The Kip Keene Box Set: Books 1, 2 & 3

by Nicholas Erik

  The guards stepped forward as Keene’s phone rang again, the plaintive ringtone filling the dull room with a lonesome cry.

  3 | Bail Out

  Wade Linus clicked through the satellite images on the laptop screen. He let out a long sigh, and hitched his baggy pants up to take a walk outside. He’d found no sign of Lorelei Keene, Kip’s sister, anywhere. Missing in action for months.

  And worse, there had been a severe hitch in the plan for Keene and Strike. The championship race had halted, and Wade could think of only one reason why.

  They’d been made.

  He tried Keene’s phone again.

  Endless ringing.

  Linus stepped into the bright afternoon light and stared at the placid sea. On the horizon, he could see beach bunnies and surfer dudes rollicking in the waves along the perfect coastline. The shot could’ve been something out of a movie—a majestic view from the bow of the SS Bank of Legends, graciously on semi-permanent loan from Strike’s wealthy mother.

  There was one thing about movies, though—the boats never ran out of fuel.

  Real yachts, as it turned out, were fuel guzzling monstrosities. No doubt hordes of polar bears were living on ice floes the size of New York City apartments because of this beast. After the group had reassembled in the weeks following their Atlantis escapades, the passing months had been a fight against financial attrition.

  Miranda Strike was trying to make amends with her daughter through the boat loan, but her generosity and pocketbook had limits. Funding for the craft’s upkeep was strictly the trio’s responsibility.

  Which was why the SS Bank of Legends was anchored off the coast of California, without money for a marina slip or even enough fuel to make port.

  Linus placed his hands on the brass railing and tried the line again. Busy.

  Who else had that number?

  He removed the oversized flat-brim from his head and scratched, trying to think. Frank? Francis? Who the hell was the old man Keene had said was “working on something big”?

  Franz Chibuco.

  Linus ended the call and slipped his phone back into his pocket. Small waves slapped against the bottom third of the hull. Worst came to worst, he could always swim to shore. It couldn’t be more than three miles.

  Maybe that was a lot.

  Linus tried to calculate the distance and translate that to a land equivalent.

  An idea totally unrelated to miles and inches sprang into his mind, and Linus raced off the deck, stumbling down the steep stairs to the master cabin. A new set of satellite photos—fresh from the NSA and other government agencies he had hacked—flashed across the screen.

  Linus confirmed that his suspicions had been correct. The latest photo, timestamped five minutes prior, showed a group of men entering the pre-fabricated main office to interrupt Keene and Strike’s little heist.

  “I’m gonna be out here forever,” Linus said and went to check out the mini-fridge. He cracked the last Nitrous Steer energy concoction and set it down on the desk. He closed his eyes and counted to ten, trying to consider his options.

  But he had only one idea.

  He pulled up a number on screen and dialed.

  An old man answered and said, “Hola?” The sound of a power saw or some sort of large tool could be heard in the background.

  “Mr. Franz,” Wade said. “You don’t know me, but we both know Kip Keene. And I think he needs our help.”

  “I see. I have been trying to call him, and he has not picked up. Now I understand why.” His thick accent was tinged with worry. “I have something important to tell him.”

  “I think he could die if we don’t think of something,” Linus said.

  And the two spoke about just what the hell they were going to do about Kip Keene’s predicament.

  Keene’s phone again went to voicemail, announcing the presence of a new message with a cheery tolling of bells.

  “That is a very irritating sound,” Johannes said, shaking his head. He had evicted Strike from his office chair and was now lounging in the plush leather, his racing boots propped upon the desk. He winced when one of his guards caught Keene in the face with the butt of the pistol. Keene moaned and crumpled to one knee. “But perhaps that is worse.”

  Keene spit blood on the floor and leaned his head against the wall. “If I knew you hated it so much, I would get more people to call.”

  “Yes, quite funny.” Johannes flipped the keycard in between his fingers. He glanced at the list of passwords and other personal information on the papers before him. He stared at the torn sheet of paper—which contained details about off-shore transactions and off-book money-laundering activities— his men had removed from Keene’s pockets. “I see you have everything. Very clever.”

  “Not really, you European ass-hat.” Strike glared from the corner of the room, where she was tied up. She strained against the ropes in a futile escape attempt. “All your account info is in your emails, which go through me. And you told Keene about your stupid activities after you had three beers because you’re a lightweight. He found the piece of paper in your trailer along with your keycard while you were off playing vroom-vroom.”

  In response, one of the guards hit Keene in the face again with the pistol.

  “I wouldn’t want to ruin such a pretty face,” Johannes said. “You being Next and all.”

  Strike hurled a stream of obscenities at him and banged her elbows against the wall, ruining the plaster with a number of small divots.

  “And to think I liked you when I first met you,” Keene said. His vision blurred in and out of focus from being slapped around like a cheap piñata. He couldn’t tell whether his speech was slurred, or his ears weren’t working at a hundred percent.

  “You liked him?” Strike said, like Keene had just copped to robbing little old ladies.

  “For an hour, maybe.”

  “Jesus, I can’t believe I’ve trusted you with my life.”

  “Enough,” Johannes said. “Imagine my disappointment when I found my new drinking associate was trying to steal from me. I told my men, no, I do not believe this. But then they give me this file on a Mr. Kip Keene, deep from the archives of the FBI. And he looks just like Johnny.” Johannes sounded perfectly crisp, arrogant and rich—like a bad movie villain about to get away with the whole shebang.

  “Yeah, well, money talks.”

  “That it does,” Johannes said. “Now I need to know something.”

  One of the guards lifted Keene off the ground and shoved him towards the desk.

  Keene stumbled into the solid oak and drooled on the table. Johannes’ nostrils flared, and he wiped up the offending saliva with a disdainful frown.

  Keene spit on the desk after Johannes was done.

  “That wasn’t necessary, was it?”

  “But I enjoyed it.”

  “Yes, well, I suppose a man must enjoy something. A last supper, of sorts. Anyway, as time is of the essence, I need you to answer a question.”

  “Mine first.”

  Johannes leaned back in his chair and raised his eyebrows. “I don’t think you’re in any place to make such demands, Mr. Keene.”

  “I’ll answer your question once you answer mine.”

  “Ah. Quid pro quo.”

  “Yeah, sure, whatever. I don’t speak jackass.”

  “Your wit exceeds your skill at thievery, Mr. Keene. Go ahead,” Johannes said with an exaggerated wave of his hands. “Time is short.”

  “How’d you know we’d be here now?”

  Johannes stared at him for a moment, then burst out laughing. “That’s it?”

  “Yeah.” Keene felt his ears growing hot. The guards joined in laughing. The urge to smash their faces against the desk rushed over Keene, but unfortunately his current situation ill accommodated such grandiose fantasies. Instea
d he was forced to ride out the roaring waves until Johannes had exhausted himself.

  “That, Mr. Keene, is simple,” he said, smoothing the wrinkles of his fire-retardant racing suit between long breaths, “My security team receives a notification whenever my office keycard is used. Since I am the only one with the key, it was rather obvious that something was amiss when it was used mid-race.”

  “Didn’t think of that,” Strike said. “Damn.”

  “The downfall of the common criminal.”

  “What’s that?” Keene said.

  “Overconfidence,” Johannes said with a gleam in his eye, “Now, Mr. Keene, I need to know whether you have reported any of this data about the origin of my funds to the authorities or other outside sources.”

  Keene stared at the row of monitors, where racers kicked their tires in the sand and drank water, waiting for the race delay to abate. Why the hell had he come to the desert? It had never brought him good things on this planet.

  Only trouble.

  Lots of it.

  A snapping noise near his nose brought him back to attention. Johannes’ manicured fingers flashed in front of Keene’s face.

  Keene grabbed the man’s hand and twisted the wrist back. Johannes unleashed a yelp and tried to pull his arm away, but Keene held steady.

  A hammer click forced him to release his grip.

  Johannes shook his hand out and gritted his teeth, his eyes narrowed on Keene. “Tell me what you’ve done, so we can bury you in the desert.”

  “What an offer. I think I’ll pass.”

  “Shoot the girl,” Johannes said, jabbing his good hand at Strike. “Shoot the goddamn whore in the leg.”

  “What? No, wait—”

  A shot roared out from the pistol’s barrel, and Strike screamed. Keene’s ears rang, a loud woooooo overpowering his partner’s strained cries. Blood splattered the nondescript gray carpeting, like someone had spilled a can of crimson paint.

  Strike buried her head against her knees, clutching her thigh.

  After a minute had passed, Johannes took his palms away from his ears. “That was louder than I thought.”

  “Always is,” Keene said, the words slow and measured. Impossible thoughts boiled up to the rim of his consciousness, but none of them were tenable plans. Two guns and two big men meant the odds were stacked against him in such a way that made escape impossible.

  “The authorities. What’d you tell them?”

  “Common criminals don’t have contingencies,” Keene said with a grim smirk. “Right?” His phone rang again, sounding far away. “You mind if I get this?” Keene took it out of his pocket and held it out.

  “That goddamn phone.” Johannes swiped the device from Keene’s hand and answered it. “Stop bloody calling, you ingrate. Mr. Keene is busy.”

  His eyes widened as he listened to the person on the other end of the line.

  “Who is it?”

  “You bastard.” Johannes leapt over the table and tackled Keene. Caught off guard, Keene took multiple blows to his face before getting his defenses up. Between the grunts and his still recovering ears, it was difficult to tell, but he could’ve sworn he heard footsteps outside.

  Keene blocked a punch with his elbow and rolled out from under Johannes. The two guards pointed their guns at him, ready to fire and dispatch this nuisance once and for all.

  But then the office door came hurtling in, taking out one of the guards in a hail of smoke and plaster dust.

  “Put your weapons down. Down on the goddamn floor,” an authoritative voice screamed as boots trampled against the floor.

  Keene felt cuffs slip around his wrists.

  He breathed a sigh of relief.

  Thank God for the FBI.

  4 | The Coast

  Strike sat up in the master bed, swinging her good leg off the mattress.

  “Whoa, whoa,” Keene said as he came down the stairs. “Doc ordered bed rest, a month minimum before you’re good to go.”

  “I’m fine. Help me up.” Strike grimaced when she tried to put weight on her injured leg. The bullet had entered the fleshy part of her thigh, but unfortunately had also nicked some of the muscles and bone, chewing them up in the process.

  On the scale of flesh wound to disaster, her predicament ranked somewhere in the middle. Still, gunshot wounds required rest.

  Keene came over to the bed and put his hand on her shoulder, gently easing her back down.

  “You need the rest.”

  “Like hell I do,” Strike said. “We lost our score. We’re stuck in the goddamn ocean. We need money.”

  “We’ll figure it out.”

  “Not by sitting on my ass.”

  “Just relax.”

  “My leg feels like fire ants are running through it, and all I can take is aspirin. That’s like pissing on a four alarm fire and hoping the block won’t burn down.”

  Keene smiled. “The kid’s working on something.” He nodded over his shoulder, where Linus was tapping away at his computer keyboard like a hound after a rabbit.

  “So it’s up to him, huh?”

  “Show a little faith. You’re not the only one having a difficult time.”

  Strike adjusted her legs on the bed and stifled a groan. “Son of a bitch that hurts.”

  “Rest.” Keene nodded and gave her good leg a pat. Then he walked over to Linus and stared over the kid’s shoulder at the endless stream of text and information whizzing past. “Tell me you have something.”

  “What’s with the whisper, dude?”

  “I can hear you, asshole,” Strike called out from the bed.

  “I guess rest was a dumb idea,” Keene said. “Tell us what you got.”

  “Well, Johannes’ main accounts have all been frozen, which you kind of had to expect. So that’s like, a few hundred million down the drain.”

  Strike made an exaggerated groaning noise. “Goddamnit.”

  “At least you’re not dead,” Linus said.

  “Quick thinking, blowing the whistle,” Keene said. “I thanked you, right?”

  “Not really, no.”

  “Well, thanks.” Keene paused and glanced over his shoulder. “She thanks you, too.”

  “The kid did all right,” Strike said. “Even if we’re gonna be poor forever.”

  “About that,” Wade said, pointing to a long string of numbers on the screen, “I think I found a couple hidden stashes from the info you gave me.”

  “How?”

  “Boring computer stuff. Basically, from the main accounts, I figured out a transaction profile and likely set of locations for any other accounts our racer friend might have been hiding off the books.”

  “And?”

  “And, after two weeks of backbreaking labor and sleepless concentration, I found this one in the Caymans. I tried the login info you gave me, and boom.”

  Wade pressed a few buttons and a window popped up.

  “Two hundred thousand? That’s nothing,” Keene said.

  “It’s enough to get this rig down to Ecuador and link up with Franz,” Linus said.

  “Sold. Drain it.”

  Hawaii or any sort of vacation appeared to be out of the question. Keene had spoken with Franz once in the two weeks since he’d returned to the boat. The old man had remained cryptic about what exactly he had discovered, only mentioning that it was marvelous and the key to his fate.

  And Keene’s as well, for the discovery involved the Silver Songbird, that strange statue fashioned of precious metal left behind for him by Fox. The figurine had been successfully “activated,” as Franz had described the situation in opaque terms.

  But further details weren’t forthcoming. Further explanation required a visit in person, a demonstration.

  Keene’s thoughts drifted to the note that had accompanied th
e Silver Songbird. He ambled to the other side of the room, deep in thought, and rooted through a chest of drawers.

  On top of a pile of t-shirts was the note that Fox had left him in Cotopaxi, Ecuador five months prior. Keene picked up the wrinkled paper and began to read, skimming over the parts regarding the final remains of Derek Dash—his former best friend.

  … I would say that we shall meet again, but I believe that you must carry on the work that I have prepared you to do alone, for I am returning home.

  You must now be the god in the machine.

  I trust that you are up to the task. The items accompanying the Songbird should be of some assistance in your new quest.

  Fox

  Was this the task she had meant—activating the Silver Songbird?

  Keene read the final lines again. God in the machine. Deus ex machina. The wheels of fate, of destiny, acting against man, pulling them along like puppets. The stuff of myths and bad novels. He didn’t understand what this work entailed, being the god in the machine—or how the hell he had been remotely prepared for it.

  “And done.” Linus’ voice broke through Keene’s swirl of ideas.

  “What’s done?” Keene returned the note to the drawer and pushed the bureau shut.

  “The account, dude. All the funds are ours.”

  “See, I told you he was coming along.” Keene turned around to check on Strike, but she was fast asleep. He leaned over and whispered to Linus, “So, about that Lorelei thing.”

  “Still no trace anywhere. Gone. I’m trying, dude.”

  “Right. Yeah, I know.”

  Keene walked up the stairs and out onto the deck. He stared at the California coastline, the pristine blue water, and at the vast infinity.

  If he possessed any control over fate or any godlike powers at all, then why the hell didn’t he know where Lorelei Keene had spent the past five months?

  5 | The Wheels of Fate

  It took an additional two weeks to navigate the yacht through international waters while avoiding customs regulations and rip currents. This was a good thing, as it gave Strike’s leg a chance to heal fully. Per protocol, Linus stayed with the SS Bank of Legends while Keene and Strike took care of business on shore.