The Red Pearl Effect (Sam Quick Adventure Book 1)

by Scott Corlett

  Without turning from the window, he said, “We’re in control now. But our opportunity is thin. There are no second chances in this game.” A joint and lighter slipped from his pocket. “If the wrong people peg our shit, we’ll end up in sweatboxes on Cuba, and our mommies and daddies won’t be able to do jack about it.”

  Still facing away from the others, he slid the crinkly paper between his lips, put the lighter close, and inhaled deeply. All was quiet for several long moments.

  Then smoke blasted from his nostrils and bounced off the window glass. “Now, who’s going to pick up the pizza?”

  – 7 –

  Monday, 9 July

  Island of La Palma

  The ball of light at the tunnel’s end grew larger. Sam Quick and Eric Hunt’s eyes fought to adjust to the increasing brightness. Another dozen strides; Quick and Hunt emerged into fresh air, running so fast that their arrival topside was more of a leap than a series of grounded steps.

  Quick’s eyes acclimated first. She rushed past Hunt.

  The old man lay facedown by the mine’s entrance like a bite of food awaiting its final descent down La Garganta del Diablo: his bare head glowed red in the afternoon sun; his blood pooled in the surrounding dirt; and inches from his rough fingertips, a walkie-talkie hissed.

  Quick’s hands clamped on a hole in Manuelo’s back. “Check for a pulse.”

  Hunt pressed three fingers against the leathery skin overlying the guide’s carotid artery. For what seemed like minutes, he maintained the pressure, holding his breath and looking at Quick. Finally his eyes widened. “A pulse, but faint and erratic.”

  “Get the Jeep, while I keep pressure on the wound,” Quick ordered, as blood seeped between her fingers.

  Hunt ran for the 4x4.

  “Sam! Eric! Manuelo!”

  Up the hillside, a jagged line of shaking branches and fleeing birds was rapidly weaving toward them. Then Slater crashed from the bushes and jumped down to the gravel yard.

  “How bad is it?” Slater ran forward and knelt beside Quick. She looked as if she had lived a month in the wilderness, covered by dirt and bits of leaves and twigs.

  “Just barely a pulse,” Quick said.

  The Jeep squealed to a stop. Hunt jumped out, while Quick half stood, keeping her hands clasped on the wound.

  “Kalia, take over for me. We need to get him in the Jeep.”

  “Please be OK,” Slater whispered, as her hands slid over Quick’s, which then slipped out from under the grad student’s, with warm blood oiling their retreat.

  Quick grabbed Manuelo’s legs; Hunt wrapped his arms under the guide’s chest. Moving in unison, they lifted the Spaniard onto the Jeep’s rear bench, as Slater’s hands remained locked on the wound.

  “Kalia, maintain pressure. Eric, monitor vitals,” Quick said, jumping on the driver’s seat. Slater crawled in behind Quick, as she compressed the wound. While Hunt climbed into the Jeep’s rear storage space, and ripped off his T-shirt and stuffed it under Manuelo’s head as a cushion.

  The engine roared. Dirt and gravel flew from under the tires, setting the birds screeching. Hunt grabbed the roll bar with one arm to steady himself and Manuelo, while Slater’s hands stayed tight on the wound. The Jeep hurdled down the rutted two-track lane.

  Quick cranked the wheel. The Devil’s Throat disappeared behind them. And the mountain dropped steeply ahead.

  If not for the day’s events, Sam Quick, Eric Hunt, and Kalia Slater would have enjoyed the stunning view from 6500 feet high, west over the Atlantic, directly toward the United States, 3700 miles away.

  – 8 –

  Monday, 9 July

  Moscow

  The sound reverberated throughout the elegant salon like a thunderclap.

  “The plan is in motion,” the enormous man said in Russian, as his reddened palm lifted from the desktop that he had just slapped with all his considerable might. Like the remains of a fossil dig, the man’s facial bones hinted at a former vitality. But now, his face was rocky and cratered, with flesh piling up in pallid, irregular mounds beneath his eyes and around his chin and jowls as if bulldozed from the hollows at the centers of his cheeks.

  Sergei Sokolóv stomped from behind the desk and then stopped before a credenza. “The British dogs and their American masters will search London and all the UK high and low for their precious plutonium, soiling themselves with fear of a deadly snowstorm. While tomorrow, the shipment will quietly leave Baku.”

  A mother-of-pearl spoon plunged into a pyramid of Grade 000 Royal Beluga caviar. The spoon rose into the air; Sokolóv tilted his head back; the roe spilled from its iridescent perch into his mouth.

  A woman stepped beside Sokolóv. “Yes, my darling, all is as it should be.” Beside his dour mountain of gray flesh, Nin Zanin appeared a bright toy: she was clad in a tight, red blouse and a matching miniskirt. Shiny, dark hair, a large beauty mark high on her right cheek, and eyes the shape of unshelled almonds adorned her face.

  Sokolóv looked down at her. The twin slits formed by his bloated eyelids narrowed. A black line of caviar juice jagged from his lower lip to an inky drop gathering in his chin’s rough cleft.

  “Everything is up to us now, my darling, Nin. We cannot fail. Russia’s greatness must no longer remain hobbled by small men clawing for rubles. NATO flanks us to the west, and the Chinese press us from the east. Russia’s supremacy depends on our success.”

  “To be sure, under your hand, Sergei, Mother Russia shall soon rise again.” Nin reached up and transferred the caviar juice from Sokolóv’s chin to her fingertip.

  Then she moved to a nearby wall covered side to side and floor to ceiling by a world map. Her finger slashed at the chart.

  “But first we must destroy the one true enemy.” Nin stepped back from the wall. The black juice formed a pirate’s X on the map. Directly atop Washington D.C.

  Sokolóv’s lips spread. “One step at a time, my lovely Nin. Are you sure no one will discover the bodies in London until it is too late?”

  “Do not worry, Sergei.” Nin returned to the credenza. “All the intermediaries are, shall we say, under such a heavy workload they won’t have time to speak with the authorities.”

  Sokolóv snorted and scooped another load of fish eggs. Staring into Nin’s eyes, he raised the spoon and dribbled the caviar into her mouth.

  Nin Zanin’s tongue swept her lips clean. “Now, Sergei, we must celebrate the beginning. And to help us do that, this morning, some very nice Ukrainian girls arrived.”

  Sergei Sokolóv took her hand. “You are an angel, my Nin.”

  – 9 –

  Tuesday, 10 July

  Island of La Palma

  The vise gripping his head tightened another notch. Inspector Juan Reyes stared at his office doorway, sighed, and then said in good English, “You must be Mr. Davies. Please come in and join your compatriots.”

  Sam Quick, Eric Hunt, and Kalia Slater turned and studied the man standing behind them. The visitor looked like a former pro athlete early into his second act as a confident business executive, sporting a solid build, salt-and-pepper hair, and island business attire of a polo shirt and linen pants.

  Zach Davies stepped forward and offered his hand around to the Americans, his brow wrinkling as he read the print on Hunt’s shirtfront: “The Revolution Won’t Be Tweeted.”

  Then Davies turned to Reyes and reached out his hand, “Encantado de conocerte, Inspector. Por favor, llámeme ‘Zach.’”

  Reyes ignored the gesture and went on, “Mr. Davies is, I understand, an attaché from your American embassy in Madrid. He has come to”—his face contorted—“assist with our investigation.”

  The skin around his eyes relaxed a bit, as he added, “Fortunately, Dr. Quick, finishing your official statements will conclude your involvement in this matter. Now perhaps, you could enlighten Mr. Davies as to the reason for your visit to our lovely island?”

  For a moment, Quick stared at the dark eyes intently watching her f
rom below the salt-and-pepper hair. Is he really some embassy drone sent by NRLI? Or is he CIA? In her line of work, these visits were routine but rarely ever welcomed, and certainly never by Sam Quick.

  The scientist kept her tone neutral. “The goal of my expedition is acquiring soil samples containing bacteria of interest from La Garganta del Diablo, La Palma’s zinc mine. We chose the Devil’s Throat because some of its resident bacteria should prove resistant to high zinc concentrations. Plus, the mine was abandoned after the 1949 volcanic eruption, making it easily accessible to interlopers such as my team.”

  At the mention, Inspector Reyes crossed himself. “A terrible tragedy. Many villagers died during the collapse of San Gabriel Arcángel, the lovely church that formerly sat in Tazacorte’s center, including several members of my extended family.” Reyes shrugged his shoulders at the murmurs of sympathy. “That is life on La Palma.”

  Davies looked at Quick. “Forgive my naiveté, but why is the Navy interested in zinc and bacteria?”

  Quick returned his look. He undoubtedly knows about my role at NRLI. And maybe even about ALCHEMY. So why the pretense? “Like all American military branches, the Navy maintains a robust biological research program. My work centers on extremophiles, the bacteria that live in unusual or extreme conditions, such as in the scalding water found near undersea volcanic vents or in radioactive soups of nuclear waste.”

  She continued, “The target of my current project is metalotolerant extremophiles, the bacteria that thrive in the presence of high concentrations of metals such as zinc, cadmium, or copper. These metal-loving organisms are essential for cleaning up toxic-waste sites like those sometimes found on decommissioned military bases.” This was all true, she thought. And therefore no need to add anything about ALCHEMY.

  Davies was then silent while the scientists recapped the previous day’s events, with the inspector frequently interrupting. After Quick described the Jeep’s race down the mountain to the village medical clinic, Davies remained quiet for a moment. Then he turned to Slater. “You said the assailants spoke a language unfamiliar to you?”

  Before the Hawaiian could answer, Reyes cut in, “As I told your compatriots, Mr. Davies, I believe what Ms. Slater heard was one of the North African languages.” He sighed. “On rare occasions, we are visited on La Palma by elements seeking to transit cocaine and heroin to Europe from Africa, which is little more than one hundred miles east of here. And we have recently received reports of such trafficking activities near La Garganta del Diablo. If Dr. Quick’s expedition encroached on such endeavors, well, you can imagine … ”

  The inspector went on, “I believe that once Sr. Alcanzar regains consciousness, he will verify the language in question. Moreover, the remains recovered from the shaft”—Reyes’s stomach churned as he recalled the corpse with the broken timber run through its abdomen and, worse, the pickax embedded in its neck—“are consistent with someone of North African extraction.”

  As he spoke, Reyes watched for any reaction from Quick to the mention of the man whom she—however justifiably—had killed. Her eyes gave none. He knew from his wife’s Hollywood television dramas that American women were not to be trifled with. But this scientist who so easily opened a man’s throat with a pickax was something else. His head’s throbbing intensified.

  Davies looked at Quick. “Just one more question for now: who cares enough about your work to kill for it?”

  Reyes’s head almost exploded.

  And Sam Quick had her confirmation that Zach Davies knew exactly why she was visiting La Palma when he arrived at the Tazacorte police station.

  – 10 –

  Tuesday, 10 July

  Island of La Palma

  Sam Quick looked around the table. “Shall we head to the hotel? It’s been a hell of a couple days, and we’ve got another long one again tomorrow,” she said more as a statement than a question.

  Eric Hunt, Kalia Slater, and Zach Davies nodded in agreement, and each hurriedly swallowed their final bites. The four Americans were seated in a simple, open-air seafood restaurant not far from the hotel. And they had just wolfed down their first real meal of the day, after finally leaving the police station at nightfall.

  Quick started to rise. But a glint across the crowded street running alongside the dining terrace caught her eye.

  The others rose from their chairs. The waiter surged forward and leaned over the table to collect the tab, blocking her line of sight. When he pulled back, the reflection’s source was gone.

  Seeing Quick hesitate, Davies asked, “Something wrong?”

  “Probably nothing.” But Quick doubted the words as soon as she said them. Because that sure had looked like a camera. Pointed directly at them.

  Outside the restaurant, the Americans merged into the foot traffic drifting up the narrow street. They managed to slip through the crowds of tourists fingering trinkets at the storefront tables. Until they met a dense, barely moving wall of tanned flesh. A group—each member twenty-something, heavily inked and pierced, and wearing scant tribal-cloth beachwear—stretched across the lane, a dozen people deep.

  Quick threaded her way through the pack and noticed several of the young men and women check out Hunt. She saw Davies also watching the interaction.

  After the clique was well behind them, Quick said, “Not exactly your usual tour group back there.”

  Davies said, “They’re probably here warming up for this weekend’s antiglobalization rally in Madrid, to protest the ICF.” Seeing the blank looks, Davies went on, “The International Capital Forum is a summit where the world’s major economies set trade policy for the coming years. Their choices affect everyone from”—he pointed across the lane—“that tapas stand owner to investment bankers in Hong Kong. And the ICF is the headline event for groups opposed to global capitalism—not the least of which because eight world leaders, including the president, will be in attendance.”

  “If the protest will be held in Madrid, why are they staying here on La Palma, a three-hour flight away?” Hunt asked.

  “Antiglobalization groups use places like La Palma as in-country staging venues to meet up, toke up, and hook up before their targeted events,” Davies said. “A day or two before the ICF begins, they will converge on Madrid. And already being in Spain, they will avoid crossing the border when customs is on highest alert for incoming protestors, during the days just prior to the event.”

  “You seem to know this movement rather well,” Slater said loudly, as the pedestrian crowd forced her against the railing of a beer garden. On the barrier’s opposite side, a trio of young men lifted their bottles in toast to her. Slater flashed her big smile reserved for disarming drunken frat boys back home and kept moving.

  “The State Department, along with the FBI and CIA, monitors myriad antiglobalization groups.” Davies sighed. “And what I don’t learn from embassy briefings, I hear from my little sister, who is”—his thumb pointed over his shoulder—“probably out there somewhere.”

  ∞

  A big cake at a little girl’s birthday party. Yes, that’s exactly what this hotel reminds me of, Sam Quick thought, approaching the pink building with the white trim. Except she hardly felt like celebrating. Quick had not allowed herself to process the prior day’s events, only to recite them back to the police as if she were reading from a book. And the scientist had no plans to do so anytime soon. She planned to spend the next hour before bed mapping tomorrow’s collection grid.

  The group climbed the hotel steps. At the top, Quick turned and looked out over the street. She half-expected to see the camera-wielding man from outside the restaurant. But she found only red-faced vacationers strolling the plaza below.

  Inside the hotel, at the second-floor landing, the foursome exchanged “good nights.” Hunt and Slater split off down the corridor, while Quick and Davies resumed their climb, as they headed toward their third-floor rooms.

  ∞

  On the second floor, as the grad students walke
d down the hall, Slater asked, “So, what’s Davies’s story?”

  “Good question. Sam seems wary of him,” Hunt said.

  “Yeah, I wonder. Anyway, he’s kinda hot in a young-but-old guy sort of way.”

  “Sure, if you say so,” Hunt said, laughing, as they arrived at Slater’s door. He stretched and started to turn for his room. “Well, good night.”

  “Eric?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I hate to ask this. But after all that’s happened, I really don’t feel like being alone. Would you be down for a sleepover? Totally nothing, you know—”

  Hunt held up a hand. “No prob. I’ll rinse off and be right over.”

  ∞

  On the third floor, Davies put a hand on Quick’s shoulder. “Look, I’m sorry about what happened to your guide—”

  She glanced at the hand and then straight into Davies’s eyes. “Really? I’d have thought your only concern would be ensuring that we fragile scientists didn’t get into any more trouble. That is why you’re here, isn’t it—to keep on eye on us?”

  Davies’s eyes remained genial, but he withdrew his hand.

  “And by the way, he’s a friend, not just a guide.”

  Davies nodded. “OK, sure, your friend. But whatever the relationship, we both know that the local authorities should handle the investigation. And that your team should safely finish your research and then return to NRLI.”

  “Thanks for the advice.” Quick’s room key sliced into its slot like a laser.

  ∞

  On the second floor, Hunt slipped into his room. The door closed.

  Even at this hour, the air was hot and humid, and he wanted to get his sweaty body into the cool shower as soon as possible. He ignored the light switch and moved into the dark room, peeling off his shirt while walking forward.