“What the hell happened?” Marni demanded.
“Where have you been?” Tina asked.
“I spent the night with Preston,” Elle said.
“Were you in the lab when the police raided the place?” Marni asked.
Preston told her the cover story. The police were tipped off about a planned attempt to steal numerous computers from the School of Information labs. They ordered her and Preston to clear the premises. She relayed the story to them.
Neither looked convinced.
“If they were raiding the building,” Marni said, “why would they just let you two go? Don’t they normally interrogate everyone on the premises of a building when they raid it?”
Good question. After a moment, Elle shrugged. “Not this time,” she said.
“Are the computers for your thesis okay?” Tina asked.
Elle nodded. “Yes, all of my data is fine.”
Tina pounced immediately. “How do you know that?” she asked.
“Know what?”
“That they didn’t take the materials for your thesis. If they asked you to leave, then how do you know?”
Elle needed coffee for this. “I took my laptop with me.” She gestured to her bag. “That has everything I need.”
“So the police raided the building but let you take your laptop,” Marni said.
Elle nodded. “I need to take a shower.” With that she bolted.
She knew Marni and Tina were still suspicious, but she didn’t know how else to answer their questions. Adam tracked her down at the coffee house to see if she was okay. She was relieved he just asked her how she was doing. He actually seemed pretty worried but accepted her reassurances that she was fine.
When Elle joined Marni and Tina for dinner that night and explained Preston was finished with his work there, she got even more eyebrow raises. She should have been a little more careful about the timing of that revelation.
Marni said, “I’m going to assume you can’t tell us what happened, since we’re talking about a police investigation and all.”
Elle just kept sipping her lemonade.
“But if you’re in trouble, you’ll tell us, right?” Although Tina phrased it as a question, the order was clear.
Elle grinned. “Absolutely.”
And with that, Marni and Tina let the topic drop.
Clark told her she had done excellent work on her thesis after reviewing her first complete draft. It was just a matter of doing some revisions, and she would be finished. Graduation was becoming a reality, as was Elle’s realization that no matter what she ended up doing, it was about time to say good-bye to the place she had called home for the past four years. She had been excited to come here as an eighteen-year-old and had spent four great years there. The excitement about becoming a “full-fledged adult” was tempered with more than a little sadness, although her excitement was still there.
The thing Elle began to rethink, however, was what she would do after she left. She wasn’t so sure about working for the CIA. Maybe she belonged at Virginia after all. She didn’t need to be at the CIA to keep in touch with Preston. And while it seemed exciting to work in intelligence, the reality… maybe not so much. She winced whenever she saw the bruises on her upper arm from where the terrorist had grabbed her.
Preston lived with danger; it was as natural to him as breathing, so the urge to broaden his horizons was nothing unusual for him. She was comfortable with her computer and her books. The CIA library had been so impressive, however. And there was no way terrorists would attack Langley. Again, Elle found herself wishing she could develop a predictive model.
Chapter 30
Elle ended up working at the lab late one night. Clark dumped a last minute round of thesis revisions on her she needed to finish that night so she could have a complete draft ready for her readers the next day. She wouldn’t miss this part of being a student: being at someone’s whim. Was the working world all that different? Well, it probably couldn’t be any worse. At least she would get paid better for it.
She heard the squeak of the main door opening but didn’t think anything of it. College students lived on a 24-hour schedule, especially at this time of year, as the major term projects came due and finals loomed. But she wasn’t expecting the door to the lab to open. Elle turned around but didn’t have time to react when two guys in ski masks rushed in.
The guy in front knocked her out of her chair. He kicked her in the stomach, leaving her gasping for air as the wind was knocked out of her. She hunched over, trying to ward off more blows, but they focused on her laptop. She couldn’t believe they were just here with all the fluorescent lights glaring. Of course, the ski masks made the lighting irrelevant.
“This is the laptop,” one said, hunched over her CIA-issued laptop. He sounded like… like any other male college student. Who the hell were these guys? After a few minutes, the other said, “This isn’t the screen we need. The other account is locked.”
Elle was still using the CIA laptop because the dataset was there. They wanted it to stay on their machine, so she had to use it for her thesis, but she didn’t use the encrypted account anymore. Before she knew it, one was grabbing her by the arm and literally lifting her onto her feet. It hurt. A lot.
“Unlock it,” the one who grabbed her ordered her, yanking her over to the table.
Her left hand shook as if she had overdosed on adrenaline. She couldn’t even steady it enough to swipe her index finger.
“Hurry up!” the one who had a hold of her arm snarled as he yanked on her.
The other held up an arm, stopping him. “Cooperate with us and you’ll be fine,” he told Elle. She guessed that meant don’t cooperate and… her aching stomach gave some indication of what could be next.
Think. She had to think. In addition to being given a sequence to unlock the laptop, she had been given another sequence. One that would wipe the hard drive but pull up a blank computer with “dummy data,” as Jack had explained. What was the sequence? Her mind was blank.
She steadied her left finger and swiped it. She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t just let them get the laptop.
Dammit, she was not a spy. Maybe Preston would be able to do what he had to do regardless of this. Yet she knew anyone knowledgeable about computers would be able to read the entire hard drive, including pulling up things that had been deleted. She was willing to bet these guys knew how to do that.
The swipe was good. It was time to type in the prompt. Maybe she could type in the wrong word? If it locked, what would these guys do?
A painful inhale reminded her of what these guys might do.
“Go on,” the second one said, jabbing her in the side, close enough to where she had been kicked to make his point.
Elle leaned in, her hands again shaking of their own accord. “Wait!” she said. “I messed up.”
“Messed up?” the first one, who was holding her by the arm, repeated.
“Y-y-yes,” Elle said. “I swiped the wrong finger. I need to restart the sequence.” Despite her trembling fingers, she was able to push the shutdown button and hold it down, prompting the laptop to reboot. It seemed to take forever but gave her time to gather her thoughts. She just had to remember the sequence, which, as she recalled, was simple. The opposite of everything she had to do for the true startup sequence.
Once the prompt came, Elle swiped her right index finger. She was proud to see it wasn’t shaking very much. She had to think carefully to reverse the letters of the password, but the laptop accepted it, so she got it right. Finally, Elle let the laptop perform a retinal scan of her right eye instead of her left one. She thought she heard the screech of the main door opening again, but it was probably another student: no real help was on the way.
A regular-looking screen came up. The hard drive should have been wiped of the real data. The guy released her and pushed her aside as both of them leaned in close to the computer. Elle slowly backed away. Somehow, she didn’t think just r
unning out of here was going to work. There were a lot of people in the library, but it was too far for them to hear her screaming. The labs were quiet; someone could be in another lab, but she couldn’t count on it, since most School of Information Science students could work on their laptops anywhere.
How the hell was she going to get out of here? They didn’t seem to have any weapons. At least, if they had guns, the guns weren’t out. Not that it really mattered. It wasn’t like Elle would be any real match for them in hand-to-hand combat. She needed an advantage.
She glanced at the door and had an idea. She reached over and flicked out the light.
Chapter 31
Elle was pulling the door open as she heard one of the ski-masked guys cry out, “What the hell-”
More guys were in the hallway. A lot more. Someone grabbed her, but she started swinging wildly above her head. She hit a nose, it felt like. The person made an “Oof!” sound and let her go. She took off down the other way, just like Preston had. She knew those hallways like her own home; someone in the dark who wasn’t as familiar with the building would be hard pressed to figure out where she was going. Someone was yelling something behind her, but she wasn’t interested in trying to figure out what they were say.
She saw the light from the lab as she reached the undercover walkway. They weren’t far behind her. She began screaming as she ran through the walkway. Elle prayed someone was in the stacks. Sure enough, someone opened up the door, looking through to see who was making the racquet. Elle flew past the guy and started to run down a narrow flight of stairs, only to fall halfway down.
She hardly registered the pain in her knee as she got up and continued running. She had to make it to the secret room. Would she go in there if someone was in the corner? Hell yeah.
Elle could hear them running behind her as she rounded the corner. She pulled open the shelf panel and pressed the button. It seemed to take forever for the shelf of books to move back. As soon as a big enough space opened, she slipped inside and leaned her whole body against the shelf to push them back into place. It settled into place as she heard the footsteps round the corner.
“Where the hell did she go?” a guy asked.
“I know,” another said.
Elle put her hand over her mouth, trying not to make too much noise as she breathed. If they somehow knew about secret compartments and started testing things, she was toast. She reached into her pocket for her cell even as she remembered zipping it up in the front compartment of her backpack. Shit, shit, shit.
“The safety room is back here,” one guy said.
Oh, double shit. How the hell did they know about that? Elle looked around. She began pressing on the wall, trying to remember exactly where Preston had been pressing against the wall. She knew it was this wall; the image of him doing it was clear in his mind
“It’s gotta be behind these shelves,” the other said.
Elle learned what the phrase “heart leaping into your throat” felt like. She felt like she was going to choke. She forced herself to stop for a moment. It had to be this wall, directly across from the wall to her left, which was where the TV screens were. But Preston was taller than her.
She started pressing higher points in the wall. After a few moments, a section of the wall opened, revealing the panel of buttons. She hit the button that revealed the tv screens. That wouldn’t help her now. Elle started hitting each button in turn. Maybe one would send a distress signal to someone who could come get her out of here. Panels and compartments around the room began opening.
She found the box. The money probably wouldn’t help her here. Neither would the passports.
The gun.
Could she fire a gun? Elle picked it up and was again surprised at its weight. Hopefully it was loaded. She didn’t know how to check that. She’d seen them push out the barrel on TV, but there was no circular barrel on this gun.
“Here!”
Elle swiveled around to see the shelf start to move. She could literally feel sweat spring out of her armpits and drip down her lower back. Oh shit oh shit oh shit. This was not anything she studied in school.
Chapter 32
Elle could see the gun shaking in her hands, but she kept it upright, pointed at the moving shelf. Sure enough, it revealed two guys. They had lost the ski masks and were wearing campus police jackets. Jeez, did the campus police give those things away?
The one in front came to a stop at the sight of Elle’s gun. His stop was so abrupt, the guy behind him bumped into him. He stared at the gun before staring at Elle again.
“I-I-I-I’ll shoot!” Elle threatened, trying desperately to hold the gun steady. Instead it shook worse.
“Hey, let’s calm down,” the guy said. “I’m just reaching into my jacket pocket here.”
“Freeze!” Elle screamed. It seemed like the right thing to do.
The guy behind him held up a badge. FBI. “We’re with the FBI,” he said.
“Huh?” Elle said. She didn’t know if she should believe him or not. She hadn’t seen the guys’ faces: she didn’t know. She kept the gun raised.
A third man entered the room. It was Agent Sykes, and his nose was swollen. “Lower your firearm, Elle,” he said.
She lowered it then. When Agent Sykes reached for the gun, she held on for another minute before loosening her grip. At least she hadn’t had to fire it. She was an analyst, after all.
“That’s it,” Agent Sykes said as he took it from her trembling grasp. “Let’s get you out of here.” He gave her a considering glance. “You’ve got a mean right.”
***
It turned out the FBI had been watching all along. They had been gathering and planning to storm the building while Elle unlocked the laptop.
“I take it Agent Raddock showed you the safe room?” Agent Sykes asked.
Elle nodded, all but slurping down the soft drink he got her from the vending machine. Her throat was parched.
“Have you ever discharged a firearm?” Agent Sykes asked.
Elle shook her head. Both agents looked amused.
“Have you ever punched anyone?” Agent Linden asked. Sykes rolled his eyes while Linden looked like he barely kept himself from laughing.
Elle couldn’t hold back a chuckle. “If I’d known you were watching, I wouldn’t have been so hasty.”
Now Linden rolled his eyes. “Give us some credit: this isn’t our first time at the rodeo.”
She was sure she’d laugh about it one day. She answered all their questions, which included a full explanation for what had happened. They called it a “debriefing.” The agents gave her all of her things back.
“Agent Williamson and Agent Smith said they’ll be in touch,” Agent Sykes said. “They’ll want to fully debrief you as well.”
Elle was sure they would.
“What we’re telling the university police and media,” Agent Linden said, “is that this was another attempted robbery.”
“What about the terrorists?” she asked. It still seemed weird to call two guys who seemed just like every other student on campus “terrorists.” Students even wore ski masks when it got really cold.
“They’ll be in federal custody for a while,” Agent Sykes said. Well, at least they wouldn’t be near her.
“Is this all of them?” she asked.
“We have no way of knowing, unfortunately. We’ll keep an eye on things for a while.” This was both comforting and creepy. More comforting than creepy at this point.
Then the agents gave Elle a ride home where, again, Marni and Tina were waiting. There was no hiding the bruising on her face from when they hit her in the lab, so she had to go with the robbery story. They hugged her tight.
“This is far more excitement than we need to wrap up college,” Tina said.
“Damn straight,” Marni agreed.
After taking a long, hot shower, Elle was relieved to climb into her own bed. She had no sooner turned out the light, however, than her cell rang. She ch
ecked the caller ID. It said “Unidentified,” which told her who it likely was.
“Hello?”
“Elle? It’s Henry Smith. Are you okay?”
Elle went through the whole story again, assuring him she was fine.
“If our timetable works out as planned,” Henry told her, “this will be resolved very soon.”
She was about to ask about the timetable but stopped herself. If he wasn’t telling her, she didn’t have the clearance.
“Quick thinking to remember to disable the laptop,” Henry told her. “Impressive.”
Even though she was lying alone in her bed, she couldn’t hold back a smile.
“If they had obtained the information on there, the entire operation would have been jeopardized,” he continued. “You performed a great service for your country.”
Who would’ve thought?
Chapter 33
It was a good thing it wasn’t too warm yet. Elle found herself turning to turtle necks and scarves to hide the bruising around her neck and jaw where she had been punched. Clark’s eyes seemed to fixate on the bruise when they met the next day.
“Elle, I can’t even begin to tell you how sorry I am,” he said.
Elle wondered where in the world this was coming from. Was more craziness in store? “For what?”
“For dragging you into this,” he said. She didn’t say anything- she couldn’t- but after a pause he continued talking. “I know these ‘robberies’ must have something to do with the project. If I had ever, for a single second, thought you would be in danger…”
Elle shook her head. “No, Clark, you don’t have anything to apologize for. This project has been life changing.” She couldn’t tell even him that she was applying for a job with the Agency. She hadn’t told him about her and Preston, either, because they weren’t exactly close like that, but the sorrow in his eyes made her feel guilty. “This experience… has been incredible.”
“Something for you to remember while you’re studying law and business, huh?” Clark managed a smile.
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