Blowback (The Black Cipher Files Book 1) (33 page)

The passenger side of the car was crushed against the tree. I crawled over the driver’s side and he reached in to help me out of the car. I stood, swaying woozily. “Got to get moving.” My throat was sore, scratched. I couldn’t quite figure out why.

We tramped toward the house. Lucas was favoring his right leg. And my vision had the tendency to separate into two images. “You okay?”

“I’ll live,” he said. “Let’s find a ride.”

“We’ll take the Jag.” I said fiercely, “We’ve got to get them back.”

“We will.”

We limped up the porch steps. The only indication that something violent had happened here was the slight scorch mark on the door frame and some trampled grass.

Lucas pushed open the door and we paused, gazing inside. Nothing in the entry was disturbed.

“How the hell did they find her?”

“I don’t know.” Lucas said, “The bigger question is why take her?”

He took my hand and squeezed, the sides of the ring cut into the skin on my finger.

The ring.

“Your ring?” Lucas asked.

“Dammit.” The satellite transmission ring Carson had given me, supposedly for my protection. I ripped the ring off then twisted and pressed the stone twice and screamed into it. “Damn you, damn you, Carson. Did you put a GPS transponder in this?”

Lucas looked at the ring, then stared at me. “You think they tracked you through this ring?”

I nodded and viciously twisted the ring back to off. “He must have put a tracker in it so he could track me.” The last ring hadn’t had a tracker, but they hadn’t needed one. They’d used my implanted beacon. I swayed, trying to piece it all together.

“They went toward D.C.,” Lucas said, as we limped down the hallway to the kitchen.

“I saw.”

“Plates on the SUV?”

“Dealer plates,” I responded tersely. “Nothing to trace.”

We stepped into the homey kitchen, where the lights still blazed. The scent of brewed coffee overlay the slight odor of gun oil and sweat. One earthenware mug sat on the oak farm table. The other lay on its side, the liquid dripped through the seam between table leaves to the pine floor below.

Plop. Plop. Plop.

“We’d better get out of here before they send a clean up crew,” Lucas said.

I was tempted to stay behind, get picked up by the cleaner crew. But the chances they would know anything about where the extraction team took Bella and Johnny was minuscule.

I pawed through the drawer in the kitchen searching for the keys to the Jaguar. I couldn’t wait to get to Carson. See his face when I ripped off his balls and shoved them down his throat.

“Jesus, you’re bloodthirsty.”

Lucas slung an arm around my shoulders and pressed a kiss to the side of my head that didn’t hurt. “Let’s get out of here before you use your secret decoder ring to set up a meeting.”

“This isn’t some joke.”

“I know.” He stopped, gripped my shoulders, his gaze boring into mine. And there I saw the anguish and the sorrow. “I know.”

“I’m sorry.” I’d lead them to Johnny too.

“We’ll get them back.”

***

There was nothing menacing about the crowded little donut shop a few miles from NSA headquarters.

It was Sunday morning so the inside of the shop was packed. Kids dressed in sports clothing, families decked out for church, a few couples with coffee and papers crowded the tables and counter. Due to the Indian Summer, the tables outside were still set up. While anguish and fear warred within me, I sat composedly at a small bistro table on the sidewalk, waiting for Carson.

Lucas had my back. He was on the bus bench about ten feet away with a clear shot, if necessary. I had an earpiece so he could alert me if it looked like anyone was moving in.

I didn’t think there’d be any kind of attempt to attack me in such a public place. But clearly I’d been horribly wrong numerous times lately.

I’d threatened Antoinette so I knew Carson would show.

Carson slipped into the chair across from me, right on time. I’d already ordered his latte.

He picked up the paper cup, took a sip while he surveyed the bruises on my face. “What the hell happened?”

I knew he was rattled because of the profanity. Tough. I looked him in the eye and deliberately twisted the ring off my finger then set it down on the table between us.

“Who knows about Bella?”

“No one.”

“Why would Staci Grant hire someone to protect Bella?”

“He frowned. “Ridiculous. Staci doesn’t, didn’t know Bella.”

“Did you bring Bella into the NSA?”

Carson took another sip of his latte, stalling. “Of course not, that was part of our deal,” he replied calmly.

“Then who kidnapped her?”

Carson blanched. “Bella’s been kidnapped?”

“Was there any chatter that indicated another kidnapping?”

“None.” He rubbed a hand over his mouth. “That doesn’t make any sense. All of the abductees were in the espionage community.”

Someone had taken Bella and Johnny. If their abduction led back to me, then the mission was likely where this mess started. “Would she have been kidnapped because I kept investigating?”

“You kept investigating?” His hand trembled slightly before he carefully set the cup on the bistro table. “I told you to drop it.”

But I hadn’t dropped it and the more I investigated, the more links there were between me, the abductions, 5491 and Bella. “Why did you want me to drop it?”

Carson stared across the street, avoiding my accusing gaze. “David Armbruster closed the investigation on Agent Johnson’s death. Apparently Johnson had files on the people who’d been abducted. Although we weren’t able to determine why they were abducted, everyone in his files is accounted for.”

This whole setup stunk and I didn’t understand why Carson would just...roll over. “Don’t you care why they were abducted?”

Carson’s gaze cut to my left as he stared intently at the logo, a steaming cup of coffee, on the shop’s window. “The agents are on administrative, low clearance desk jobs until we can determine the impact of the abductions.”

“The reason for the abductions is equally important.”

“Armbruster wanted the matter dropped. We’ve got to do some serious damage control after losing two agents in the last month,” he snapped.

“We didn’t lose them. They’re dead.” I thought about the scientists’s file. “The third component in the syringe, which they were going to inject in me, was an antidote to a DNA- altering drug.”

Carson tried to shut me down. “Our lab results were not conclusive.”

“I took files from the warehouse. The files were encrypted with a program developed by the NSA. The files contain DNA analysis of ten people. The agents were originally injected with a gene manipulation drug.” I spewed out before he could stop me. “I believe when problems became apparent, they abducted the agents to administer an antidote. Until me, they’d been successful.”

“Is this true?”

“It’s a theory.” With plenty of evidence to back it up.

A fine sheen of perspiration misted his forehead. “How many agents were in the files you took from the warehouse?”

“Nine adults, ten subjects in total.” I wanted the details from him. Something was terribly off balance here.

Carson’s face reflected shock. “You never told me you had this intelligence.”

“I didn’t trust,”
you. I still don’t.
“The NSA. Let’s focus on the problem at hand. Bella.”

Carson expelled a sharp breath. “You are really on top of your game, Jamie.”

I noted the sports analogy again. Carson’s tell. He was nervous, unsettled.

“Those agents need to be monitored for any adverse affects from both the original drug and the antidote.” I slapped my hands on the table, enjoyed the pain stinging my palms and the subtle flinch of Carson’s shoulders. I wanted answers. “Is there any way Bella could have received the original drug?”

“I can’t imagine how or why,” he answered faintly.

“Could it be because she’s part of 5491?”

If anything, Carson got whiter.

“All of the abductees related to my mission are designated 5491,” I hammered at him.

He pressed his lips together.

I leaned toward him, letting him see the fury barreling through my numbness. “Tell me.”

“It’s classified.”

“I don’t care.” I had nothing left to lose. “Someone has Bella.”

His gaze darted around the café, noting the patrons. The buzz of morning conversation and the clink of silverware on ceramic would muffle our voices. He canted toward me and spoke softly, “That’s a special department. Funding from various agencies filter through to 5491.”

“What’s the funding for?”

His mouth tightened, deep lines scored his face with worry. “This could mean my job.”

“I don’t give a rat’s ass about your job.” I hissed. “This is Bella’s life.”
My life.

“Monthly reparation payments for the descendants of certain agents killed in the line of duty.”

I processed that information but only came up with more questions. Line of duty? I received those payments but...“What does 5491 have to do with my family? My parents didn’t work for the NSA.”

But he didn’t answer.

If I followed the logical chain of information, I had to ask, “Tell me about TICOM.”

He jerked at the request. “TICOM?”

“Don’t act stupid,” I accused.

Carson rubbed his hands over his face in a gesture of total defeat. “TICOM was an operation during World War II.”

“I know that.” I gulped more black coffee and forced myself to remain calm. “Skip to the important parts.”

“You know the joint U.S. and British forces captured the castle in Saxony, Germany, confiscated the cipher machines, and took the German codebreakers captive?”

I waved him on. “Yeah.”

“After they were captured, those codebreakers disappeared.”

“We eliminated them?” The idea that the U.S. had been so brutal against non-combatant enemies was shocking. Disgust flashed through me, but I kept coming back to one thing. “What does that have to do with my family?”

“We didn’t eliminate them,” Carson replied calmly. “We picked their brains and, after the war was over, we gave them new identities in countries far away from Germany.”

Realization dawned. “So that’s why parts of the TICOM operation are still sealed from anyone, even Congress, reading them.”

He nodded. “To keep those German codebreakers--and their families--safe.”

I couldn’t put together what this had to do with me and Bella.

“Your father was a Nazi codebreaker.”

Papa? That couldn’t be right.

“He wasn’t old enough.” My father had only been ten during World War II. Besides he wasn’t German, he was Norwegian.

“Yes he was.” Carson rebutted, “It was a time of turmoil. Passports, identification could be changed, recalculating nationality, age.”

My father was a Nazi? My father was German? He had been involved in the war. It didn’t seem possible. I tried to process everything. My entire life was a lie. My family’s entire life was a lie. My father….

Focus on the bigger picture, Jamie.
The information seemed so bizarre, so huge, and even though other evidence seemed to support the idea, the small details kept getting in my way.

“But...why keep those people secret?

“We were uneasy allies with Russia. The Germans had cipher machines for Russian code too. We wanted those Russian codes.” He sat still, speaking quietly, “It’s my understanding we also didn’t want the Germans revealing our code to the Russians.”

“Weren’t they worried about the codebreakers eventually returning to Germany?”

“Any return to Germany was against the agreed upon negotiation terms.”

I was still trying to figure out the ramifications of this information. “What if they tried?”

“Sleepers were in place to stop that from happening.”

“So...if a codebreaker broke the terms of agreement, the sleeper was activated.”

“Their directive was to eliminate the rogue codebreaker,” Carson finished for me.

I didn’t say anything, too stunned to process all the information he’d just thrown at me.

“Sleepers are insurance,” he said patiently.

I knew that too.

Suddenly I recalled Bella’s revelation. I clamped a hand on his wrist in a grip so tight, my fingers turned white. “My parents were arguing about TICOM the day they were killed.”

Carson fell silent but there was a look of anguish on his face.

“What?” I demanded an answer. I thought about Department 5491. Reparations, making amends for a wrong, to descendants of agents killed in the line of duty.

Carson had become my mentor, the only authority figure in my life. The look on his face made me want to turn away, to close my eyes and go on without the knowledge he had.

“A sleeper cell killed your family.”

I sat immobile, unable to take it in. A sleeper. Killed. My. Family. A giant ache settled in my chest. I had to focus on the here and now. Focus on what you can control.

“That issue is dead.” Like my parents. Focus on now. “Why did they take Bella?”

“There’s no reason for it.” Carson frowned, paused.

His attitude was far too casual for me. My heart thudded, ba-boom, ba-boom, like a car stereo too heavy on bass drums, shaking my frame, rattling my composure.

“Did the agency do this?” I demanded. “You owe me at least that much.”

“No. I would know if this had something to do with the NSA.” Carson put on his best authoritative voice, “I’ll do some checking. Call me as soon as you find her, I can send in an extraction team.”

Not a chance in hell. I wasn’t letting him, or the NSA, anywhere near Bella.

“Anything else you can think of?”

“Yes.” Carson wiped his fingers fastidiously on a paper napkin. He leaned over and whispered in my ear, “Don’t ever threaten Antoinette again.”

I couldn’t summon any emotion beyond one thought.
Now he knows how it feels.

But, I wasn’t any closer to finding Bella.

THIRTY-SEVEN

I sat, thinking about all of the information Carson had revealed, all of the things he was still hiding.

Lucas’s voice sounded in my earpiece. “Jamie. We’ve got someone showing too much interest in your table.”