by W B Dineen
My mom’s eyes plead with me for understanding. “You remember how I’d go off for a week every year over your dad’s and my anniversary?”
I do remember. She always said it was her special time to reflect on her life and memories. I always thought of it as her week to revel in self-pity.
“She spent that week with me. I’d get a message to her where to meet me, along with money to buy tickets.” He squeezes her hand. “She came every year.”
I look at my mother in complete amazement. In one sense she’s been cheating on both of her husbands, even though she and Theo were legally divorced when I was a kid. But in another, she gave up her life to do what she thought was best for Jenny and me. Even though that meant marrying a man she couldn’t fully commit too. While I don’t condone her marrying Chuck, I realize her motives weren’t selfish. She did it for us. Apparently, she has more strength in her little finger than I have in my entire body. “What about Chuck?” I ask.
Theo holds my mom close. “Chuck is your mother’s husband. He’s been Jennifer’s dad.”
“But mom can’t go home now, can she?”
My dad shakes his head. “Not until this is over.”
“What will Chuck and Jen think?”
Tears begin to spill from my mom’s eyes. “They’ll think I’ve gone missing. It’s the safest thing for them.”
“Oh my God, Mom, they’re going to worry about you so much!” The emotional impact of all this hits me like a bomb going off.
My mom takes my hand and leads the way to my bedroom. She sits on the bed and indicates I should sit next to her. “Honey, I’m not proud of the decisions I made. I can’t condone what I did to Chuck. But I promise you, aside from spending time with Theo, I’ve always tried to be a good wife to him. I’ve tried to love him and make a nice life for him.”
I can’t imagine the guilt she’s felt over the years, and I want to say something to comfort her, but I come up blank. The whole situation is so overwhelmingly sad.
She reaches over and puts her arm around me and I lie with my head on her shoulder. I close my eyes and realize that life is ultimately a terminal condition. None of us gets out alive, and we sure as hell don’t get out unscathed. I’ll tell you one thing though, I’m going to do everything I can to help figure out who’s after us and make them pay for all the trouble they’ve caused my family. I’m not going down without a fight.
CHAPTER 31
I must have dozed off because when I open my eyes, Jake is the only other person in the room. He’s sitting on a chair facing the bed. There are books on Pasadena architecture sitting on the side table next to him, along with a cup of coffee he must have been working on.
I stare at him for a long moment, trying to figure out how he got involved with my dad, when he realizes I’m awake. He smiles at me, but I’m not in the mood to return it. “Where do you fit into all of this?”
He waits a beat before answering, “You know who my dad was.” When I nod my head, he continues, “My dad and Nikolay met during graduate school. Not only did they remain friends, but Niko would regularly send my father equations he was working on.” He clarifies, “My dad’s primary focus was math, and Niko’s was physics. They were a good team.”
I roll my hands like I’m playing patty cake, to get him to speed things along. He does. “I inherited my dad’s interest in math and eventually went to Berkeley myself. I finished both my undergraduate and graduate degrees there before becoming an analyst for the CIA. I worked for the government for several years, but when my dad got sick, I moved home and started teaching at OSU, in Corvallis.”
“Okay, but how do you fit in with Theo?”
“Theo always kept in touch with my father. One day, Dad got a letter saying Theo wanted to come home.” Taking a deep breath, he explains, “My dad lived in Albany his whole life and knew it like the back of his hand. Theo asked him to find an out-of-the-way property to use as a safe house.”
“Is your dad still alive?” I didn’t meet him at the funeral, but maybe he was in a nursing home or something.
Jake shakes his head. “No. He died from pancreatic cancer nine years ago. But he got to enjoy having Theo home for a year before he passed. That’s when I got to know him.”
I ask, “Do you still teach at OSU?”
“Kind of. I’ve been on sabbatical for the last couple of months. I was planning to go back in the fall, but who knows what’s going to happen now.”
“Have you met my mom before?” I ask.
“Several times. She’s come to Albany for the last nine years to spend time with your dad.”
I nod, thinking that’s where all the things from my childhood came from. She must have decorated for him. How sad that Theo has been sentenced to living in the past with only his memories for comfort, while my mom, Jen, and I moved on. I think of the woman from the cemetery. “Did my dad ever date anyone? Was there someone special in his life?”
Jake says, “If there had been, I would have told you to take your questions to him, but the truth is Theo has remained faithful to your mom since I’ve known him.”
This is turning into a gut-wrenching tragedy. I’m determined to help my parents figure out who’s responsible for ripping our family apart. And as a person who believes in karma, I’d like to be the one to make sure they get everything coming to them.
“Do you have any idea what’s going to happen now?”
His hand taps out a nervous rhythm on the arm of the chair. “Theo and I have talked about how to proceed in similar scenarios, but you and your mom were never part of the equation. Truthfully, I don’t quite know where we go from here.”
“Why does it matter that Mom and I are involved?”
He looks deeply into my eyes like he’s struggling with how much to disclose. “Because there are things we hoped you’d never need to learn.”
I can’t imagine what other clandestine secrets they’re holding back. I mean, a top-secret weapon created, stolen, and used on the WTC seems to be as unbelievable a story as I can imagine. Before I can say as much, my parents walk in the room. My mom scoots me over and sits beside me. “Your dad and I have been talking.”
Theo interjects, “We need some help. While we’re loath to bring an innocent party into this, we do need someone.”
Mom continues, “We need a person our enemy doesn’t readily associate with any of us, so Jen and Chuck are out. It has to be someone they’re not already tailing or eavesdropping on. Theo looks at me intently. “Do you know anyone?”
“Seriously, Dad, the only people I usually associate with are through work.” Then I ask, “What do you need this person to do?”
He motions to Jake. “Remember the letters I left for you in my coffin?” Jake and I nod at the same time. Jake even reaches into his jacket and pulls them out.
Startled, I ask, “Why in the world do you have them on you?”
“Your dad taught me a long time ago not to leave anything behind that I wasn’t prepared to lose. I figured he went to extraordinary efforts to make sure we got these, so I wasn’t going to risk leaving them in the apartment on the off chance we didn’t get to go back.”
Dad explains, “We need someone to deliver them.” I thought we could do it, but after Einstein’s Cave, there’s no way we’d be safe.
I suggest, “How about a delivery service? Or we could mail them.”
Theo shakes his head. “The people receiving them are probably under surveillance. Any deliveries made via mail or delivery service would cause interest.”
“How is this person supposed to get the letters to the recipients without being spotted?” Jake asks.
Dad responds, “They’ll need to be able to fit into their surroundings, so they don’t draw any attention to themselves.”
My mind is blank. I employ a bunch of people who are plain enough looking not to draw attention to themselves. But there’s only one person I’m confident wouldn’t blow her cover, my assistant, Brittany. The fact that’
s she’s a forty-year-old single mother of two is what’s holding me back. I don’t have the right to put her in danger.
“What happens if we can’t find someone?” I ask.
“Then we wind up taking risks that could quite possibly get one of us killed.”
I release my pent-up breath. “Hand me the phone.” I proceed to punch in a number I know by heart.
The call is answered immediately by a confident, “Hello.”
“Brit, it’s Kate. I need your help.”
CHAPTER 32
I arrange to meet my assistant at the Tommy Bahama store at the Paseo shopping mall at 10:00 the next morning. I tell her how to dress and to make sure she isn’t followed. I explain she isn’t to drive her own car and that I’ll reimburse her for all expenses. She agrees without hesitation.
I’m not happy about dragging my employee into this mess, but I figure I’ll give her the final choice without offering too many of the details. As far as she’ll know, I’m on the run, but she won’t know why, just that I need her as a messenger girl.
After cautioning her not to talk to anyone, I hang up. “Dad,” I confess, “I don’t feel very good about this.”
He puts his arm around me. “I know exactly what you mean. I’ve put everyone I’ve ever known in danger. That list includes my parents, my wife, and my children.”
I mutter, “All this for some weapon that can destroy the world. What’s the point?”
“It always boils down to money and power," Theo answers.
“Why the World Trade Center? Why that day?”
“All we have is speculation until we know who used our weapon on those buildings, but here’s what we do know: On September eighth of 2001, the secretary of defense announced that two point three trillion dollars in Pentagon funds had gone missing and were unaccounted for. This was huge news. Never before had our government confessed such an enormous loss of funds.”
“Why did they admit to it at all?” I wonder.
“Because there had been an official audit. After that, there was no way the information was going to be kept secret,” he replies. “They had to fess up, eventually. But if they did so right before a tragedy like 9/11, chances were the American people would be so preoccupied with finding and punishing the culprits, they’d stop asking what happened to the almost eight thousand dollars per US citizen that was missing.”
I gasp audibly. “If that’s so, then you’re saying our government was behind 9/11! I don’t believe that.” I can’t believe that. To do so would undermine every belief I’ve ever possessed about what it means to be an American citizen.
Smiling sadly, he continues, “Katie, first and foremost, governments are businesses. While you like to think they care about every person in our country, that’s not so. They care for us only in regard to how we fit into their agenda. Their main concern with us is keeping us out of their way while they pursue their own ends.”
I’m astonished to hear my dad talk like this. I don’t believe for a second our government is as cold as he’s making them out to be. “Why the World Trade Center?”
“Again, the answer is twofold.” He explains, “The target had to be big enough to divert the world’s attention. There had to be a substantial loss of human life to do this. By having the event occur in our nation’s financial capital, it would only heighten the level of fear and panic. Then there’s the missing gold and silver.”
“What missing gold and silver?” I demand.
“Billions of dollars in gold and silver bricks were stored under the WTC complex. After 9/11 less than 230 million dollars were recovered. Two partially-filled trucks were found under the debris, so it seems for some time before 9/11, someone had been moving the stash out. By hitting the World Trade Center, the perpetrators could have been hoping to cover up the crime by claiming the gold and silver as part of the wreckage.”
My dad pulls up a blog article on his laptop from some group called Silver Sleuths. “National news organizations would have never reported this because their bosses are linked to the powers that be who didn’t want this information exposed.”
I skim the article that basically states nearly 167 billion dollars of metal was unaccounted for. “So, if the buildings were taken down to cover the crime of stealing these precious metals, then who would be the perpetrators?” I ask.
Theo explains, “It would still have to be a government. Perhaps not ours or maybe in conjunction with ours. To get all those planes hijacked at the same time, there had to be a breakdown of national security that could have only happened at the highest level. How else do you explain so many known terrorists successfully boarding multiple airplanes at the same time, hijacking those planes, and hitting their targets? Someone very high up had to be involved for that kind of breach to occur all at once.”
I shake my head. “In both scenarios, you’re pointing the finger at our government.”
“I’m pointing my finger at a faction within our government.” He elaborates, “Most of the country thinks of the government as one entity, but that isn’t so. The president on down are puppets for the real rulers. The president is a poster boy for the country. He has no power to speak of, and the senate and congress have even less. The lesser branches simply exist so the American people can feel like they have some say in how their world operates.”
“That’s bullshit!” I yell. “You sound like some wackadoo conspiracy theorist when you talk like that.”
“Katie, let’s look at my life for a moment. When I was seventeen, my parents were killed because I refused to study at a foreign university. If you think for one minute that country’s government wasn’t behind the request for my transfer, you’re fooling yourself. The only reason I was able to finish my degrees and research in my own country is either out of sheer luck or with my government’s knowledge and protection. My work was funded by a black-ops faction of our political machine and that research was to build an annihilation weapon. Even if I hadn’t run, my lifespan would have only been as long as I was considered useful. You can’t think for one minute I would have been allowed to live with the kind of knowledge I have, if I wasn’t owned hook, line, and sinker by our government.”
He adds, “This may sound like a bunch of unrelated coincidences to you, but trust me, most coincidence isn’t as random as people believe.”
I demand, “Why did you ever get involved in this kind of research if you knew how the findings were going to be used?”
“I did it because I’m a scientist. I want to know how the world works from the most micro to the most macro levels. I want to find solutions and solve problems. And truthfully, I never really thought about the government using my findings to initiate war. I convinced myself it was all in the name of defense, so I could keep working on my research with a clear conscience.”
I stare at Theo and realize he really believes what he’s saying, even though I can’t bear to be that cynical. He adds, “Every person who died on 9/11 and every person they left behind is a weight on my soul.” Then he confesses, “A big part of being a scientist for me has always been my desire to understand God. I don’t know if I believe in an omnipotent being like is taught in most religions, but I do know I believe in a higher power, and if that power can judge me for my sins, I’ll spend the rest of eternity paying the price for my insatiable desire to learn and create. My quest has changed the face of our world in the most hellish way possible.”
CHAPTER 33
My mom goes out after dinner to stock up on supplies. When I ask after her safety, Theo assures me, “Your mother knows the area better than the rest of us, she knows how to get in and out of places quickly, and most importantly, she knows how to avoid people who might see past her disguise.” He declares, “I have the utmost confidence in her.”
Mom and Dad bought a beat-up old Honda Civic, with cash, when my dad arrived in Pasadena. The title and tags haven’t been transferred, so they’re officially in the name of the student they purchased it from. Thi
s adds another layer of protection.
Mom heads to stores on the east side of town to outfit us. She buys a wild array of clothing items and enough food to last a month. I feel a huge sense of relief when she gets back, even though she’s been gone less than two hours.
Before bed, Theo suggests we sleep two to a room, for safety. To me, he asks, “Would you mind if I stayed with your mom?”
Poor Theo. While we’re all running for our lives from some unknown evil, part of him must feel like it’s Christmas getting this extra time with the love of his life. I would prefer not to be bunking with Jake, particularly after of the lip-lock we shared in Einstein’s Cave, but darn if I have the heart to deny my parents their time together.
I reply, “Sounds good, Dad.” Then I give them both a hug and tell them I’ll see them in the morning.
Jake wishes them a good night, and then follows me into the room we’re sharing. “Don’t get any ideas,” I warn him.
Looking shocked and feigning innocence, he responds, “As if I would!”
I can’t help it, I begin to laugh. This whole situation defies reason. I’m incredibly attracted to this man, and let’s face it, we might die tomorrow. I should devour him like he’s hot and gooey pepperoni pizza fresh out of a wood-burning oven, and I’ve just been rescued from a month adrift at sea, but I can’t. I need to think about my family, and what’s going to happen to us. I’m in no frame of mind for romantic entanglements.
To maintain modesty, I crawl into bed with my clothes on. Jake follows suit. He lifts his arm up and declares, “At least let me hold you.” I roll right into his embrace and rest my head on his chest. He smells earthy and vaguely spicy. His arms are warm and strong, and at this moment I’m safe. I savor the feeling for as long as it lasts. I sleep like the dead.
When I wake up, I’m all alone. My brain suddenly kicks into overdrive and I worry about the danger I might be placing Brittany in. For a minute, I allow myself to think about my dad and how everyone he’s ever known has been in jeopardy just for having a connection to him.