Dark Deceptions

by Dee Davis

  With fingers long practiced, she manipulated the crevices and curves, and with a small squeak of protest, the box sprang open, revealing its treasure.

  The faded petals of a rose.

  Cliché, really. But she smiled, her mind drifting back to the market square and the sweet smell of roses. No one had ever given her flowers before. And in that moment—everything had been perfect.

  But nothing was forever.

  She closed the box and put it back on the mantel, ashamed suddenly of her vulnerability. It was only a memory. Turning her back on the mantel, she sat in the wing chair, snuggling into the warmth of its cushions as the snow fell and the fire snapped and hissed.

  Life was in the present. Here in the mountains. With Adam.

  And on that note…

  She stood up and began gathering the myriad toys scattered throughout the room. A Tonka truck, a Leapfrog cartridge, a Lego pirate, a Happy Meal racecar, and a stuffed turtle named Timmy. Crossing the room, she tossed the toys into a plastic basket, and satisfied that she’d tidied a bit, started for the kitchen and a hot cup of tea.

  Before she’d taken two steps, she stopped, instinct sending a warning as the hairs on her arms rose ominously. She waited, hardly daring to breathe, trying to figure out what it was that bothered her.

  And then she heard it—a low screeching noise as if a window were opening or something were being dragged across the floor. She froze, concentrating on identifying the location of the noise, her heart hammering to a stop as something moved again.

  Upstairs.

  With Adam.

  Mind scrambling, she quickly went through the possibilities. Most likely an animal. The worst of which would be a bear. Thanks to the summer drought, food was in short supply. But bears were more interested in the kitchen than an upstairs bedroom. Burglary was possible, but uncommon here in the mountains, which meant if the intruder was human, it was most likely a vagrant looking for a warm bed for the night. Unless, somehow, her cover had been blown.

  She discarded the notion as quickly as it had occurred. It had been too long and she’d been too careful. Probably just the wind. But better safe than sorry. She grabbed the poker and headed toward the stairs. She’d have preferred her Beretta, but it was upstairs in a lockbox. Too far from Adam. There simply wasn’t enough time.

  Moving silently on bare feet, she crept up the stairs, straining for further indication of where the danger lay. If only she could get to Adam’s room, they could crawl out the window. The gable would give them a way down to the roof of the porch and from there to the ground—and safety.

  The landing at the top of the stairs was shrouded in darkness. It provided cover, but made it difficult to see. At the end of the hall, the glow from Adam’s night-light spilled out into the corridor, the soft light almost comforting in its normalcy. She started to move, pulling up short as a shrill moan echoed through the house, the sound emanating from the spare room.

  Adrenaline flooded through her and she lifted the poker as she stepped from the landing into the hallway, ready for a fight.

  Nothing moved.

  Waiting another moment, just to be certain, she inched forward, back to the wall, sucking in a breath as she swung into the spare room. A breeze lifted the curtain as snow spilled through a broken window. Jammed into the hole, a twisted tree limb moved back and forth, screeching against the jagged glass. Annie sighed, relief washing through her, her warrior instincts dissipating as quickly as they’d come.

  She’d meant to cut back the tree. Remove that branch. But there’d always been something else to do and she’d kept putting it off. Now she’d be replacing a window as well.

  First thing tomorrow.

  Grabbing a towel, she stuffed it into the hole between the glass and the branch. Then, after bending to retrieve the poker, she headed back into the hall to check on Adam. The hall was warmer than the spare room, but she shivered anyway. The aftermath of her scare.

  Adam’s room was chaotic as always. No matter how easy she made it to put away toys or how often she managed to do it herself, there was still always a mess, her son fond of throwing things every which way.

  His bed was shadowed, his covers piled high. As usual, he’d burrowed his way to the very bottom of the bed. As a toddler he’d always managed to turn himself round about. Head under the blankets, tiny little toes pressed against the pillow. Nothing had changed.

  She smiled, lifting the covers, and then choked on a scream as she realized there was no Adam. Only a pile of abandoned stuffed animals, their friendly faces adding horror to her rising panic. The wind outside whistled, drapes flying high as she whirled to face an open window.

  Heart shriveling, she called Adam’s name, her mind conjuring images of him hurt and frightened.

  Outside, in the softly falling snow, she could see fading tire tracks on the drive. Someone had been here. Someone had taken her little boy.

  “Adam,” she screamed again, but the wind whipped her words away, taunting her terror. “Adam��”

  But she was too late.

  Adam was gone.

  “So in the final days of April, General Hooker leads the Army of the Potomac upstream to slip around Lee’s left flank.” Nash drew a hooked arrow on the board to illustrate the point, just as the beeper on his belt vibrated twice. “Lee responds aggressively and during the first week of May wins what may have been his greatest victory.” The beeper vibrated again, this time repeating its message twice, but Nash ignored it, looking instead at his students. “Who can tell me what happens next?”

  Several hands shot up, while others thumbed through their text.

  “Hillary?”

  The girl smiled, shifting provocatively in her seat. “The Confederates march into Pennsylvania.”

  “Right,” Nash said, nodding encouragingly, his beeper practically dancing against his hip. “Then what?”

  “General Meade kicks his ass,” Reggie Fenderman said, accompanied by general laughter.

  “I don’t know that I’d have chosen those exact words, but you’re right. The Army of the Potomac did indeed defeat Lee at Gettysburg in July 1863. Which, as we know, changed the course of the war. And tomorrow, we’ll find out why. For today, time’s up.” He nodded at the students, reaching down to shut off the insistent electronic device. Damn technology.

  Three giggling coeds waited at the foot of the dais. “Professor Brennon? We have a couple of questions.”

  He groaned inwardly. It wasn’t that he didn’t welcome inquiring minds, but these three were more about chatting up the prof. “Ladies, you know I’d love nothing better than to stay here and discuss the war with you, but I’m afraid I’m late for a meeting.”

  Emmett appeared in the doorway, assessing the situation with a mocking grin. When Nash had started teaching American history eight years ago, enrollment had jumped 25 percent—most of them female, much to the amusement of his colleagues.

  “They’re getting younger every year.” Emmett grinned.

  “Don’t remind me.” Nash closed his briefcase and shrugged into his jacket. “I got a pair of panties in the mail last week. Jesus, you’d think they’d be more interested in guys their own age.”

  “Hey, you’re our resident rock star,” Jason said, joining them as they walked down the hallway, stopping in the doorway of another classroom.

  Nash was currently chairman of the history department, and his dissertation on the role of espionage during the Cold War was considered, by some, the preeminent document on understanding various intelligence strategies used by both the United States and the U.S.S.R.

  “Tomorrow, your essays on Lenin are due,” Hannah was saying from a lectern at the front of the room. Her dark hair was cut short, strands spiking in every direction. “And starting next week, we’ll begin our discussion on Trotsky and the effect he had on the communist movement in Russia, so I’ll expect you all to have read the text. And, Martin, that means you.”

  Ignoring the resulting laught
er, she quickly strode to the back of the room. “I swear to God, next year I’m going to petition to teach Western civ. It’s got to be a hell of a lot easier than trying to get this lot to understand the differences between communism, fascism, and democracy. So what’s with the summons?”

  “No idea,” Emmett said, still limping a bit from his injury in Southeast Asia. “Text just said to head downstairs.”

  “I’m betting it’s Avery,” Nash said as they walked out of Fischer Hall into the bright May sunshine.

  Sunderland College was located in central New York not far from the Connecticut border. Surrounded by rolling hills, stately farms, and vast nature preserves, the ivy-clad institution, founded in 1823, was a liberal arts college of the highest reputation. Nationally ranked among small colleges, Sunderland drew some of the greatest minds in the country. And serious students flocked to the tree-lined, bucolic campus to learn from the very best. There was even a joke that the reason the trees had lights in them was so that the squirrels could study at night. Which Nash had to admit had a certain ring of truth.

  “Great,” Emmett sighed. “Just when I was getting through to them about the subtle nuances of inflation, Avery calls. Every time my TA takes over, the upper-level classes regress at least a month.”

  “You should choose your TA more carefully next time,” Jason said, waving at Tyler, who had emerged from the humanities building.

  Teaching assistants were a way of life at Sunderland, particularly for those professors who were a part of the Aaron Thomas Academic Center. Created fifteen years ago by the CIA in response to the increased threat of terrorism, the nationally renowned think tank was home to a dozen or so of the best minds in the country, Ph.D.s who also handled some of the nation’s most dangerous counterintelligence operations.

  There were eight permanent members of the American Tactical Intelligence Command (A-Tac), all tenured professors with expertise in both academia and espionage. And from time to time, as missions demanded, they were joined by other experts in their field, the think tank acting as cover for their association and affiliated operations.

  Since A-Tac professors were often called away to “advise” on top national issues, their teaching assistants were given the chance for more hands-on classroom experience than their colleagues at other universities. All of which meant that competition for graduate positions was extreme. And the winners, like their mentors, were usually the best of the best.

  “I had no choice.” Emmett shrugged. “The kid’s a senator’s son. Strings pulled and all that. Probably has visions of running the Fed one day.”

  “Well, he’s lucky to have you,” Hannah said. “I mean it’s not every day you get to work with a Draper fellow.” The coveted prize was given annually to the country’s most noted economist. Emmett had actually won twice.

  “I’m not sure he sees it that way.” Emmett grinned. “But thanks.”

  “So anyone know what’s going on?” Tyler asked as she joined them.

  “Not a thing.” Emmett shook his head. “But Nash thinks it’s Avery.”

  “Well, that’s a given. No one else summons us in the middle of class.”

  “It wasn’t the middle,” Jason said. “And we go when called. It’s part of the job.”

  “Actually, just at the moment,” Tyler sighed, “I think I might prefer Avery to Chaucer. Or at least the endless complaints about Middle English.”

  Nash smiled, knowing that her protestations were cursory. The truth was that Tyler was as passionate about her teaching as she was about ordnance.

  They’d crossed the campus in short order, making their way up the steps of the Aaron Thomas Academic Center. Crossing into a narrow side hallway, the group stopped in front of an elevator marked “professors only,” and Nash inserted a key. The doors slid silently open as the assembled company stepped inside.

  “This always makes me feel like Maxwell Smart,” Emmett said, inserting another key and pressing a button hidden behind an Otis elevator sign.

  “I know what you mean,” Hannah said as the elevator started to move downward. “Although, for me, it’s more Bruce Wayne. I always half expect Alfred to be waiting at the bottom with my utility belt.”

  “It is sort of like the bat cave,” Tyler agreed, “but considering the money the suits in Washington have spent on it, I kind of think they’d resent the analogy.”

  “Depends if you’re talking the campy television show or the movie,” Emmett said as the elevator stopped and the doors slid open.

  “They all sucked,” Jason protested. “The original comic is the only way to go.”

  “Batman, I’m assuming?” Lara Prescott said as they stepped into the austerely appointed reception area. The room served more as a buffer than as a real welcoming area. From time to time, students had tried to gain entrance to the coveted elevator.

  Thanks to CIA fail-safes, the very few successful attempts had all ended in an upper-floor lounge and general disappointment. But just in case there was ever a breach to this level, the reception area was designed as a decoy and, without proper identification, the precursor to a not-so-pleasant meeting with Avery—who also happened to be the dean of the college—and a one-way ticket out of Sunderland altogether.

  “Are we that obvious?” Tyler asked, pressing her hand against what looked like a professorial bust, but was really a biotechnical scanner.

  “Not you.” Lara shook her head, slapping her hand against the statue of the center’s namesake, Aaron Thomas. A prominent early American scholar from New York, Thomas had been quite the rabble-rouser. Famous for his treatise Scíentia Potéstas Est—Knowledge Is Power—Thomas also served as a spy for General Washington, making his role in A-Tac all that much more apropos.

  “Jason. You have to admit he does have a rather well-documented obsession with all things Batman.”

  “And you love it,” Jason said, dropping a kiss on the top of her head. With an impressive Ph.D./M.D. combo, Lara chaired Sunderland’s chemistry department and served as A-Tac’s expert in biochemical weaponry, as well as the unit’s medical officer. She and Jason had been living together for the past year. Although such relationships were frowned upon by their bosses at Langley, the team nevertheless turned a blind eye to their relationship.

  Life was short and it was best to take what you could while you had the chance. Nash knew that firsthand. And even though in his case it hadn’t ended well, he still didn’t regret the fact that for a little while at least, he’d been lucky enough to find someone who’d accepted him for what he was.

  But nothing was forever.

  “So anyone seen Drake?” Hannah was asking as they walked through the now-open panel in the rear reception wall.

  “He had an off period,” Tyler said. “So my guess is he’s already down here.”

  As if to verify the fact, Drake appeared in the doorway to the war room. “Nice of you to join us,” he said with his customary grin.

  “So have you got any idea what this is all about?” Jason asked.

  “Why don’t you ask the big guy himself.” Drake moved aside to reveal Avery Solomon standing at the head of the conference table. The man dwarfed even Nash. An ex-marine with service in both the CIA and the Pentagon, the fact that Avery had worked with three different administrations said a lot about his loyalty to country and his ability to sway even the most strident of critics.

  His appointment as commander of A-Tac eight years ago had coincided with Nash’s arrival in the unit, the two of them hitting it off instantly. They’d worked countless operations together, and now, along with Tyler, were the senior members of the team.

  “So what’s up?” Nash asked with a frown. “You’ve got your serious face on and that’s never a good thing.”

  “If everyone will have a seat, we’ll get started,” Avery said, his tone no-nonsense. The rest of the team took their places, the jovial mood from the elevator replaced with somber anticipation. “I just got word that we’ve received a credible thr
eat against a high-ranking official.”

  “That’s not exactly something new,” Drake said. “We get hundreds of threats on a weekly basis.”

  “Yes, but as I said,” Avery continued, shooting him a censorious look, “this one is credible. More than credible, actually. It’s verified. According to Langley’s intel, a splinter group of Al Qaeda is planning an assassination.”

  “Which group?” Hannah asked.

  “Ashad.”

  “Out of Pakistan. Didn’t we have a run-in with them a few years back?” Tyler asked. “The massacre in Peshawar.” Seventeen innocents had been slaughtered when a bomb exploded in the central marketplace. Despite serious A-Tac efforts, the culprits were still at large.

  “Yup,” Avery said. “That’s the one. But they’ve gotten more ambitious. This time they’re targeting the United States. A top-level government official. We haven’t been able to confirm the target, but we’ve narrowed it down to three.”

  “The president?” Jason asked, tapping away on his computer, already trying to secure new information.

  “No. Secretary of State Wright seems most probable, but it could also be Evan Packard.”

  “Head of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee,” Nash inserted, considering the possibility. “His stance on terrorism hasn’t exactly made him the darling of Islamic extremists.”

  “Well, Richard Wright is, if anything, more militant than Packard,” Hannah said, like Jason, already working on her laptop. “So who’s the third candidate?”

  “Blake Dominico.”

  “The U.S. ambassador to the U.N.?” Drake asked, clearly surprised.

  “There was considerable objection to his being appointed, if I remember correctly,” Jason said, looking up from his computer. “If he had his way most of the Middle East would become U.N.-occupied territory.”

  “So we’ve got three good candidates,” Nash said, still frowning. “But why us? I mean, Homeland Security has entire divisions to handle this kind of threat.”

  “Because we’ve got credible intel identifying the contract shooter as former CIA.”