Dividing Zero

by Ty Patterson

  ‘None of these guys could be John Doe.’

  Beth looked Heavenward as if seeking forgiveness for her sister’s stupidity. ‘Yeah, I know. However, do you want to find out what the heck is going on?’

  That silenced Meghan till they boarded the Gulfstream.

  ‘You know what he looks like?’ she asked, once they were airborne.

  Beth brought up three photographs on her screen. ‘I got them from their driver’s licenses.’

  The men looked similar to John Doe.

  No wonder Stoll wasn’t sure. Meghan swiped through them swiftly and then turned to the brown-haired man with them.

  ‘Who did you meet yesterday?’

  Zeb filled her in while the aircraft defied gravity and made short work of the three hundred and fifty miles that separated the cities and landed at eleven a.m.

  Zeb rented a vehicle at Toronto airport and drove downtown, to the Distillery District, a commercial neighborhood in the Canadian city.

  He parked in a public parking lot, crossed the street, and waved in the direction of a glass-fronted building.

  ‘He’s in there. He works as an insurance broker.’ He mentioned a well-known firm.

  ‘You aren’t coming in?’ Meghan asked as she eyed the building and its surroundings.

  ‘Nope. It might spook him.’

  Of course it would. Stupid question. Zeb has the look. Cusak was an operative. He might wonder at Zeb’s presence.

  Cusak hid his surprise and put on a neutral expression when he approached the twins in the enormous lobby of his office.

  ‘Ms. Petersen?’ he inquired, looking from one sister to the other.

  ‘We both are, as you can see,’ Beth smiled disarmingly and introduced themselves.

  ‘How can I help you? My office didn’t give me any details.’

  She showed him John Doe’s photograph.

  ‘Do you know him? Was he a Dividing Zero operative?’

  Color drained from Cusak’s face.

  They were back in the aircraft three hours later, leaving behind a shaken man.

  Cusak had cooperated fully once he had heard about Maddie. He had been thin on details.

  ‘I am still bound by various oaths of confidentiality,’ he explained. There was no bitterness in his voice. No anger, that his previous life had been washed away.

  ‘We knew how it would be.’

  He mentioned a few details in passing; didn’t elaborate on any of them.

  No, he responded to a final question from Beth. He hadn’t met the other operatives at all. They were deliberately isolated from one another. All each one of them knew was there were five of them.

  The Gulfstream didn’t return to New York. It winged to Atlanta, where Randy Weinerger, another of the operatives, owned an upscale bar.

  The twins visited the establishment on the evening of the eighteenth day, jostled through stockbrokers, TV anchors, minor celebrities, and asked for Weinerger.

  A smartly dressed waiter nodded his head in the direction of a discreet office.

  Beth knocked once and opened the door without waiting for a response and stopped suddenly.

  Weinerger looked exactly like John Doe.

  He wasn’t.

  Weinerger reacted in the same way Cusak had. He closed down immediately on hearing the program’s name, and thawed only when Maddie was mentioned.

  He didn’t have any more leads than Cusak had.

  ‘You could have called,’ he said as he was escorting the twins out an hour later.

  ‘Would you have taken it?’ Beth challenged him.

  ‘No, ma’am.’

  They flew to Seattle the next day, the nineteenth.

  Beth was disappointed at their lack of progress and was silent on the flight. Meghan wasn’t disappointed. The wisp of a thought floating in her mind, was taking shape. It was helped by Werner’s search results.

  Still too many blanks to be filled in, she decided and didn’t enlighten her sister.

  Gary Dubronovik had done well for himself. He owned a palatial home in the Madrona neighborhood with views of Lake Washington.

  He was a restorer of old homes and his business was doing well, going by the activity in his home office.

  Dubronovik’s reaction was different from Cusak’s and Weinerger’s. He denied any knowledge of Dividing Zero and threatened to call the police.

  ‘I’m a builder. I know nothing of the world you describe.’

  He waved away Maddie’s story. ‘I have never been to Toccoa or Connersville. Don’t even know where they are.’

  He hadn’t left Seattle in a year. He had alibis.

  Beth was silent on their flight back. Chang and Pizaka hadn’t made any progress in the two days either. There were no more videos or pictures from John Doe.

  ‘We get leads. They disappear,’ she said once, sheen of tears in her eyes.

  There’s one more lead. Meghan bit her tongue and held the words back. No point in raising her hopes. Let me dig into it, first.

  ‘How is it that these operatives are doing so well?’ she queried aloud, in an attempt to distract her sister.

  Beth shrugged. She didn’t know.

  Zeb looked up when he felt two pairs of eyes on him.

  ‘Their silence has been bought. The military made a settlement with them. Money and new identities, in return for silence.’

  They reached New York in the afternoon and instead of heading back to their office, they headed to Amy Kittrell’s home.

  She had been discharged. She still wasn’t talking to the cops. Darien Kile, her lawyer, was still running interference.

  However, he had allowed one brief meeting for the twins.

  Meghan was shocked at the mother’s appearance.

  The lively woman in the photographs was missing. In her place was a listless, worn out woman who rarely spoke. Whose hands trembled constantly.

  A flicker of hope lit her eyes when the twins entered her home. That light disappeared when she saw they were alone.

  ‘We are close, ma’am. We will get her back soon,’ Meghan said in sudden certainty, her gut telling her she was finally chasing the right lead.

  ‘We have just one question for you.’

  Amy Kittrell looked at her in askance.

  ‘Your husband never hit you, did he? Maddie interpreted all that, wrongly.’

  The mother looked at Meghan dumbly for a moment and then her eyes filled and tears rolled down her cheeks.

  She nodded and began sobbing quietly.

  Chuck Keyser had made his plans.

  All the loose ends would be taken care of.

  Just one kidnapper is in a position to speak. And he won’t. There will be another attempt. This time, it will succeed.

  He dialed a number and waited for it to ring.

  Meghan’s phone rang and echoed inside the SUV.

  Zeb was driving them back, to their Columbus Avenue office.

  He raised an eyebrow at Meghan and accepted the call at her nod.

  ‘Meghan Petersen?’ a male voice asked.

  ‘Yes.’ Her eyes narrowed as she tried to place the voice.

  ‘It’s Chuck Keyser, ma’am. We spoke a while back.’

  ‘We did, Mr. Keyser.’ Excitement flooded her voice. ‘You have something for us, sir?’

  Keyser paused for a moment.

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  ‘I know where your man will be.’

  Chapter 38

  Day twenty saw the twins winging it in their gleaming white aircraft; an early start to their day, before the sun warmed the earth and made heat rise from the asphalt and concrete highways of the country.

  ‘What’s in Courtville? You know it’s somewhere in Illinois, don’t you? Another small city. Why would John Doe be there?’

  Beth was in rapid fire mode as she seated herself opposite her sister. ‘You have joined the dots haven’t you?’

  Keyser had asked them to meet him in Courtville; a request that had led them t
o jetting across the country again.

  The twins had decided to go to the meet alone. There was something in Keyser’s voice; something that hinted he would be spooked by a large group.

  ‘I’m waiting,’ Beth prompted when Meghan didn’t respond immediately.

  ‘I know some of it. I think Keyser will fill in the blanks,’ Meghan replied, reluctantly.

  Beth studied her sister; it wasn’t like looking in a mirror since the two knew where they differed.

  Meghan’s eyebrows were closer on her forehead than Beth’s. Their noses had the minutest difference.

  They were different in personality too. Meghan was analytical. Beth was more emotional and impulsive.

  I knew she would crack it. I knew she was working on something the last few days. She had that distracted look on her face, Beth thought.

  They had different social habits too.

  I have Mark and spend as much time I can, with him. She hardly dates. Says most of the men she meets are uninteresting.

  Beth made a gimme gesture with her hand. ‘Spill,’ she ordered her sister.

  ‘It was Stoll’s mention of civilian usage that got me thinking,’ Meghan began slowly.

  ‘He didn’t say the program was used on civilians.’

  ‘I know. You want to listen?’

  Beth zipped her mouth, settled back, and listened.

  ‘Stoll’s comment reminded me of a Mayo and Kane case,’ Meghan continued. ‘You remember, the one where they settled on behalf of some firm’s employees.’

  Beth jerked forward as if a live current had passed through her. ‘Dividing Zero was involved in that? How—’

  She pursed her lips when Meghan raised a warning hand and leaned back again.

  ‘No, the program had no connection. However, Stoll’s remark and the case got me wondering. What if Dividing Zero had been used by civilians?’

  Meghan smiled when Beth’s mouth rounded in an ‘O.’

  ‘I got Werner to look at incidents in Toccoa and Connersville. Any incident, going back ten years. Deaths. Disappearances. Anything.’

  ‘Werner came back with two events. A man disappearing mysteriously in Toccoa. Another one who was never seen again, in Connersville.’

  ‘Both occurrences in the same year, seven years back. Both worked for defense contractors in California.’

  ‘Here’s the funny thing. Both were whistleblowers. Both had complained to friends about malpractices at their places of employment. They were planning to report to the Department of Defense’s Whistleblower program.’

  ‘Same employers?’ Beth asked.

  ‘No.’ Meghan mentioned two well-known names.

  ‘Whistleblowers disappearing…that would open a can of worms, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘The local PDs investigated. They’re still open cases. The defense contractors were investigated. They came out clean. The stories died out.’

  ‘What kind of malpractices?’

  ‘No details on that.’

  Beth pondered for a moment and then shook her head. ‘I don’t get it. So what if they disappeared? Dividing Zero didn’t make them disappear. The program rubbed out their existence.’

  Meghan’s smile eclipsed the sunshine. ‘Both men had told friends they weren’t alone. There were a bunch of folks. They were planning to write a joint letter to the Pentagon.’

  Her smile grew broader when Beth continued to look puzzled.

  ‘There’s an image on the internet. Someone took a photograph of a news article that mentioned the two missing men. There’s a reference to a group of whistleblowers.’

  ‘One name is mentioned in that news report. Billy Bob Feitz. From Courtville.’

  She showed the image to Beth who studied it in silence.

  Meghan took a breath. ‘Billy Bob Feitz doesn’t exist.’

  She broke it down for her sister.

  ‘Someone came to know of Dividing Zero. That someone thought, wouldn’t it be great if these pesky whistleblowers disappeared?’

  ‘Toccoa and Connersville didn’t go perfectly for them. They were just disappearances, not erasures. Courtville was smooth.’

  ‘John Doe found out about the cleanups. Maybe he arranged them and was blackmailing Mr. Mastermind.’

  ‘Mr. M didn’t like that. He arranged for John Doe to disappear,’ Beth chimed in excitedly.

  ‘Yeah, and possibly John Doe got wind of it, grabbed Maddie and disappeared, himself.’

  They fell silent, each one of them worrying at it, trying to find holes in Meghan’s theory, trying to find other explanations.

  ‘Why would John Doe contact us?’ Beth chewed her lip, a frown marring her face.

  ‘He wants us to look into the program.’

  ‘Why wouldn’t he go to the cops?’

  ‘He was threatened. Amy Kittrell and Maddie’s lives were at risk. The cops didn’t get anywhere in Toccoa and Connersville.’

  ‘Is Kittrell the mastermind?’

  ‘I can’t see how he could be. He is too visible; he would be the first one suspected if the program was discovered.’

  Beth pondered for a moment and brought up another name. ‘What about Chuck Keyser?’

  ‘Nope,’ Meghan replied. ‘I looked up his profile. He doesn’t have the smarts.’

  ‘He could be involved.’

  ‘Possible,’ Meghan conceded.

  ‘Are we in danger?’

  ‘No,’ Meghan was definitive. ‘This is fact finding for him. He’ll want to know how much we know.’

  ‘Is Mayo and Kane involved?’ Beth didn’t give up on her line of inquiry. She was emotional and impulsive. She was also relentless when she got hold of a lead.

  ‘Nope. Werner ran probability algos. Came with very a low possibility.’

  ‘You know who Mr. M is?’

  ‘I hope Keyser does,’ Meghan confessed.

  ‘What about John Doe?’

  ‘Sis, I thought you would have figured that out by now. He’s –’

  The pilot announced they were landing and Meghan took the opportunity to stay silent and let Beth figure out John Doe’s identity for herself.

  Courtville’s station was a flat single-story structure when they drove up from Southern Illinois Airport. The station had a large parking yard at the front, a ticket office, waiting area, and not much else.

  In front of the station was a road that went into the city. Beyond it were thick woods, and behind the station were the tracks.

  The yard had three other vehicles when they rode in; no people were present.

  The twins waited for a moment. No person stepped out from the vehicles or from the station, to meet them.

  They went inside the station, to the waiting area. It was empty. The agent in the ticket office looked up hopefully when they approached him, and mouthed something they couldn’t hear.

  Beth shook her head at him. They weren’t there to travel.

  Keyser was waiting for them when they emerged from the station.

  Chuck Keyser's hair was cut close and his face was deeply creased. His body, however, could have passed for a much younger man’s.

  There wasn’t an ounce of fat on him, as he waited in the parking lot, his feet spread, a brown coat flapping against his legs.

  A gray shirt tucked into faded blue jeans and a wide leather belt, completed his outfit.

  He removed his shades when they got closer. He looked at one and then the other twin.

  ‘Meghan Petersen?’

  ‘That’s me.’ She shook his hand and introduced Beth.

  ‘Why Courtville, sir?’ Beth asked him.

  If Keyser was startled by her abrupt question, he didn’t show it. His flat, black eyes studied her before he replied.

  ‘Josh Kittrell, the dead man, will show up here,’ he replied in a gravelly voice, ‘if you stay long enough.’

  Meghan closed her eyes briefly and clamped down on the surge of triumph deep inside.

  I was right! That was the only explanation fo
r the goings on. She glanced at her sister and smiled at the expression on her face. She’s figured it out too.

  ‘You don’t look surprised,’ Keyser continued. ‘How much have you put together?’

  Meghan told him while studying the man in front of her.

  How’s he involved?

  ‘Did you have those men killed? Make Feitz disappear?’

  A muscle twitched on Keyser’s face. He didn’t become angry. His black eyes remained flat.

  ‘No, ma’am. But what Josh and I did, led to their deaths. And to Feitz’s cleanup.’

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘We looked the other way, ma’am.’

  Keyser headed the liaison unit when Josh Kittrell joined his team in Baybush. After a few years, their role soon turned to managing potential whistleblowers in the defense industry.

  Negotiating with them. Threatening them, sometimes.

  Keyser broke off and looked around the yard. Nothing moved other than his coat, which slapped his legs.

  Josh and he were asked to go hard on the Toccoa man. They did. The man didn’t budge from his position. He was determined to spill. He would go public with the insider information he had.

  He had evidence of bribes to senior politicians made by his employer. Weapons trials in countries where innocents had died. Coverups of those incidents.

  Keyser and Kittrell were asked to back off when the Toccoa man remained resolute. Matters would be dealt with, differently.

  ‘He disappeared. We knew he had been killed, though his body was never found. The Connersville man suffered a similar fate.’

  ‘Feitz was different.’ The words flowed out of Keyser as if a dam had burst. ‘He was a loner. One of those people who don’t get along with others.’

  ‘We were told about Dividing Zero. He was a natural for it. We were given a software program and access to federal and state databases. Asked to execute the program.’

  ‘We refused.’

  A man came out of the station and looked at them. The ticket agent. He watched them for a moment and disappeared inside.

  ‘We were threatened. Our families were threatened. We were told we would disappear like the three men.’