“I don’t understand,” said Rudy. “Have her records been removed?”
“No,” said Bug, “if they’d been expunged it would leave a trace in the system and MindReader’s programmed to look for that sort of thing. You can’t hide from MindReader…”
“But…”
“Unless you’re not in the system at all, and Junie Flynn is definitely not in the system. She’s never been in a hospital, at least not under that name or the name on the phony birth certificate. She’s never been to a dentist, she’s never been vaccinated, she’s never been to an ER. Never been to a shrink, as far as I can tell.”
“How thoroughly have you looked?” asked Church.
“I got a couple of guys on this and they’re going all the way down the rabbit hole, but Alice isn’t there.”
Church pursed his lips and said nothing.
Rudy asked, “But what does that mean? Is she … a spy? A mole, or something like that? Is she operating under a false identity?”
“We don’t know,” said Bug. “It’s not Witness Protection or anything like that, and I don’t make her for a deep-cover mole.”
“Doubtful,” agreed Church.
“As far as the system goes,” continued Bug, “prior to entering college she didn’t exist. Most of what we have is really recent stuff, what she put on her Web site and the content of her podcasts.”
“Put people on those podcasts,” said Church. “I want summaries of everything she’s said.”
Bug made a strange face. “Way ahead of you. I have a whole bunch of my guys on that. I started them on the podcasts as soon as Joe headed out to Turkey Point. Most of the stuff is general conspiracy theory material, and a lot of speculation on the Black Book, M3, all of that. But then Joe suggested we listen to last night’s podcast. If the thing with the president wasn’t already taking up so much manpower we’d have gotten to this sooner. But man-oh-man-oh-man.”
“What is it?” asked Rudy, gripping the arms of his chair.
“Last night Junie Flynn announced that she has obtained a complete copy of the Majestic Black Book and that tonight she plans on sending it to every newspaper and university in the world. And to every nonprofit organization, every grassroots organization…”
Rudy gasped. “She … she lied to us.”
Church sat back in his chair. “So it seems.”
“I’m embarrassed to say that,” Rudy said, “except for the obvious deception about her source, I believed that she was being straight with us. I caught none of the eye shifts, body language changes, or facial tics typical of someone who is lying. And considering the pressure of the situation, at least some of those elements should have been there.”
“What do you infer from that?” asked Church.
“That she is either a very practiced liar, or she is — for some reason — unaware that she is lying.”
“No other options occur to you, Doctor?”
“Not immediately.”
Rudy saw a twitch on Church’s mouth that might have been a smile. “Let me know if you have any additional insights to share.”
“If I may,” said Rudy, “Bug — could you go through those podcasts more carefully? If she’s made this bold a move then there may be some precipitating event. She may have hinted at it in some way that will give us a clue as to what she has planned.”
“‘Planned’?” asked Bug. “I told you, she’s going to release the Black Book.”
“There has to be more to it than that. She’s openly challenging M3. Surely she knew that they would respond. If they killed her parents, then she would have to be aware of the threat to herself. Until now she’s only talked about the Black Book. Now she not only claims to have it, but has threatened to release it in a way that will force M3 to move against her, to stop her.”
“I agree,” said Church.
“We need to figure out what game she’s playing.”
Chapter Sixty-two
Turkey Point Lighthouse, Elk Neck State Park
Cecil County, Maryland
Sunday, October 20, 10:52 a.m.
I stared at her.
“What do you mean you got us killed? Junie … what did you do?”
She hugged her arms to her body, but a shiver swept through her, raising goose flesh on her skin. “Joe … when we were on with your boss, Mr. Church, and those other men … I was scared. I…” She shook her head like she was trying to shake off angry bees. “It’s so big! The president, the crop circle … this is the kind of stuff I podcast about and write about, but now it’s here, it’s right here, and I guess I kind of freaked. I flaked out on you. And the thing is … I still don’t know how much I can trust you.”
“Jesus Christ, Junie, I just saved your life from a hit team.”
“I know…”
“What more do you want?”
She stood several feet away from me, near the top of the stairs, tension rippling through her as if she was trying to decide whether to tell me or to make a break for it down those stairs. I tried to get inside her head and see it from her perspective, but maybe she’d lived in the world of conspiracy theories and paranoia too long. Maybe a lack of trust was the only thing she could rely on. And really, who was I to her? Sure, we shared a couple of freaky moments of subliminal communication, but who’s to say that wasn’t brain chemistry misfiring because of all the trauma? Hey, it’s not like I’m not crazy already, so I could have been reading a lot more into my first encounter with Junie than was ever there; and I didn’t have Rudy riding shotgun on my sanity right now.
“Joe … I’ll make a deal with you,” she said at last.
“Can’t wait to hear this, but sure, go ahead, let’s see what’s behind door number one.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I. I’m like this when I’m serious.”
That probably wasn’t as comforting or amusing as intended. She filed it away.
“Here’s the deal … you get us out of here, you get us somewhere totally safe, and I will put the Majestic Black Book into your hands.”
I stared at her.
“What?”
“That’s the deal.”
“You have the book?” I growled. “After all this … you have the damn book?”
“Yes.” There was some hesitation in her voice, but she repeated her answer. “Yes. What’s it going to be, Joe? Do we have a deal?”
I towered over her, glowered at her. I wanted to yell at her, shake her.
What I did, though, was smile.
“Either you are one cool bitch,” I said, “or you’re every bit as crazy as I am.”
Her smile was of a lower wattage. “Do we have a deal?”
I stuck out my hand. “We have a deal.”
We shook on it.
Outside, Ghost suddenly started barking.
Then we heard the helicopters.
“The Coast Guard! Thank God,” she said as we raced to the windows.
There were two of them, coming in low and fast a hundred yards above the blue water. Coast Guard helicopters are red and white, easy to spot against the sky or sea.
These helos were as black as the bottomless well of despair that had opened in my heart.
There was a puff of smoke, small and pale in the distance. It was a slender thing and I knew it for what it was. I’ve seen so many of them, up close and mounted. I’ve seen what they can do. A hundred pounds of metal and wire and chemicals; sixty-four inches long. Sleek and silver in the sunlight, moving at Mach 1.3. Nine hundred and fifty miles per hour. Like an arrow shot by a god of war, the Hellfire missile flew toward us.
“Run!” I screamed as I hooked my arm around her and hurled her toward the stairs.
Above and around us the world seemed to disintegrate into a burning fireball of pure destructive force.
Hellfire without a doubt.
Chapter Sixty-three
The Warehouse
Baltimore, Maryland
Sunday, October 20, 10:55 a.m
.
“Give me something to do,” Rudy pleaded. “If I simply sit here and do nothing while all this is happening I’ll go insane.”
“As it happens, Doctor,” said Church, “there is something you can do.”
He handed Rudy a sheet of paper on which was a list of names accompanied by notations about each person’s credentials and contact information. Several of the names were highlighted in yellow.
“These are some experts who might be able to provide some useful information relative to this case.”
“I recognize some of these people. George Noory? He has a conspiracy theory radio show. And Bill Birnes, he publishes UFO Magazine. They’re both on TV a lot in all those UFO specials.”
“Yes. The others are experts as well. Some areas of expertise overlap. You can speak frankly to any of the people whose names are highlighted.”
“Why them?”
Church gave him the smallest of enigmatic smiles. “They are friends of mine in the industry.”
Chapter Sixty-four
Turkey Point Lighthouse, Elk Neck State Park
Cecil County, Maryland
Sunday, October 20, 10:57 a.m.
We ran and hell followed after.
The whole lighthouse shuddered like a man does when he’s taken a bullet but hasn’t yet realized he’s dead. The walls cracked, crooked lines ran from top to bottom. The wooden stairs groaned as the bolts tore themselves free from the juddering structure.
“Run!” I screamed.
But she was running as fast as she could. As fast as it was possible to run down a set of stairs that was rippling like a serpent, twisting itself into an Escher-esque impossibility. The top of the lighthouse was a fireball. Flaming debris rained down on us. There was a great cry of tortured metal and I looked up to see the massive reflector come plunging through the burning deck to drop like a fiery comet to the concrete floor below. I dove for Junie and nearly crushed her against the wall as tons of metal and wood and flame smashed past us, the jagged steel beams of the reflector’s support reaching out to pluck at the handrail.
“God!” Junie shrieked.
The stairs were starting to collapse. I grabbed Junie’s hand and pulled her as I ran down. Shocked and terrified as she was, she ran with me. Civilian she might be, but she was not falling apart. Chunks of building stone tried to crush us. The stairs wanted to die beneath us. Heat bloomed up from the growing mound of debris that now filled the center of the lighthouse.
There was a huge crack and I felt the whole last section of stairs cant outward, reeling like a suicidal drunk toward the fire.
“Junie — jump!”
Her hand locked tight around mine and then we were in the air with nothing under us but hot air and a hard landing.
Ten feet doesn’t sound like a lot of distance to fall.
It is.
As we hit, I dropped into a crouch, taking as much of the impact as I could in my calves and thighs. I pulled Junie against my chest and twisted so that we hit the ground on my side and rolled over and over like a log, sloughing off the foot pounds of force. But I rolled a half turn too far. Into the edges of the burning rubble. Flames leaped onto my shirt and jeans.
With a howl of pain I thrust Junie away from me and I tried to roll fast enough to smother the flames. Then a shadow passed in front of me and Junie was there, on her feet already, tearing off her coat, swatting at me with it, killing the fires that wanted to consume me.
I scrambled to my feet, my clothes smoking but no longer burning.
“Thanks,” I said breathlessly, and she managed, despite everything, to give me a crooked grin on a soot-smudged and fear-flushed face.
One hell of a woman.
There was another cracking sound and we looked up in horror to see a massive fissure snapping its way down the wall.
“It’s all coming down,” she cried.
“We have to get out of here,” I snapped. “Right damn now.”
Junie tossed her smoking coat away as we headed for the back door to the house. The door was still ajar and I shouldered through it, drawing my gun, pointing the barrel everywhere I looked. There was no one in the kitchen except the dead man Ghost had killed, sprawled in a lake of blood.
I heard Junie make a soft sound, a grunt that was an inarticulate and visceral reaction to the presence of violent death.
“Don’t look at it,” I said, but it was too feeble and too late.
Junie edged around the blood as if it were a hole into which she could topple and fall. I jumped over the corpse and ran to the window. She crowded in beside me. Perhaps it was an accident or maybe she had that much presence of mind, but she pressed against my left hand rather than my gun hand.
Outside, the helicopters were still hovering above us, admiring the destruction they’d wrought. One was stationed high, missiles aimed for another blast. The other was lower, angled sideways with the bay door open and the ugly snout of a minigun pointed straight at the house.
But we were inside, in shadows, and they couldn’t see us.
“What are they doing?” asked Junie.
“Watching to see if anyone comes running outside.”
“What can we do?”
Without getting too close to the window glass, I angled my head to look up and down the yard. I spotted Ghost. He was alive, crouched under a pine tree forty feet from the house. He looked terrified.
Lot of that going around.
“Are we dead?” gasped Junie.
It was so strangely worded a question that I turned to her. Usually people ask Are we trapped? or Can we get out?
Are we dead?
That was a different kind of question and it opened within my mind a window of speculation about her. It also provoked a response from my inner committee. The Cop barked a sharp denial. Cold and certain. The Warrior rose up and thumped his chest to prove that he was the toughest ape in the tree. But the Modern Man, the quietest and least often heard from of my inner selves, spoke in the clearest voice.
“No, Junie,” he said, using my mouth, my voice, “we’re going to live.”
It was a clumsy line, awkwardly phrased, a bit of bad melodrama. And yet I knew that I meant it, and I knew that those words conveyed more than their surface meaning. I looked into Junie Flynn’s blue eyes and saw understanding and trust and — something else. It looked like sadness, but she gripped my wrist and gave me a firm nod.
“Then let’s get the hell out of here.”
We backed away from the window and ran through the house to the front door. The dead men lay where I’d left them. Inside and out.
“Listen to me,” I said. “Right now they don’t know if we’re alive or dead. They’re going to shoot at anything that moves.”
“What do we do?”
“We give them something to shoot at.” I pointed to a stand of sassafras trees thirty yards to the right of the open door. “I’m going to draw their fire. You run for those trees like your ass is on fire.”
She frowned. “What about you?”
“I’ll be right behind you. Their focus is going to be the kitchen. As soon as you hear them open up, you move.” I touched her cheek. “No matter what happens, stay low and get lost in the woods. You know this forest, you live here. Find people. Find help.”
I fished a card out of my pocket. All it had on it was a phone number.
“As soon as you can, call this number. They’ll connect you with my boss, the man you spoke to earlier.”
She glanced at the card and handed it back.
“No, you’ll—”
Junie recited the number back perfectly and tapped her head. “Like an elephant, Joe, I never forget.”
I grinned at her. “Good brain you have there.”
“At times.”
As I made to move away, Junie suddenly grabbed my shirt and pulled me close for a very brief and totally unexpected kiss.
“For luck,” she said as she pushed me away.
I goggled at her. �
�Wow,” I said.
“Go!” she ordered.
I went.
The chopper with the minigun was slowly descending, clearly preparing to land on the lawn beside the flower garden. The kitchen was filling with smoke and I realized that pretty soon the entire place was going to be a bonfire. Junie was going to lose everything she owned. That gave me a flash of panic and I spun and ran back to the living room.
“Junie — the fire’s spreading.”
“No!”
“Your computer, the records about the Black Book. We need to get that stuff — we need to take that with us.”
She shook her head. “No, it’s okay. I have it all stored on my Web site in blind pages, and I’ve attached a lot of it to e-mails I sent myself. There’s some stored in cloud servers, too. The rest of it…” She went to touch her head, but her hand faltered. She took a breath and tapped her skull. “I’ve got the rest of it here. I don’t forget things.”
Smoke was coming up from between the floorboards now. Some of the debris must have punched through into the cellar and now the fire was burning up. We were out of time.
“We need that information,” I warned Junie.
“Then we have to get out of here. Get me to a good computer with a secure Wi-Fi and I’ll get you everything you need.”
I nodded and ran through the smoke into the kitchen. The chopper was ten feet above the grass.
Scary in one way, perfect in another.
With my Beretta in a two-handed grip, I leaned my thighs against the sink, aimed out the window and squeezed the trigger. The first shot hit the black metal beside the open door. The second shot hit the Closer who was crouched over the minigun. Not sure where I hit him, but it was solid enough to punch him back into the shadows of the helo. I paused to wait for the next man to swing into position to return fire. He did, leaping forward to grab the minigun, swinging the barrel around toward the house.
I took him in the face.
It was a long shot and I was aiming center mass, but it clipped him right above his snarling mouth. Lucky shot for me, damned unlucky for him.
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