Point of No Return

by Rita Henuber

  “Holy shit,” Jack said, clicking back and forth between the screens. “Are these guys related?”

  “Nope, and it gets better,” Gunny’s voice said.

  “Where the hell is the real Bristol?” Honey said.

  “That’s the better,” Coop said. “Sending a file now.”

  The next document was emblazoned with Coroners Report and an official seal. Jack scrolled through the detailed report of skeletal remains found in a remote Ohio state park months ago. Death estimated to be right before the time Global came on the scene. Cause of death: blunt force trauma to the back of the head, most likely from a fall. ID on the remains based on a wallet found in the clothing as Francis Nelson. Who disappeared around the same time as estimated date of death.

  “Bristol and Nelson served a tour of duty together.”

  “Flaming fish balls.”

  “These guys got into some scrapes,” Gunny said. “Minor stuff except for Nelson. He’s a tool.” There was a pause. “He’d been disciplined, busted down a rank, spent ten days in the stockade. Major,” Gunny’s formal tone garnered her full attention, “the officer who busted him was Saunders.”

  She and Jack straightened, their eyes going to the stacks of notes.

  “What else?” Jack said, excitement in his voice.

  “The two women at Global, sending pics now, have ties to East European and Chinese cyber crime organizations.”

  “Coop,” Honey said, her muscles tingling with excitement, “send a list of the high points and everything you have. It will be a couple of hours before we can get out of here. It’s a three-hour drive to the airport, two hours back to DC.”

  “Doing it now.”

  Pings announcing file arrivals filled the room.

  “Auntie? Ma’am, are you there?”

  Honey jerked around to look at the phone. Kara calling her ma’am? “Yesss . . .”

  “David Bristol’s bio says he started global with three million in lottery winnings inherited from a great-aunt. We checked with the Indiana lottery. The old lady won a hundred thousand. She took a one-time payment of a little over sixty thousand. Not only that, but her death is sketchy. We checked the online obit. She was in great health, planning a world cruise. It was a shock to friends. With everything else, it seems odd.”

  “Yeah.” Honey’s mind hop, skipped and jumped through scenarios. The for-sure things were the real Bristol was dead and Nelson assumed his identity. Anything else was assumption.

  Jack looked as gobsmacked as she felt. “We have to sort through this . . . make notes, figure . . .” he said. “Notes? Notes. Son of a bitch.” He lunged for the backpack containing Becca’s older notes.

  “I’ll check in again before we leave here.” Honey ended the call. “What?” she said as he upended the bag, spilling the remaining books on the table.

  “The man Becca filed a complaint against. I think it was Nelson.” Jack riffled through the books. “We weren’t looking back far enough.”

  “How far?” Honey went for Saunders’s and Ramsey’s older notes.

  “A year, maybe year and a half. March, right before Lee’s birthday.”

  She searched Saunders’s logs for dates, rapidly scanning pages. “Got it. Two complaints from female enlisted soldiers. Nothing here about an O’Brien.”

  Jack scattered Ramsey’s notebooks across the table. Pages flipped like being in a gale force wind. “Here.” His big hand slammed down on a page. “Ramsey met with Becca.” He turned the page. “Jeesus-h-christ. He persuaded her not to file a complaint because Nelson had complaints pending.” He turned the page, then planted his hands on each side of the book, leaning over. “Nelson was a short-timer. Ramsey thought the Army wouldn’t do much, better to not file a formal complaint.” He went back to Becca’s notes and shot her a sideways glance over his shoulder. “Becca agreed. I never heard any of this. Only that she had a problem.”

  Honey sensed Jack’s anger building. “Ramsey’s advice was sound. Once a woman files a complaint she gets a rep.” She shook her head. “Makes no difference if it’s valid. It can kill a career. Becca did the right thing.”

  “Why didn’t Ramsey remember that? Make the connection when they died?”

  “Their deaths were reported as a car accident. The name was Nelson, not Bristol. She hadn’t started the review at Global. There was no connection for him.”

  He gripped the edge of the table, arm muscles knotted. For a moment, she thought he’d flip it over.

  “We know the first part of the why. Bristol-Nelson, whoever the fuck he is, couldn’t risk Becca, or Ramsey and Saunders, showing up at Global and recognizing him.”

  “Yeah. But there are pics of him on the net.” Jack laced his fingers behind his head and brought his folded arms close to the side of his face. “Why kill . . .” He grimaced. “Why kill, or take those kids? It’s fucking stupid. Motherfucking demented. Sick bastards.”

  That about summed up this fubar, but Honey kept that thought to herself. “Nelson took the girls to keep the people who could out him busy. I can’t explain what happened with your family. I do know if Becca, the colonel, or the general had appeared at Global they would have eventually recognized him. Pictures on the net are one thing. Voice and body language are another. There’s no sinister plot to sell stolen technology. This is Nelson’s plain vanilla attempt to cover murder and theft of the lottery money.”

  “You’re right. The simplest explanation is generally the right one.” He went to the laptop. “You’re right about him covering up a murder. You’re right about not selling technology. What the fuck are they doing?”

  “And how the fuck did Global clear investigating committees with the difference in lottery money?” The adrenaline coursing through her added an edge to her voice.

  Jack clicked through the pages on the laptop. “It’s in here someplace.”

  Honey headed to the stove. “I need coffee before I dig into that. My mind is racing in a half dozen directions.”

  “Ditto.” Jack brought out the beans and grinder and dumped beans in the hopper. While Honey viciously turned the crank, Jack fed the wood stove and put water on. “Plan?”

  “First things first. Check out what we’ve been sent. Get the hell out of Dodge and back to DC, then decide who we take this to,” she said.

  “Agree,” Jack said. “The jacked-up part is, who the hell in DC are we going to trust?”

  The motivation for taking the girls and killing Jack’s family was understood. What Global was doing wasn’t. They took turns reviewing the data screens, jotting dates, anything that popped out, and prepping to leave. Coop had found no alerts on buying or selling weapons or technology outside normal Chinese lanes. The alerts he did find consisted of attacks on corporate and government secrets. Cyber defense may not be that great in the private sector, but in the government it was far more complex than the public was led to believe. Every day thousands of people employed by secret agencies searched for those attacks.

  “There’s no intel of Global actively in these areas. What are we missing? I don’t see it,” she said.

  Jack rubbed the back of his neck. “Their financials make it appear every cent they make gets poured back into the company. We might be looking for another set of books.”

  “Our options are limited here. Let’s refocus, start at the beginning, go over everything since we first became involved. Jar some little detail.”

  Jack went first. Eyes pinched, recounting painful details from when he learned about his family to the time she arrived at the cabin. Nothing jumped out.

  She began with the village and finding the girls. Something in her encoded memory took her to the Tango who came close to blowing her head off and stopped. “I recognized a man. Actually the gang tats on his knuckles, then his face. He was a petty thief, a pickpocket, I’d tried to recruit as an asset. The . . .”

  It came crashing together, connecting cartoonishly like boxcars on a mile-long train. The man was known to steal f
or IDs and credit cards, selling them to gangs.

  Porter and Barras were linked to cyber gangs. The crude tat on Verna’s arm.

  The personnel files on Porter’s computer.

  Her hand shot out, grasping a fistful of Jack’s shirt.

  “Hey. You’ve got hair in the there. Let go.” Jack’s hand covered hers, peeling away her fingers.

  “Identify theft.”

  Jack grew still. “Flaming fish balls,” he whispered.

  She gave him the fish-eye. “Global is trading on the status they gained from the feds. City, state, and national governments have given them complete access to harvest any and all information needed to steal and build credit.”

  “A billion-dollar industry. Global, the contracts . . . a pretext.”

  They stood stone still, Honey grasping Jack’s shirt, his hand covering hers, taking what they knew and pressing the implications through the new framework.

  Chapter 20

  “I’m ready. You?” Honey said, dropping her bags near the door.

  “I’m gonna shut down the security systems. Turn the generator off.”

  “Security systems, other than the jammer?” This information was new to her.

  “Got a cam thing set up out on the road. Couple up on the hill where I thought I could be watched from. Haven’t checked in a couple of days.” He pulled her close. “I figured with my very own hotshot Marine intelligence office here, no one would dare . . .” He paused and gaped over her shoulder at one of the laptops.

  “Jack?” He didn’t answer. She tried to block his view of the screens but he looked around her. “Never thought I’d see the day when Agent Always Hard preferred a computer to . . . or—” She twisted around. “Something there?”

  “Yeah.” He banged a few keys, and when the screen split into four views he pointed to the upper left screen. “That’s a replay.” A large dark figure swept past the camera, then another.

  Honey looked at the white numbers at the corner of the square, 01:03, and a chill ran through her. What she saw wasn’t an animal. It was a man. Two men.

  Jack pointed to the two lower screens. “Real time.” These screens delivered a bird’s-eye view of the cabin. He must be part monkey to have set them that high. A large odd bird glided past one camera and then into view of the second wider-angle camera. The bird was a surveillance drone circling above.

  “Look.” Jack pointed at the feed where she’d seen the two figures. “They went back.”

  Honey tapped her ear, a way to ask if he thought there were listening devices.

  “No. Jammer blocks them. I never considered drones.” He pointed to the remaining view. “This cam is halfway inside the jammed area. The laser alarms are fifty feet out and cover the entire perimeter of the cabin. They didn’t come in that far. Global?”

  “Who else?” she said.

  “How?”

  “Moore knows where I am.” Gawd, she hoped he wasn’t a part of this.

  “They here to watch, damage, or terminate?” Jack watched her intently.

  “Watch.”

  “Agreed,” Jack said quietly, “or they would have come at us last night. They want us in the open.”

  She looked out to the lake. “Don’t want bullet holes in the cabin or trees to raise questions. We just disappear.”

  “Time to get the fuck out of here.”

  “Okay.” They ramped up their preparations to do just that. “We get in the car and drive like a bat escaping hell.”

  Jack shook his head. “Not the car. Top speed it could do on that axle-busting road is twenty-five. My truck.”

  “That bucket of rust. Are you crazy?”

  He didn’t seem to be paying attention as he shut down his laptops, placing them in lined metal cases. He slipped the flash drives into a jeans pocket.

  “That thing will crumble at the first bump it hits.”

  “Nah.” He stopped what he was doing and gave her a quick kiss. “The truck in the shed.” He turned his attention back to storing his equipment. “A Blazer . . . built for off-roading and rutted roads.”

  “Inside that dilapidated shed?”

  “Good hiding place, huh?”

  “Yeah.” She recognized Jack had taken command of this op. His turf, he should. Still, it felt odd not to be the alpha in control.

  “Once I’m in the shed the bucket of rust has to be pushed away from the door.” He pointed at her. “Your job. Clear the cinder block away from the front wheel and shove. It isn’t in gear.” He put the laptop cases in a duffel and rested the shotgun on top. “It’s on a downhill slope. When it gets rolling, open the shed doors all the way, jump in the Blazer and we’re outta here. Anything in the rental you need?”

  Honey shook her head as she crouched over her duffel, removing her weapons and magazines.

  “They’ll expect us to use the sedan to leave. It’ll take them a couple to realize what’s happening.”

  She snapped her holster on her belt and checked the load in the H&K out of habit. Jack did the same with the Desert Eagle.

  “We’ll be in the open. The Blazer’s cab and doors are off. I have a vest in the truck I’ll put in on the console. As soon as you’re in the truck put it on. The seat has a four-point belt lock. Use it. I plan on going like the fuckers are shooting at us.”

  “Don’t need the vest.” She held up her dragon skin.

  “Really? You travel with a vest?”

  “I carry a long gun . . . I carry a vest.” She loaded a magazine into the H&K. “Never know when you’ll need one.” She remembered the drill instructor at officers candidate school, the one who hated her, holding up a vest saying, Never leave home without it. That was before they were widely used.

  “Shudda known.” He watched her shrug into the vest. “You have a hat and jacket in there, get them on. Protect you from dust and flying gravel.”

  She pulled out a hoodie and a utility cover, closed the bag and handed it to Jack, who slung it on his shoulder.

  “Questions?”

  “Not a one,” she said, securing her vest. “Kick the brick. Shove. Open. Jump in. Buckle up.”

  Jack took a look around the cabin as he tucked his shirt into the waist of his jeans. “Time to giddy-up.” Holding the truck key in his mouth, he closed the cabin door behind them. “Don’t want the critters making themselves at home,” he mumbled around the key. “When you hear the shed door open, follow.” He started down the steps and stopped. He took her hand and squeezed. She squeezed back.

  Honey put the hoodie on over the vest and zipped it up. The sight of her in a vest would be an instant alarm. She tucked her hair under the cap, tugging it far down. Jack stopped at the latrine, then walked casually to the shed. Metal hinges creaking like fingernails on a chalkboard were her signal. She didn’t rush to the old truck but walked with purpose and shoved the broken cinder block clear of the tire. Then she tugged open the driver’s-side door of the rust bucket, surprised the door didn’t fall off, and shoved. It moved a few inches. Inside the shed, a V8 engine roared to life. Doves fled the protection of the vines covering the quivering roof and a chattering squirrel escaped the vibrating to a nearby tree. The sound echoed against the hills. Whoever was out there was alerted now. She dug her boots in, gave the truck another heave and it was on its way. Lopsided wood doors groaned a protest as she shoved and kicked them open. The shed swayed. She backpedaled, afraid the whole thing would collapse.

  From the darkness a red truck mounted on monster tires appeared in a cloud of dust. “Need a ride?” Jack yelled, pulling beside her. He wore a beat-to-hell leather jacket over his vest, a red ball cap on backward and mirrored shades.

  She stepped back and leapt into the Bubba truck. Her feet had barely left the ground before Jack gunned it. She squirmed, grasping at any handhold, fighting to get upright in the seat and facing forward.

  “Quit playing around and fucking get buckled in,” he commanded as he jerked the wheel to navigate the turn onto the road and avoid
the rental car.

  “I would if you’d quit driving like a fucking maniac,” she yelled back, struggling to get her arms through the seat restraints. It wasn’t exactly easy with the vest on. Jack slowed, reducing the bumping, for which she was grateful. She had no desire to face-plant on the road.

  “Go for it,” she yelled the moment the clamps and buckles clicked together. She looked back over her shoulder through the rooster tail of billowing dust at the fast disappearing cabin. No men appeared. “Where do you think they’re watching from?”

  “I’d say the second bend ahead.” He swerved to avoid a foot-deep rut. “Get glasses on.”

  Honey did as told and tugged her hat down farther. Jack glanced over at the bag open at her feet holding the long gun and magazines, then quickly returned his gaze back to the road. “Where’d you leave your lock cases?” he asked.

  “Don’t have any.”

  “How the fuck you get on a plane with weapons and no lock cases?”

  “Private plane.”

  He turned and gave her an incredulous look.

  “Told you . . . I’m rich.”

  “Jack!” she screamed and grabbed the windshield frame. A Hummer launched out of the woods into their path. Jack accelerated, going up the steep incline on his side of the road. The driver’s-side tires climbed the hill so far Honey twisted her arms around her restraint straps and braced for the roll she knew would come. Rocks slid, the truck engine whined, tires spun as they crashed through brush, but no roll. Jack expertly maneuvered the Blazer over the slope and blasted past the Hummer and Bear in the shotgun seat.

  Honey looked back, getting a count of the men in the Hummer . . . “Gun!”

  Jack did the automotive version of zig and zag.

  Holy f’ing fish balls. The fuckers shot at them. Watch mode, hell, they were in terminate mode. She slammed a magazine in her second H&K and put it at her feet. Firing from one moving vehicle at another with handheld weapons was not like it was in the movies. It was damned difficult to hit a target. In moments they would round a curve, totally blocking them from the Hummer’s view, and she expected Jack to stop to stand and fight. He didn’t. He sped up.