by Peter Darley
“Afraid I’ll mess it up.”
She shot him an understanding smile. “Everybody messes it up sometimes, even the most experienced. Messing it up can be part of the fun.”
He laughed nervously. “Well, maybe someday. Who knows? I just don’t think my head’s in the right place at the moment, with what I’ve got to do and all.”
“I understand. If there’s anything I can do to help, just let me know. OK?”
“You got it.” He moved over to his leather recliner, sat down, and resumed his task with a highly-sophisticated-looking laptop. A sequence of numbers filled the screen.
Belinda came up behind him, her mind blank at what she saw. “Wow. Is this the code you were talking about?”
“This is it, and it’s an absolute nightmare. The program I’ve got installed to decode it isn’t the best. I didn’t have time to update it at the lab. Because of that, it takes days. All it’s going to show at the end is a date, a time, and a location.” He scrolled down the screen to show her that the code extended for page after endless page.
She gasped. “Oh, boy.”
“It’s a complex new type of crypto-numeric,” he said. “They clearly didn’t want anybody figuring it out, but lives are at stake. I really have no choice but to keep working on it.”
She leaned over and kissed his cheek. This time, he smiled comfortably. “Well, I’m here if you need me,” she said.
“Belinda?”
“Yes.”
He smiled at her. “Thank you. I can’t tell you how much better it is being here with you.”
She didn’t say anything, but knew the affection in her eyes spoke for her. It was remarkable to her that he was thankful to her after everything he’d done. He was introducing her to feelings she’d never known before. No man had ever actually cared about her in the past. They may have slept with her, but that wasn’t caring. It was an exercise in mutual taking. Despite the gnawing questions she still had, she knew she was developing a deep tenderness for Brandon, and, somehow, a sense of sadness. He seemed to have the weight of the world on his shoulders. But why? Who, or what, was he fighting that was causing him so much anguish?
The numbers scrambled and changed on the monitor screen like a swarm of insects, faster that the eye could see. Brandon watched intently, waiting with painstaking patience.
It took hours for the first result to appear—the letter ‘S.’ He took a pen and a sheet of paper from the desk, and wrote it down. It was nothing. Just one letter. But it was the beginning of the answer to his last chance to stop the attacks, once and for all. Where is it going to happen? Who’s gonna be next?
Ten
Tonight
Brandon continued to sleep on the couch. He occupied himself with his work spending hour after hour focused on his laptop, and left it running around the clock. Waking at 7 a.m. every morning, he threw on his warm, water-proof clothing, and rubber-soled boots. He scaled the steep, two mile-high ridge behind the cabin, pushing himself to the limit. He’d resumed his morning training routine after a three day break. The door closing upon his return was always Belinda’s wake-up call.
She immersed herself in the experience of the cabin––its serenity, beauty, and the departure it offered from the frustrating life she’d left behind. She was living a utopian fantasy that she didn’t want to end.
The decoder in Brandon’s laptop produced an average of two letters per day. Belinda found her calling by studying them intently to see if she could glean anything from the location it was slowly spelling out. So far, there wasn’t enough to identify, but helping with something so vital gave her a feeling of self-worth.
Brandon often found himself watching her as she studied the letters. Even the way she chewed her hair when she was concentrating gave him a warm feeling inside. He’d never seen anybody do that before.
Their relationship grew, day by day. While the laptop processed the code, Brandon occasionally gave himself a break. They sat together watching movies, had snowball fights, fed Snooky together, and acted as free as children, enjoying their reprieve from the horrors of the world. Their lives became intertwined, sharing every facet of daily life. They worked as a team, with their only disagreement being over music. Brandon had a penchant for eighties-style arena rock, but Belinda preferred soul and blues. Unfortunately, he didn’t have any soul or blues in his CD collection.
He quickly discovered what real cooking was all about when Belinda took control of the kitchen. He smiled inwardly, embarrassed by his initial offering to her. She was a fine teacher in that department, although burning the potatoes on his first attempt became a source of mutual laughter.
On their seventh night together, snow was falling again. Brandon lit the fire and continued with his task on the laptop. The sheet of paper lay next to him with the sequence of letters having grown considerably. “I’m so close now,” he said. “I’ve got most of the location letters, but I still can’t quite make it out. I’ve got a time and confirmation of this month. I’m just hoping it hasn’t already happened.”
“There’s been nothing else that looked like Carringby on the news,” Belinda said. “I’ve been keeping a close watch.”
He gave her an appreciative smile. “I know you have. You’ve been absolutely awesome.”
A beep from the laptop caught his attention. He looked down to see the number ‘1’ with a cursor flashing beside it, awaiting the next numeral. He’d have preferred it to have been a ‘2’ as the first digit. The anticipation of the missing second number only put him on tenterhooks. Despite Belinda having not seen anything during her days of searching news channels, his paranoia of failing for a third time was compromising his rationality. His hands began to tremble.
“What’s wrong?” she said.
“I don’t know if it’s already happened.”
“I swear nothing’s been on the news.”
“I know, but I’ve got a ‘one’, as in ten, eleven, twelve, or thirteen.”
“It could also be fourteen through nineteen,” she said hopefully.
He rubbed his eyes nervously, stared at the cursor, and muttered impatiently through his teeth, “Come on, come on, you son of a bitch.”
And then the missing number appeared: ‘4’.
His heart went into palpitations. “Oh, my God.”
“What’s wrong?”
He looked at her with dread in his eyes, and his scar deepened again. “It’s tonight.”
“Tonight?”
“That’s what it says. February fourteenth, at twenty-three hundred hours. Why the hell would they pick Valentine’s Day? Sick bastards. But what if it’s wrong?”
“How so?”
“It’s like what happened at Carringby. I decoded the time, but they arrived earlier than what it said. They could’ve changed the plans, and I still have no idea where it’s going down.”
Belinda picked up the paper on the table and studied the letters: S, T, L, K, E, C, I, Y, U, T, C, O, T, N.
Brandon studied her expression as her eyes swept across the letters. He could almost see her realization dawning. “You think you know where it is?”
“I’m not sure. I feel like something’s screaming at me, but I can’t quite get it. It reminds me of a crossword. Like trying to find the missing letters.” And then the penny dropped. “Salt Lake City, Utah!” she shouted out excitedly.
Brandon leaped off the recliner. “Are you sure?”
“Positive.” She pointed it out to him on the paper. “The ‘A’ and ‘L’ are missing from ‘Salt,’ only the ‘A’ from ‘Lake,’ and the ‘A’ and ‘H’ from ‘Utah.’ I have no idea what C, O, T, N, means.”
“Colton,” he said. “Oh, my God. It’s a munitions factory they’re gonna hit. Colton Ranch. It’s just outside of Salt Lake. Thank you so much, Belinda. You don’t know how much you’ve just helped me.”
She looked at him uneasily. “What are you going to do?”
“I’m gonna suit up and get out there.” He
hurried over to his Kevlar attire draped across the leather sofa.
“And do what?”
He stopped in his tracks. She did have a point. Seeing no other way to answer her, he said, “Whatever I can.”
Her body tensed and panic appeared in her eyes. “Please don’t do this, Brandon. I’m begging you. There has to be another way.”
He looked at her, sorely torn. It was even worse than on the afternoon he’d left for Denver. This time, he had more to lose than ever. Having Belinda living and working with him had given him happiness he’d never known before, but he could see no other options. “Please understand, I don’t want to go. I’m scared, as anyone would be, but I have no choice.”
“Why?”
He picked up his combat attire. “Because there’s no one else. I have to stop them. I have to help those people.”
“Brandon, stop. Don’t do this. Don’t leave me, please.”
“I have to.”
“What can you possibly do if they’re going to attack a weapons manufacturer? You’re just one man. If they can get through that kind of security, you won’t stand a chance.”
He pulled on his combat pants hurriedly. “They won’t have to get through any security.”
“What do you mean?”
He struggled to know how he was going to explain all of the particulars to her. Every answer he could give would only lead to another question. “They’re already inside the base.”
“Then call Colton Ranch and warn them.”
“I already did that in the beginning with the Everidge attack in Dallas. They treated it as a prank call. Two hundred and thirteen people died because I didn’t act.”
Belinda was silent for a moment. But then an idea came to her. “The press.”
“What?”
“Call the press and tell them what you know. They can be deadly to any organization, believe me. My first job after college was for a government-funded communications corporation. It was shut down after the media exposed it for secretly operating a money laundering outfit.”
He didn’t speak. His fear of revealing himself, in any way, to the media was a constant concern.
“How about if I call them?” she suggested.
“You?”
“Yes, me. Now please, Brandon, don’t go. Let me help you.”
He put his combat jacket back on the sofa and looked into her eyes. Every one of his instincts cried out to stay with her in his serene utopia. But what if she was wrong? Her expression showed such assured sincerity. She’d worked in the corporate sector and had knowledge of the press and its powers that he didn’t. He’d grown to trust her, and was overcome with an eagerness to take her at her word. Her powers of persuasion were also enhanced by the realization that she was as reliant on him as anyone else. What would happen to her if anything went wrong? It was an unbearable thought.
Convinced of her judgment, he accepted there was an alternative to personal intervention, one that was likely going to be far more effective. “All right, let’s call it in.”
Belinda spoke to a reporter through Brandon’s sat-scrambler phone, the conversation becoming increasingly heated. “The Colton Ranch Plant is going to fall under attack tonight at eleven, you have to believe me . . . No, I can’t prove it. All I can tell you is that this is related to the attacks on Everidge in Dallas, and Carringby in Denver.”
Brandon took the phone from her and switched it off.
“Are you sure the call wasn’t traced?” she said.
“They can’t trace a call from this phone. It’s a one-of-a-kind sat-scrambler.”
“What’s that? Does it have some kind of jamming technology?”
“Not exactly. It has divertive capabilities. The NSA may try to trace the call, but their surveillance technology will pinpoint the location to a place far from here.” A sly, knowing grin crept from the corner of his mouth. “Very, very far from here.” He closed his eyes and exhaled, hoping intensely that they’d done the right thing.
Belinda lightly caressed his arms. “Everything’s going to be fine. I can feel it.”
“I sure hope you’re right.”
“Either way, it’s over. It’s not your responsibility anymore.” She gestured to the sofa. “Let’s chill out and, if you feel ready, you can tell me all about what’s been happening.”
He looked at her with extreme uncertainty. Ultimately, he knew he couldn’t keep the truth from her any longer. “All right,” he said. “But it’s a long story.”
Eleven
First Time
“OK,” Brandon said. “I’d been assigned to the Mach Industries facility in Arlington after I was injured on the field. It was after about a year when I was doing some research. I discovered . . .”
“What?” Belinda said.
“The attacks are not the work of terrorists.”
“They’re not?”
He hesitated again, but eventually resumed. “It’s the CIA, Belinda. Or, a rogue faction of it, at least. They’re initiating false terrorist attacks to create excuses for wars against foreign nations.”
She gasped. “Now I understand what you meant in the van on that first night.”
“What’s that?”
“You said ‘Those killers were the authorities’. Now it makes sense. But it still doesn’t explain why.”
“Two months ago, I found out what they were doing and I saved the codes for the plans to a flash drive. It was a deleted file I’d stumbled across in the mainframe. Nobody could have found it even if they’d gone looking, which is why I don’t think they know what I have.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” she said.
“Well, yeah, I guess. They know I have a hell of a lot of their tech. I had to get out of there, so I loaded up the Turbo Swan and escaped in it.”
“What did Carringby have to do with any of this?”
“It was on the plans, along with the dates and times. With Carringby, it was all about the XD-47.”
“What is that, exactly?” she said.
“What’s what?”
“Those letters and numbers. XD-47. I saw them all the time, but didn’t take any notice. What do they mean?”
“It’s a serial number for a component in a missile.”
Belinda’s jaw dropped. “Carringby was manufacturing a missile?”
“Parts for one, but those thugs didn’t really want it. The army already had the XD-47. They’ve had it for almost a year.”
“So why attack Carringby?”
“They wanted to make it look like somebody else wanted it. It’s an excuse for a war.”
“Why would anybody want to start a war?”
“For profit. There’s phenomenal money involved. I decoded the plans from the flash drive. That’s how I knew they were going to attack Carringby, and I tried to stop it.”
“What did you hope to accomplish?”
“I-I had to do at least something,” he stammered. “I couldn’t just ignore it and hope it would all go away.”
“Many people died, my colleagues included,” she said bitterly. “I’m not saying I was close to them. But I had regard for them. Are you saying they died just for some kind of theatrical staging?”
He looked away, loathing having to give the only answer he could. “Yes. All I have is the equipment I stole. There’s nothing else I can do. If I’m apprehended, I’ll be charged with desertion and theft of government property. They could put me away for a very long time.”
Belinda slapped the arm of the chair. “It’s absurd. They could take your freedom from you because you tried to save innocent people? What kind of a world do we live in when the law could allow something so cruel and ridiculous?”
He placed his hand on hers appreciatively.
“I’m so sorry, Brandon. At least now I understand what you’re all about. I wish you’d have told me this before.”
“I had to know if you could handle it,” he said. “I mean, this is terrifying stuff.”
There was a long silence as they stared at one another. Her compassion and understanding touched him profoundly, and the moment caught him by surprise. His heart raced, but he wasn’t afraid or uncertain this time.
She touched his cheek, and for once, he permitted himself the luxury of responding. Regardless of the outcome, the fact that the burden had been taken out of his hands brought a sense of liberation to him.
Their mouths met, ensnaring him in the grip of passion. His body cried out for her touch, but his sexual inexperience consumed him again. My God, what the hell am I doing?
Flashes came before his eyes—his experiences on the battlefield in Afghanistan, and the sight of his buddies falling to enemy fire. Every one of them had been cold in their treatment of women. He questioned if that was why? Was it because they knew they were going to die? That screwing so many women was their only chance of preserving their genes? That can’t be what this is all about.
“It’s all right,” she whispered, her breath coming in short, excited bursts.
He knew there was nothing unknown about it to Belinda. But to him it was an experience both alien—and yet strangely familiar. Somewhat free of his burdens, he felt he knew what to do instinctively.
He gently picked her up in his arms and lowered her gracefully onto the rug in front of the log fire. Regardless of how many times he’d visualized this moment in his mind, nothing could ever have prepared him for it. He unbuttoned his shirt, discarded it, and knelt down. The situation had taken hold of them both with such spontaneity. It was a moment that had been given to them so perfectly.
Slowly easing his way forward, he cautiously removed her jeans. He noticed the skin on her thighs was smooth and flawless, with the most delectable bronze coloring.
In a dreamlike state, he brought his mouth to her groin and kissed her intimately, drawing her into a frenzy of passion. The pure, sensual scent of her gripped his senses, inducing a tempest of unbridled desire within him.
She pressed her hips downwards and moaned, revealing to him that he’d found his target. That knowledge urged him on to caress her tenderly with an intense need to please her.
