The Reaper (The Phoenix Chronicles Book 2)

by R. J. Patterson

  “Fine,” she said, handing over the drink. “Busted.”

  Dr. Z snagged the drink from her hand and resumed skateboarding inside. When he neared his desk, he spun around and looked at Morgan, who was standing in the doorway.

  “The last time you brought me a hot chocolate with peppermint,” he said, inhaling the steam drifting upward through the small hole in the lid, “you wanted me to help you identify what you thought might be a UFO.”

  “I promise this time, it’s far more serious.”

  Dr. Z removed the lid and took a big gulp. “More serious than the time you thought you’d found the Loch Ness monster on a satellite image?”

  “Would you have a seat and open the video I emailed you earlier this morning?” she asked.

  He sighed. “For a cup of peppermint hot chocolate, I guess so.”

  Dr. Z collapsed into the chair behind his desk and started clicking on his computer keyboard. As he did, Morgan eased near him and peered at the screen over his shoulder.

  “What exactly am I looking at?” he asked. “I need context before I analyze anything.”

  “This is from our parking garage last night,” she said. “And I’m hoping this was an experiment you were running—or a prank. I’m fine with this being a prank.”

  He cast a sideways glance at her. “My days of pulling office pranks are long gone.”

  “You used to pull pranks in the office?” she asked with a faint smile.

  “More often than I should have,” he said. “But I learned my lesson a long time ago when trying to do what I thought was a lighthearted prank for a colleague’s fiftieth birthday.”

  “I take it that the prank didn’t go over like you thought it would.”

  He shook his head. “She chased me around the lab with a pair of scissors. And I’m pretty confident that had she caught me, she would’ve stabbed me to death.”

  “What exactly did you do?”

  He shook his head. “It was a long time ago. And I was foolish.”

  “Well, why don’t you use your years of wisdom to figure out what’s going on in this video?”

  “Sure thing,” he said, clicking his mouse. Seconds later, the video began to play, displaying her car in the parking garage.

  “What is this?” he asked.

  “Just wait for it. You’ll see soon enough.”

  A few seconds later, the note that she’d found on her car suddenly appeared in the video.

  Dr. Z gasped. “What the—”

  “Right? That’s why I showed this to you. I’m hoping you can give me some answers.”

  He glanced up at her wide-eyed. “I’m not sure I know what’s going here. That’s virtually impossible.”

  “Virtually impossible,” she repeated. “I’m wondering if it’s physically impossible.”

  “There are some experimental cloaking devices that are circulating, but not that have been impossible to detect.”

  “So, that’s what you think this is? Some experimental cloaking gizmo?”

  He shrugged. “Maybe. I need to analyze this further and determine if the pixels are being manipulated. But at first glance, it just seems rather freaky.”

  “I don’t like freaky,” Morgan said. “I like tangible, explainable. I don’t like being left in the dark.”

  “Welcome to the dark side,” Dr. Z said. “Welcome to science.”

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  “Frankly, you can’t know everything, no matter how hard you try. And sometimes, there are people on the other side of the globe—”

  “You mean, like China?”

  “China, Japan, Russia—who knows—that have developed technology faster than we have. And it’s entirely possible that they’ve figured out how to perfect cloaking.”

  “So, you think this is using some type of cloaking device?”

  Dr. Z nodded. “I can’t think of any other plausible explanation. The note didn’t just float there and stick by itself. That’d be some very cutting edge stuff, if that’s what really happened. But I wouldn’t count on it.’

  “So, what do you think this means?” Morgan asked.

  “It means, there’s a traitor in our midst.”

  “Any ideas on how to root them out?”

  “Revert to our biometrics system for entrance. Instead of just swiping our keycards tomorrow, have people use their thumbprint. That should solve the issue.”

  “Unless the person is a traitor,” Morgan said.

  “That’s a possibility too. If they have access to the technology and to our offices, we need to develop a better way to sniff them out.”

  “So, basically, we have to try everything and see what sticks?” she asked.

  Dr. Z nodded and fiddled with his bow tie. “Science is a process of elimination. We must remove every possibility and discover what’s most likely. That’s where the answer lies.”

  “And then what?”

  “I’m just the science guy. Once you find the traitor, what you do with him is up to you, not me.”

  “Keep searching,” Morgan said. “When we find out who’s responsible for all this, I want them to hang.”

  Dr. Z arched an eyebrow. “That’s a bit archaic, don’t you think?”

  “I’m not playing around,” she said. “It’s bad enough that national security at stake, but our own offices are under siege too. Those bad actors need to be flushed into the open and dealt with severely.”

  “You deal with them however you like,” Dr. Z said. “My job ends when I expose them for who they are—if I can.”

  “Is there a possibility that you can’t?”

  “I can eliminate plenty, but I might not be able to reduce the options to one. And if that’s the case, I advise you to tread lightly.”

  “Just find out who’s responsible for this, okay?” Morgan said.

  “I’m on it,” Dr. Z said.

  She exited his office and headed back to her own.

  The thought of there being a mole in the Magnum Group office sickened her. She glanced at her phone as it buzzed with a text message from Brady Hawk.

  Making a pit stop in DC before heading back. We need to see someone.

  Morgan wasn’t happy about the update. She wanted her top two field agents back in the fold to discuss what was going on—and figure out who was behind the conspiracy to murder DEA agents.

  CHAPTER 19

  Washington, D.C.

  HAWK REQUESTED PERMISSION to stop over in Washington before returning to Los Angeles in his fabled way. When Hawk followed a hunch, he lived by the mantra of “It’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission.” His charm was like a soothing balm for irate directors. And he was certain that Morgan May was well versed on all of Hawk’s antics since she’d spoken to her uncle about recruiting him.

  The Magnum Group jet made its final approach into Washington.

  Alex glanced at Hawk as he pocketed his phone. “Did you wait until just now to ask the director if we could do this?”

  He gave her a sideways glance. “How exactly do you define the word ask?”

  “You just told her, didn’t you?”

  Hawk nodded and grinned sheepishly.

  “It’s not that I didn’t suspect this before right now, but it sure explains a lot about John Daniel and where he gets his conniving ways from,” she said.

  “You call this conniving, but I call it being careful,” Hawk said. “Have you already forgotten that there was a mole in the Magnum offices?”

  “Was a mole is the key phrase there,” she said. “Not anymore.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “This is the group we’re entrusting with our lives. If there was someone intercepting all our communications and they wanted us dead, we would be by now.”

  “Perhaps they don’t want us dead just yet,” Hawk said. “Or maybe they have other plans for us. Have you ever considered that?”

  “I’ve considered plenty of scenarios,” Alex said.
“And the one that frightens me the most is you going rogue and widowing me.”

  Hawk grabbed Alex’s hand as she fought back the tears welling up in her eyes. “Hey, honey, it’s all right. We know that’s a possibility every time we go on a mission. But you know I’m careful.”

  The dam holding back Alex’s waterworks burst.

  “I just don’t know what I’d do without you,” she said between sobs.

  Hawk put his arm around her. He wanted to tell her that she’d be fine and remind her of how many assassins she’d killed in the past. But he was seasoned enough as a husband to know he could mention that in a different moment, one where she wasn’t heaving.

  “That’s why we’re doing this together,” Hawk said. “You keep me in check while we’re out in the field, and we’ll both come back alive, okay?”

  Alex delicately wiped the corner of her eyes with her fingers. She sniffled and took a deep breath, trying to get under control.

  Hawk squeezed her hand again, reassuring her that he’d be careful and everything would be fine. It was what he told himself when he was in some of his most difficult situations, especially when he was stuck somewhere with no foreseeable way out. It fueled his creativity and carried him when he was at his lowest points. “I just need to see Alex one more time,” he would think to himself. Now, John Daniel was also in this mix, strengthening his determination even more.

  The tires barked as the jet touched down. They grabbed their bags and found an SUV waiting outside the private hangar.

  As they drove along, Hawk pondered what they’d learned about Ambassador Brownfield’s mistress, Diana Lorado. There were a few things that bugged him about her situation, which couldn’t have been coincidental.

  “She had to be planted,” Hawk said aloud.

  “Who?” Alex asked, making Hawk realize he’d just blurted out the sentence without any context.

  “I’m sorry. I was thinking about Diana Lorado.”

  “I agree, but the real question is by whom,” Alex said. “Based on the way the cartel went after her, it certainly seems like she has some ties there.”

  “And they’d definitely have the ability to equip her with false identities, passports, and stacks of emergency cash.”

  “Maybe Director Besserman will have more information for us,” Alex said.

  Hawk raised his index finger. “Before we see him, I got a message that Dan Timmons wants to see us ASAP?”

  “Dan Timmons, as in the director of the DEA? That Dan Timmons?”

  Hawk nodded.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I thought I’d surprise you,” he said with a faint smile. “But for the record, I’m not exactly excited about it.”

  “We’re going there right now?” she asked.

  “Headed to DEA headquarters in Springfield as we speak.”

  When they arrived on the DEA campus, Hawk and Alex were stopped for a brief security check before a staffer ushered them upstairs to Timmons’ office.

  Timmons sported a thick mustache and a healthy head of brown hair. Based on the bio Hawk had scanned, Timmons was in his early 50s and had a lengthy history of service in the military and in government positions. He’d earned several awards, including a purple heart after losing his pinky finger when it was shot off during a gun battle.

  “Welcome to the DEA,” Timmons said, cradling a coffee mug. “Please come in and have a seat.”

  He led them to a small couch in the corner of the room and sat down in a plush arm chair across from them.

  “I appreciate you stopping by,” Timmons said.

  “Of course,” Hawk said. “I’m sure you’ve been concerned about what’s happening within your agency.”

  “Very much so,” Timmons said. “And thanks to you two, I can sleep a little better at night knowing that my agents won’t be exposed like that anymore.”

  Alex smiled. “We’ll be sleeping better too.”

  “I know you weren’t in Bogotá in an official capacity, wink wink,” Timmons said, making the gesture as he said it, “so I wanted to unofficially honor the two of you as well with the DEA Medal of Valor.”

  Alex cocked her head to one side. “The DEA has a Medal of Valor?”

  “Not officially,” Timmons said, nodding toward the pair of boxes displaying the medals on the coffee table in front of them. “Most of our agents who earn this are working undercover. Everything official has to be made public, but this is the way we honor our agents in-house.”

  “We were just doing our jobs, sir,” Hawk said.

  “Yes, but it was a damn fine job,” Timmons said. “The entire agency here is grateful for your service. I’m sure you heard about Ambassador Brownfield’s resignation.”

  Hawk and Alex both shook their heads.

  “News just came through this morning, which has me feeling even more confident that things are under control again,” Timmons said. “I can’t believe how reckless Brownfield was. But now I appreciate that this case is closed and we can move on. The designer drugs that those Colombian cartels were bringing into the country won’t be so easy to get in now. And that’s a good thing for all Americans. I mean, just last night, our agents intercepted a massive shipment from Colombia. It would’ve had a street value of a quarter of a billion dollars and would’ve affected thousands of lives. But thanks to your work, that threat was squashed.”

  “Happy to help, sir, though I’m not sure I would consider the case closed just yet,” Hawk said.

  “Just a few loose ends and paperwork to tie up?” Timmons said, arching his eyebrows before taking a sip of his coffee.

  “Something like that,” Hawk said.

  “Well, I trust it’ll be completed soon enough,” Timmons said. “And I look forward to reading a full report when you’re done.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Hawk said.

  He and Alex both stood and shook hands with Timmons before collecting their medals and leaving.

  When they got in the car, Hawk looked at Alex. “You should’ve received several of these things for what you hand to endure at the Vargas mansion.”

  She laughed and waved dismissively at him. “Can we just forget about these?”

  Hawk smiled. “How much do you think we can get for them if we sell them online?”

  * * *

  UPON ARRIVING at Langley, Hawk and Alex met with CIA Director Robert Besserman. He was chewing on the earsock of his glasses and studying a document when they walked in.

  “There you are,” Besserman said as he looked up and stood. “I was looking forward to speaking with you today.”

  “I hope everything’s okay,” Hawk said.

  Besserman invited them to sit in the chairs across from his desk. “For the time being, but I think this case is far from over. It all depends on how far down the rabbit hole you want to go.”

  “We’re always all in,” Alex said.

  “I know, but I think you’ll find this interesting,” Besserman said as he handed them a file folder.

  “What is this?” Alex asked.

  “It’s a dossier on Diana Lorado,” Besserman said. “She’s got quite the checkered past.”

  “Which explains why she’d be working with a Colombian cartel,” Hawk said as he looked up from the page.

  “Maybe,” Besserman said. “But there weren’t any obvious ties we found between her and any of the cartels there.”

  “Perhaps she hooked up with one of them while she was in prison,” Alex suggested.

  “As you’ll see in that very thorough report, we looked into that and didn’t find any link between the other inmates and the Colombia cartel.”

  “That doesn’t mean there isn’t one,” Alex said.

  “Of course, but there might be something else worth looking into,” Besserman said. “At the bottom of page five, you’ll see a brief note about when she was arrested by Border Patrol agents and detained for six months. There’s no record of what she was doing wrong or why they kept her t
hat whole time. It’s all very strange and it might shed some light on why she was attempting to cozy up to Ambassador—I mean, former Ambassador Brownfield.”

  “We’re already aware of this information,” Hawk said.

  “But have you followed up on it?” Besserman asked.

  “Do you think this was more than just about picking off key DEA agents to move drugs into the country?” Hawk asked.

  “You know I don’t believe in coincidences, Hawk. And at the same time that these agents started turning up dead, we started hearing chatter of terrorists moving more freely through the country, like they’re organizing somehow.”

  “And that’s unusual?”

  “Very—unless either something major is about to happen or if they’re congregating. And neither one of those scenarios bodes well for our country’s security.”

  “Okay,” Hawk said. “We’ll keep digging.”

  “Start with the Border Patrol agent who arrested her,” Besserman suggested. “He might be able to shed some light on what Lorado was doing on the border and why they kept her for so long without officially arresting her.”

  Hawk and Alex thanked Besserman before returning to their car.

  “What do you think?” he asked.

  She shrugged. “Down the rabbit hole we go.”

  CHAPTER 20

  Eastern Oregon

  REAPER WATCHED THE SUN rise above the mountains and felt the chill in the air begin to fade. He parked on the shoulder of the two-lane highway, just across from the latest lead he’d managed to track down. Due to a constant struggle to find Travis Taylor, Reaper wasn’t hopeful that this one would be any different. But he had to keep trying. The sooner he found Taylor, the sooner Reaper could get on with his life and move closer to Charlie.

  The previous night’s stakeout had proven fruitless. The truck Reaper had seen striking out across the plains at dusk was just another worker returning home from a long day on the range. But Reaper was determined not to leave until he felt satisfied his search had been thorough. And he wasn’t—not yet anyway.

  When Reaper returned to his hotel room, he searched for anything he might be able to leverage to find out where Travis Taylor was. And just as Reaper was about to call it a night, he saw a name on the Sheepshead Ranch website that made him take a closer look.