The Speed of Sound

by Eric Bernt

  Merrell managed to overlook the disrespect he was being shown, because of his rising curiosity. “Senator, just what the hell is this thing these two are in possession of?”

  “I’m not at liberty to say.”

  The Homeland Security director shook his head. “You don’t know, do you?”

  Corbin Davis grinned slyly. “Tell yourself that if it will make you feel better.”

  Merrell hated being kept out of the loop. “Must be a real game changer.”

  Davis paused, deciding to give the top cop just a tiny crumb to nibble on. “That would be an understatement.”

  CHAPTER 89

  New Jersey Transit Train, Approaching Philadelphia, May 28, 12:33 a.m.

  When Eddie’s fingers finally stopped flying across his laptop keyboard, he looked up to realize he had no idea where he was. All he knew was this wasn’t his room. Where am I? He started to panic until he turned and saw Skylar sitting next to him. She was sound asleep. Just the sight of her helped calm him down. He now remembered that they were in a train. Headed to Philadelphia. To hear his mother sing.

  Eddie glanced out the window, but couldn’t see much. Silhouettes of apartment buildings and factories and gas stations and junkyards. A never-ending blur of streetlights and park lights and brake lights. It was not enough detail to give him any idea where along the route they were.

  Skylar must have fallen asleep a while ago. She looked so peaceful. He was about to say her name when he stopped himself. And just watched her. Listening to her breathe. Eddie matched his breathing to hers, inhaling and exhaling at exactly the same pace. Then slowly reached out to touch his finger to her skin. He wanted human contact. Maybe only a fingertip’s worth, but it was still a giant leap.

  Skylar suddenly jolted awake, which made Eddie jump, too. “Sorry, I must have fallen asleep.”

  Eddie immediately pulled his finger back, pretending to scratch his forearm. “Why are you sorry?”

  “I tried to stay awake.”

  “You were tired.”

  She nodded, glancing at his laptop supercomputer to see that it was turned off. She was about to ask him what he’d been working on, when the train lurched forward, slowing noticeably.

  Eddie was worried. “What happened? Did the train come off the tracks?”

  She checked her watch. It was 12:33, which meant they were just about to pull into 30th Street Station. “We’re almost there.”

  Eddie looked confused. “Almost where?”

  “To 30th Street Station.”

  “We’re in Philadelphia?!”

  She paused a long moment before saying, “Yes, Eddie. Welcome home.”

  CHAPTER 90

  Harmony House, Woodbury, New Jersey, May 28, 12:42 a.m.

  Michael Barnes was now certain that a third party had entered the game. Or, rather, a third party who had always been in the game, watching in silence, lurking in the shadows, had decided to reveal itself by entering the field of play. There was no other possible explanation for the sudden disappearance of his two-man team sent to Gloria Pruitt’s residence. Barnes had ruled out every other possibility. Someone knew they were coming. Which could only mean Barnes’s communications had been compromised. My God, for how long?

  Barnes was impressed. Such a move required patience. Discipline. Resources. And experience. Which meant whoever had caused the disappearance of his team was a formidable adversary. Perhaps, even, an unbeatable one. But Barnes had been in unwinnable situations before. It had been decades since he’d faced such a daunting challenge, but he was confident he still had the chops.

  There was, however, one critical difference. In those earlier situations, all of which had occurred outside US borders, there was no walking away. Failure meant death. That was not the case today. He could just walk away. Disappear. It was an option he’d prepared for years ago. While Michael Barnes was indeed fiercely loyal to Marcus Fenton, he was not willing to rot in a cell for him. If the ship was sinking, Barnes would jump and jump fast, and never look back.

  But this ship wasn’t sinking just yet.

  The irate calls from his boss were the least of Michael Barnes’s concerns. So what if the venerable doctor had been humiliated at the hands of a New York City Police detective? All Butler McHenry had done was confirm one very crucial piece of information: the echo box was now working. Acoustic archeology was real. The detective had played a recording for Dr. Fenton. Which explained why the third party had stepped out of the shadows.

  The two questions burning in Barnes’s mind were: Where was the echo box currently, and what did the nurse have to do with Edward Parks and his device?

  As to the first matter, Lutz and Hirsch had never lost visual contact with Homeland Security Agent Harold Raines. Barnes’s team had done exactly as they were instructed, maintaining a safe distance from the subject. Barnes had expected them to report that Raines was returning to the Sixth Precinct to gain possession of the device. Instead, Michael Barnes was informed that Agent Raines had returned to the Homeland regional office at 633 Third Avenue. Which could only mean one thing: Homeland was giving up the chase, at least in New York. Edward Parks and Skylar Drummond were no longer in the city. They had gotten away. When Lutz and Hirsch asked what they should do, Barnes ordered them back to Harmony House.

  As to the second matter, regarding the nurse, the previously unknown party would have only protected her because she had value to them. They wanted her to continue working for them. They wanted to maintain the status quo. Their status quo. Which couldn’t possibly include someone who had just tried to have her killed. Michael Barnes could almost see the bull’s-eye materializing on his forehead as he stared at his own reflection in his computer screen. They would be coming after him, and when he least expected it.

  Barnes was surprised at how quickly he reached his decision. Perhaps it was the wisdom that comes with age. Or that deep down, he doubted that he truly still had what it took. Whichever the case, after nearly two decades of loyal and dutiful service to Dr. Marcus Fenton and Harmony House, Barnes simply got up and left his office. He didn’t take a single personal item with him. Not a photo. Not a pencil. Not even one of the many stomach remedies he always kept on hand. He exited the building, walked across the parking lot, got in his beige Impala, and drove off the grounds of Harmony House without so much as a word.

  The only things he would be taking with him on his journey were contained in two thirty-six-cubic-foot, vacuum-sealed aluminum storage lockers buried side by side beneath a wooden toolshed in his backyard. Because that was the plan. He’d carefully stocked the lockers years ago. The metal boxes held everything he’d need to live on for years in any number of environments. Michael Barnes was going off the grid. He just needed to get his carefully packed supplies, and he would be gone. Pffft! The world would never see him again.

  Unless he wanted it to.

  CHAPTER 91

  30th Street Station, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, May 28, 12:45 a.m.

  Eddie was once again wearing his baseball jersey as he and Skylar walked through 30th Street Station with the other Mets fans. Some people in the distance booed, which wasn’t entirely unexpected. New Yorkers would have greeted arriving Phillies fans similarly. Skylar took note of several Philadelphia police officers gathered in the main concourse. There was a notable lack of urgency about them. It was clear they had not been put on tactical alert for two federal fugitives in possession of stolen classified technology. Not yet, anyway. But Skylar veered away from them, just to be safe.

  “Are we still playing tag?” Eddie asked.

  “Yes, we are.”

  “Do we have to?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “Why are you afraid so?”

  “Because they’re still playing.” She nodded toward the police officers.

  Eddie paused. “I don’t ever want to play this kind of game again.”

  “I don’t, either.” She smiled at him as they made their way out of the building with
the flow of Mets navy blue and orange. They moved down the sidewalk toward a line of cabs, where a man with dreadlocks, wearing a bright-orange vest, was coordinating who got into which cab.

  Skylar turned to Eddie and asked, “Would you be okay taking cab ride number twenty-nine?”

  Eddie studied the line of cabs, along with their license-plate numbers. “Twenty-nine is a prime number. I like prime numbers, because they can’t be divided by anything but themselves. Do you like prime numbers?”

  “Love them.” She answered playfully, knowing what his reaction would be.

  He made his BUZZER sound.

  “Will you take cab ride number twenty-nine because it’s a prime number?”

  “No, I will because you asked.” He smiled at her briefly.

  The man in the vest pointed them toward the cab at the front of the line. Skylar moved toward it, opening the door for Eddie to get in, only to discover that he had moved to the cab behind it. “He wants us to ride in this one, Eddie.”

  “I don’t want to ride in that one.” He pointed to the cab behind it in line. “I want to ride in this one.”

  “Do you mind telling me why?”

  “No, I don’t mind.”

  Skylar waited for an explanation as the man in the vest told her they needed to get a move on or lose their turn. It took her another moment to realize she needed to ask Eddie, “Why?”

  He pointed to the license plate of the first cab. “All the numbers are even.”

  “What’s wrong with even numbers?”

  “Other than the number two, even numbers cannot be primes. Twenty-nine is a prime number. It is odd.”

  Two of the cabbies farther back in line started to HONK impatiently. Eddie covered his ears in pain. “Tell them to stop honking their horns. It hurts my ears.”

  Skylar pleaded, “They will stop honking if you get in the cab. Eddie, please.” To her surprise, he climbed in the door she was holding open for him. Skylar joined him in the back of the cab, which smelled like stale, cheap beer.

  Eddie cringed. “This cab smells like that place for guys with no place better to go, except there are no peanut shells on the floor.”

  The driver was apologetic, saying that somebody had spilled beer on the floor earlier that night, and he hadn’t had time to clean it up.

  Skylar asked Eddie, “Would you like to go directly to your old house, or would you rather get something to eat first?”

  Eddie answered without hesitation. “I would like to go directly to my old house. I have only been hungry for a few hours, but I have been waiting to hear my mother’s voice my whole life.”

  Skylar gave the driver the address, and he headed for it. She kept a close eye on Eddie, who wouldn’t stop fidgeting. “I don’t want you to get your hopes up too much.”

  “How will I know if my hopes are up too much?”

  “You need to consider all the possibilities.”

  “What are all the possibilities?”

  “Well, for example, one possibility is that your father no longer lives there.”

  Eddie nodded. “I understand that my father may no longer live there. But the echoes of when he and my mother did live there will still be there.”

  “If someone else now lives there, they may not be comfortable allowing us inside, particularly at one in the morning.”

  “Why wouldn’t they be comfortable?”

  “Would you be comfortable letting a perfect stranger snoop around your room at Harmony House?”

  “We are not going to snoop around my old house, Skylar.”

  “I know that. But whoever may live there now might not. And we can’t explain exactly what we’re going to do there, either, so as far as any new resident might be concerned, we’ll be snooping around.”

  “Why can’t we explain exactly what we are doing there?”

  “This is another thing you’re just going to have to trust me on.” She smiled ever so slightly.

  Eddie briefly thought about the growing list of things Skylar had asked him to trust her on. “Yes, I understand that if someone else now lives there, they may not be comfortable allowing us inside.”

  Skylar nodded reassuringly. “But don’t worry. If that’s the case, I’m sure I can find a way to convince them.”

  Eddie smiled and nodded, because he knew the statement was true. “I’m sure you can convince them, too. Look how many things you have convinced me to do that no one has ever been able to convince me of before.”

  She nodded. “That’s because you trust me.”

  “How do you know I trust you?”

  “Through your actions.”

  “My actions communicate that I trust you?”

  She nodded. “Actions speak louder than words.”

  Eddie stared out the window. “No they don’t.”

  “It’s a figure of speech.”

  “I don’t like figures of speech.”

  “This one is actually a good one,” Skylar assured him. “If someone tells you they care about you, they might mean it, but they also might not. But if someone shows you through their actions, then you know they mean it.”

  Eddie noticed the cabdriver was nodding in agreement, so he nodded, as well. “I will continue showing you through my actions that I trust you.”

  She looked him in the eyes. “I’m glad, Eddie. That makes me feel good.”

  He looked away. “Why does it make you feel good?”

  “Because I want you to trust me.”

  “Do you trust me?” he asked with all sincerity.

  “Eddie, I trust you one hundred percent.”

  “That makes me feel good, too.” He said it with the exact same intonation she had used.

  For the first time since she’d known Eddie Parks, Skylar couldn’t be sure of whether he was merely regurgitating what he had just heard or actually meant it. So she asked, “Why does it make you feel good?”

  “Because I want you to trust me.” The slightest hint of a smile crept across his face.

  The cab headed north on Broad Street, passing the main campus of Temple University before heading west on Susquehanna Avenue. The driver pulled to the curb in the 300 block and announced that they had reached their destination. The meter read: $17.30. Skylar paid him with a twenty, and got out of the cab, along with Eddie.

  He stared at the door to 317, but did not move toward it. “Eddie, what’s wrong?”

  He just stood there, pointing toward the home’s entrance. “That’s the wrong door.”

  “Are you sure it’s the right address?”

  “It’s the right address: 317 West Susquehanna Avenue, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 19122. But it is definitely not the right door.”

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  “The door is the wrong shape and wrong color. It should be brown and splotchy, not black, and it should be curved on top.”

  “Maybe it was just painted.”

  “No, it was not just painted. Nothing is the same. The whole building is wrong. It’s not the same at all.”

  Skylar only now noticed how new the redbrick structure looked. In fact, the entire block looked new. Like it had all been recently rebuilt and gentrified, much like developers were intending to do with Butler McHenry’s mother’s neighborhood. Dread filled her voice. “Eddie, do you remember if the building used to be made out of brick?”

  “It was not made out of brick. It was made out of wood. Yellow-painted wood. Some of it had termites, and those parts were more gray than yellow.”

  Skylar moved to him carefully. “Eddie, do you know that when they build new buildings, they often tear down old ones first?”

  “Yes, I do know.”

  She waited for him to connect the dots. He didn’t. “I think that’s why the building looks different now.”

  Eddie looked like he’d had the wind knocked out of him. “You think they tore down my house?” She nodded. Eddie was devastated. “If they tore down my house, the echoes will be too dispersed. If the ec
hoes are too dispersed, I won’t be able to reconstruct enough of the original sound waves to hear my mother’s voice!” SLAP! SLAP! SLAP!

  Skylar quickly grabbed his hands and held them tight as he flailed against her. “You will hear her, Eddie. I don’t know how, but I promise you will hear your mother sing.”

  His face turned red as he fought against her with all his might. It took considerably longer than usual for him to calm down. Skylar did not release him until she was certain all the fight had left him.

  And that was when all hell broke loose.

  CHAPTER 92

  317 West Susquehanna Avenue, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, May 28, 1:01 a.m.

  Eddie tensed suddenly. His entire body went rigid. Skylar had no idea why until she saw the six heavily armed federal agents moving swiftly toward him. Weapons drawn. Safeties off. Eddie started screaming hysterically. The Philadelphia-based Homeland Security agents had been waiting for them in the shadows. They were now less than twenty feet away. Eddie and Skylar were completely surrounded. How could I not have seen them? Skylar thought.

  “FREEZE!” barked the lead agent. “FEDERAL AGENTS!”

  Skylar pulled Eddie in tight, clutching him with every bit of strength she had as his body started to convulse.

  The lead agent barked, “PUT YOUR HANDS IN THE AIR!”

  Skylar kept a firm grasp on Eddie, and screamed, “If I let go of him, he’ll harm himself!”