The Inverted Pyramid (An Alex Vane Media Thriller, Book 2)

by A. C. Fuller

  "Then leave now. Buy a one-way ticket to Bangalore. I'll meet your flight."

  "How will I tell you when I get it?"

  "Use the laptop I gave you to order the ticket, and you won't have to. See you soon, James."

  He picked the laptop up off his desk and slid it into a backpack.

  In his bedroom, he considered packing up some clothes, but didn't. From a small safe in his closet, he retrieved his passport. He grabbed a bottle of water and a large baggie of veggie sticks from the fridge, and, minutes later, was in a taxi headed for JFK.

  62

  Mount Sinai Urgent Care, Columbus Avenue

  Alex sat in on a cheap plastic chair, head in his hands, waiting to hear something about Camila. He knew she'd been in surgery, but because he wasn't family, they'd been unwilling to give him the details.

  He'd contacted Camila's mother soon after arriving at the hospital the previous day. She'd helped connect the hospital with Camila's doctors back home, but she was unable to travel because of her Alzheimer's.

  The waiting room was cold, or maybe he just felt cold. He kept seeing Bice's brain—gray and pink and red—splattered on the seats of the car and being washed by the rain into the grate by the curb. He could barely believe Bice was dead, and he couldn't stop thinking about his own parents.

  When his phone vibrated in his pocket, his shoulders tightened slightly. Every time it had vibrated or rung in the last two days, he'd half-expected a cryptic message from his source. But his source was dead, and he was going to have to get used to the fact that he'd never hear from him again.

  The text was a long note from Greta that had been split up into three different messages:

  1/3: Hey, baby. We're not going to know what we are doing. We're going to be scared as hell. Our lives as we know them will be over. But I want to do this with you. I want you to come home while I'm fat and naked except for my Jimmy Choos, and I want you to make me eggs. I want to go back to work whenever it's a good idea and know that little Esmerelda Mori-Vane or Buster Vane-Mori is crawling around James's apartment while you guys rant about whatever you're ranting about that day.

  2/3: BTW, our last names sound TERRIBLE together. But I want our baby to find Lance's cigar on the floor and try to use it as a chew toy, but you pull it away right before little Freddie Mercury Junior eats it. I want to watch you and little baby Beyoncé Stardust ride the stupid merry-go-round in Central Park.

  3/3: I love you, and I'm going to come to the hospital with Lance as soon as I get off work.

  Alex read her messages twice and slid the phone under the chair on the linoleum floor.

  He remembered what Camila had told him in Seattle, that people tend to define themselves in terms of the absence of something familiar.

  He felt like a fraud and he realized now that he always had. On some level, he'd always known that his bravado and superficiality were a cover. But now he felt laid bare. Transparent. Like the vacancy he'd felt inside was on the surface, was all that he was. But it actually felt kind of nice. Like at least he could see himself.

  He reached down for his phone to text Greta, just as it vibrated again. A new message from Sadie Green: How is Camila? Thought you'd want to know that a guy from CNN told me that the justice department is investigating Plutarch Capital and Chairman Gathert.

  As he finished reading, another text from Sadie arrived: PS—Married life isn't so bad. Maybe you and Greta should try it.

  He closed Sadie's text, read Greta's again, then began typing his reply: I'll see you soon. In the past, I thought I was too selfish to be a dad. Too driven. Now, I just don't know who or what I am. I want to want it, I really do, but I—

  He stopped typing, read over his text, then held down the delete key until it was blank again. He typed: See you in a bit, and pressed "Send."

  The fluorescent lights flickered and Alex saw a familiar nurse come into the waiting room. He was tall and lean and his tightly-wrapped dreadlocks went down to the center of his back. Alex had watched him coming and going all day.

  "Anything you can tell me?" Alex asked.

  "Yeah. It turns out you're Ms. Gray's POA," the nurse said with a slight Jamaican accent.

  Alex stared up at him, unsure of what he was talking about.

  "Power of Attorney," the nurse said slowly. "On her medical forms."

  "Umm, okay, so—"

  "We had them sent in from Iowa, and she has you listed."

  "What does that mean?"

  "Means I can take you to the room. Doctor Wan told me to fill you in."

  The nurse led Alex down the hallway and into a small room, where Camila lay under a sheet, tubes running from her arms to two different IV bags. A thin, white wire ran from under her gown to a heart monitor behind her, which beeped with a slow, steady rhythm.

  Alex stared at her, trying to pick up a slight movement, a facial twitch, anything. She lay completely still.

  The nurse examined the monitors and made a few notes on a chart that hung on the wall beside the IV bag. "Just her vitals," he said. "We check them every hour."

  "What can you tell me?"

  The nurse hung the chart back up on the wall, stepped over to Alex, and put a hand on his shoulder. "Take a seat."

  Alex sat on the blue recliner in the corner and the nurse squatted next to him so he could meet his eyes.

  "The shot hit her chest and pulverized her right lung. Luckily, it was an old bullet. A twenty-two, so the exit wound isn't as bad as it could have been. Her lung filled with blood, so she wasn't getting good air exchange. She lost blood fast, and the oxygen saturation in the blood she had left was poor. Generally, a wound like this wouldn't land someone in a coma, but she lost so much blood that—"

  Alex turned away.

  "Sorry. You want me to go on?"

  "Yeah," Alex said as his phone buzzed in his pocket. He reached in and silenced it, eyes still on the nurse. "Please finish. Somehow it makes me feel a little calmer to know exactly what happened. Keeps me from making things up."

  "The paramedics placed what's called an endotracheal tube into her lungs to help with her breathing on the drive over. They started an IV to give medications for pain and to keep her blood pressure stable. Luckily, the crew that was here was good. She was in surgery within fifteen minutes. Doctor Wan removed the lower lobe of her lung."

  The nurse pointed at one of the tubes running out from underneath her gown.

  "See that? It's going into the space between the chest wall and the lung. It's pulling air and any residual blood or body fluids from her chest cavity, which helps keep the lung inflated. Once the lung heals, we'll take it out. This could take a couple of days or up to a week."

  "And when her lung heals, will she . . ."

  "Will she wake up? We think so, but there's no way of knowing." He stood and turned to leave, but stopped himself and leaned in over Camila.

  "What?" Alex asked, standing.

  "Look," the nurse said, pointing at her face.

  Her eyes were open.

  Alex leaned in, and, though she didn't seem to recognize him, he was sure he saw movement in her face. "What does it mean?" he asked.

  The nurse was already at the intercom, paging the doctor. "I'm gonna have to ask you to step out," he said, hanging up the phone. "Looks like she's waking up, and the doctors are gonna want to have a look at her."

  Out in the hallway, Alex watched as a doctor and another nurse hurried in. As he pulled out his phone, he saw Camila's arms moving for the first time. She was going to be alright, and he sighed, deeply relieved.

  After watching her for a few minutes, he looked down at his phone and saw a new text from James:

  I'm at the airport, about to board a flight. I think you know who I'm going to see. But I need to tell you that I'm not coming back. I'm leaving News Scoop. It's nothing against you or Lance. We won't do anything that will lead back to you two. You are not going to be implicated in anything illegal. But we are going to revolutionize journalism.
I'll be in touch.

  When he looked up, Lance and Greta were standing in the hallway, watching him from about twenty feet away. Lance smiled at him and pulled a cigar out of the inside pocket of his wrinkled jacket. He ran it under his nose and nudged Greta forward, hanging back as she approached Alex.

  She wore black jeans and a white linen shirt embroidered with blue flowers along the seams. Her hair was tied up into a messy, woven bun.

  Alex stared at her, trying to read the expression on her face. At first, he thought it was anger, probably at him.

  Then he realized it was concern. For him.

  She saw how he looked. She saw through him. She knew him. In that moment, he realized that she'd probably seen through him all along, and loved him anyway.

  He took a step toward her and stopped when he noticed she was wearing her sapphire blue Jimmy Choo heels.

  Greta noticed him noticing and stepped toward him. "I figured Cam could use me at my best."

  "She woke up."

  Greta smiled. "I knew she would."

  He stepped forward and hugged her gently. She pressed her body into him and rested her head on his chest.

  "I'm in," he said.

  "In what?"

  She leaned away slowly and a look of recognition spread across her face.

  "I'm in," Alex said again. "Did you bring the wine?"

  —The End—

  Thanks for Reading!

  Besides my family, nothing makes me happier than the thought of a reader finishing one of my books.

  So . . . thank you!

  As an indie author, I work hard to bring you excellent work as fast as I can. I've got many books in the works, and I plan to be at this a long time. I hope you'll come along for the ride.

  The best way to do that is by joining my reader club. I never sell or rent your e-mail address. I never send spam or junk, but I do send:

  •inside information about my books

  •invitations to in-person launch parties

  •notes about my writing workshops and other public appearances

  •recipes

  •links to free books

  Check out the reader club to get a free sample of The Cutline, a novella featuring Alex Vane two years before the events in The Anonymous Source and four years before the events in The Inverted Pyramid.

  If you enjoyed The Inverted Pyramid, please consider leaving a brief, honest review on Amazon. Reviews help young authors like me get noticed, which helps get me closer to my goal of writing full time.

  Until next time,

  A.C. Fuller

  Hansville, Washington

  Author Notes, April 2017

  This book is dedicated to the memory of Roger Hobbs. I met Roger about three years ago and he passed away unexpectedly in November of 2016, at the age of twenty-eight.

  Roger was a writer of extraordinary talent, whose first book, Ghostman, came out when he was just twenty-four years old and won many of the awards thrillers can win in this world. His second book, Vanishing Games, came out two years later, also to wide acclaim.

  Roger and I wrote together from time to time, and I was mesmerized by his talent. I have many fond memories of writing with him in Seattle—me at work on The Inverted Pyramid, him on City of Sirens, the book that would have been his third and will now remain unfinished forever.

  I recall one afternoon in particular, when Roger was working on the opening scene—a heist during a political coup in Bangkok. We were eating lunch in a Mexican restaurant and talking through ideas for the scene when, out of nowhere, Roger dictated about a page of pristine prose off the top of his head. It would have taken me ten drafts to write something that good, and he just spoke it, fully formed, between bites of taco.

  That's the kind of talent Roger had. It made me envious and left me in awe. I miss him terribly and I grieve for his friends, his sister, his parents, and his partner Lara.

  I remember another night, when Roger helped me come up with the premise for The Mockingbird Drive, book three of the Alex Vane series. We stood on the steps of a towering office building in downtown Seattle and Roger said, "You should use an old hard drive as the McGuffin!"

  So, I did.

  The Mockingbird Drive brings Alex Vane into the modern world—2017 Seattle and Las Vegas, to be exact—into the world of stolen hard drives, WikiLeaks-type hackers, social media, and a mass shooting that may have taken the life of Alex's friend.

  Roger also helped convince me to switch to first person voice for The Mockingbird Drive, and I owe him a big 'Thank You' for that. I had a great time writing it, and I think it's my best work yet. It comes out June 30, 2017, but you can pre-order it here or flip the page for a preview.

  And, while you're at it, do yourself a favor and go check out Roger's books. Help keep his memory alive, as I will.

  A.C. Fuller

  Free Preview: The Mockingbird Drive

  1

  Payoff Plaza Strip Mall, Las Vegas, Nevada Tuesday, June 13, 2017

  Twelve years ago, Greta tiptoed up behind me in our tiny kitchenette in New York City, wrapped an arm around my waist, and asked me to marry her. Even at nine months pregnant, she moved elegantly and spoke poetically. "We have this one life together," she said. "Let's use it to walk each other home."

  Her only demand was truth. She knew that we'd both change over time, because that's what people do, and someday one of us was bound to change in a way that would fracture our marriage, at least temporarily. But as long as we were completely honest, we could work through anything.

  I promised her that day that I'd never lie to her, and I never did.

  About a hundred years before I met Greta, Joseph Pulitzer wrote three words on the newsroom wall of The New York World, his flagship newspaper. Accuracy. Accuracy. Accuracy. The founding principle of journalism. Above all else, get your damn facts straight. I learned this on my first day at Columbia Journalism School, and I've never had to retract an article. I haven't once made up a detail to enhance a story.

  But Greta kicked me out eight months ago, and I haven't been a real journalist in years, so I guess truth and accuracy aren't enough. At least not anymore.

  Here's what probably happened:

  James Stacy stepped out of his bright blue MINI Cooper, glanced left and right, then slowly rotated three-hundred-sixty degrees, eyes darting from car to car, hands tight around the handle of an old leather backpack. He was pretty sure he hadn't been followed.

  He spotted the office of The Las Vegas Gazette between a Chinese restaurant and a liquor store, and huffed across the parking lot in the already-oppressive heat. His face quickly became slick and blotchy. James had lost and regained the same twenty pounds ten times in the last ten years, but recently he'd regained the twenty, plus a few extra, so his jeans and blazer were too tight. The sun was hot on his back, and his shirt clung to his damp skin as he paused to read the paper's motto on the glass door: IF YOU DON'T WANT IT PRINTED, DON'T LET IT HAPPEN.

  He scanned the parking lot again. There were about a half-dozen cars in the lot, and none had come in after him. Traffic was light along South Rainbow Boulevard, and most of the businesses in the area wouldn't open for another hour or two. Everything was quiet, which was how James liked it. It wasn't that he'd expected to be followed—not exactly, anyway—but he was always a little anxious. And the stolen hard drive in his backpack wasn't helping.

  He stepped into The Gazette office and stopped at the receptionist's desk. A young woman looked up from her smartphone and smiled. "Mr. Stacy?"

  "Yes, I'm a little early. I'm here to meet—"

  "Ben is expecting you. I'm his assistant, Esperanza. Just let me check to see if he's ready for you."

  James took a seat on a threadbare sofa against the far wall and watched Esperanza walk down a dark hall and disappear through a doorway.

  The lobby was a dump. Two clashing armchairs faced the sofa, and between them sat a low coffee table littered with old magazines. In a corner, a small ro
ck fountain buzzed quietly, out of water. The hallway looked to be only about thirty feet long, with two doors on each side and one in the back, which James figured led to a back alley. That was it. The newsroom and corporate headquarters of The Las Vegas Gazette. The fourth-largest weekly in Las Vegas, and there were only four. The whole place couldn't have measured more than eight-hundred square feet.

  Even without much of a sense of humor, the irony of the situation wasn't lost on James. He was sweaty and nervous, but he was one of the most influential journalists on earth. And there he was, sitting in the office of a half-assed newspaper, waiting to meet its half-assed editor, Benjamin Huang.

  In the mid-nineties, when he was an up-and-coming tech reporter at The New York Times, Huang had been caught inventing sources. Desperate to stay in print, he'd bounced downward from The Dallas Morning News to The Boise Register to The Albany Free Times, until he finally bottomed out at The Gazette, a paper that only existed so its casino-mogul owner could claim it as a business loss.

  James, on the other hand, was part of the two-person team known as NUM, Next Underground Media. Fifteen years earlier, he had gotten his first newspaper internship and figured out within five minutes that he'd never be a regular reporter. He believed that the journalism of the future would be done by data leakers and computer hackers, the people who operate outside the media. The ones who can get to the bank statements, memos, and e-mails that are supposed to be private. And, like most young people in the early 2000s, he knew that newspapers were dying anyway. People weren't going to keep paying a dollar a day to have someone throw yesterday's news in the bushes when today's news was available online for free.