Blind Eye; Silent Waters; Janus Effect

by Jan Coffey

  The voice on the answering machine stopped him dead. He sat back on his heels and listened. In all the years Joseph had worked for him, Martin Durr had never left him a message. But he was leaving one right now. Joseph was stunned.

  He stood up and walked out into his bedroom.

  “I’ve tried your cell phone several times, Joseph. This is my second call to your apartment. I know you consider the cell phone an extension of your hand…”

  Joseph stared at the machine.

  “Anyway, I know I asked you to come over later tonight so that we can get some work done. But I have to postpone that. I totally forgot that my wife wanted me to go with her to the Young Concert Artist Series at the Kennedy Center. You know I’m working from home tomorrow, but call me when you get to the office in the morning. Maybe we can get together tomorrow afternoon.”

  The call ended.

  “Since when are you interested in the performing arts?” Joseph continued to stare at the phone. “Maybe? Maybe we can get together tomorrow afternoon?”

  His mind was racing. This was not the Martin Durr he knew.

  Joseph had turned off his cell phone when he’d left the office. That was stupid, but he’d made up his mind. He was leaving the country and getting as far away as possible from Durr. It didn’t matter. He tried to focus on the positive. He didn’t have to go to Durr’s house tonight. That meant he could take his time packing and getting to the airport.

  He dismissed the option as quickly as he considered it. No, there was definitely something wrong. Durr sounded downright civil on the phone. That feeling of urgency again crept in. Hurrying back to the closet, he quickly fit all the cash into the bottom lining of his bag.

  Joseph knew his boss better than he got credit for. Durr was covering himself. That call was the kiss of death.

  He grabbed a pair of Italian leather loafers that he’d bought only last week and stuffed them on top of the money with the bag of toiletries. On top, he packed a pair of khakis, two shirts, and some underwear and socks. Going out of the bedroom, he zipped the bag shut and swung it up on his shoulder.

  Joseph turned off the lights as he went through. By the front door, he turned around and took one last look at his apartment. He wondered what would happen to his things once he was gone. Collecting the furniture and the few modest pieces of art had been a labor of love. He switched off the light and opened the door.

  The only family he had left was a younger sister in Chicago. He hadn’t seen her for years. He always regretted not doing his part in staying in touch. She was a good kid, one of those people who had her hands in a dozen things to help her community. She sure had tried to stay in contact with him, but had given up after a while.

  He guessed she’d end up with everything. But that was assuming someone would declare him dead. Missing didn’t automatically call for an estate settlement. It would be years.

  Joseph went out into the hall, thinking that maybe he didn’t have to stay away forever, anyway. Stranger things had happened. Durr might end up in jail and Joseph could be a key witness.

  That was a possibility he hadn’t considered until this moment.

  As Joseph slid the key into the deadbolt, he looked up and down the hall. It was empty, but the elevator suddenly seemed miles away. Pocketing his keys, he hurried toward it.

  Perhaps, he thought, he should be going to the police instead of going to the airport.

  As he reached for the elevator button, he hesitated, startled by the sound of the adjacent utility room door open behind him. He turned in time to see the silencer on the handgun appear from the darkness inside.

  Two shots were fired, driving Joseph back against the elevator doors. As he slid to the floor, his assailant came toward him, the gun aimed for the kill shot.

  Just before he saw the flash, though, Joseph thought of his sister. She’d have no trouble inheriting his things, after all.

  CHAPTER 65

  Connecticut

  The change came on like a fast moving storm. One moment she was sleeping peacefully. The next, Amelia shivered violently. Sid guessed she was having a seizure. He held onto her face. Her eyes were open. Her muscles were tense.

  “You’re okay, Amelia. We can work this through. Stay with me.”

  He’d taken his jacket off a while ago, and he quickly folded it now and put it under her head. He laid her down on her side.

  She took a breath and suddenly stopped breathing.

  Sid recognized what was happening. Amelia was having a tonic-clonic seizure. During the tonic phase of this seizure, the patient sometimes temporarily stopped breathing. The muscles, including chest muscles, stiffened for a short period of time. He gently touched her face.

  “We can get through this. Come on, Amelia.”

  He kept track of the second hand on his watch. Her face was getting darker. From his experience, this kind of seizure didn’t require CPR, as the patient would soon begin to breathe again on their own. He tugged at the neckline of the sweatshirt making sure it wasn’t pressing against her throat.

  Forty-five seconds.

  “Come on, Amelia.”

  At the very moment doubt plunged an icy hand into his brain, she took a shallow breath. Then she took another breath. And another.

  “You’re doing great. Come on.”

  He continued to keep track of time. She was still shaking. But her eyes now were watching him. Sid reached over and took her hand. She clutched onto him.

  “It’s over. You’re okay.”

  She started crying. Tears rushed down her face. He picked her up off the ground and gathered her against his chest. A soft sob escaped her. Her mouth moved. Incoherent sounds escaped her lips.

  “You’ve been under a lot of stress. Also, you might be dealing with a sugar imbalance or mild dehydration. Nothing to be frightened of.”

  She took his hand and letters started forming on his palm. He was able to decipher what she was writing right away. M.

  “Marion?”

  The slight movement of her head indicated yes.

  “You were thinking of your sister.”

  She stared writing on his palm again. There were more letters this time. At some point, he lost track.

  “Start again,” he told her.

  She started again. He looked down at her fingers tracing letters on his palm. D…A…N…G…

  “Danger?” he asked.

  Another nod.

  “Marion is in danger?”

  She confirmed by tapping her hand on his before starting to write again. He knew the next word as soon as she began. W…I…

  “WIPP?”

  She nodded. He shifted his body until he was looking into her face. Tears glistened on her cheeks. He brushed them away.

  “I know.”

  The sun was going down. She was shivering, but he knew this wasn’t because of a seizure. She was cold.

  “WIPP,” she wrote again on his hand.

  Amelia wasn’t thinking about cold. The concern was for her sister.

  “Mark Shaw is on his way there,” Sid assured her. “In fact, he might have already arrived.”

  She didn’t seem at all convinced.

  Sid considered their options. The smell of smoke had disappeared. He couldn’t see any sign that the fire was still burning. Not too long ago, he’d heard a siren in the distance that he’d guessed was a volunteer fire department signal. Whoever had come into the woods to put out the fires must have succeeded by now. It was only a matter of time before they’d come into the woods looking for them.

  Perhaps they had…but didn’t know what direction to go.

  The breeze was picking up. The temperatures dropped down into thirties overnight. This past week, there’d even been hard frosts several times. He couldn’t have her spending the night outside.

  Marion started tracing letters on his hand again. She wasn’t giving up. Still, he had no option. The decision was clear.

  “We’re going to try find our way back to the a
mbulance before it gets too dark,” he told her. “That does two things for us. We might find someone to help us, and once we find someone with a phone, we can contact Mark and you can hear his voice yourself.”

  The look of determination in her face told him that Amelia would stand on her two feet and lead the way herself if her body would cooperate.

  Sid just hoped there were no surprises for them along the way. They’d escaped one near death experience. He was afraid they wouldn’t be so lucky the next time.

  CHAPTER 66

  Nuclear Fusion Test Facility

  Marion knew she only had seconds before the man pulled the trigger.

  “The lab…the samples that are in there…they have to be stopped or the entire Southwest will be destroyed,” she said hurriedly, looking up from the bottom of the shaft. It already felt like a grave. “We were in the middle of testing when…when you killed the others. The clock is ticking. The containers are exposed. And we’re sitting next to a stockpile of nuclear material.”

  He raised the weapon, ready to fire.

  “That’s the only reason why I was trying to come back in here. Please…talk to someone…ask their opinion. This is more than killing one person. You’ll be destroying this region for the next thousand years. This will be the largest nuclear disaster in history. You must have family. Think what you’ll be doing to them. Think how their children will suffer.”

  Marion was amazed by her own courage. Pleading, reasoning, was the only thing she could do—the only way she could fight him. He wasn’t wearing a mask this time. The man pointing the gun at her was of an age that he might have a family. She already knew that asking for his sympathy would never work. Not when she’d seen how brutally they’d killed the other scientists in her group. She had to stress the things that he could lose.

  “How could you—one person—stop it from happening?”

  She was relieved when he spoke. He wasn’t a machine following orders. There was hope.

  “The cementation technique. I have to seal each container. They started leaking when the power went off.”

  “The power is now on.”

  “Yes, but the leakage already started. Some of these samples were intended to fail. The only way to stop everything from going up…including the storage site next door…is to completely seal each container.”

  “How many containers are you talking about?”

  “Nine.” She saw no reason to lie. At this point, her only focus was on stopping the nuclear accident.

  “How do you know you’re not already too late?”

  “I did the calculations when the power went off. I’ve been keeping track of how much time is left before the first containers start releasing hydrogen into the test lab. If that starts to happen, we’re all dead.”

  She held out the watch so he could see it. She glanced down at the numbers.

  “We have eight hours and twenty-three minutes left,” Marion told him. “This is a lengthy process. I have to get started right away.” This last bit of information was a lie. But she guessed he wouldn’t know that.

  He stood there, thinking. Marion knew she’d introduced at least the element of doubt. She was still alive.

  Suddenly, he bent down and laid the crowbar in the track. The doors closed until they reached the bar.

  “You wait right there,” he ordered. “Step back against the far wall and don’t move.

  Marion did as she was told. She had no place to go. Going up the ladder wasn’t a viable option. Neither was trying to open the door to the Test Drift facility.

  He backed away from the door and disappeared, but she could tell he wasn’t far away. She could hear his voice, talking on the phone.

  For the moment, anyway, she was alive.

  CHAPTER 67

  Roswell, New Mexico

  Agent Jerry Harvey spread the blueprints on the faded, splintered picnic table and ran a hand through his thinning red hair.

  “So what are we looking at?”

  Three other agents had met them at the deserted restaurant and filling station five miles from the airport. Everyone’s attention was on the drawings they’d brought. One of them spoke up.

  “These are the plans of the WIPP storage facility that TMC Corporation faxed to us.”

  Mark looked carefully at each page as the Harvey and the others studied the drawings. Finally, Harvey shook his head.

  “There’s nothing that resembles a habitable work area anywhere,” the agent said. “This supports what we already knew. The facility is a hundred percent robotic. Actual inspectors go down there only occasionally for short periods of time to monitor the integrity of the containers.”

  “Did TMC build this facility?” Mark asked.

  “I don’t believe so,” another agent answered. “Right now, they’re in the middle of a ten-year contract. They took over the job from the Department of Energy.”

  “I know I’m not a lifer as far as military service,” Mark said. “But I do know that the policy of working with contractors is to give them as little as they need to know. Is there any way we can get the layout of the facility from the group that actually built it?”

  Botello and Harvey exchanged a look like they’d had this conversation before.

  “The DOE is impossible about releasing classified drawings,” Botello replied.

  “I understand. But I think, at this point, they can at least give us a simple answer.” Mark motioned to the blueprints spread on the table. “We need to know if this is the extent of what’s there.”

  “Interesting point,” Botello said, looking at Harvey.

  “I’ll make some calls,” Agent Harvey agreed, walking back to their car.

  Agent Botello motioned to Mark to follow him. When they were ten feet from the others, he stopped him.

  “You strike me as a guy who has a lot at stake here.”

  Mark looked steadily at him. “A lot? Absolutely. I’ll do whatever it takes, including going down there myself and searching through that facility.”

  CHAPTER 68

  The Kennedy Center, Washington, DC

  Nellie Johnson was ambitious. She had guts and presence of mind. She was young. She had expensive tastes. She was hands-on. She knew exactly what was going on and what they had to do.

  As far as Martin Durr was concerned, she was just exactly the person to take over for Joseph Ricker…for now.

  Communication, though, was an issue. She was in New Mexico. He was in Washington. She had to be able to contact him—especially tonight. Martin would have to break his cardinal sin of not using electronics for sensitive communications. For that reason, he’d brought his BlackBerry with him.

  It was only ten minutes into the dance performance when he felt the soft whirr of the device vibrating in his pocket.

  “I have to get this. I’ll be back,” he said softly under his breath.

  Despite his wife’s utter shock, Martin immediately stood up, worked his way to the end of the row, and moved quickly up the aisle to the back of theater.

  An attendant closed the door behind him. Durr looked around the spacious lobby and approached a greeter wearing a name tag. He asked her where the public phones were located.

  She pointed out two places in the far corners of the lobby. They were both too public.

  “Any others?” he asked.

  “Let me see.” She thought for a moment. “Oh, yes. There’s a public phone on Parking Level A, at…at the entrance to the lot.”

  Durr started in that direction, taking the BlackBerry out of his pocket and checking the text message. Just as he’d thought, it was from Nellie. Short and to the point.

  Call me.

  Martin Durr was breaking his own rules, but he was being extremely careful about it. There’d be nothing incriminating in this call. Nothing for anyone to trap him with. He was still on the board of directors of New Mexico Power, and it was absolutely understandable for Nellie to contact him—especially with all the changes the organization w
as going through right now.

  There was no one on Parking Level A, which suited Martin perfectly.

  He dialed the secure number he had for her. She answered immediately.

  “Good news. Your missing item has been found.”

  He knew she was talking about Marion Kagan. This was good news, and that only left the twin sister. He hadn’t yet heard anything from the group sent to eliminate her.

  “I’m good here. You can talk. Did they proceed as they were instructed?”

  “Actually…not entirely,” she said. “The subject is claiming that certain objects she was handling need to be sealed or a Level Seven accident will occur.”

  Martin knew enough about nuclear accidents to know that a Level Seven accident was the most catastrophic. But that didn’t affect him. He could care less if that entire state went up in smoke. In fact, something of that magnitude would shift everyone’s attention to the clean-up that had to follow. Now that he thought of it, there could be money made in that, as well.

  “Finish the job,” he instructed.

  “Sir, if I may. I know enough about the issue at hand and the location of the objects in question. I strongly recommend that something be done.”

  “Where were you when the original directives went out?” he asked, not liking to be second-guessed when he gave an order.

  “Sir, I was never privy to specific details.”

  Nellie wasn’t stupid. He still didn’t like it.

  “Are you going to make the call or should I do it?” he asked, letting his anger come through in his voice.

  There was a slight pause before she spoke.

  “I’ll make the call,” she said finally. “That’s before I get on the next flight out of New Mexico, sir.”

  Durr had never taken her for a coward. But he guessed everyone had to have a vulnerable spot. He’d found hers.