The Dark Hour

by Robin Burcell

  “Excuse me?”

  “The drug PCP.”

  “No way. That guy was so squeaky clean, he wouldn’t have ever used anything. He barely drank. His brain was a temple—his words, I kid you not—and he wasn’t about to pollute it with anything. Except coffee. He definitely drank coffee.”

  “He had PCP in his system at the time of the shooting.”

  “I have a hard time believing it. As weird as he was, I really liked him.” Maddie moved from the dresses to a table with scarves artfully tossed about on it, and she pulled one up, fluffed it out a little, as though that arrangement was far superior. Carillo said nothing, merely waited, his experience always having been that it’s best to let people talk, fill in the silence, and after a moment, she paused in her ministrations, looking up at him. “Not just weird. Brainy weird, you know? And very into conspiracy theory.”

  “What sort of conspiracy theory?”

  “The typical. Corrupt government. Major corporations funding politicians to further their own interests. I mean, no one took him seriously. At least not at first. But then he sort of became obsessed.”

  “Over what?”

  She gave a cynical laugh. “He hacked into the server of some company with some program his friend helped him write and said the evidence was right there. Don’t ask me what it was, because I have no idea.” She picked up another scarf, running it through her fingers, before laying it across the table. “Look. I’m sorry the senator was killed, and I’d really like to help, but when Hollis started saying that they were going to implant him with some mind-controlling device, that was when I started distancing myself. A little too sci-fi for me, you know?”

  “You know the name of this friend who helped him write the program?”

  “Izzy.”

  “Izzy what?”

  “That’s it. Just Izzy.”

  “Any idea where I can find him?”

  “Sorry. The only time I ever met him was at Hollis’s place. He was always working on Hollis’s computer. Almost like a fixture there, if you know what I mean.”

  A woman walked in, and Maddie gave Carillo a tentative smile hinting that she hoped he was done with the conversation. He slipped his card on the counter. “If you think of anything else, give me a call.”

  “Sure thing.”

  Outside, Carillo went over his notes, wondering at the possibility that Hollis’s symptoms of paranoid schizophrenia were brought on by PCP usage. Who else would bring up aliens from Atlantis? And brain implants? He could see why the guy would be dismissed as a nutcase. But a couple of things bothered Carillo, the hacking into the server for one. According to the police, the guy’s hard drive was clean, but maybe a tad too clean. And now there was this mysterious friend, Izzy, who might have helped him program his computer.

  Maybe it was nothing.

  Then again, maybe it was something, and he picked up the phone and called an old friend in the FBI’s Computer Analysis department. “Any chance you guys can do some deep forensic work on a PC?”

  Chapter 15

  December 7

  Washington, D.C.

  Tex was ordering as Sydney walked into the coffee shop, and so she was forced to wait for answers about her sketch and the woman’s identity until they were alone. He handed a cup to her, then walked over to the condiments. “You take anything in it?”

  “I’m surprised you don’t have that written down somewhere along with everything else you know about me.”

  “Tastes change.”

  “Half and half.”

  He poured a splash into her cup and she put the top on before following him out. They stood on the sidewalk next to a row of coin-operated newspaper stands, both of them watching the traffic, not talking at first. Sydney figured that Tex would tell her what he wanted and after several moments, with no sign that he was in any hurry, she said, “What’s going on?”

  “I’m not even sure where to begin.”

  “How about we start with Griffin’s wife? If she’s dead, who’s the woman in the sketch?”

  “Honestly? I don’t know. The building they were in exploded. He was rescued, she wasn’t. Or so we thought.”

  “So you thought? Was there a body? DNA?”

  “Charred beyond recognition. We were told the body was positively identified by DNA.”

  “Okay, either it was a sloppy investigation, or there’s some other logical answer. After all, Griffin was a witness, you’ve got a dead body buried in his wife’s grave and an alleged DNA test stating it’s her.”

  “Look who you’re talking to Sydney. It’s not like someone couldn’t have gone to great pains to fake a DNA test. And knowing all the players involved and what it could mean, I’m not about to ask to have the body exhumed.”

  Sydney wrapped both hands around her coffee cup, trying to keep warm. “Meaning what?”

  “Meaning I have no idea what it means yet. I’m willing to concede that she very well could be dead, and this is just a huge coincidence. Except like I said, my gut’s telling me otherwise. It’s also telling me that this isn’t something I can bring up at the next team meeting. Not if I want to help Griffin. I’m not even sure I can go to her boss about this.”

  “Her boss?”

  “She didn’t work for us. She was CIA,” he said. “Jesus. I’m breaking about a dozen rules just talking to you about this stuff.” He kicked at the dirty slush pile near the curb, knocking a piece loose, then crushing it underfoot. Finally he looked at her, said, “Bottom line? Griffin’s in trouble.”

  Her first thought was that guys like Griffin were always in trouble. The word should be tattooed across his forehead. Tex meant something else. He had to have meant something else. But when she recalled how Griffin had acted when he’d left her on that rooftop in Amsterdam, sketch or no sketch, she knew this was different. “What sort of trouble?”

  “He’s been burned. Set up for a murder he didn’t commit. His only hope is to let us bring him in, clear his name before he’s found by anyone else. I don’t think he’s going to let us do that.”

  She stared at her coffee cup, watching the thin vapor of steam rise from the vent in the lid, thinking that had she refused to go out on that drawing, she’d be sitting in her office, doing what she was meant to do, with none of this touching her in any way. “You’re about to tell me something I don’t want to hear, aren’t you?”

  “Afraid so. Right now, Griffin is completely in the cold. He’s got no one, and if he’s not careful, the trumped-up murder charge will end up being real.”

  “Real? How?”

  “He’s after the man who murdered his wife. And if I know Griffin, he won’t rest until he’s killed him.”

  Sydney well remembered the pain in Griffin’s voice when he’d told her about his wife and how she died. “Okay,” she said. “Let’s say this woman in this sketch is someone else. That means Becca really is dead, and some might think he’d be doing a service. Taking his wife’s killer off the street.”

  “Except I think the suspected killer is a key player in this LockeStarr investigation right now, and I need him alive.”

  “Why? What’s so important about LockeStarr?”

  “We believe they’re a front company for the Network. Recent intelligence came in that they’re behind the recruitment of Dr. Fedorov, a Russian Vector scientist known for his work on chimera viruses, viruses that are fused from more than one type, in this case for bioweapons. We’ve heard that they’re about to or already have tested one such weapon.”

  “Tested where?”

  “That’s the million-dollar question. Right now, every allied agency is scrambling to investigate any unconfirmed rumors of large-scale deaths, whether it’s fish, birds, or suspected group suicides of splinter religious sects. We don’t even know what the weapon’s supposed to do. Poison the air? The water? Viral? Bacterial
? If it really is Fedorov involved, we’re guessing viral. Whatever it is, we’ve heard that it works and they’re already lining up buyers. That means in order to find this weapon, I need this guy that Griffin’s hunting down, and I need him alive, Sydney. And to keep him that way, I have to know who he is, who he was working with, and where this stuff is being manufactured, and your sketch might be the only tie we have to find him.”

  Sydney sipped at her coffee, ignoring the voice of reason in her head that said she needed to discontinue this conversation, walk away, and not look back. What she did instead was ask, “Why are you telling me this?”

  “A couple reasons. One, I need you. Griffin’s got one objective. Kill the guy he thinks killed her, and he won’t come in until he’s achieved it. He knows damned well that if I show up, it’ll be to stop him. You might be the only one in the world who could safely get close enough to him.”

  “And the other reason?”

  “Right now he’s considered a rogue spy, one we’re under orders to bring in. Let’s just say that there are a few agencies, including here in the U.S., that might not be so understanding should they run into him. And if this really is Griffin’s wife involved in all this, there’s something a lot bigger going on than even I know about. Someone went to a lot of trouble to make her look dead, and more recently to burn Griffin. The question is who? And why?”

  “You’ve got to have some idea.”

  “The strongest being that when he started looking into his wife’s murder, he stirred up a hornet’s nest.” He pulled off the lid from his cup, then dumped the coffee into the snow at his feet, the hot brown liquid cutting into the ice like acid. “The thing about hornets, you get stung by too many, you die.”

  Sydney tossed her half-full cup into the trash, having lost her taste for the beverage. “As much as I’d love to help, my office is never going to let me go. They forced me to take vacation leave.”

  “Maybe with good reason.”

  She looked up at him. “Pearson knows . . . ? God. How did I not see that coming?”

  “There’s a lot going on here and not enough time to go into it. So how about it?”

  “Backroom politics aside, you think I’m just going to be able to jet off to Europe and find a man who doesn’t want to be found?”

  “I do, because you have something he wants. The sketch. He has no idea who it’s of, but I damned well know he wants it.”

  “How do I know you’re not using me as a way to find him?”

  “I am using you. To help him.”

  Sydney shoved her hands into her pockets. “Look, Tex, I want to help Griffin. But the last time I ran out there for you, someone was murdered, and the killers came after me. That seems to be a theme with your group. I’m not sure I’m the right person for it,” she said, taking a step back, and then another. Her mother wanted her home for Christmas. It was a promise she intended to keep. “I’m sorry.”

  She started to walk away.

  “He needs you.”

  Sydney stopped in her tracks. Tried not to think about the history she and Griffin had together. The operation they’d worked in Italy. The time he’d come back for her, saved her life at risk to his own. It wasn’t that she wasn’t grateful. She was. It was that Griffin and his ilk were world-class spies. They were highly trained for that sort of work. She might be able to shoot with the best of them, handle herself in a fight, run an investigation. But she was not a spy. And now her job was on the line. “I need to think about it. It’s the best I can do.”

  It was well after six by the time Sydney returned to her office, then drove home, telling herself that if she were smart, she’d stay far away from Tex and Griffin and anyone else involved with ATLAS. She was not getting involved. Griffin might be in trouble, but he was well equipped to deal with it, no matter what Tex said. And probably the last thing Griffin wanted was for her to be in his way.

  Besides, what could she possibly do to help? He wanted the drawing, and she could send that electronically, assuming she even knew where to send it. And then what? If, as Tex said, it looked just like Griffin’s wife, how would he react when he saw it? If it really was she, his quest for revenge was over. Still, there was bound to be a lot of pent-up anger, never mind unanswered questions that were going to cause a whole new set of problems, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to be around when he found out.

  Pressing the remote for the gate to her apartment complex, she drove in, and not seeing any vacant spaces at the perimeter of her building, pulled into the underground garage and parked. Her footsteps echoed across the cement floor as she walked to the elevator, pushed the button, and stepped on. Her apartment was on the fifth floor, down a long carpeted hallway and around the corner—in other words, about as far from the elevator as one could get. A good thing if one wanted peace and quiet. A bad thing if one was carrying groceries.

  When she inserted her key into the lock, the door pushed open. She hadn’t even turned the key yet.

  Sydney stepped back, drew her gun, then shoved the door open the rest of the way with her foot. The apartment was dark. Reaching in, she flicked on the light switch, did a cursory search, saw the living room was empty, as was the kitchen. The hallway to the bedrooms and the one bathroom was to the right. She angled out, stepped to the side until she could see down the hall. Both bedroom doors were open, just as she’d left them. They were empty. The bathroom was empty. And there was no one in the closets.

  She holstered her gun and walked back out to the living room. Nothing looked disturbed.

  And though she was fairly meticulous about making sure her door was locked, she had been in a hurry this morning to make that appointment with Pearson at FCI . . .

  “Oh, you are home.”

  Sydney glanced over at her front door, still standing open. Her neighbor from across the hall, Tina, stood there looking in, bundled up in a coat, scarf, and gloves, while her black Labrador, Storm, pulled at his leash, trying to get into Sydney’s apartment. “Just got home. Why?”

  “I think Storm scared off the two electricians who came to your door.”

  “Electricians?”

  “From the utility company. Storm was growling at my door, and when I looked out the peephole, I saw them standing in front of your place. When I opened up to tell them you weren’t home, Storm lunged at them. He’s not usually a barker, but man. He sort of went nuts. Good thing I had him by the collar.”

  Sydney’s gaze flicked to the door, then back down at the dog, who seemed inordinately interested in the scent on her threshold. She walked up, bent over, and scratched Storm behind his ears. “Good dog.” Then to Tina, asked, “They say anything?”

  “Not really. Just wanted to know when you’d be home. That was maybe a half hour ago? The one guy said he’d leave a card, and that was it. They took off.”

  “I wonder what they wanted.” Sydney shrugged, acted as if it were no big deal. “Thanks, Tina.”

  “No problem. Storm, come,” she said, tugging on his leash when he didn’t immediately follow her down the hall toward the elevator. Once Tina was out of sight, Sydney examined her front door, but couldn’t tell if it had been picked. Seeing no sign of a business card, she closed and locked the door, then called the utility company, asking if they’d sent anyone by. They hadn’t.

  Next call was to Tex. “You guys dispatch someone by my place disguised as utility workers?”

  “Not us, darlin’.”

  “I was afraid you were going to say that.” Tucking her cell beneath her ear, she told him what happened, while she grabbed her small, soft-sided suitcase, then started rummaging her drawers for clothes, wondering if three days’ worth would be enough. “It seems my neighbor interrupted them before they got in. But my door was unlocked, which means they were that close to entering.”

  “What are your plans?”

  “I figure I have two choice
s. Scotty’s or a hotel.”

  “Or catch a flight to Europe.”

  “No way. This mess is clearly a result from my last trip there.”

  “And you think staying in a hotel is going to make them go away?”

  She glanced toward the window, suddenly wondering if they had actually left. “Hold on,” she said, turning off her light. She strode across the room, parted the curtain, looked out to the lot below, and saw a vehicle that stood out, mostly because it was backed into the space. “There’s a white van parked with a view of the entry gate and the drive leading into the garage.”

  “You ever seen it there before?”

  “No.” And the coincidence of its presence right after the sighting of the false utility workers was enough to set her alarm bells ringing. Tex was right. It didn’t matter where she went, or whom she stayed with. If they’d found her apartment this easily, they’d have no trouble tracking her down through her friends, maybe even her family. It was that last thought that spurred her to action. The farther away from them she was, the safer they’d be. “How soon can you be here?”

  “Give me ten minutes.”

  She dropped the curtain, disconnected, then turned the light on to finish her packing. That done, she put her suitcase by the dining room table, turned a chair so that it faced the door, then sat there with her gun in one hand.

  Chapter 16

  December 7

  Washington, D.C.

  Tex finally called. “I’m parked in front of the lobby doors. You want me to come up?”

  “I’ll meet you down there.”

  She grabbed her bag and keys, tucked her gun in her coat pocket. She did not turn off the light, in case they were watching her window from outside. Checking the hallway in both directions before stepping out, she locked the door behind her, then walked to the elevator, her hand in her pocket, finger on the trigger guard. Healthy paranoia seemed the wisest of courses right now, and before she even pressed the down button, the elevator bell signaled its arrival on her floor. She stepped to the side, her concealed gun aimed directly at the door. Tina and Storm stepped off.