by Mark Nolan
Jake dropped the phone, which continued to broadcast the horrific sound. He struggled to reach out to it and end the call, but he felt like he was moving in slow motion. His breathing became labored, his ears were ringing, his vision was blurred, and he felt as if his skin was covered with hundreds of crawling, stinging insects.
Cody was shocked by the sound. He began howling as his sensitive ears heard four hundred percent more sound than Jake, and many more frequencies.
He pawed at the phone, trying to turn it off. He’d been trained to operate all kinds of controls, such as light switches and doorknobs, but he wasn’t able to swipe on a touchscreen.
He managed to turn the phone over so the speaker was facedown against the carpet. He then pressed on the back of the phone with both of his front paws and barked at the top of his lungs to alert his “pack” to the danger.
Terrell ran up to them with his hands over his ears. He got down on one knee next to Cody, grabbed the phone and ended the call. “What the hell was that?”
Jake struggled to a sitting position on the hallway floor, with his back against a wall. He was groggy and his head hurt. He retched between his knees, but nothing came up from his empty stomach. He took deep breaths in an attempt to regain his equilibrium and then looked around for his dog. “Cody, are you okay?”
Cody barked once and came closer, pressing his face against Jake’s. Jake hugged him and continued to breathe as his heart rate returned to normal.
A drop of blood trickled out of Jake’s nose and dripped down his face. Cody licked the blood off Jake’s chin.
“I’m all right, thanks to you, buddy,” Jake said. He gave a silent prayer of thanks that his dog had not been harmed.
Terrell handed Jake’s phone to him. “Turn that damned thing off until our tech officer can check it for malware.”
Jake tapped the phone. “Roger, that.”
“On my way in here, I shot down a drone that was trying to get in through the front door.”
“Good work. I answered my phone and got my ass kicked by some kind of weaponized sound.”
“What is this—the work of a mad scientist?”
“I don’t know, but there’s plenty of scientific equipment in that secret room.”
Terrell looked at his phone. “Roxanne Poole just arrived. If anyone can figure out the scientific part of this, our tech officer can.”
Terrell reached out to Jake, clasped hands with his best friend and pulled him to his feet, then kept his grip and pushed him against the wall to keep him upright. He looked him in the eye. “You good to go?”
“Yeah … I’m good,” Jake said. He’d never had an older brother, until he’d become friends with Terrell in the Marine Corps. They’d gone through hell together in the Middle East, and had somehow survived. Now they thought of each other as a brother from another mother.
Terrell scowled at Jake. “Why are you at this fancy mansion anyway?”
“I let myself get talked into doing some security work for Dylan’s friend, Levi. That former CIA guy.”
“Not good,” Terrell said. “The last time you worked with the CIA, you nearly got yourself killed.”
“That’s a fact. This guy’s retired CIA though; he owns a private security firm,” Jake said.
Working for the CIA and the JSOC could be highly dangerous. You didn’t do it for the paycheck. You did it because you knew that somebody had to do it.
Terrell shook his head. “Being a good man is a thankless job.”
Jake nodded in agreement and walked away on wobbly legs toward the study. Terrell and Cody followed him.
Terrell stopped and stared in amazement at the secret doorway.
Jake noted Terrell’s defensive body language, knowing how his friend felt about being closed in. “Sorry, but the room is down those stairs, underground.”
Terrell frowned. “Underground? You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Terrell’s irrational but all-too-real claustrophobic fears crawled in hot tendrils up his back. His heartbeat increased, and his skin became clammy.
He recalled a past life in a desert far from home, where he’d fought through a secret underground bunker that held chemical weapon missiles and prisoners who were being tortured. He couldn’t fire his rifle or pistol because he might hit a prisoner or detonate a warhead.
He and his fellow Marines had cut the power lines after midnight, infiltrated the bunker, and killed the enemy up close, with their KA-BAR knives. They’d fought in hand-to-hand combat, in pitch-black darkness wearing green-lighted night vision optics. They’d won the battle and freed the hostages, but right then, Terrell had sworn he would never put himself in that position again. Never.
Cody stood in the doorway, sniffed the air, and growled. Jake patted him on the back. “I don’t want to go down there again either, but it will only be for a minute.”
Terrell’s phone vibrated and he read the message, then turned to Jake. “Roxanne is coming inside now, along with the CSI team. They don’t want anybody to go into that room, so we’ll wait here.”
“Roger that,” Jake said. He noticed the look of relief on Terrell’s face.
Terrell took a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket, stopped and looked around, and then put it back. “You sent me a text at dawn. What was that about? What happened?”
Jake turned on his phone and showed Terrell a photo of the dinghy and the dead man with the grenade launcher. “He was going to blow up the Far Niente, and kill Sarah and Cody. But I gave him a burial at sea, which is more than he deserved.”
“If you shot him in self-defense, that works for me,” Terrell said.
“You’re right, international maritime law and universal jurisdiction allow you to take defensive action against pirate attacks at sea.”
“It sounds like you’re still reading those law textbooks.”
“Maybe I’ll surprise you one day and become a lawyer.”
“Sure, in your dreams. You don’t even have a bachelor’s degree.”
“There are ways around that. Besides, you’d think that after all the bachelor parties I’ve been to, those might count toward an honorary bachelor’s degree.”
Terrell shook his head. “We can get the FBI to run this through their facial recognition database.”
“Agent Singer has Homeland working on it.”
“I’ll touch base with her.”
“It made me wonder if there was still a bounty on my head.”
“Cody had a bounty on his head too.”
“Right, all the military war dogs were wanted by the terrorists. Remember the reward? Twenty thousand dollars for any MWD, dead or alive.”
“Yeah, and I’ve seen you kill a man to protect your dog.”
Jake nodded. “If those dirtbags try to come after Cody, it’ll be the last thing they ever do.”
Lauren came into the room. “Jake, the police have arrived.”
Jake gestured at Terrell. “This is my friend Terrell Hayes with the SFPD.”
“Hello,” Lauren said.
Terrell gave her a nod. “Ma’am.”
Lauren stared at the secret doorway, then turned to Jake. “Did you say the amber skull controlled the bookshelf?”
“Yes. I turned this counterclockwise, and the shelf rolled sideways.” Jake pointed at the sculpture.
Terrell stepped closer and looked at the skull. While his back was turned, Lauren took a deep breath and then headed down the stairway.
Jake realized what she was going to do, and tried one last time to protect her from the horrors that awaited her if she went down those stairs. “Lauren, please don’t. The police have sequestered it as a crime scene, and you don’t need to see it for yourself. The description in the report will be enough to give you nightmares.”
“This is my house, and I have to know what’s down there!” Lauren said.
Lauren hurried down the narrow stairs and opened the door at the bottom. She heard Terrell say, “Stay out of there, it’s a cr
ime scene.”
A terrible, pervasive odor took her breath away. It reminded her of burnt meat combined with the acrid sulfuric aroma of discharged fireworks.
At first glance, the room looked like some kind of high-tech surveillance setup. On her left was a wall of electronic equipment. There were over a dozen computer monitors lining the wall. Some flickered with real-time stock market investment charts, but most were focused on the insides of homes, spying on the residents as they went about their daily lives. On one, a woman she didn’t know was taking a shower. Another displayed a crystal-clear view of her own bedroom, in living color.
Along the far wall was a wooden worktable that looked strangely out of place. It held a locksmith’s key-cutting machine and all kinds of blank keys.
On her right was something that chilled her to the bone—a desk and a black leather office chair, where her dead husband was sprawled. She only knew it was him because she could recognize his bathrobe. His face was so mutilated there was no trace of the familiar features that she’d fallen in love with so long ago.
He was wearing headphones, and the ear covers appeared to be melted onto his skull. Both sides of his head were horribly burned and disfigured. Most of his facial skin was burned off, exposing the scorched skull underneath. His hands were gripping the headphones, and they were both burned to a crisp. His mouth was open in a silent scream, and his tongue was fried like bacon, sticking out between what was left of his lips. Worst of all, his eyeballs appeared to have burst.
It looked as if the headphones had fired blowtorches into both of his ears and made the flames shoot out of his eyes, nose and mouth—burning his skull from the inside out, while his hands were seared to the black plastic of the headphones in a desperate attempt to pull them off.
The room was a nightmare, hiding underground, beneath her happy home.
She screamed and staggered backward toward the door. Then everything became a blur and went dark, as she fainted.
Chapter 13
The Crime Scene Investigation Unit entered the mansion carrying the tools of their trade. Tech officer Roxanne Poole, a brunette with determined brown eyes, came into the study and approached Terrell, Jake, and Cody.
Roxanne had a brainy look on her face that said: If you mess with a tech nerd like me you’d better change all your passwords, quick.
She nodded at Terrell. “What have we got, Lieutenant?”
“Follow me, Rox, down those stairs. The husband is dead. The wife just now went down there and screamed at the sight of him.”
“What’s that awful smell?”
“Burnt magnesium, scorched skin and boiled blood. It reminds me of war, and I don’t want to be reminded,” Terrell said.
Roxanne recognized Jake. She used one finger to push her glasses higher on her nose. “Why are you here?”
“I’m working for a private security firm hired by Lauren Stephens. My dog found that hidden stairway, and I called the police.”
Jake’s phone buzzed. He looked at the display, then walked out of the room, with Cody close on his heels.
Terrell said, “Rox, I want you to check Jake’s phone for viruses. Those could spread to my phone and others.”
“No problem. I can do it in a minute.”
They gloved up and wore shoe covers. Terrell went down the stairs ahead of Roxanne, clenching his teeth and holding his breath. Once he was inside the room, he stayed near the door; guarding it, but also staying close to the escape route.
He noted Lauren passed out on the floor a few feet away from the body, and cringed when he saw what was left of her husband. No matter how many times he saw death, he could never completely suppress that initial reaction. The room began to close in. Sweat broke out on his forehead, and his heart raced until he heard it pounding in his ears.
Roxanne noticed Terrell’s discomfort. She was feeling something similar, but made an effort to appear calm in front of him as she snapped a picture of the dead husband. “Did his headphones electrocute him?”
Focusing on regaining control of his body by concentrating on facts, Terrell said, “If this is what I think it is, the headphones shot sizzling-hot magnesium shrapnel into both ears, that burned white hot like fireworks inside his skull.”
Roxanne coughed in the foul air and shuddered. “What an awful way to die. How do you know about the headphones?”
“Last month in Las Vegas a wealthy man was killed this way by his cell phone. I heard about it from a contact at Vegas Metro.”
“Couldn’t the killer have used shotgun pellets instead of burning magnesium?”
“Yes, but this is more horrific and it sends a message.”
“A message to who? Lauren?”
Lauren stirred on the floor and groaned.
Terrell felt the walls closing in on him. “I’ll carry Lauren upstairs before she comes around and sees her husband like this again. I don’t know how you can stand to be down here. It’s like a burial crypt.”
“It’s all about mind over matter. If I don’t mind, it doesn’t matter,” Roxanne said.
Terrell picked up Lauren, put her over his shoulder in a firefighter’s carry, and made his way back up the stairs.
Roxanne was left all alone, underground, with the mutilated dead body. Only after Terrell had left did she allow herself a moment to express her own repulsion. She took a breath and coughed out the sulfuric air, then clenched her fists and closed her eyes for a moment.
After she’d gathered herself, she looked at the wall of high-tech electronics, and her eyes lit up. She tapped on the computer keyboard while watching the screens.
“Oh yeah, still logged in to all kinds of things. You’re going to tell me everything you know.”
Chapter 14
Jake was standing in the mansion’s living room, talking to an employee of the security company, when he heard footsteps behind him and felt as if someone was staring at his back. He turned as Roxanne approached him.
“I’m Sergeant Roxanne Poole, the tech officer. We’ve never met, but I feel like I know you because I saw everything on your phone when you were arrested.”
“Which arrest? It seems like everything is illegal these days and I’m always getting arrested for one damn thing after another.”
“The most recent one.”
“Good thing I deleted some stuff off my phone before you got ahold of it.”
She tipped one side of her mouth up in a half-smile. “I saw everything you deleted, too. It only took a minute to crack your password and extract your data.”
“One minute?”
“Yes, I used a Cellebrite UFED.”
“What’s a UFED?”
“Universal Forensic Extraction Device.”
“Huh. I guess I’ll have to get a phone with fingerprint security.”
“I can open those too; it just takes a little longer. I wanted to tell you I liked your nature photography.”
“Thanks.”
“And surprisingly, no dick pics.”
It was his turn to smile. “Disappointed?”
“No.” She shook her head and looked away, not meeting his eyes.
“You’re welcome to keep copies of my nature photos.”
“I already have some of them rotating as my screensaver.”
“I’m going to be traveling soon. Is there anything on my phone that might cause excitement with Customs and Border Patrol?”
“The CBP might wonder why you have such an unusually high number of contacts.”
“I worked in the media and I made it my business to know everybody in town.”
“Okay, but why do your contacts include the chief of police, SFPD inspectors, FBI agents, Secret Service agents, and Congressman Anderson?”
“Maybe you’ve heard that Garth Brooks song, Friends in Low Places,” Jake said. He tapped on his phone. “What’s your number?”
“Why do you want mine?”
“We’re working together on this situation. I might find a clue and pass i
t along to you. I do that with Terrell and his partner, Beth, and an FBI agent named Knight.”
Roxanne thought it over for a moment and then recited her phone number.
“If you’re the tech, can you unmask a number that texted me a photo?” Jake held out his phone and showed her the symbol.
She stared at it curiously and took a picture. “I can try, but first, Terrell said to check your phone for viruses.”
Jake handed his phone to her. She pulled a device out of her pocket and plugged it into the phone. A minute later she handed the phone back. “You had some seriously bad stuff on there.”
“Did it come from that image?”
“Probably, a picture text can infect your phone with a virus, allowing a hacker to take control.”
“That’s what happened, my phone’s volume went up, and some kind of weaponized sound knocked me to the floor.”
Roxanne blinked. “It’s a good thing you didn’t forward that image to anybody else. I’m going to grab some equipment out of my van, and I’ll be right back.”
Roxanne went out the front door, just as Terrell’s partner, Beth Cushman walked in.
Beth was pale-skinned like her Scottish mother. She wore a pantsuit and cop shoes and had short, fiery-red hair and a personality that matched. She appraised Jake with her cool blue eyes. “Jake Wolfe, why am I not surprised?”
“Hey, Beth.”
“What are you doing here?”
“Nice to see you too,” he said with a smile. “I just dropped by to find a secret room and a dead body for the cops. I know you’re busy, so I try to help out when I can. You owe me a donut.”
Beth shook her head at Jake. He shrugged in reply. Jake knew she was concerned that he was dating her friend, Sarah, the veterinarian who took care of Beth’s cat. His guess was that Beth was hoping he wouldn’t break Sarah’s heart, so she wouldn’t have to break his arm.
Cody barked at Beth, and she scratched him behind his ears. She was one of the few people who could get away with that.
“Hi, Cody, I see you’re still hanging around with this troublemaker,” Beth said.
