Out of Sight (Project Athena)

by Trish Milburn

  She turned halfway toward Daniel, who stood in the doorway to the kitchen with a spatula in his hand.

  “How do you like your eggs?”

  “Scrambled.” Like her life. Like her brain.

  Before he could ask anything else, she stepped into her room and closed the door. She flopped back onto the bed and stared at the ceiling. How long would it take them to find her if she took Daniel’s vehicle while he was in the shower. Likely about two seconds since it probably had a tracking device on it.

  She wondered how her father would have handled the situation. What was she thinking — he was a military man through and through, trained to devote all to his country, no matter what it asked. After all, he’d evidently assassinated the leader of a country at the government’s demand.

  She’d been so young when he vanished. Had she even really known him? If she found him now, would he measure up to the pedestal on which she’d placed him?

  Daniel knocked on her door. “Breakfast is ready. I’m going to hop in the shower, but go ahead and eat before it gets cold.”

  “Okay.”

  Jenna dressed and headed for the kitchen. But the hum of the computer equipment coming from Daniel’s room stopped her. She glanced toward the bathroom, heard the water still running. If she couldn’t flee from the world in which she found herself, she was going to make the most of it.

  She hurried into the room and wiggled the mouse on the computer they’d used the day before until the screensaver disappeared and revealed the desktop. She clicked to bring up an Internet browser and plugged in “Sgt. James McCay” in the search engine. Not many hits, and nothing she hadn’t seen before. After a quick check to make sure Daniel was still showering, she began searching the computer’s directories, poking around to see what she could find. There had to be some way to access the agency’s records, and she had no doubt they had more information on her father than the pittance they’d given her.

  The shower shut off. Why didn’t men take longer showers? She clicked faster, trying to see as much as she could before the opportunity vanished. They could very well leave the safe house today, and she’d never get another opportunity like this.

  She evidently made one click too many. A pop-up window appeared asking for a clearance code. She hesitated, couldn’t even begin to guess the right answer. Then the screen went blank and the computer shut down, followed in quick succession by all the other units in the room. Her heart rate went supersonic.

  The phone rang, and she jerked at the sound on the heels of the equipment shutdown. Daniel ran out of the bathroom, towel around his waist, anger and concern pulling at his features, and snatched up the phone receiver.

  “Yes?” Pause. “I don’t know, but I’m about to find out.”

  Jenna expected to hear yelling from the other end of the line even from where she sat, but the fact she didn’t made it even worse. She imagined the dead calm of the faceless man’s voice as he conveyed his displeasure at the latest turn of events. Was he telling Daniel that Elliott was on his way to collect her as she’d been warned he might?

  Her blood froze. The fight or flight instinct nearly overrode the common sense that she couldn’t fight well enough or run far enough to escape the agency and its goons.

  The conversation seemed to go on for an eternity before Daniel hung up and turned to her. She expected a loud tirade, but he only stared for the longest time before speaking.

  “Are you deaf? Didn’t you hear a word I said about Elliott and what they can do to you if you push them too far?” He moved toward her with deliberate steps. She stood to face him. “Is that what you want? Because it sure as hell seems like it.”

  The fight won over the flight. “I’ve done everything you and the agency have asked of me, but your side isn’t living up to your half of the bargain. I’ve gotten pitiful little information about my dad, so I took the opportunity that presented itself.”

  “What you did was possibly sign your own death certificate.” His eyes burned with anger. Daniel spun and walked toward his bed, unwrapping the towel as he moved. “Get out.”

  Needing space as much as he evidently did, she complied and retreated to her own room without even glancing back to see what had been hidden behind that towel. Had she been a fool to try to sneak the information? The agency had abilities and powers she likely couldn’t imagine. Why hadn’t it occurred to her that they’d monitor the computers here, ones with sensitive information available?

  Because the need for reciprocal information from the agency and her lack of control gnawed at her. She wanted to scream at someone without them holding the threat of death or invasion over her head.

  But the answers she sought weren’t forthcoming. Neither was any meaningful conversation with Daniel. For three hours, he locked himself in his room and didn’t speak to her. She heard him typing away on the computer and talking on the phone, but she couldn’t make out the words.

  She was about to go insane from boredom. All her attempts to talk to Daniel failed. When she’d started for the door to take a walk, Daniel sensed it and curtly told her to keep her butt inside if she wanted to keep it intact. He’d already taken her cell phone hostage, so she couldn’t even call to check in about her animals’ welfare. So she took turns lying on the couch and her bed wracking her brain for clues she might have missed.

  The frustration reached the breaking point as the sun sank toward the horizon. She wasn’t waiting anymore.

  Jenna stalked to the door to Daniel’s room and banged on the wood. “Open up or I’m walking out the front door and keep on walking.”

  “Not a good idea.”

  “You know what, I don’t care. If you have to shoot me, shoot me. It’s preferable to slowly going batty in here.”

  She headed for the front door, prepared to walk back to Arlington if necessary. Maybe she’d burn off the steam building up inside of her. She had her hand on the doorknob when Daniel jerked open the bedroom door.

  They stared at each other across the small living room. She wasn’t about to cave this time. She was done with being told what to do. She couldn’t live that way, no matter the consequences.

  “Let’s go over some more stuff,” he said.

  Finally, something to do besides watch her fingernails grow.

  They scoured the endless databases until she was yawning roughly every ten seconds.

  “Go to bed,” Daniel said.

  “We need to keep working.”

  “Just get a couple of hours sleep. You’re not in top form at the moment.”

  As she stood, she noticed the screen he’d clicked to. An early edition of the Post. The top headline read, “President proposes more reforms to U.S. aid programs.” She read the first few paragraphs, then sighed. “That’s not going to go over well with our note writer.”

  “No, but the president is under heavy guard. And his family has been moved to an undisclosed location.”

  That gave her a small measure of comfort as she trudged off to bed. She sank into the softness and wondered how she’d ever be able to wake up after only two hours.

  ****

  Jenna woke with a jolt, her heart hammering and her hands tightened into fists. The whole horrible night she’d been taken to Elliott’s lab replayed in her mind. The elevator ride, the guard telling Daniel to take her to Section C, the two guys they’d passed in the hall...

  Oh my God!

  Jenna flew from the bed, stumbling over the sheet and nearly falling on her face.

  Daniel appeared in the doorway, his eyes wide. “What’s wrong?”

  “I know where I saw him. That night you took me to Section C, he was one of the guys we passed in the hall.”

  Daniel looked stunned. “He’s one of ours?”

  “Yes, yes.” She pushed past him. “We checked everywhere but at home. How could I be so stupid?” She gestured toward the computer. “Pull up your agency database.”

  “There isn’t one.”

  “What?”
<
br />   “We don’t have one. We’re not structured like the other agencies. None of us know everyone else or what other sections are even doing.”

  “I don’t believe this. You have a database on just about the entire U.S. population but not on your own agents. Fan-freaking-tastic!”

  “Quick, pack some things. We’re going back.”

  “To your place?”

  “No. We have other quarters in the District. We’ll stay there until this is over.”

  Jenna rushed back to her room and started tossing clothes in a tote bag. If she couldn’t go back to the town house, these were the only clothes she had.

  After Daniel checked the exterior cameras, shut down the equipment and set the alarm, Jenna followed him out the door. They were almost to the SUV when she heard a whooshing sound.

  “What the—?” Daniel grabbed his neck.

  Jenna saw his knees buckle and his head hit the bumper of the SUV just as she heard the second whoosh of air. Something struck the side of her neck. She turned to run back to the house, to call for help. But her legs wouldn’t move. She tried to raise her hand to the burning in her neck, but she couldn’t lift it. Her vision blurred. She felt herself falling, but she blacked out before she hit the ground.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Jenna awoke with an overwhelming feeling of nausea and a headache throbbing in painful waves. She tried to swallow and feared she might choke on her tongue. Her mouth tasted thick and bitter. She tried swallowing, seeking moisture, but it felt like she might swallow her tongue.

  She tried to open her eyes, but they felt as if someone had sewn lead into the lids. And even the dim light hitting her eyes sent piercing pain zinging through her skull. God but she felt awful.

  “She’s still out.”

  The sound of Kevin’s voice made her lift her eyelids a fraction more. She tried to lift her hand to rub her eyeballs, but her hands wouldn’t move from behind her back. A fresh wave of nausea rolled through her stomach. She closed her eyes and waited for it to subside. When she was fairly confident she wasn’t going to puke, she opened her eyes a slit.

  Someone stood across the room talking on a cell phone. Her mind processed in slow motion, but finally something clicked into place. She still couldn’t wrap her mind around what she saw — Kevin, not the man who’d met with Tumeri.

  “We used the larger dose, and it seems to have worked,” Kevin said.

  “What...” Damn, could someone please scrape her tongue?

  Kevin flipped the phone closed and turned toward her. He seemed shocked she was awake. Well, awake wasn’t exactly the right word. But the right word escaped into the foggy recesses of her brain.

  He kneeled in front of her and looked into her eyes. The urge to spit in his face never got past the urge. She didn’t have enough moisture in her mouth, and at the moment she couldn’t remember how to spit anyway.

  Kevin lifted his hand to her throat and ran his fingertips over the skin.“I’m sure that burned like fire. I really am sorry, but I had no choice.”

  What burned? His finger grazed a sore spot and she winced. Oh yeah, the dart to the neck. Yes, it burned, even worse when Kevin ran his fingers over the puncture area.

  Everyone had choices. Hadn’t she told Daniel the very same thing?

  Kevin returned his attention to her eyes.

  She wanted to ask him so many questions, but her thoughts seemed to be falling into the abyss between her synapses.

  Kevin exhaled a long, slow breath. “I wish they hadn’t found you.”

  She’d just bet he didn’t. Not that it mattered, for all the good it’d done the agency and the president.

  She couldn’t even help herself at the moment. He had to know who she was, what she could do, why she was in the D.C. area. That’s why she’d been drugged, kidnapped and bound. Her outlook appeared mighty grim, especially since he hadn’t killed her yet. There were worse things than dying. She thought of Elliott and his subterranean lab.

  Kevin stood and crossed the bare room to a chair at a small table. No other furniture filled the space, which looked like a basement that hadn’t been cleaned of cobwebs anytime recently.

  “It’ll all be over soon,” he said, as if he was talking to himself. He sounded almost as tired as she felt.

  Failure and shame swamped her. She’d told Daniel she wasn’t cut out for this high-stakes undercover business, but he wouldn’t listen. Now here she was with the identity of the assassin she’d sought all along or at least a conspirator, and she couldn’t do a thing about it. Just when she thought the drugs might be beginning to wear off, she’d lose her train of thought.

  Even her invisibility couldn’t help her when her feet and hands were tied so tight she wasn’t sure the blood was circulating.

  “How did they figure out you could make yourself invisible too?”

  Too? She felt the crinkles Daniel was always mentioning form on her forehead. Daniel. Was he alive?

  Kevin leaned forward, propping his forearms on his thighs. “The agency didn’t tell you, did they?”

  She tried to form a “What?” and even felt her cracked lips move, but no sound came out. Had they messed her up for good? Had Elliott provided the drug that had taken her and Daniel down? If so, why? He worked for the agency? Didn’t he? But...but...focus, damn it! She stared at Kevin.

  “You’re not the only one.”

  Only one what?

  The answer clicked audibly in her head. Invisibility. She wasn’t the only one.

  “We’re alike. Both products of government science and victims of circumstance.” He held up his hand. His fingers faded, disappeared and reappeared.

  The revelation helped clear her mind more, but she didn’t show that outwardly. Maybe Kevin would continue to talk if he thought she wouldn’t remember any of this. Why was he talking? Was he using her as his priest and this musty basement as his confessional?

  How could she have been so blind? Even as she asked herself the question, she couldn’t see any definite clues tying him to the plot. Would someone more trained in detection and intelligence have noticed something she’d missed?

  She thought back to all the times he’d roamed freely in the White House right under her nose. The morning he’d left a note while she was hiding in Patti’s closet. The mysterious footprints in her newly mopped floor. Had he been there the night Rennie had cornered her in the hall? Had Rennie sensed Kevin’s presence and not realized it?

  And when Kevin had seemed to sense her presence when she’d nearly run into him while invisible — he had sensed her. Thus the goons outside Daniel’s apartment. She heard Pegram’s bark echo in her head. She nearly lost what grip she had on control. How she’d dearly love to launch herself at Kevin and make him pay for using an innocent pup to try to get to her.

  He’d pay later. How had she sat across from him at dinner, enjoying every minute of it?

  She pulled at the rope binding her wrists.

  “I can’t untie you. There’s too much at stake.”

  “Why?” she asked past the thick, cottony feeling in her mouth.

  “Daniel, the others who brought you in, they don’t understand. They’re going to ruin everything if they pull the rug out. The world is a dangerous place, Jenna. Stability is imperative if we don’t want these little dictators turning to our enemies, ones who can hurt us.”

  How could he think that murdering the president of the United States would promote stability? Maybe in the countries the president had labeled as corrupt, but not at home. But perhaps the homefront wasn’t the top priority for Kevin and his co-conspirators. Stability in places like Mindu meant money in their pockets. And maybe they figured Tumeri was a necessary casualty and they could deal with whatever tyrant took his place.

  “You’re...” She swallowed in a vain effort to moisten her throat. “Wrong.” Her head swam, making it nearly impossible to focus.

  Kevin shook his head. “No, Jenna, you’re wrong.”

  Footsteps sou
nded on the floor above them. Kevin halted and looked up. His expression hardened. The footsteps thudded down the stairs. Jenna’s heart went wild. Was this her final moments? Or were they taking her somewhere else? She didn’t dare ask herself why.

  She couldn’t ask, not with her mind fading and her eyes drooping.

  The door opened and she saw the man who’d met with both Tumeri and Harmon enter the room. Her eyes closed, but her hearing kept functioning, even though everything sounded miles away.

  “We got the go-ahead,” the unidentified man said.

  “The president’s not backing down?”

  “No. It’s time for you to finish this.”

  The man stalked out of the room and up the stairs.

  Jenna had never felt so helpless, not even when Daniel had prevented her from leaving Elliott’s lab.

  She needed to figure out how to get free of her bonds and out of this concrete pit. And from the sound of it, she didn’t have much time. Now was one time she wished Daniel could read her mind. She pictured one of his cocky grins and hoped he was alive.

  Kevin left. Through the fog invading her brain, she heard the bolt close. She listened to his footsteps climb the stairs. They joined the other set as the two men left the building. Whoever the other man was, at least he’d left with Kevin. She was alive — for now. And she didn’t plan to be around when they got back.

  But how could she escape when she...couldn’t...think?

  ****

  With effort, Jenna opened her eyes and looked around the dim room. How long had she been out? The candle on the table flickered. It didn’t look much shorter than when Kevin had left.