She needed to do something.
She wasn’t sure what. Not yet. But she did have one idea.
Everyone was busy looking for Lee Patterson and the manuscript. They were hunting for whoever was behind all of this. Agent Denzel’s entire team was focused on this. Kotler was focused on it.
No one was focused on Red Ryba.
No one except her.
She shut off the shower and toweled herself dry. She stretched, trying to loosen tight muscles in her neck and back and shoulders. Her hands, a bit bruised and scraped, ached but were otherwise fine. She’d skip the bandages. They just slowed her down.
She dressed, casual and comfortable. She needed to look relaxed, at peace. She needed Rachel to see that her little sister was alright. She needed Rachel to leave.
Liz emerged from her bedroom to find Rachel placing a veritable feast on the little dining table. “Your fridge is like the health food section of a grocery store,” Rachel said, shaking her head. “I did the best I could.”
“You’re a trained chef,” Liz smiled. “Your worst is better than most people’s best.”
“Bruschetta. Prosciutto. Olive spread. Eat.”
Liz ate. And it was good. She hadn’t felt hungry before, but now she was nearly ravenous. And for the next hour, she and Rachel talked, caught up, shared what they knew about various family members.
“Momma wants you to come see her,” Rachel said.
Liz nodded. “It’s been too long, I know. I’ll go by the home this weekend. Are they taking good care of her?”
Rachel shrugged. “She spends most of her days cackling with the other ladies in that place, playing cards and taking very slow walks around the pond. She misses you.”
“I miss her,” Liz replied.
“But she’s proud of you,” Rachel said. “She tells everyone about you. How you’re a scientist that works for the FBI. The whole place knows everything you do. I bring them five-star cuisine twice a month but isn’t Liz just incredible?” She laughed.
She was teasing, smiling at Liz, but there was a certain bite beneath the surface. Rachel wasn’t jealous by nature, but she loved their mother as much as Liz did, and it hurt, Liz knew, to be so accomplished and still be “the other daughter.”
Liz hugged her. “If you stopped taking that food by, they’d start appreciating you more,” she said.
Rachel laughed. “That’s true.”
The conversation went on for a while longer, but finally Liz yawned, and Rachel stood and cleared the dishes. She loaded the dishwasher and got it running. And she gave Liz strict instructions to get plenty of rest. “I talked to your boss, that big guy.”
“Agent Denzel.”
“He said you’re off duty for the next week, and longer if you need it. So you’re off duty. You hear me?”
“I hear you,” Liz said.
They hugged, and Rachel kissed Liz’s cheek again. When she was gone, Liz closed and locked the door. For the first time since moving in, she made sure the top bolt was turned. She double checked even before walking away.
Alone, she stood in the middle of her living room. She turned slowly, taking in the details. This place was made to be a comfort to her. It was filled with photos and heirlooms from her past. It was home, and she needed that right now. All that talk of her momma made her feel a little guilty, and a lot homesick. She meant it when she said she’d go visit. Maybe even before the weekend.
But for now, she had work to do.
She went to her grandfather’s bag and took out her laptop. She logged into the FBI database, using her credentials, and started sifting through everything she could find about Red Ryba.
There was a lot. Most of it speculation about his involvement in crimes around the world. There were hints of him everywhere, but very little proof.
What she was interested in most, however, was his current whereabouts. Unknown, but again, hints.
She pulled up the security footage of him and passively watched as he attacked her. She looped it, watching it on repeat. She was detached from it. For now. She was focused, being an unbiased observer, trying to find clues. That was what kept her steady.
The truth was, there really was no way to be sure that it was Red Ryba in this footage. They suspected it, because of his brother’s involvement, but couldn’t prove that he was the one who had grabbed her. The FBI wanted him for questioning, but so far, he was unreachable. Once again, just as he’d been in hundreds of other cases, Red Ryba was a ghost.
She knew that other agents were tasked with finding him. This wasn’t her job. She was operating well outside of her purview. She tried to make her searches as passive and discrete as possible, so she wouldn’t be flagged, and her access wouldn’t be restricted. It was making it tough, like trying to find evidence from a photograph, at a bad angle. She was looking for details that might not even exist. The hope of tracking down Red Ryba was narrow to impossible.
But she would find him.
She would find him.
20
FBI OFFICES, MANHATTAN
The NSA was not cooperative.
Kotler wasn’t privy to the conversation, due to not having the right level of clearance. But it was clear enough, as he sat at one of the desks in the bullpen and watched through the glass wall of Denzel’s office. Denzel had left the blinds open on purpose, despite the NSA agents request that they were closed. Passive aggressive as ever.
It made Kotler smile to think of Denzel asserting authority over his own window coverings.
Kotler had some proficiency with lip reading, but the angles and the distance made it difficult. He could, however, see the body language of both men clearly, and he was learning plenty. Denzel was furious, agitated, but keeping his cool. The NSA guy was controlled, unreadable.
It gave Kotler the creeps.
Things progressed. Denzel was at first obstinate and defiant, maybe a bit blustery. He was asserting that he had control over this, that it was his case. Over time, however, he began to show signs of resignation and uncomfortable acceptance. Kotler couldn’t know what his partner was hearing, but he could make a guess that the NSA agent was quietly and calmly taking things over.
That hadn’t been entirely unexpected. Kotler and Denzel had talked extensively about what to expect, once they’d alerted the NSA to what they’d discovered. There was no delusion here. Denzel was aware that when it came to the level of government secrecy involved, the NSA would want to edge out any element that wasn’t entirely under their control. That included the FBI. And it particularly included Dr. Dan Kotler.
Denzel had taken a seat behind his desk now. A sign that he was putting up what barriers he could, between him and the NSA.
A defensive position, Kotler knew. It was settled. They would be asked to hand everything over and stop pursuing the case.
After several minutes of conversation across the desk, Denzel rose and opened the door to his office. He stepped out onto the catwalk and pointed to Kotler, motioning for him to join them.
Kotler was not surprised.
Best case, he’d be asked to remove himself from the investigation and let the secret agents and professional codebreakers take it from here. It also seemed likely that he’d be told, in no uncertain terms, not to mess with the NSA’s investigation.
Kotler made his way up the steps and slipped into Denzel’s office as the door was closed behind him. Denzel closed the blinds now, and Kotler gave him a quick, surprised look.
Now there would be secrets?
“Sit down, Kotler,” Denzel said.
Kotler sat in one of Denzel’s chairs, and the NSA agent sat in the other. Denzel dropped into the office chair behind his desk, leaning forward on his elbows.
“Dr. Dan Kotler,” the NSA agent said. “I’m Agent Steven Coben, with the NSA.”
“Good to meet you,” Kotler said, shaking the man’s hand.
“Agent Denzel tells me you’ve been instrumental in this investigation so far. You cracked the
code to free Dr. Wiley and Dr. Marvin. And you discovered the microdots embedded in the manuscript.”
Kotler nodded. “I’ve had a great deal of help from Dr. Liz Ludlum and her team, as well as the agents and the technology team here in Historic Crimes.”
Agent Coben nodded. “So I’ve been told. But it seems you’re the one person at the heart of all of this, aren’t you Dr. Kotler?”
Kotler blinked. “I’m … not sure what you mean.”
“Well, Agent Denzel receives a tip that leads to the discovery of your name on a manuscript, tucked away in a government-sealed room.”
“My great-grandfather’s name, actually,” Kotler replied, cautiously.
“Quite a coincidence,” Coben said.
“Not a coincidence,” Kotler said. “Whoever is behind this knew about that manuscript, and about the sealed room. They used my connection to Agent Denzel to get their hands on it.”
Coben nodded. “And then a gunman attacks a café and tosses you a clue to unlocking the cypher in the manuscript. A clue that, again, literally has your name on it. Why did you take that from the crime scene, by the way? Rather than leave it for the police?”
“I felt we were running out of time,” Kotler replied. “Dr. Marvin and Dr. Wiley …”
“Were still locked in the Black Chamber, yes,” Coben interrupted, nodding. “And by all accounts, they still had a good 48 hours of air.”
Kotler was silent.
He couldn’t read Coben. The man was a blank, as far as his body language went. He was evidently trained to control even his micro expressions, right down to holding the shape of his eyes during conversation. He was good. Unreadable. It made Kotler uncomfortable, which he assumed was the point.
This was a game.
Coben was casting suspicion on Kotler, trying to rattle him, to see if he’d reveal something about his involvement in all of this. It was possible that Coben even believed that Kotler was behind it. That Kotler was the “mastermind.”
The only way to win, Kotler knew, was not to play.
Agent Coben, inscrutable and empowered by the whole of the US government, was playing a game that had no rules. None, that was, beyond the rules of human psychology.
Kotler mentally cursed himself for not seeing this coming. It was a complication they didn’t need right now, as the person behind this had what they were after and could escape at any moment. They couldn’t afford to play “clear Kotler’s name.” The person who had orchestrated Liz’s abduction—who had endangered several people Kotler cared about as well as a number of civilians, was still out there, and was still a threat. Maybe even more of a threat, now that they had some of the oldest secrets of the NSA.
In scenarios such as this, when one person held all the power and all the cards, there was literally nothing Kotler could say or do that wouldn’t be scrutinized and assumed to be incriminating. Agents like Coben were trained to look for even the tiniest hints of hidden meaning. He would assume Kotler had an agenda, and work from that assumption. It was a biased approach, but it was the safest play, in his line of work.
“It piqued my curiosity,” Kotler replied, holding Coben’s gaze.
This would be Kotler’s play. It was a code, of sorts. He was sending a message to Coben, with no assurance that the man would understand it. Although Kotler couldn’t get a read on him, Coben was still human. There was still the man’s psychology to contend with, and that was the card that Kotler had dealt.
“Piqued your curiosity,” Coben said. There was a long pause, and the man smiled, though Kotler could see it wasn’t entirely genuine. It touched his eyes, but it was guarded.
Which was a good sign. Coben had let his guard down, for just an instant, giving Kotler a chance to read a hint of understanding in his features. Kotler’s message had been received.
“Dr. Kotler, we’d like to request your assistance in the rest of this investigation.”
Kotler nodded, “Of course. Roland and I are already …”
“Agent Denzel’s presence, in this case, is no longer required,” Coben said.
Kotler glanced at Denzel, who had his hands clasped under his chin. He gave a slight nod.
Kotler turned back to Coben. “Agent Coben, if not for the resources of this department, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have made any progress on this. Agent Denzel knows everything about this case. I only know the parts I’m privy to.”
“You’ll be briefed on everything you need to know,” Coben said. “But Agent Denzel and his department have been compromised.”
Kotler’s eyes widened, and he looked to Denzel.
“They say,” Denzel said. “They’re not entirely wrong. Patterson. Ryba getting to Liz. Data breaches.”
“Two years of data breaches,” Coben added. “The majority of which seem connected to you, Dr. Kotler. Wouldn’t you call that suspicious?”
“I’d call it a reason to pull me from this case, and call me compromised,” Kotler said sternly. “But Agent Denzel and his department are absolutely exemplary.”
Coben pursed his lips, inhaling and exhaling through his nose, and then nodded. “I agree,” he said.
“You agree?” Kotler asked. “Which part? Because honestly, I’d rather not be removed from this right now.”
“All of it,” Coben said. “You should be removed, but you’re too much of an asset. And Agent Denzel and the Historic Crimes division have done an outstanding job, despite the obvious liability of having you onboard.”
“Ouch,” Kotler said wryly.
“Now you hold on one damn minute!” Denzel started, bracing his hands on his desk and rising slightly from his chair.
Coben held up a hand. “No offense. But let’s be real, Agent. The bulk of the cases you’ve closed over the past two years were tied directly to Dr. Kotler. Gail McCarthy and her smuggling network—that was a big win, but it wouldn’t have been on your radar if not for him. And it certainly wouldn’t have been as complicated, if not for Dr. Kotler. The entire existence of this department is because of him. You do realize that?”
Denzel and Kotler exchanged glances.
“Wait,” Kotler started. “Are you implying that Historic Crimes exists because of me?”
Coben studied him for a long moment. “Your great-grandfather … he was a founding member of the NSA. You’ve uncovered that.”
“Yes,” Kotler said.
“Your family history …”
Kotler frowned, but Coben didn’t carry it any further.
“You have to know, Dr. Kotler, that there’s more going on here than meets the eye. Haven’t you wondered, about all of this?” Coben motioned to the office, toward the bullpen currently hidden by the blinds. “In two years there have been three major upgrades to this division. Funding allocation has been increased multiple times.” He turned to Denzel. “Agent Denzel, in your long and varied career in government service, how often have you known any bureaucratic agency to consistently raise funding?”
Kotler studied Denzel and noted that his friend was surprised by the question. He hadn’t considered it before, Kotler knew. Neither had Kotler. Not really. He wasn’t technically a government employee, merely a consultant. He had thought there were conveniences to the charter of Historic Crimes, and an odd sort of accommodation that fit neatly with his own skills, expertise, and interests. He’d thought that perhaps he’d come along at the right time, that someone in the upper echelons of the Bureau had been waiting for an opportunity like this. Was it possible there was something else going on?
“Dr. Kotler,” Coben turned back to him. “I do know that neither you nor Agent Denzel is actually compromised.”
Kotler studied him, somewhat surprised by his abrupt honesty but once again cautious when he realized that Coben was still guarded, still finely controlling his body language.
Coben continued. “But we need him here, and we need you with us. You may have had help, but it was you who uncovered all of this. And, for some reason, it’s you who is at
the heart of it. As of right now, your security clearance has been raised. Which means I can tell you certain things. One of those things is that the manuscript isn’t just an inventory for the Black Chamber. It is the Black Chamber. And the information it contains creates a profound threat to national security.”
Kotler shook his head. “I’m sorry … I want to make sure I follow. This manuscript, drafted decades ago, contains sensitive information that’s still somehow dangerous today?”
“That’s right,” Coben said. He was watching Kotler intently, his gaze steady and signaling how dire all of this truly was.
“How is that possible?” Kotler asked.
Coben smiled. “Well, unfortunately, your clearance level hasn’t been raised quite that high.”
Kotler slumped back, stunned. He looked to Denzel, who was pensive and grim. “Roland?”
Denzel shrugged. “The resources of this department are here to help, if we’re needed.”
“You’re needed,” Coben said. “You have manpower on site. I’ll be taking over. If you don’t mind.”
“Not at all,” Denzel said, his voice tight.
“We’ll be taking the files and translations you have. But I’d like you to continue investigating Agent Patterson and trying to find the person behind all of this.”
“Of course,” Denzel replied.
Coben looked to Kotler then. “And I’d like you to come with me.”
“Under arrest?” Kotler smiled, half kidding.
“As an asset. We need you to help us retrieve the manuscript.”
“I believe there are agents better trained for that sort of work,” Kotler said.
“But you’re trained as well, aren’t you Dr. Kotler?” Coben smiled. “We need you for something else, though. So far, your adversary in all of this has been using not just cryptology but your personal history as a tool. We think there’s a connection to you and your past, and we want you on hand, just in case.”
Kotler thought about this, sighed, and nodded.
“Good,” Coben said, smiling the same half-guarded smile as earlier. “Then let’s get moving.”
The Stepping Maze Page 12
