. She was too choked up to speak. The stakes were too high.
“Listen, this is what we do. We’ve got this.” Nikki slid the visor down over her face.
Jackson appreciated the pep talk. That was usually her job. And maybe this time she was the one who needed it.
Using hand signals to communicate, they silently and methodically worked their way through random rubble along the broken pavement until they reached the entrance to the building. Only when they got close did Jackson spot the SUV that had taken Elle. It was parked on the first floor of the building. Someone had driven it right through a huge opening where a wall must have once existed. There was no one on this first floor, but that didn’t mean they wouldn’t run into resistance once they entered the building.
Jackson took a moment to settle. She closed her eyes and took a deep, slow breath.
She needed to focus. And she needed to tamp down her anger. She needed to be cool and tactical. Elle needed her and she wasn’t about to let her down.
Nikki signaled toward a dark stairwell ahead and to the right. Jackson nodded.
Showtime.
They descended cautiously into the belly of the beast.
Chapter Thirty-five
The drugs were kicking in. They had tied Elle to the chair to keep her from sliding out of it. She’d been stalling, hoping for a miracle. The thin man had given her sodium thiopental. The drug slowed the speed at which her body was sending messages from her spinal cord to her brain. As a result, it was going to become more difficult to perform high-functioning tasks, the concentration needed to think up a plausible lie, for example.
She had the sense that she was somewhere between consciousness and nodding off.
The man who’d first come to the room clapped his hands loudly.
“Wake up, Dr. Graham.” He sat in a chair facing her.
“Please let me go.”
“Tell me what I want to know first.” He tipped her head back with a finger under her chin. “Where are the samples you harvested?”
“In the ocean.”
“I know they came from the ocean. Where are they now?” He slapped her, jolting her back to the moment. “Stay with me! There’s no way you would go through everything you went through to come back empty-handed. Where are they?”
“We put them back in the ocean.”
“You gave her too much. She’s not making any sense.” He was angry with the thin man.
There was a loud pop, and then a second and third in rapid succession. Elle squinted beneath the bright, overhead light. Her head was pounding. She wiggled her fingers which had fallen asleep. The ropes were stinging her wrists.
“What the fuck is going on?” The angry man stood up, knocking his chair over.
Someone else was in the room now. Another loud blast. Was that gunfire?
Jackson got a glimpse of Elle through the narrow opening in the door. She plowed into the room in a rush, Nikki was right behind her. They surprised the two men, one of whom lunged at her. He reached inside his jacket for a weapon, but she was on him before he was able to take aim. She committed all her weight into charging him. She caught him in the gut with her shoulder and they both went down. His sidearm slid across the floor and under the bed. She straddled him and struck him twice with her pistol. He didn’t move.
Behind her, Nikki had pinned the second man to the floor. She was on a radio now. The cavalry had arrived and was following the trail of bodies to their location. She and Nikki had taken out the four guys who’d forced her off the road.
Jackson registered everything despite her focus on Elle. Jackson rushed to her. She brushed Elle’s hair away from her face to get a better look. Elle didn’t seem herself; her head lolled so Jackson held onto her.
“Baby, talk to me. Are you hurt?” She worked the ropes loose, and when she did Elle practically slid into her arms.
“Jackson?” Elle touched Jackson’s face. “Are you real? Am I dreaming?”
“Yes, sweet girl…this is a bad dream, but it’s over now.” Jackson sank to the floor cradling Elle in her arms. She drew Elle to her chest and held her. “It’s over now. Everything is going to be okay.”
A medic was at her side within minutes. He checked Elle’s pulse and her pupils. Jackson reluctantly released Elle so that the emergency medical team could get her onto a stretcher.
“We’ve got her now, Commander.” One of the men spoke to her. “She’s in good hands.”
On some level, Jackson knew he was telling her the truth, but it didn’t matter. She didn’t want to let Elle out of her sight. Jackson swiveled, looking for Nikki. From across the room, Nikki met her gaze.
“Go.” Nikki motioned for her to leave. “You go, we’ve got this.”
The two men had been handcuffed and a handful of soldiers were in the room now to assist with the captured assailants.
Jackson nodded and strode to the door. She followed the stretcher upstairs and climbed into the back of the ambulance. She held Elle’s hand. Elle blinked and then smiled at her.
“You came to my rescue again.” Her voice was weak.
“I’ll always come to your rescue.” Jackson raised Elle’s fingers to her lips and held them there. Relief flooded her system. Elle was alive. Elle was safe. Nothing else mattered.
Chapter Thirty-six
Elle held a forkful of noodles aloft to allow them to cool. It had been two days since the incident, and she was finally getting to cash in on the pasta dinner she’d been promised. Across from her, Jackson swirled noodles using her fork and a spoon.
“I never mastered that.” Elle was amused by the mouthful Jackson had just managed.
Jackson chewed and swallowed.
“I have skills.”
“No one doubts that.” Elle laughed. “Most certainly not me.”
So much had happened in the past two days. So much had been revealed.
Liam had not acted alone. He was simply the tip of the
spear for Emosyne, one of the largest polluters of air, water, and climate on the planet. Emosyne Industries dumped more pollutants into the nation’s waterways than US Electric and American Paper combined.
They’d seen the writing on the wall because they’d been the ones who put it there.
What better way to cash out than to sell the cure for the problem they’d helped create in the first place. They basically bought BIOME’s leadership with dark money, and in return, Liam was to deliver the harvested phytoplankton. They would grow it, store it, and then sell it for a huge profit to nations all around the world.
It was an exploitive opportunity too big to pass up, like buying up water rights in Third World countries.
“What deep thoughts are you thinking over there?” Jackson’s question coaxed her back to the moment.
“I was just thinking how I was working for the devil without even realizing it.”
“You don’t know that.”
“They funded this mission, I’m sure they funded lots of the research at BIOME, including mine.”
How had their lucrative blend of pollution, speculation, and law-bending been allowed to continue? Their dirty money had even been one of the primary funders for climate denial. How could Liam have been so completely turned?
“I can’t stop thinking about Liam. About what changed for him.” Elle genuinely struggled to understand why he’d acted as he had.
“Maybe he just lost hope.” Jackson reached across the table and covered Elle’s hand with hers. “It happens to all of us.”
Elle rotated her hand to entwine their fingers. She dislodged the negative thoughts. Elle wanted to focus on Jackson and on getting back to a normal life.
“I’m sorry, I just can’t stop turning over every detail in my head, looking for what’s underneath.”
“I know how you science types are.” Jackson smiled. “Always looking for answers.”
Elle squeezed her hand lightly.
“At least something good has come out of all of this.”
“You mean, besides meeting me?” Jackson twirled more noodles with her free hand.
The Sea Within Page 21
