Open Secret

by Fiona Quinn

  “Fifteen minutes?” someone whispered. “He should be here.”

  Someone had been watching him and timing him. The mile and a half from house to the park, that abutted the church property, did indeed take him less than fifteen minutes. That was his every-day jog time no matter where he did his daily run. If he was in a race, he could shave that down to from six miles an hour to a pace of a little better than seven miles an hour. If there was something chasing his ass, then he might even be able shave a little more off that. But adrenaline can do that for you.

  Radio static was followed by, “Delta Three. Where is he? He must not have his phone. He’s not showing up.”

  “Delta Two. Even so, you should have him by now.”

  “Delta Three. I’m telling you, he hasn’t come through.”

  “Yes, he has, I watched him leave the road. I’m Delta Two.”

  Okay, their radio skills sucked.

  That was information.

  Rowan had to acknowledge that his own skills also sucked. He was obviously too predictable. They knew he’d jog, and they knew where. They had placed a crew out here. Of course, they could have crews set in each direction coming out of his house. And that felt right to Rowan. He had to plan as if these weren’t the only guys lying in wait. These were just the lucky guys who would get action from being posted in the right direction. Maybe build up some points with whoever had an ax to grind. They thought he didn’t have his phone. Later, he’d have to figure out what that could mean. He’d have to figure out a lot of things.

  “Delta Eight. I’m positioned at the corner of Billings and Turnbull. He’s not to me.” That must be the guy at the next trail head, where Rowan would hit pavement again on the other side of the pond. If it had been Rowan planning this operation, that pond was where he’d lay the trap. Fewer opportunities for escape.

  They were tactically weak. That was more information. And so was the number eight.

  Delta Eight?

  Eight was a lot. Rowan didn’t want to take on eight. Or one. He just wanted to finish his jog, pack for New York, go to bed, and with any luck, have an excellent dream about Avery.

  “Delta One. You’re sweeping?”

  “Delta Three. I’m sweeping!”

  Rowan watched the light move across the gravestones left to right, right to left. He wanted to catch one of them and make them talk. He needed to understand just when and why he’d been targeted. If he could figure out how to do that, and not get dead or rolled up in the process, that would be good.

  “Delta One. I’m coming up the back. I’ll see if he didn’t have a heart attack and keel over between here and there.”

  Rowan drew himself up along a thick trunk opposite the guys with poor radio discipline. He focused on the shape of this man striding up the trail. That was the tango he wanted to take down. The head of their spear. Delta One. If he could trap that guy, Rowan could get answers.

  This was the time for Rowan to get his body under control, slow his breathing and his heart beat, and make a plan.

  The Delta One guy moved forward, and a red laser beam danced across his black pants. “It’s me, fool. We’re at the thirty minute mark. We’ve missed our opportunity for tonight.”

  “We got to get him before morning!”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Rowan

  Monday Night

  Alexandria Virginia

  Snaking his way through the trees, Rowan moved toward the road. Blade in hand, he wanted a look at their vehicles. Get a license plate.

  A dog was going ballistic in the house up ahead.

  The group of hostiles—male, military-age—formed a single unit of dark shadows as they made their way to the road. It wasn’t exactly a wedge formation. Some of those guys were spooked and bunching up tight on the next guy’s heels. Ten of them.

  Weekend warriors strapped with weapons. Half the number from Brussels, and probably less than a teaspoonful of skill. Had those been Sergei Prokhorov’s men, Rowan would be back in a car trunk.

  The hostiles gathered at the edge of the road, whispering into their comms.

  Under the parking lot light at the church, Rowan could just make out three cars parked nose out over by the shed. When the tail lights popped on, and they powered down the road, Rowan would take a video. He couldn’t get it from this angle, though.

  Rowan bent in two and sprinted toward the church, then stood at the wall, peering around the corner.

  Rowan closed his blade and slid the knife clasp onto his waistband ready to pull and flick open if needed. He reached into his pocket for his phone and got ready to get the pictures.

  A surprised intake of breath spun Rowan around. A form hovered just there behind him, mouth open.

  Adrenaline dumps can make you freeze in place like a statue.

  Freeze sucked, Rowan knew that personally. That moment when the brain stutters…

  Sandwiched between the hostile’s hands was the unmistakable shadow of a gun tricked out with a suppressor and laser.

  New guy. So now they were up to eleven head. He was probably jogging in from his position farther down the trail.

  As Rowan processed that information, his body was acting from training. He dropped his phone to clear his hands as he grabbed the top of the gun, gripping the slide so the guy couldn’t shoot and pushed it away from where it was aimed at Rowan’s chest. Rowan slammed his knee into the guy’s groin to steal the air that was going to form the call for help.

  Just as Rowan swung a follow-up fist into the guy’s jaw, the held back scream of discovery slid past the pain. “Here!”

  It was loud, and it carried. So did the oof that sounded as the guy’s head cracked into the corner of the brick building. The tango crumpled to the ground.

  Rowan picked up his phone and quickly snapped the guy’s picture, front and profile.

  Now Rowan had a knife and a gun as he moved behind the church and into the graveyard to find cover. Rowan didn’t want to use a gun, especially this gun, a .40 caliber from the heft of it. Depending on the bullet in the chamber, it could tear through the walls of a house. It could speed through the woods. Any bullet that wasn’t precisely on target, meant that his neighbors were endangered.

  Unlike the silent shots that made spy thrillers on TV so exciting, there wasn’t actually something called a silencer. The most you could do is suppress the volume of the gunfire. The noise would still drag everyone awake. People would be scrambling to pull their own weapons from their bedside tables and out of their safes. If this was Afghanistan, the sound of gunfire could turn into a battle for survival, and the chances of him coming out of this shitstorm whole and healthy would be pretty much nil.

  Good thing I’m home safe and sound in my neighborhood in Arlington, Rowan thought wryly.

  In a low crouch, Rowan slunk between the tallest gravestones.

  A pew sounded and at the same time a chunk of marble exploded upward near Rowan’s shoulder.

  Rowan dove to the ground.

  He hoped the sound of that shot and the barking dog got a good Samaritan to pick up their phone. A few sirens would clear this place out nice and fast.

  The clouds moved off the moon, and from where Rowan lay, he saw a human shape not twenty feet and three gravestones away.

  To hell with it, Rowan thought as he framed the shadow in the glow-in-the-dark sights. Rowan wasn’t going to shoot anyone in the back, though. “Hey buddy, you looking for me?”

  “He’s here!” the guy yelled, then came the pew pew as Rowan acquired the target, and put a double tap in the guy’s chest.

  Rowan squat ran toward the guy to make sure he’d taken this tango out of the game. He reached down and touched his chest. Heavy plates. Did they think he’d be jogging with an AK?

  The tango was probably just knocked out from impact, not killed. He just might get his opportunity to have his question and answer session after all.

  Rowan fumbled his phone out and snapped the pictures before he snatched up
the guy’s gun. Problem was, Rowan had nowhere to put it. The elastic on his jogging pants wasn’t going to hold the weight. After another quick pat down for weapons, Rowan grabbed the guy’s radio, using his mouth to twist the knob, turning the volume off.

  Rowan scanned left then right, deciding his path.

  Beyond, lights flashed on in the neighborhood. Stay inside your damned houses. Get your kids down. He sent the mental command through the wind. He wouldn’t head that way, he needed to draw any gunfire away from the houses.

  Rowan crouched behind the tombstone as a door on the church popped open. A man’s form stood silhouetted by the interior light. He was about Rowan’s height. About Rowan’s coloring. And was wearing clothes that in a panicked mind could be jogging clothes.

  Rowan rose to sprint for the door when he saw figures rounding the corner of the church. Shit. “Get in! Lock the door! Get down!” Rowan yelled. “Call 911!”

  So he gave up his position.

  A gun in each hand, his knife in his waistband, Rowan took off, zig zagging toward the tree line. If they were to shoot at him, those bullets put kids at risk. Where he’d go to keep everyone safe, he hadn’t a clue.

  He stopped at the dumpster, took a knee, drew a bead on the front guy chasing him, and pulled the trigger in one fluid motion.

  Rowan didn’t aim center mass. Since one of the tangos had body armor, they probably all had body armor. Rowan wanted spurting blood and screaming pain. That would spook a novice crew.

  Pew. Pew.

  And then the scream.

  And the jostling confusion.

  And the sirens. Lots of sirens.

  Panic.

  Garbled commands.

  Grunts.

  Rowan had a pretty good idea of how this would unfold. It sounded like it was taking a normal trajectory, but that didn’t mean that as soon as he got his shot off that Rowan didn’t haul ass off his X and make his way deeper into the tree line and safety to wait for the police.

  He’d approach the authorities with an introductory phone call to their commander first.

  He had knocked a guy out and shot two other men.

  He was the aggressor with weapons in his possession.

  And Rowan had no desire to get locked up in the pokey tonight.

  Chapter Twenty

  Avery

  Tuesday Morning

  Warrenton, Virginia

  Avery

  Avery put her to-go cup of coffee into her cup holder as she motored toward Taylor’s house. She was listening to George over the Bluetooth. It was really just too darn early for George to be this angry. Windsor and Shreveport, the publishing house owners, must be really riding him hard. Her sympathy meter was set on low.

  His snarls rose from the speaker phone as Avery clicked on her turn signal and rounded past the barn with its peeling white paint and sagging doors. She took a right at the fork.

  “Since I’m almost to the house now,” she said with an even tone, “I’m not sure, outside of teleporting, how you think I can get there any faster. Please remember, I’m the editor not the writer. I can’t make the manuscript show up out of thin air. You’re confusing me with Hermione Granger.”

  “Listen to me—”

  “Before, you say anything else, this is about the location I lose cell service, if I lose you it’s because I’m—” and then she pressed end.

  It wasn’t far from the truth. Cell service out here was nil. That was probably a feature not a bug for Taylor.

  Avery rested her phone on her lap. She was thinking about Rowan. Something about him was unsettling her. She’d gone to bed right after their talk and woken up an hour later in a panic, terrified for his safety. She couldn’t figure out why.

  He pressed between the leaves of her thoughts like a book mark.

  Here was her place.

  At the next red light, she sent Rowan a text. He’d given her his number last night, and she realized she hadn’t given her number in return. In her mind it was a good enough excuse to reach out.

  Avery - Good morning, this is Avery. Now you have my number.

  Rowan - Thank you. I was just thinking about you. Want to Skype tonight? Nine?

  Avery - Okay. Hey, odd question I know, but is everything okay?

  A car behind her tooted its horn, and Avery realized the light was green.

  At the church, she pulled into the parking lot to read his response.

  Rowan – Things have been a little tense since we talked. Some people were fighting in my neighborhood last night. Not the norm here. Police were making their presence known so I didn’t get much sleep. Then I got a call from my uncle. My dad is in the hospital out in Sacramento. Something kidney related. Meeting now. Talk to you tonight. :)

  It was good that they were going to talk again. For many reasons. But mainly because she might have more information about this project, and Avery could ask better questions, even if she couldn’t tell Rowan anything from her end.

  Ever since the Skype conversation last night, Avery had been mulling the concept of whistleblower. Rowan must have picked up something in her words or her inflection since he’d even brought it up and asked if she was okay. If an author had given Avery this present scenario in a manuscript, it wouldn’t make it through content editing. Avery would be leaving comments like. “I need more. This doesn’t rise to the level of threat we need here.”

  But Avery felt threatened.

  Like the ground was shifting under her feet.

  Like she didn’t understand the rules, and invisible hands held the remote.

  Like she was living in an alternative universe, and the idea of being in control of even one’s own thoughts and emotions was an illusion.

  Maybe this was how things worked now.

  Or, maybe ethics and laws simply hadn’t been developed to counter this yet.

  What was the “this”?

  Avery couldn’t even define it.

  She had other things to do besides babysit Taylor Knapp. Other projects on her plate. But here she was, pulling onto the long dirt drive toward Taylor’s farm house because…Avery wasn’t exactly sure about the because. She wanted to say it was her civic duty, but that was a bizarre thought.

  The “because” is that my name is going to be associated with this thing. And as much as I disagree with my brother-in-law on a daily basis, Curtis was right about this; Taylor’s project was morally wrong. Even if Taylor herself thought she was some kind of white knight exposing the evil underbelly of the nation.

  I guess there are worse things than being starving and homeless on the street with your bat shit crazy mother, Avery thought as she popped her car door open.

  She made her way up the front walk. The lights in the house were off. Avery checked her watch. It was the same time as when she arrived yesterday. But who knew? Maybe Taylor had been burning the midnight oil typing out her story.

  When she reached the door, Avery mashed her index finger onto the illuminated button to ring the bell.

  After a long moment, the door opened. Taylor, dressed in over-sized pajama bottoms and a ratty T-shirt, pressed her lips together and rolled her eyes, stepping out of the way for Avery to enter. “I don’t have anything for you.”

  “Nothing? You did nothing yesterday after I left? Not a single word?” Avery stood momentarily blinded after moving from the bright morning sun into the dark hallway.

  “I’m still waiting.” Taylor brushed past her. “Come on.”

  Dutifully, Avery followed toward the back of the house. “I don’t understand.”

  “Which is fine. Look you said Saturday, right?” They were in the kitchen, and Taylor moved to the coffee maker. Avery had probably pulled the woman out of bed.

  “You said you needed my outline by Saturday, so get off my ass. I’ll have it by then.” She reached up to grab the bag of coffee grounds. “You’ll have something by then.”

  “Perhaps you’d like a sounding board.” Avery climbed onto the same stool she’d
sat on just yesterday morning at this same time. “We can talk, and I can type notes.”

  “Want a cup of coffee? You’ve got bags under your eyes.”

  “Yeah, well work is stressful right now.”

  “Because of me?”

  “Because of the industry changes. Yes to the coffee, thank you.” How was she going to get Taylor to give her information to possibly talk to Rowan about when she didn’t even know what information she was looking for? “You slid in just before things started to get really bad. Good for you. How exactly did you land on Windsor Shreveport? Who’s your agent?”

  “Oh, I don’t have one of those.” Taylor reached for two mugs.

  Avery frowned. “We don’t take unsolicited manuscripts. We wouldn’t consider you without representation.”

  Taylor turned, mugs in hand. “I know Inge Prokhorov. She’s the wife of Patrick Windsor.”

  “Our founding partner.”

  “Yeah, so she gave Patrick my MS, and Windsor Shreveport offered me the contract.” She took the carafe to the sink to get water.

  “Nice!” Lame. “How is it that you ended up with this penname? Did Ms. Prokhorov suggest it?”

  “My agent suggested it.”

  “I thought you just said you didn’t have an agent.”

  “I had an agent. I just didn’t have an agent who was effective. I got this gig on my own. It probably had nothing to do with his capabilities. I give him kudos for even signing a female. He was trying to pitch my ideas for games to the industry where there’s a huge bias against women.”

  They sat in silence until the coffee pot dinged.

  Taylor filled their mugs and brought them to the counter. She pushed the tray with sweeteners toward Avery and pulled a carton of half-and-half from the fridge and held it out.

  “Thanks,” Avery said, accepting it. “This agent you had, did he pitch anything under the Taylor Knapp pen name that caught on?”

  “Different pen name, Tyler Krill, and yes. I had a contract and developed a game, but just before release, the project got pulled. It got some pretty big public outcry.”