Return (Matt Turner Series Book 3) (8 page)

Matt glanced again at the image on his phone. Ostrovsky had surely had it translated by now. “Assuming this group and evacuation are a real thing, what led you to believe a recovery didn’t occur as planned? The Museum and Library were rebuilt multiple times, existing for several hundred years.”

Ostrovsky cut in, his tone swollen with pride. “Because, Matthew, a piece has been sealed tight, exactly where it was originally hidden, for nearly two thousand years. It’s never been seen, except by those who hided it, myself, and a few others in past two weeks.”

Matt lay back on his bed and slid his free hand under his head. “I doubt that.”

“Why?” Ostrovsky demanded. “Why do you doubt?”

Because I found this thing on eBay. Because you bought it off eBay. Because the person who alerted you to its existence only did so because I pointed them to it. Evidently, you and The Gray share certain sources, and, unfortunately, they didn’t first seek their finder’s fee from The Gray. But let’s just go with the visual evidence in the photo …

“The wear on the object. Some of the characters are almost completely rubbed away. That doesn’t happen to granite that’s been sealed inside some protective casing. I don’t know … maybe if there were chemicals-”

Markus interrupted, “You’re surely correct, Matthew. But Mr. Ostrovsky is referring to the second artifact. A sister piece to the one I sent you. It’s in pristine condition, appearing today as perfect as when it was made.”

Both keystones…

Matt deliberated, half-hearing Markus as he went on about the objects, details Matt had known for a few years, such as the three engraved languages: Greek, Demotic, and Hieratic—dialects as accessible to Matt as English. But the symbols in this photo were different from those Matt had known. He’d accepted the information he’d read in imprints—that all three keystones had been engraved with the same messages. The pic on eBay had happened to be of a side that matched the others. This new side in the photo—new to him, anyway—read:
song hymn Thonis
.

“Regardless,” Matt continued the skeptic act. “These ‘patrons’ of yours could’ve simply fetched their hidden treasure two, five, even twenty years later, and they’d have no need to use these stone pieces as guides. They’d know exactly where they hid these scrolls. Or their children, or grandchildren. You get what I’m saying? You’re assuming too much from very little information.”

A slurp from the other end of the line. Ostrovsky chuckled. “He is such the wise one, no?”

“Matthew,” Markus said. “The piece I speak of—the one sealed away, the perfect one—was moved from some prior hideaway to the one where it was recovered, two centuries after it was made. The keepers of this secret were still keeping it, generations later.”

Yes, they were. Crap … Just how much do you know?

Matt began, “Well, then … maybe you’ve got something there. But look, if all you need is a translation-”

“I’m afraid that’s not all,” Markus interrupted. He sounded even more self-satisfied. “They’ve been translated, but the
code
is the problem. There are … contextual issues. I’m afraid we’re at a standstill without your help. Now, as I mentioned, Mr. Ostrovsky is prepared to offer multiple forms of compensation.” Markus paused. Matt said nothing. “Shall I proceed?”

Matt remained silent as he counted down from thirty, though he was more than a little curious about these
“multiple forms of compensation”
or
“imbursements.”
Ostrovsky must’ve known that money wasn’t a driving motivator for Matt these days. Hopefully, some creative threat wasn’t part of their plan to compel him.

…three … two … one…

Matt inhaled deep, exhaled into the mic, and said, “Go ahead.”

* * *

Iris and Joss had just sat down at the small kitchen table, take-out Cuban food arranged on their plates almost identically. Matt moseyed back into the room, his stride a bit off, his expression too cool. Iris saw through it in an instant. Big things were rattling around in that head.

“What’s up?” Iris asked, predicting his response.

“Oh, nothing. How’s the food?”

Denial and redirection. Typical plotting Matt.

Iris touched Joss’s arm. “Look at my brother right now,” she said, and Joss frowned, confused, before turning to observe Matt. Iris went on, “That’s his secret face. Call him on it when you see it.”

Matt harrumphed and served himself dinner. “Look at my sister. That’s her intrusive face.”

Iris persisted. It usually required three attempts to make him talk. “Who was that on the phone?”

“I’m going to Ukraine. I’ll be back in a couple days.”

Two attempts,
Iris observed.
Vitaliy Ostrovsky. The Ukrainian billionaire.

“Is it-?”

“Don’t try to talk me out of it. It’s happening. This is my
resolute
face, if you recall.” He smiled, and pinched one of Iris’s shoulders as he sat down at the table. They’d discuss it later, after Joss was gone. He was irritated, but keeping it jovial for the sake of their guest.

Iris caught Joss’s averted eyes. She wore the perfect
Mom and Dad are fighting again
expression—clearly seeing through the feigned light banter.

Joss said, “Sooo …” to fill the air.

Matt swallowed a bite and set down his fork. “Sorry. Let’s talk about the work—our mission here at Subzero Ventures.”

“Get it?” Iris asked Joss, receiving only puzzlement in return. “The name? My idea. Get it? Cold cases?”

Joss nodded, enthusiastic. “Oh, nice. Very clever.”

“I.T.’s been congratulating herself on that for two years,” Matt said. “Moving on …”

* * *

In the living room, as 11:00pm approached, Matt and Iris were still sharing stories about missing persons cases they’d investigated. Matt’s clinical approach to this subject wasn’t fooling Joss any more than his earlier attempt. Pain wilted his face the longer they spoke, aging him another ten years in a mere two hours. Only a small fraction of their cases could be closed with what anyone would consider a happy ending, but Joss didn’t sense that he planned to quit anytime soon. No, this was simply his cross to bear.

As their stories went on, Joss felt no less appreciation for the uncanny nature of her situation. She was in the home of
the
Matthew Turner, had earlier shared a bottle of wine with the man’s sister, and for the past couple hours had sat listening to firsthand accounts of their amazing work.

A newborn taken from a hospital’s maternity ward, now seventeen, reunited with his birth parents. An elusive serial killer of runaways caught and imprisoned. The six-year-old girl taken by her mother’s dangerous ex-boyfriend, safely recovered, two states over. Matt’s initially rocky relationships with local law enforcement, the Department of Justice, and the FBI had reached a stable, professional groove, and those few individuals familiar with his involvement in cases continued to protect the secret. They certainly didn’t want to alienate the greatest, irreplaceable resource at their disposal
,
n
or would their objectives be aided if
even a single leak slipped through the cracks.

It’d been a long day, and Joss was exhausted. However, she didn’t detect the same fatigue from the siblings seated across from her, and she refused to be the one who called it a night. One of them had to give her a ride, after all.

“You look tired,” Iris said to Joss, interrupting Matt. “You about ready to wrap it up, continue the discussion tomorrow?”

“Not tomorrow,” Matt corrected. “I’ll be back maybe Wednesday or Thursday.”

Iris sneered at him. “Oh, yeah. So you’re leaving
tomorrow
? Guessing I need to figure out flights and such? You know tomorrow’s Sunday, right?”

Matt nodded to her and stood up. “Yep. And yes, please, to Belgorod.”

“Ukraine?”

“Russia. I’ve got a ride from there. Thanks. You’re the best.” He turned back to Joss. “C’mon, I’ll give you a ride. You have a car at your house?”

Joss stood. “Sure do.”

“No, no, no,” Iris said to Matt. “You need to pack. I’ll take her home. And check your messages on the cork board. Pete Sharma’s been relentless since last night. Would you call him back, please?”

Matt ignored his sister, instead holding out a hand to Joss. “Again, it’s great to have you onboard.” She shook his hand. “We’ll get into details or whatever when I get back. Enjoy a week to yourself. I.T. will backdate your payroll to today, so it’ll be like a paid vacation.”

A few minutes later, in Iris’s car, Joss listened as Iris revealed why she was so eager to give her the ride.

Joss said, “And you want me to …”

“Just another set of eyes, you know? Look out for him. He doesn’t take care of himself by himself. I mean, I don’t expect you to go in his room when he’s gone to sleep and check him for artifacts.”

“Is that what
you
do?”

Iris glanced at her, maybe a little embarrassed. “Sometimes … Okay, yeah, every night. He doesn’t get real sleep when he’s reading! It’s not like dreaming, you know? His brain is as active as the person he’s experiencing. It’s why he was so deteriorated after Cuba.”

“And you pulled him out of that?”

“No, he did that himself. I mean, I was taking care of him as best I could—groceries and bills and whatnot—but one day something clicked in him and everything just stopped. It turned out he could turn it off, after all. Great, right?
Phew!
But, no, instead of rejoicing at this, he only twisted it to fit into his depression. Instead of thinking, ‘Wow, now I can live a normal life,’ he thought, ‘Wow, if I’d realized this sooner, so many things would be different.’ Like our dad, and Matt’s old ex, for instance, maybe would’ve worked out different if he hadn’t been at the mercy of his ability.”

“And you disagree?” Joss wondered aloud.

“No, but it doesn’t matter.” Iris turned onto Joss’s street, pulling in front of the unlit house Joss pointed toward. “Who says he could’ve turned it off way back when? If he’d just tried harder? No reason to believe that. Anyway, I hope you don’t feel like I’m piling all this crazy responsibility on you.”

“No, no. Not at all.”

“Good. ‘Cause I need to pile some heavy responsibility on you.” Iris smiled.

Joss tried to match Iris’s face as she stifled an
uh-oh
.

Iris looked at her earnestly and said, “I know we don’t know each other … You can absolutely say no. It’s just—there’s only me, you know? I can only do so much. All these trips he’s been going on, I have to stay back and manage the work. He knows it. Half of me thinks he’s not on some big mission, but just going places to escape from
me
—the one yanking the damned needles out of his arm.”

Big mission?

Joss waited for her to go on, but quickly realized Iris was awaiting a go-ahead. “What do you need me to do?”

* * *

Matt stood over the open duffel bag at the foot of his bed, eyes fluttering through a visual inventory. He’d packed all the clothes and personal items he needed, but something was missing. He walked to the wall, pulled a few artifacts from the shelf, and zipped them in his backpack. A thin bar of sunlight shot between the curtain panels, and Matt glanced at the clock on his nightstand: 5:54.

He poked his head in I.T.’s door, finding her still asleep, as expected. At her desk in the office area, Matt scrawled on a sticky note,
Pete info in the key file. Luvya.
and stuck it to her monitor screen. Outside on the front porch, he set down his duffel, locked the door behind him, and turned to his car.

“Morning,” Joss said. She was sitting on his trunk, dressed in dark blue jeans and a gray pullover hoodie emblazoned with a bold red
R
. At her feet stood a lime-green suitcase.

Godammit, Iris.

“Can we stop for coffee on the way?” she asked. “My body’s upright and here, but my head’s still buried in a pillow.”

This was not the trip for I.T. to assign him a babysitter. He tried to think through the cloud of grogginess in his head, but this early, and with everything weighing on him since yesterday, the only thing he could think to do was tell her to go home. Whatever Iris had told her, just cancel it.

Say “I’m in a rush, can you please move?” and leave it at that.

“Rush,” he said as he walked down the steps.

Joss scrunched her face, confused. It hadn’t come out right. Matt stopped at the back of his car, and observed the “R” on her sweatshirt.

“Rutgers?” he said as he motioned her to move off of the car.

She slid down. “Not me. An ex. I went to NYU. This is just the warmest sweatshirt I have.”

Matt popped the trunk open and placed his bags inside. Joss bent to pick up her suitcase just as the trunk clicked shut. He brushed past her to the driver’s side door and got in, ignoring her stunned “Uh…”

As he stepped on the gas, he caught a glimpse of her dazed face in the side mirror, palm upturned at her side.

Thirty minutes later, Matt stepped into his airline’s short, first-class check-in line. He felt bad ditching Joss like that, but he wasn’t going to stand there and argue. Besides, I.T. had surely prepped her on how to counter any of his objections. The reality was, he simply couldn’t be responsible for her. And he couldn’t have her slowing him down, or saying the wrong thing to the wrong person. And he needed to be agile, free to pivot on a whim.

With Ostrovsky involved now, Matt’s complex new plan had many more moving parts, and having never read a single imprint from the man, Matt had little basis for predicting behaviors. It’s why he agreed to risk a trip to Ukraine at all. He needed to get in Ostrovsky’s head. Though he was certainly curious, the artifacts they wanted him to read were unlikely to contain anything surprising.

That reminded him. He needed I.T. to block any calls, texts, or emails from Peter Sharma while Matt was gone. His archaeologist friend could screw up everything with a single excited message.

A voice behind him said, “I’m still gonna need coffee.”

Matt closed his eyes. “Shit.” He turned around to see an unruffled Joss standing beside her bright green suitcase. “Look, I’m sorry about earlier—that was incredibly rude of me—but you just can’t come with me.”