Subtle Target: Six Assassins Book 2

by Heskett, Jim

  Alec tilted his head for a second, and then he shifted his backpack around to the front. He unzipped the front pocket and chuckled to himself. He lifted the wallet and wagged it at Zach. "What would I do without you?"

  “Probably get pulled over for driving without a license.”

  Alec pivoted and started to walk away. As he went, he craned his neck around to say, “And, I’d expect you to be there to bail me out if that happens.”

  Zach watched him walk down the hall and then disappear. It was the most cordial conversation they’d had in days, so he was grateful for that. He turned the key in the front door to find a pile of clothes on the floor greeting him. His stuff he had left in the dryer, unfolded.

  "Oops," Zach said. He'd forgotten about it, and Alec had left it here for him, a clear passive-aggressive gesture. Zach scooped up his clothes, trying to keep them together in a single lump under his arms as he walked it back to his room. He did fairly well, only losing a few socks on the way.

  He dumped the pile on his bed and then turned back around to pick up the stray socks. As he did, he paused to enjoy the total peace and quiet of the moment. There were few throughout the day like this. The upstairs neighbors often played the music too loud. The downstairs neighbors would fight. Zach usually kept earbuds in his ears so he could think. But now, for one glorious moment, there was no sound coming from anywhere.

  He decided to grab a sports drink from the kitchen fridge. He had a choice between purple and orange, so he went for the orange. Obviously. Alec could drink up all the purple bottles, and Zach wouldn't care one bit.

  As he guzzled it, leaning against the kitchen counter, he noted a folder sitting on top of the oven. The word Zach had been written in pen on the front. This had been done in a fine cursive, nothing like Alec’s scratchy handwriting.

  Zach finished the drink and set the bottle aside as he picked up the folder. He opened it to find a series of printed search results and screen captures of various websites. When his eyes focused on the first one, a chill ran through him.

  They were all the websites and searches Zach had done at the library.

  "What the hell?" he said as he scanned through the first few pages. The bottom of each page showed a timestamp and an IP address. The IP address didn't mean anything to him, but the timestamp did. After a little mental math, he matched it to two days ago, the exact time he had been at the library. The printed pages matched his searches, even in the correct order he'd done them: Draconis, Firedrake, other related search terms.

  But, when Zach flipped past the first ten pages, his blood turned to ice. He backed up and bumped into the fridge, causing a couple of magnets to plummet onto the linoleum floor.

  Instead of search results, the next page showed a graphic from a website. A picture of a naked woman, except it wasn’t a woman. It was a young girl. Very young. Definitely under eighteen.

  “Holy shit,” Zach said as he checked the timestamp and IP on that page. It was the same as the others. But he hadn’t searched for anything like that at the library — he wouldn’t have. That would be crazy.

  There were ten other pages like this, child porn websites and search results. All of this was to make it look as if he’d been clicking around the library internet for kiddie porn.

  Could they tie the IP address to the exact computer he’d used in the library?

  His hands shook. Zach felt a tightness to his stomach, and he thought he might puke. He dropped the file folder on the counter and ran back to his bedroom, where he grabbed a lighter from his nightstand. Almost sprinting, he ran back to the kitchen and flicked the lighter.

  He held the first page above the flame until it curled and browned and then lit up. He let it burn until he couldn't hold it any longer, then he dropped it in the sink. He did this with all twenty of the pages until he had a pile of smoldering ashes in the sink.

  Someone was trying to frame him by planting a fake browsing history. Lightheaded, panting, he grabbed the edge of the counter. Who would do this to him?

  Chapter Thirty

  GABE

  Gabe crossed the fingers on his left hand as he hit the RETURN key with his right. A terminal window appeared in the middle of his monitor with a blinking cursor. It hesitated for a second as if struggling under the weight of the command.

  White lines of text flashed on the screen, spilling across the black of the window. It would take the program a couple of minutes to run, so he thought he might grab more Pepto-Bismol from the bathroom.

  He groaned as he stood, feeling the tightness in his stomach. They'd given him a cane to use since he wasn't supposed to stress his abdominal muscles for several days. But, he didn't want to be dependent. He wanted to get his strength back as soon as possible. Exercising his abs seemed like the best way to do that. Plus, walking with a cane reminded him too much of his grandfather.

  That man had walked around with a thing made of gold and topped with some rare purplish stone. As a small child, Gabe had thought it impressive. Later on, Gabe realized it made him more like a James Bond villain than a hero, a symbol of how he had made his money and the aggressiveness of his avarice.

  Gabe had been eighteen when he'd realized he didn't want to be like his grandfather, or his father, for that matter. And now, only four days removed from the poisoned potato salad that had almost taken his life, he was grateful his apartment was small. To go from his bedroom to the medicine cabinet in the bathroom in his childhood home would take a fifteen-second walk. Here, it was less than five.

  Gabe staggered into the bathroom and glugged another hit of Pepto. He'd actually grown to like the sweet and chalky taste of it over the last couple of days. Upon discharge from the hospital, they hadn't told him to treat his nausea and stomach pain with Pepto. But, they hadn't told him not to, either. He had a handful of Vicodin for the pain, but he'd tried to avoid taking them. Even one pill dulled his senses, and he needed to be ready—Ready for Ember's call, ready to assist her when she needed it. So far, he was getting by okay on aspirin and deep breathing during the day, with half a pill each night at bedtime.

  Gabe slowly worked his way back over to his computer and sat down. The program finished running, and his screen changed. A browser window loaded the index of a website he’d been hoping to invade for the last several hours. After twelve attempts ending in no joy, he had almost given up hope.

  But not this time. Lucky number thirteen had panned out.

  “Holy shit. I did it.” He put his hands in the air and let out a victory bark, even though it twisted his stomach into knots. Now came the real work of combing through the data.

  * * *

  A little while later, Gabe opened the door to see Ember standing there. She raised an eyebrow. “Why are you so smiley?”

  “I have good news. Come in.”

  She entered with a hesitant expression on her face. Hands on her hips, she paused one step in and surveyed his apartment. “I don’t think I’ve been here before.”

  “You haven’t.”

  “It’s… cozy. Like you did the whole thing with one trip to IKEA.”

  "Cozy is a code word for 'small.' I get it. But, we're not here to talk about my living arrangements. I have to show you something back in my bedroom right now."

  “Good thing you’re not wearing just a robe, or I would definitely not accompany you into your bedroom.”

  Gabe laughed. “Yeah, it’s not that. Come with me.”

  “Okay, but I don’t have much time.”

  “This will be quick. I promise.”

  “Good,” she said as she followed him toward his bedroom. “I’m on my way to Denver.”

  “What for?”

  “I want to talk to President Wellner about this Lydia person. I think he needs to be aware of what’s going on with her, even if he probably won’t do anything about it. Not just the attack on our Branch.”

  “He wrote a memo about the attack. I guess you haven’t had time to read it.”

  “No, I rea
d it. Memos are for people stealing frozen dinners out of the office break room fridge. Not about a dozen people attacked in the one place they’re supposed to be safe from something like that. A memo is not enough.” She paused and frowned at his hobbling gait. “You okay?”

  “Fine. Stomach hurts a little, but it’s getting better every day.”

  “Didn’t they give you pain meds?”

  He shrugged. “Yeah, but I don’t like to take them. A little at night, so I can sleep, but not during the day. There’s too much to do.”

  “Don’t be a hero, Gabe. If you’re in pain, take the pills.”

  “Forget about that. I have to show you this.” He pointed her to the laptop and cleared dirty clothes off the bedspread to make space for her. “You’re going to love this.”

  Ember sat on the edge of his bed and stared at the screen. “Okay, what am I looking at?”

  “You are looking at the back end of the Parker message board. Full access, every message not currently archived.”

  Her eyes jumped wide. “You hacked into a Branch message board?”

  “I sure did.”

  “Do you have any idea how much trouble you could get in for doing that?”

  He snorted. “Are you saying you don’t want to know what I saw?”

  “Hell no. I want to know every little detail. Gimme, gimme, gimme.”

  He swiped along the trackpad to open the first of the messages. “Lydia has been talking with someone named Vincent Belcamino. Do you know the name?”

  Ember nodded. “He’s the head of a mafia family in Denver. Mostly under the radar because the rumor is that the feds have been watching him for a few years. But he pops up every now and again, does charity stuff, accepts local business awards.”

  “That makes sense. Anyway, Belcamino and Lydia have been talking over the message board for months. Initially, he was posing as a potential contract, talking back and forth about killing someone in New York. A lot of coded messages that I only half understand.”

  “They kept their conversation on the message board the whole time? Why would they do that and not switch over to text or email?”

  “Not sure,” Gabe said. “Maybe they didn’t want a record of it somewhere else. Maybe they assumed they would get away with it. That doesn’t matter, though. All those messages led them to something. Now they’re actually talking about setting up a meeting between the two of them.”

  “What for?”

  Gabe grimaced when a wave of pain rippled through his stomach. He did his best to hide it, but there was no way to avoid it. Ember pursed her lips, but she didn’t say anything.

  "Lydia is looking to become the Belcamino's exclusive wholesale provider of Oxycontin, and she's also looking to expand into heroin, which is from a contact on their end. She gives them a cherry deal on the pills; they introduce her to their dope hookup."

  “Are they still talking, or do they have something on the books?”

  Gabe grinned. “They have something set up. You’re going to love it.”

  “When is this meeting?”

  “Tomorrow. Coleman Elementary in Parker shut down last year, and the building is just sitting there. Lydia and Vincent are meeting in the gym at sunset.”

  Ember stood and put a hand on Gabe’s shoulder, then gave it a squeeze. “Excellent work, recruit. This is it. We know where she’s going and what she’s going to be doing there. All I have to do is get in close and then wait for my moment. Tomorrow night, I’m going to put a bullet in this poison-happy bitch.”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  EMBER

  Ember pushed open the door to Wellner’s office anteroom. His Pretty Young Thing secretary was at her desk, her lacquered fingernails clacking on a mechanical keyboard. Her attire was a little too obvious; tight sweater and tighter jeans, with red heels and matching lipstick. But, Ember had to admit the heels looked great on her.

  On the couch, new Historian Kunjal sat, scribbling with pen on a yellow legal pad. The pen vibrated in his hand, flying over the page. Ember figured she would get carpal tunnel in about ten seconds if she tried to write longhand the way this kid did. Didn’t seem to bother him, though.

  She wondered if Kunjal didn’t have his own office yet. She only ever seemed to find him here, hanging out in this lounge area out front of Wellner’s door. Maybe Kunjal had a thing for this way-out-of-his-league secretary.

  Both of them looked up when Ember snapped her fingers. “Can I help you?” asked the secretary in her cooing kitty cat voice.

  Ember marched over to her. “I don’t think we’ve been introduced. I’m Ember Clarke. What’s your name?”

  “Naomi.”

  "Well, Naomi, I'm here at David Wellner's office to see David Wellner. Can I go in to see him, or do I need to learn the secret handshake?"

  “President Wellner is not available at the moment.”

  Ember wanted to get up in Naomi's face and remind her that Ember had once saved Wellner's life a couple of years ago. But, the secretary might not even know about that fact. It wasn't public knowledge. So, instead, Ember pointed at the frosted glass of his office door where she could see his outline. "He's sitting right there at his desk. By the look of it, he's eating."

  “I didn’t say he wasn’t in. I said he’s not available.”

  Ember bit her lower lip and took a breath. "It's almost the end of the day, right? I'll just wait for him, and maybe I can buy him a beer down the street."

  “I don’t think that’s going to happen. President Wellner is preparing for a late meeting with some representatives from the Highlands Branch. He won’t be available for the rest of the day. Would you like to schedule something for next week?”

  Ember smiled. “Do you know who I am?”

  Naomi nodded but didn’t say anything.

  “Then you know I’m in the second week of a six-week trial by combat. You know I could be dead before next week, right? I would like to see him today, and I don’t think it’s unreasonable to ask for five minutes with him.”

  The secretary shrugged. “Next week is the first I have available.”

  Ember closed her eyes and counted to five. When she opened them, she pivoted to leave, but then her eyes landed on Kunjal. He didn’t look up, even as she stood and stared at him for several seconds.

  She stopped a couple of feet in front of him. "Hey."

  He looked up from his notepad and donned an awkward grin. “Good evening, Ms. Clarke.”

  “Do you have a minute? Prison Guard Naomi here won’t let me in to see Wellner, but I wanted to talk to you too, actually.”

  He set the notepad aside. Then, after a second’s hesitation, he flipped it so the text was face-down. “Uh, sure. Would you like to go somewhere? We can meet in the hallway.”

  “Works for me,” Ember said as she motioned him toward the door. Ember gave Naomi a sarcastic smile and a tip of the imaginary cap as she followed Kunjal out of the room. Naomi sneered for a second, then she went right back to clacking on the keyboard.

  Alone in the hallway, he backed up against the opposite wall. It was quiet out here, devoid of people. The Denver Consolidated Holdings building was usually filled with switchboard operators, administrative assistants, public "relations" grunts who monitored Club secrecy, IT workers, and people who did other Club-related tasks Ember didn't understand. She only knew her Branch dues paid their salaries, and they were the machine that kept it all running. Supposedly.

  Whatever they did during the workday, most of them had already gone home. No one was lurking in this hallway, at least.

  “How can I help?” Kunjal asked.

  “I know you’re new, but you’re the official Club Historian, so you’re supposed to know things, right? Like, you’re the keeper of the secrets and all that crap?”

  He raised an eyebrow and gave her a tentative nod.

  “I wanted to ask you about the last black spot trial by combat. According to the urban legend, it happened in 1971.”

  He
nodded. “That is what they say.”

  "Then how come I can't find out anything about it? I talked to the Boulder Historian a few days ago, and he didn't have anything about it in the Branch archive. I figured, even though Review Board decisions are central knowledge and not necessarily Branch-related, there should have been a Boulder Branch rep at the meeting, right?"

  “If there was a Review Board meeting in which a disciplinary sentence was handed down, then yes, there should have been representatives from each Branch there to carry the message back to the individual Branches.”

  “Then why the hell doesn’t our guy have anything about it? He looked through 1970-1972 and came up with nada.”

  Kunjal parted his lips as if to speak, but he only breathed for several seconds. “I’m not yet as familiar with the individual Branch Historian archives. Maybe you could arrange a trip to the Parker Post Office to look through the inter-Branch historical archives kept there? I think that is your best bet to finding the true source of info.”

  “Yeah, stopping by the Parker Post Office isn’t a great idea this week. One of their members is trying to kill me.”

  “Oh. Right.”

  “So what do I do? I’m at a loss here.”

  He shrugged. “I’m afraid I don’t know what to tell you.”

  “Why is it so hard to find out info about the last black spot? Why is it so hard to find info about anything? When I first became a member, they told me the Club prided itself on transparency. That any person could look through the archives at any time. So why does it feel like I’m being stonewalled?”

  He shrugged again and gave her a blank stare. “One of my goals as Club Historian is to bring more unity to the individual Branch archives, to help them coordinate with each other and keep better records. Beyond that, I do not know what to tell you. I am very sorry, Ms. Clarke.”

  Ember sighed, patted him on the arm, and then turned to leave.