A sly smile graces Chai’s lips. “She’s probably done more for less.”
“You don’t know for sure?” I push off from the wall and stroll toward her. “Thought you’d know all her secrets, with your special skills and tenure at EDPA.”
“Boy”—Chai sips her cocoa—“there isn’t anybody on this plane of existence who knows all of Dynara Chamberlain’s secrets. Not even Murrough.”
“What’s the deal with them anyway? Dynara and Murrough?”
She pauses with her mug halfway to her mouth. “You don’t know? You? The great reader of details?”
“Reading details doesn’t do much good when Dynara wears eight layers of lies and Murrough has the outward expressiveness of the average cinderblock.”
Chai snorts. “Oh, true that. But their status isn’t mine to gossip about. You’ll either have to ask them or, well, just go on being frustrated and ignorant.”
“Ah, you two are treading dangerous ground. Not interested.” May rubs her cheeks. “I think I’ll go eat lunch.”
“You mean dinner?” I tap the glass of the interrogation room with my finger.
May pats her stomach, which rumbles in response. “I wish.” She retreats with the guards to the elevator and waves goodbye as the doors close before her. “Have fun with today’s crop of criminals for me, eh?”
“You got it.” I return her wave, and when I hear the elevator ascend, refocus my attention on the scene unfolding in the cramped room. Between a Dynara not in the mood for idiocy (but when is she ever?) and a couple of dolts who thought they could hide their wrongdoings with obvious lies. All the DuPont family could tell us about the professor and dean’s involvement with the “grant competition” is that the pair were apparently GM Poly’s sponsors, who acted as team leaders for the group of talented students selected to compete. For an unknown prize.
Anderson nudges Castile and whispers, “They know about the competition.”
Castile rolls her eyes. “Of course they do. Told you the family would spill.”
Dynara, sitting across from them, laced hands on the metal tabletop, clears her throat. “Dean Anderson. Professor Castile. Glad you could join me this dreary afternoon.”
Castile murmurs, “My pleasure,” in a tone that indicates she’s well on her way to an ass-beating via Dynara’s tiny, powerful fists.
Green eyes devour the woman inch by lying inch. “Mock me again, and I’ll break your jaw.”
Orange eyebrows cock like a gun, and I foresee the outcome of this firefight before it ever starts. “That so, Ms. Top-Secret Government Organization? You forget I have rights or something? You know, human rights? Codified in the Republic’s constitution, laid out in our legal statutes? Due process? No cruel or unusual punishment? Attorney present during questioning? Which reminds me, where’s my call? I need to tell my good lawyer friend, Sam O’Neill, about my lovely trip from Richmond, courtesy of your—”
Dynara slides her chair back, grips the edge of the table, and flips it (all forty pounds) clear across the room, where it bangs against the wall so loud my teeth clatter. Then, before anyone can think to respond, she winds back her fist and drives it into Castile’s face. The professor jerks sideways, out of her chair, and hits the floor with a dull thud. Three pearly whites soar out of her mouth, along with a spray of blood, and skitter across the floor. Castile cries out in pain, curling up into a ball. One hand cups her cracked jaw now out of alignment.
Dynara turns toward Anderson, who’s quaking in his seat, and stares at him with a look so drenched in bloodlust that the man who has sixty pounds on her petite frame appears to shrink to the size of a withered cornstalk before her shadow. “I lost an agent yesterday,” Dynara says, low. “A kid with high hopes and great skills who’d made good choices and had a bright future. I walked into the morgue this morning to view what was left of him, and there wasn’t even enough intact to send his body to his family. So I had to watch him burn, and then I had to sign a condolence letter and stick it in a box, along with a tiny cardboard urn filled with his ashes.
“That did not make me happy.” She uncurls the gloved fist she used to punch Castile, one of the fingers crooked, dislocated. While Anderson watches in horror, Dynara grabs the injured finger and yanks it back into place without letting so much as a grimace of discomfort cross her face. “So, with that in mind, you stupid, lying fucks better give me everything I ask for, or you will not exist tomorrow morning. Clear?”
“You…You can’t do that.” Castile uses the wall to pull herself to her knees. Blood dribbles down her chin and drips off onto her undershirt. “People will find out—”
“Honey,” Dynara snarls, “I’ve made way more important people than you disappear. And trust me when I say you’d be very surprised how easy it is to wipe someone off the face of the Earth.”
Castile’s pale skin grows whiter (or the blood on her face grows darker). “Gods Almighty.”
“Keep resisting, sweetheart, and you’ll get to meet those gods in person. Clear?”
Castile nods.
Anderson looks ready to faint, eyes glazed over, chest heaving.
Dynara turns her murderous attention on the dean again and spits out, “Talk, fool.”
Anderson jumps, his chair nearly tipping over. He raises his hands to protect his face, like he fears the sound of his voice will cause Dynara to lose her cool again. “Okay. Please. Please. I’ll tell you what I know. But I swear it’s not much. Sally and I were ‘sponsors’ to the students in name only, just something to put on the paperwork that went through the company, ah, DimeTrack Corporation. You know about that?”
Dynara crosses her arms, fists tucked away where they can’t attack without express permission. “The DuPont family mentioned it: a startup with considerable funds that recently launched a multi-tier innovation initiative—one tier being a competition wherein computer-oriented college students from around the Washington area compete to build some sort of special computer program.” A soft growl emanates from her throat. “I looked into the startup. It’s a shell corporation. Owned by another shell corporation. Owned by another shell corporation. A fake with untraceable origins. Created for the sole purpose of obscuring illegal activities, I’d say.”
“That’s…right. Yes. It’s a front for the man who set up the grant competition.”
One of Dynara’s fingers pops free from underneath her elbow. “Wait now. Are you saying there’s an actual grant competition in play here, not some ploy?”
“Well,” Anderson replies, swallowing, “it depends on how you think of the word grant. It’s less a research-specific grant, and more a…”
“Cash prize for reaching a certain end goal first?”
“Correct.”
“And let me guess, you and Castile get a hand in the winnings if you sponsor the team from GM Poly? Whereas some other professor and dean from some other local college will get the gold if their team wins instead?”
Anderson shifts in his chair, uncomfortable. “Correct again. Although it’s less like sponsoring and more like selecting. The man who set the competition up asked Sally and me to choose the cream of the crop and get them into contact with him so he could fill them in on the competition rules and regulations and give them the parameters they needed to begin. Our cut of the winnings for that effort, finding the best of the best, was to be a miniscule percentage of the total, but…”
Dynara begins to circle his chair. “How much was the total?”
Anderson licks his lips. “Two hundred fifty million dollars.”
“And what was the ultimate goal? The deliverable?”
“Like DuPont’s family said: a program of some kind. I don’t know the specifics. Honestly. Sally and I were only given the basic framework of the actual challenge. I can’t even tell you what the program will be used for. Just that it’s very complex and had an estimated creation timeframe of four to six months. We’re in month five now, so the teams should be nearing completion status.”
Who’s responsible for Geller’s death?
Who’s responsible for Wallis’ dismemberment?
Who’s responsible for the decapitated college kid?
Dynara doesn’t say these things out loud—they’d reveal far too much feeling for a woman who pretends to be stone. So she spits only threats and exudes only fury from her every pore. Fury her prey can taste and touch and smell and hear like the crackle of lightning before a strike. Fury that sinks into their sweaty skin, pounding hearts, scattered brains and sets off an alarm of fear that rings so loud it vibrates to the surface…
Anderson, shaking so hard the uneven legs of his chair rattle against the floor, opens his mouth to answer Dynara’s question.
But Castile, white as a sheet, beats him to it. “His name’s Oscar Delacourt. And he isn’t the one pulling all the strings, FYI. He’s a middleman. A broker. The delivery boy between the competition teams and the guy with the real designs. A guy whose name we don’t know and probably never will—let’s be honest. People who hand out two hundred fifty million like candy aren’t the sort to take off their masks at the drop of a hat.”
Dynara peers down at her crumpled form and flashes a rueful smile. “Well, at least you’re right about that.” She crouches next to the fallen professor. “So, Delacourt. A name I happen to know. Who would’ve guessed? But I do have two more questions for you wonderfully forthcoming accomplices to answer: Who are DuPont’s teammates, and where can I find them?”
Castile smiles back with bloody, broken teeth. “Sorry, fed. Can’t help you there. Pat and I tried all of DuPont’s team members after his murder. They’re all gone, vanished, poof. I can give you their names, but keep in mind that these are kids with a strong command of all things digital in an all-digital age. They know how to drop off the map way, way, way better than little old me, so far off the edge of the latitude lines you’ll be lucky to find them this century. If I were you, I’d go for Delacourt. He’s the type who likes to hide in plain sight.”
“Oh, I know his type,” Dynara huffs out, spinning on her toes toward the door. “I know his type all too well.”
Chapter Nine
The Columbian mob lives in the basement of a vegan restaurant. Not the sort of place you’d peg as a hotbed for illicit activities. Not the sort of place that would be raided on a whim.
And let’s face it, that’s the whole point.
A mint green sign in bubble letters declaring the name Regan’s Vegans, a hand-written menu in pastel chalk on a fold-out sign on the sidewalk, and windows decorated with multi-color light strands threaded through cream curtains—these things don’t read danger. From the outside, the three-story building is a cutesy restaurant for eaters with particular preferences tucked into a side street between a credit union and a dentist’s office. It is simple and clean and nondescript.
It is a perfect front.
I step out of the black van behind Dynara, who’s still clipping knives and guns to her field uniform as she walks toward the other vehicles pulling up to the curb. For the first time, I’m garbed in EDPA’s combat uniform, the crisp fabrics tight and stiff on my skin. The under-layer is a skintight bodysuit, the army’s latest ultra-thin bulletproof material, and it feels like mail made of tiny, dull-edged scales as it rubs across my arms and legs (and crotch). The top layer is a more form-fitting version of the day-to-day investigation uniform. Perfect for hooking all sorts of sheaths and holsters and grenade rings and other deadly weapons to every reachable place on your person.
Following Dynara to the last van in the lineup, where May and Murrough are waiting with three different strike teams—one for the front door, one for the back door, and one for the roof—I eye the innocuous exterior of the restaurant. Logically, given its size and design, the mob operations can’t be located on the upper floors above the main dining area; the rooms have too many windows, and there’s no obvious escape route. Which means a well-sized group of mobsters laundering money and drugs and gods know what else are crawling around in a basement or subbasement, like ants in a dirt farm. A basement that is more likely than not connected to at least one transport-slash-escape tunnel that leads to a sister base somewhere else nearby.
I’ll be the first to admit that mob activity is not my specialty. My IBI stint with Organized Crime lasted exactly two weeks, most of which I spent solving one particular murder, a drug transporter found stabbed in his kitchen, that turned out to be an isolated passion kill (a jealous ex-boyfriend) instead of a hit by a rival clan. So my knowledge of how these people work is limited. But I can tell from the way the strike teams and Dynara and Murrough pile on the weapons and dial up the whispers that I should expect this confrontation to end with a spray of bullets and a couple of bodies.
When I reach the group discussing entry tactics, Dynara’s Ocom rings, and she answers to reveal Chai in video mode. The psychiatrist, who stayed at the office with Lance to lord over Castile and Anderson, begins speaking without a greeting: “Hey, Dy. Just got out with Chelsea Lang again. She admitted that DuPont told her about the competition and that he let her sit in on some of his team meetings. She confirmed the teammate names those two knuckleheads gave us—and then Lance confirmed Castile’s claim.
“DuPont’s entire team is gone. Apartments dark. Suitcases missing. They’re probably holed up in dingy motels or squatting in derelict buildings. It’s going to be hard to track them down. They know how to erase their digital footprints.”
Dynara tugs at her tightly woven bun. “Lang say anything about the nature of the program?”
“Nah. She doesn’t know enough about programming to have gleaned anything important from the way-too-technical team conversations. She did mention, though, that some of DuPont’s colleagues seemed really nervous about the whole thing. The competition, the prize money, the program itself. She got the sense that whatever the program was for could have disastrous consequences. On what, exactly, I cannot guess.” Chai’s face on the screen scrunches up. “Sorry I couldn’t get more for you. Maybe Lance will have some luck with our college kid fugitives.”
“Not your fault.” Dynara gives her a curt nod. “Happy hunting.”
“And you as well. Be careful out there.” Chai glances to the right, as if she can see me, even though I’m standing well out of camera range. “And you be damn careful, too, Adem. You hear? Don’t want you coming home with a bullet in your ass. Or your shoulder.”
I scuff my boot against the icy asphalt. “Funny.”
Chai flicks that one springy curl, winks, and ends the call.
Dynara stuffs her Ocom back into its designated pouch on her belt and makes a Come here, fool gesture at me. “Everyone, get to your stations, set up your gear, and wait for my signal. If this goes poorly, Adem and I will need immediate extraction. All uses of force are authorized, including VERA tech, flashbangs, and, if necessary, traditional grenades.
“If they shoot at you, shoot them back. Do not hesitate. These are not amateurs. They know how to use every weapon on the market, including illegal weaponry you have never had the misfortune to lay your eyes on. Be alert. Be ready. Be willing to defend—yourselves and your comrades. Clear?”
“Ma’am, yes, ma’am,” the strike teams reply, and the crowd begins to diverge in several directions. The black-clothed men and women vanish into alleyways and adjacent buildings, locate sniper points in high windows or well-covered rooftop cubbyholes, hide themselves behind trashcans and the trees in a nearby park and in seemingly abandoned vehicles dotting the street. In thirt
y seconds, sixteen EDPA agents vanish into the darkening night, all of them prepared to act at a bad moment’s notice.
Murrough and May hang behind, near the last van in the lineup. May will stay with the two men who never emerged from the van at all, the operation techs who have their eyes and ears on every inch of a five-block radius surrounding Regan’s Vegans. Murrough will wait in a hiding place nearby, his ear-com tuned in, and the second this exchange between Dynara, me, and a mob boss goes south, his two-hundred-twenty-five-pound frame will burst in, guns blazing, fists aiming for skulls soft as eggshells under his might.
I maneuver closer to Dynara, hands in my field jacket pockets. “I’m assuming by the fact that you knew exactly where to find this particular mob broker that you also know a thing or two about the proper way to approach the mob without earning a bullet to the back of the head. So…care to let me in on the etiquette game we’re about to play?”
She checks all her weapons are secure and blows a strand of hair out of her eye. “In the Snake’s den, Adem, there is one rule of etiquette that will stop a big man in a suit from jamming a barrel into your back: keep talking sweet to the woman in red. You stop talking, or you start falling short on the compliments, you’re dead where you stand, whether a trigger is pulled or not.”
“Oh. Sounds lovely. There a reason you chose to bring a guy with the social graces of the average cow to an interview with a mob boss who’ll go ballistic at the slightest insult?”
“Yeah.” She stretches, cracking her back and neck and elbows. “You need the practice.”
“And you think this is the appropriate situation for a practice run of my social skills?”
“I’ve found that unrepentant assholery is far more easily unlearned when the asshole in question has the weight of imminent death hanging over his head.”
Epitaphs (Echoes Book 2) Page 11
