The Project

by I C Cosmos

  She sighed and turned on the recording of the conversation, which was a one-way monologue from Santini.

  >> Be ready at 15:00 sharp. You’ll be driven directly to the plane. Arrival on Flores at 16:00. A van will be waiting for you on the runway. The goods will be in it. Transport everything to the hotel. New instructions upon arrival. Copy?

  >> Copy

  >> P.S. A bonus is packed in with the goods. You’ll like it. Let it snow. LOL.

  Stunned, Helen reread the message. Santini and his people behaved as if they were invisible. Didn’t they realize she could record their chats? Luckily not.

  She crawled to the bathroom door and peeked outside. The terrace was empty, but feeling safer in the bathroom, Helen leaned against the shower stall and stretched her legs in front of her. She had no proof that “the goods” were compound 1080. She had no proof that Santini killed the dog. And she had no proof that the bonus was a fine Colombian powder.

  But she couldn’t afford to give Santini the benefit of the doubt. If he spread compound 1080 over the island, people would be at risk and thousands of animals would die a terrible death. It could take years to rid the island of the poison.

  On the other hand, if Santini didn’t plan to use 1080, the worst thing that could happen was that his goons would be searched at the airport for no good reason. They’d survive it.

  Helen’s mind was made up.

  She composed a message to the local police, informing them that environmentally dangerous and potentially illegal substances would be handed over in a van awaiting a private plane arriving from Horta at four o’clock.

  A similar message would go to the US air base on Terceira Island, telling them that US subjects were involved in the transaction.

  Helen programmed her bot to send the messages from Santini’s super-secure phone unit, which made them untraceable to her. Once out, the Terceira message would be automatically forwarded to the police on Flores and vice versa, increasing the credibility of the warning. But timing was crucial.

  Helen sat on the floor, waiting for the right moment to give the “send” order and then waiting for the plane to land, too hyper to concentrate on anything else.

  The two dots next door left the resort and split by the airport, one stopping there and one driving farther. The dots coming from Horta united with the one at the airport. Helen held her breath.

  >> Landed

  >> K

  >> In the van

  >> K

  >> OMG. We are surrounded by police

  >> WTF. Get out of there

  >> Can’t

  Helen leaned back and closed her eyes. No snow!

  ~~~

  The next morning Helen woke up to a gloriously sunny day. She drove slowly to the hotel reserved by the Consortium and launched the training. As expected, no one signed in at the agreed-upon time. The units were off the radar. Helen waited another hour, recording the no-shows for her report to the Consortium.

  Then she left the hotel and drove along hydrangea-lined roads to the center of the island. Later in the season the hydrangeas would transform the roadsides into walls of blue magic. In the meantime, the countryside was colored pink with an abundance of azaleas and a variety of flowers that gave Flores its name.

  Helen stopped at a high point overlooking a glistening lake. She got out of the car and let the serenity of the island calm her mind. The grass is greener in some places, she thought while admiring the verdant pastures.

  Crisp wind ruffled the water on the lake and blew up over the hill. Helen went back to the car and finished her report, debating what to include. Everything or only the canceled training? She closed her eyes, lining up the facts.

  Santini put the bomb in Helen’s car in Olbia.

  His rogue unit was involved in the attempted ferry attack.

  He distributed legitimate communication units to her “students,” who were deployed to Flores to take care of other, likely criminal, business.

  According to the documents Helen’s good friend in DC ferreted out and sent over, Paul Santini was wanted for serious offenses. Yet he was free to come and go as he pleased. Someone was protecting him. The Consortium?

  Unease tightened Helen’s chest.

  It made no sense to challenge the Consortium’s sensibilities at this point. She’d report only the part about the training. For now. And find a way to add Santini’s recent activities to his fancy criminal record.

  She checked whether she had received new orders but had no connection. She nearly panicked, but then stretched in the car seat, enjoying being unreachable. The dedicated civil servant turning into a rebel. Helen laughed, feeling free.

  Absentmindedly, she scooped out the engagement ring that hung on a long leather necklace hidden under her sweater. Nic’s original. She rubbed the diamond gently with her thumb, thinking about whether the Be careful! note was from Nic.

  Her phone lit up. She was connected again. She deposited the stripped report into the secured folder designated by the Consortium. The “unofficial” part went to Helen’s private “data fortress,” three supremely protected data storage units where she kept all her intel related to the Project.

  Without thinking, Helen rubbed the diamond again. The connection cut off. An image of Nic holding his hand over hers on the ferry to Olbia flashed through her mind. The connection popped up then as well.

  Helen softly rubbed the ring. The connection came on. She slid her finger over the diamond. The connection cut off. Helen laughed.

  “It’s not a secret. It’s a source,” Nic had said.

  A source of connections.

  Washington, DC

  The library

  Five days later

  The lights switched on and uncompromisingly exposed every nook of the library. Shocked gasps and heated objections filled the air.

  What bothers them more? Andreas wondered. The unexpected brightness, or losing control of the light in which they present themselves? Andreas stood next to his Transparency Station, observing the astonished, displeased faces. It was time to remind them who was in charge.

  “I have an important announcement,” he said, his nostrils registering the fear invading the library. “The latest numbers are in.” He waited until all eyes were on him. “The president’s approval rating is up by eight points since we launched TP Promotions.”

  “Unprecedented!”

  “Fantastic!”

  “Way to go!”

  Andreas nodded regally. The fear flipped over to euphoria. Convincing the president that they could get him reelected bought them carte blanche for their activities.

  The heavy wooden doors of the library opened. Two waiters walked in and distributed champagne flutes, shocking the members yet again. The doors had never before opened during their meetings, and no strangers had ever entered the library in their presence. But no one complained.

  One by one, members raised their sparkly glasses and gave toasts to the Consortium, cheeks glowing, pride and might rushing through their veins. They had taken control of the electorate! Eight points up… What a fabulous victory! And that was just the beginning. They’d go on to take over the country and the world. They reigned supreme.

  “OK,” Andreas’s voice ruled. “This is great success, and we are in the midst of making an amazing future for ourselves and the whole world.”

  Heads nodded in agreement.

  “Sit down,” Andreas ordered, his manner turning from benevolent to chillingly commanding. “We have business to do.”

  Everyone was on board.

  “It’s imperative to eliminate any leaks in our communication structure. Operation Azores made that clear.”

  The fear was back, mixing oddly with victory.

  “Our investigation hasn’t been finalized yet.”

  “The investigation is worthless,” Andreas thundered. “It goes around in circles and doesn’t single out the traitor.”

  “That’s the point. This is not an inside job. We were atta
cked from the outside.”

  “It must have been Nic.”

  But the Consortium had no clue where to find Nic.

  “Helen was supposed to lead us to him. Remember?” one member said bitterly.

  “She’s useless.”

  “More than that. She is as dangerous as he.”

  The rage fueled by their powerlessness to terminate Nic found a new target. Helen.

  “We still need her,” Moira interrupted.

  “I don’t see why. Time to cut our losses.”

  “Not so fast. She is working on an artificial intelligence program that’s crucial for the success of TP,” Moira asserted. “And we could use her to protect us from Nic’s sabotaging us.”

  Andreas nodded. He liked how Moira calmed the hotheads. He liked Moira.

  “A good point. How far is she with the AI?” he asked.

  “Difficult to say. She is quite far but must test it all.”

  “It’s taking her too long.”

  “Let’s speed it up and create a field test for her,” Moira proposed.

  “That’s OK, but we shouldn’t rely on her so much.”

  “Right. Let’s get some Russian or Chinese hackers on board. Plenty to choose from.”

  “But we don’t want to expose our system to them.”

  “They’d never know the full scope.”

  “They are hackers…”

  “Yeah. But it’s easy to eliminate them. And if anything goes wrong, we could blame it on the Russians or Chinese and no one would ever suspect us.”

  The hotheads had the last word.

  The P. C. Hooftstraat, Amsterdam

  To buy or not to buy? Helen didn’t plan on buying anything, but the elegant Armani jacket caught her eye. It was timeless. She could wear it for years. Try me on, the jacket lured Helen seductively.

  “Hey, stranger. How are ya?”

  Helen turned and found herself looking into Jon’s smiling face. He seemed different than in his study. Relaxed, happy, enjoying life. More like a surfer than a professor.

  “Hey. Good to see you. Are you on a shopping spree?” Helen pointed to the chic boutiques the P. C. Hooftstraat was famous for.

  “No. You?”

  “No. Just looking.”

  “Looking good.” Jon nodded appreciatively. “Hey, I am going to Sotheby’s showing. Would you like to go with me?”

  “Why not?” Helen said, surprising herself, and realizing how hungry she was to do something normal. With someone normal. Although Jon was hardly “normal,” having been hired by the Consortium. Could this be an opportunity to learn more about their intentions with Jon’s sessions?

  “What’s the theme of the exhibition?” she asked.

  “Quite a mix. Mostly modern art, but also jewelry, nineteenth-century paintings, and some old masters.”

  “Like Keirincx?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  “Because one of them hangs in your study,” Helen replied.

  Jon’s eyebrows shot up. “I thought you never looked at my art collection.”

  “We didn’t talk about it. Which is different than not looking, professor.”

  Jon laughed and Helen joined him.

  “I love Keirincx.” Jon’s eyes sparkled with joy. “Always wanted to have one of his paintings.”

  It was easy to chat with Jon about things that didn’t have anything to do with the Project.

  And it was fun to go through the Sotheby’s exhibition and comment on the paintings. Their tastes were similar, favoring bold abstracts that fired imagination and shouted questions demanding answers. They saved the old master for the last.

  “So, what do you like about Keirincx?” Helen asked when they finally reached the painting, a wooded river landscape, estimated to sell for sixty to eighty thousand euros.

  Jon stepped back and assessed the painting, his head tilted. “It’s the overall mood. The gentleness of it…the way the light filters through.” Jon stepped forward and inspected the painting from close up. “And the leaves. Every leaf is just right, in just the right place. Fascinating.”

  “Are you going to bid on it?” Helen asked.

  Jon shook his head. “I’d like to, but it’s out of my league. I lost a bid on a much smaller Keirincx a few months back.” He shrugged.

  “Aw, sorry about that… Well, your Keirincx is worth more than this one,” Helen said, noticing the harshness that briefly tightened Jon’s face. “Unless it’s a fake, of course,” she added lightly, not wanting to spoil their afternoon.

  “No. It’s real.” Jon looked his happy self again. “But I didn’t buy it. It was given to me.”

  “Wow! Lucky you. A family heirloom?”

  “No. It’s one of the newest additions to my collection, actually.”

  “I see.” Helen went on with their conversation while her mind frantically processed what Jon had told her. Could it be the same painting? And he lost a bid on a cheaper one…around the time she signed her contract. Coincidence?

  “You know a lot about Keirincx,” Jon said, eyebrows raised.

  “We have one in our family.”

  “Good for you.”

  Not really, Helen thought. The painting had caused nothing but trouble. It used to belong to her mom’s parents, thanks to Grams, who “repossessed” it from her younger brother. He believed the painting had been promised to him, but Grams disagreed, and the two of them never talked again. The family tradition repeated itself after Grams’s death. Helen’s mom lawfully inherited the painting, but Uncle Andreas “borrowed” it before she could collect it and never returned it. And the two of them never talked again.

  The most troubling part was that the Keirincx hanging on Jon’s wall looked like an identical twin of Mom’s Keirincx.

  Did Andreas sell it and it found its way to Jon? Improbable. Had Keirincx painted two almost identical pieces? Possible. Did Jon receive a perfect copy and didn’t know it? She had to find out.

  “We are closing in a few minutes,” a Sotheby’s assistant wearing a perfect little black dress and killer red stilettos announced apologetically. “You can come again tomorrow.” She winked. “And on Monday, of course. The auction starts at ten o’clock.”

  Jon hooked his arm around Helen’s and led her out of Sotheby’s ravishing villa, one of the many remarkable buildings in Amsterdam South, or Oud-Zuid, as the locals called it.

  “I’ve always wanted to live in Oud-Zuid,” Jon said, looking around.

  “In one of these huge villas?”

  “Yes. I love them. Don’t you?”

  “Oh, I love them, but prefer an apartment. Less to worry about when you travel a lot.”

  “A good point. I like both,” Jon said.

  They were reaching the Rijksmuseum, where their ways would split if they went on to their respective apartments. A sudden sadness took over Helen. She didn’t want to end the day yet.

  “Have you ever been to Incanto?” Jon asked.

  “No.”

  “Let’s go, then.” Jon’s face lit up. “It’s a fantastic Italian restaurant.” Jon was on his phone already. “OK. Done. We have a res in twenty minutes.”

  “A man of action.”

  Jon laughed. “It’s across from L’Europe. Which gives us plenty of time to peek into a couple of galleries on Spiegelstraat.”

  “Sounds like a plan.”

  Helen enjoyed the walk, feeling more alive than in ages, looking forward to the dinner.

  “Oh, I walked past this place so many times and never paid attention to it,” she said when they reached the restaurant.

  “That’s because they are upstairs. Easy to miss.”

  They climbed the steep staircase and were led to a small round table by the window.

  “So, how is your job going?” Jon asked when they sat down.

  Helen leaned back. The Project was the last thing she wanted to talk about. Her face must have shown it.

  “You can quit the job if you don’t like it, you know.” Jon
raised his prosecco.

  Portoferraio, the Island of Elba, Italy

  May

  “I expect flawless execution this time.”

  “I give you my best every time,” Paul said, his hand tightening the grip on his phone.

  “Can’t say that about the last time.”

  “I can’t do miracles with an incompetent team.”

  “Don’t blame it on the team. You were supposed to shadow her.”

  “From the day after the arrests. Don’t blame me for wrong orders.”

  “Don’t get smart with me. You’ve got eyes.”

  “She wasn’t there.”

  “I have a report placing her a couple of tables down from you in that café, listening to every word you let out of your big mouth. And staying in the room next to yours on Flores.”

  “You can’t believe everything you are seeing these days.” Paul’s free hand crushed the notepad in front of him. She did it.

  “And you can’t count on me getting your guys out of jail again.”

  “They weren’t my guys. And I told you they were incompetent.”

  “And I am telling you that if something goes wrong this time, I’d let your ass rot in the Italian jail system. I am told it’s a very slow and unpleasant process.”

  “Are you threatening me?”

  “Just telling you to get your job done.”

  “What do you want me to do with her?”

  “Take her out.”

  Paul Santini didn’t have to be told twice.

  Portoferraio

  Temptation painstakingly entered the Portoferraio harbor, adjusting her angle several times to fit into the spot allotted to her. Helen thought yachts of this size would have an automatic pilot to dock them. But then again, yachts like this were at least a size too big for the quaint harbor.

  Tourists were snapping pictures of the yacht, the biggest and most luxurious vessel in sight. The crew went down to the quay, looking sour, as if their job were the most annoying thing in the world. A perfectly coiffed blond sat on the back deck, working on a bottle of wine while thumbing her phone.