Encrypted: An Action-Packed Techno-Thriller Page 14

  “Check your lymph nodes,” Amanda instructed. Now that she looked at Jennifer, really looked at her, she could see the flushing to her arms, the rosy cheeks that did not indicate health.

  Devlin barely touched his neck. “No. No. They can’t be swollen.”

  “But they are.”

  Henderson stepped back. “They have the plague?”

  Amanda didn’t bother answering. What else could they have, the swine flu?

  “We’ve been under lockdown since the first case landed in New York,” Henderson rushed on, seeming to want to reassure himself this wasn’t happening. “There’s no way we could have been infected by…”

  Didn’t he get it? Didn’t they all get it? This was no accident. No natural spread of the disease.

  “We’ve been purposefully infected,” Amanda said, finding it silly to have to state something so obvious.

  “I…I haven’t been feeling well, either,” Henderson admitted. Neither had she. Everyone had chalked it up to stress and fatigue, when really, someone had been planting the bacteria right in the heart of the laboratory.

  “Dear God,” Henderson said, his tone wounded. “They truly are brilliant, aren’t they?”

  Amanda nodded. Who better to infect than the people charged with stopping the plague?

  The plan was so simple, elegant, and ironic that Amanda would have laughed, except for the fact that they would all be dead within twenty-four hours.

  CHAPTER 12

  Ciudad Juarez Hotel

  11:12 p.m., MST

  Ronnie wiped her eyes. Her hand came back black. It turned out that five coats of mascara and tears didn’t play together so well.

  Ugh. And with the hot, steaming water creating a veritable fog around her, the stench of the three cans of hair spray Quirk used nearly gagged her. Not that her stomach felt all that great before. Each time she felt any morsel of numbness setting in, that last image of Zach flashed in her mind. The sound of his voice during their last conversation, worried, yet hopeful, caressed her ears.

  Fantasy was so much better than reality.

  After so long in the bath, her fingers had long ago raisined. Perhaps it was time to wash her hair and get to bed. She leaned over the porcelain tub and fished around in her “go” bag, but couldn’t find any shampoo. Really? Quirk put that much product in her hair and didn’t give her some way to get it back out again?

  Feeling leaden, her legs complained as she rose from the bath. Grabbing a robe off the hook, she pulled it on before stepping out into the bedroom.

  “Quirk, did you pack shampoo, or what?”

  Her assistant turned around, hand shoved behind his back. Ronnie strode over as Quirk held her iPod above his head.

  “Is that him?” she asked, already knowing the answer. Her legs no longer felt heavy.

  “Who else?” he said, squirming away. “Someone has to be strong for you.”

  “Is that the 9-1-1 override code?”

  Her assistant still wouldn’t hand it over. “If he’s in physical danger, I will bed a woman!”

  He tried to stand on his tippy-toes, but Ronnie was a good two inches taller than he. She snatched the iPod from Quirk’s grasp and put the earbuds in.

  “Zach?” Ronnie asked, half afraid of the response she was going to get. Was he pissed? Distant? Dismissive?

  “Ronnie, I—” Zach said before the line went quiet.

  “I, what?” she nearly shouted.

  A rustling came on the line, and then another voice, heavily Latin influenced, spoke. “We have him, so you’d best listen carefully.”

  Ronnie’s back straightened to a rod.

  Quirk cocked his head. “What, is he begging you to meet him again?”

  She shook her head and mouthed, “He’s been kidnapped.”

  Her assistant snorted. “Yeah, right.” Then he went back to packing.

  As the man on the line took a deep breath, Ronnie put a bud in Quirk’s ear.

  “Unless you agree to surrender yourself at the time and place of our choosing, and then do as you are instructed, Special Agent Zachary Hunt will die.”

  “Damn it!” Quirk muttered.

  No freaking kidding. This was one instance where she did not want to tell Quirk that she told him so. But here they were. Ronnie shoved her assistant toward his laptop. Quirk popped the earbud out as he sat on the bed.

  “All right, all right. I’ll put a trace on it,” Quirk conceded.

  Ronnie turned her attention back to Zach’s captor. “I need to speak with Zach.”

  “You have little room to demand anything.”

  “Look,” she said. “Clearly, you need something from me, and I am not giving it to you until I am sure that Zach is safe.”

  “Um, perhaps we shouldn’t antagonize the kidnappers quite so much,” Quirk piped up.

  She mouthed, “Find him,” as Zach’s captor went into some long, rambling speech about how he was in control.

  Ronnie cut him off. “Put him on the line, or this is going to be an extremely one-sided conversation.”

  No response. Ronnie held her breath.

  Had she pushed too hard?

  * * *

  Zach watched the veins in Jorge’s forehead bulge. Guess the operative wasn’t used to having anyone talk to him like that, let alone a woman. Grant shrugged, though.

  “Let the lovebirds talk.”

  Brusquely, Jorge stuffed the buds in Zach’s ears.

  “Hey, sexy,” he said, trying not to sound too tortured.

  “Hey there, yourself,” Ronnie answered, but he could hear the strain in her voice. They both knew that they were being monitored. She hadn’t stayed out of jail for so long by being naïve. Naïve like they could carry on an illicit relationship behind the backs of the FBI and the CIA.

  “Have they injured you?” she asked.

  “Depends on your definition…”

  Jorge leaned in close. “Tell her what we want.”

  “How many are holding you?” she asked. Unfortunately, her question was piped in to the whole room.

  Zach answered as quickly as he could. “Five that I know of, but—”

  The buds were ripped out. Jorge put them back into his own ears.

  “That will be enough,” the CIA agent grunted. “Now you will hear our terms.”

  No matter how politically correct Grant tried to appear, Zach knew that no matter what Jorge promised Ronnie, there was no way that he was leaving this room alive.

  * * *

  Ronnie only half-listened as the man went on and on about the conditions of this supposed meeting. “You will come alone and unarmed, blah, blah, blah.”

  Or at least, that was all she heard as Quirk’s eyebrows nearly met in the middle of his forehead as he pounded away at the keyboard. Finally, his face tilted up with a smile. Quirk gave a thumbs-up and turned the screen toward her.

  A nice, green circle showed where the CIA was keeping Zach.

  “Hey,” she said, interrupting the operative’s diatribe. “Let’s not do that and say that we did.”

  She could hear the man fume on the other side before he spoke. “You do not seem to understand—”

  “Let me talk to Zach, or—”

  * * *

  “Or what?” Jorge chuckled. “You will trigger the self-destruct mechanism?”

  The operative shoved the iPod toward Zach, who noticed that Grant, ever so brave, backed away to the farthest corner of the room.

  “I would warn against it, since your precious agent is the one holding the device.”

  Well, not so much holding it, as not being able to get outside of the iPod’s blast range. Would Ronnie really detonate it? Would she save her skin and crispy-fry his?

  Ronnie’s voice echoed in the small room. “Really? On no, whatever will I do?”

  Zach knew she was being sarcastic, but Jorge didn’t seem to quite understand the difference. Once Ronnie’s tone got serious, maybe he would. “Don’t screw with me, spook,” she sai
d. “I know that you are company trained. So listen to the stress levels in my voice. I am not bluffing. I am not exaggerating. Let. Me. Talk. To. Zach.”

  Seriously, were they not listening to her? The woman meant it, yet Jorge and Grant grinned stupidly at one another.

  “Or?” Jorge asked.

  Ronnie’s voice filled the room. “You, my dear sir, die.”

  “You are a hacker who lives off the grid. So what exactly do you propose to do to me?” Jorge challenged.

  Zach was pretty darn sure that Jorge did not want to know.

  “Don’t say that I didn’t warn you.”

  * * *

  Ronnie bit her lip. She was serious. But was she committed to this course of action?

  “You try anything, and I will kill him without hesitation,” the operative stated. “Without regret. Without remorse.”

  She knew that. She’d heard it in his voice. Even if she did exactly what he wanted, Ronnie knew that Zach would never survive his encounter with the CIA. He could raise way too many questions back home.

  And unfortunately, they had given the CIA the perfect cover for Zach’s death. He had, after all, come across the border to fraternize with one of the FBI’s Most Wanted suspects. Zach getting “accidently” killed as he made his escape would be an easy sell.

  Ronnie glanced at Quirk. His lips were set in a firm line. As master-level hackers, they always knew that this day might come. Of course, they assumed that it would be one of them on the other side of this call. They were prepared. She just wasn’t sure if she could go through with their contingency plan.

  “Just give Zach the earpieces,” she said, hoping against hope that the agent would finally become reasonable.

  “Over my dead body,” Jorge growled.

  Gulping, she answered, “Okay.”

  Ronnie nodded at Quirk. He pulled out a small wireless detonator. He rested his hand on hers as she hit the button.

  * * *

  Zach watched as the red lights on the iPod flashed faster and faster. He’d always thought the lights were just part of Ronnie’s fashion sense, but now he realized that they also served as a countdown.

  As they blinked at an accelerated rate, Zach hoped Ronnie would know that he forgave her. He wasn’t getting out of here, anyway. She might as well protect herself by destroying the evidence.

  Jorge smiled fiercely as the iPod’s screen bloomed red and the word “Boom,” flared white. Then the tiniest pop sounded.

  Zach stared at the iPod, but it just sat there with “Every Rose Has Its Thorn” ready to play.

  Jorge, however, was not so lucky. His eyes dilated, and his smile faded as blood dripped out of his ears.

  He tilted back, then forward, before crashing to the floor—dead.

  “Like I said,” Ronnie said over the speakers, “release him.”

  Zach leveled his gaze at Grant. “You heard the woman.”

  CHAPTER 13

  El Paso FBI Field Office

  9:15 a.m. MST

  “Francois,” a voice called.

  But who would do so, especially flavored with a perfect French accent?

  He opened his eyes to find a black-frocked deacon standing before his cell. Francois’ blood ran cold, tingling the marks upon his arms.

  “Francois. It is time to come home,” Deacon Havar stated as he extended a hand into the cell. His sleeve fell back, revealing marks very similar to Francois’ own. Some blanched white with scarring. Others oozing fresh. Just as Francois’. Only the deacon’s intent was far different than his.

  Francois’ were carved for salvation. The deacon’s for damnation.

  “Hey!” an agent called from behind. “Stay back from the cell. Don’t let that guy fool you. He goes from zero to sixty.”

  The deacon inclined his head and slipped his arm out of the cell, his sleeve once again covering their shared secret. “I would like to speak with your superior.”

  It wasn’t until Havar moved away from the bars that Francois realized that the deacon had not come alone. A cluster of four young priests held onto his hem as if they were chicks following their mother. Only one stood apart from the rest.

  Lino.

  His eyes pierced the air, skewering Francois where he stood.

  Francois’ scars flared again.

  It was as if his own flesh knew that he did not have long to live.

  * * *

  Amanda sat beside Jennifer in the infirmary. Even though her assistant was hooked up to two different IV lines, she still typed frantically on her laptop. Not that Amanda was much better. By monitoring temperature spikes, she was about four hours behind Jennifer and Devlin. Those two must have been exposed to an early source of contagion, where Amanda and Henderson were hit in the secondary wave.

  The director also typed away at the far side of the beds. Amanda balanced her laptop on her knees, working while the IV antibiotics dripped into her veins.

  Most other patients crammed into the tiny medical station were more sensible. They rested, or watched the only television. Of course, the sole programming consisted of more and more reports of the Black Death’s march across America and the world. The only continent still untouched was Antarctica. Since the very first plague victim, all incoming and outgoing air traffic was shut down—much as Amanda suggested in the plague’s dawning hours.

  How many lives could have been saved if that Venice flight had been turned around in midair? Amanda felt that she should have done more to convince Henderson. She should have insisted on being on the call with the president.

  Back then, though, she was the girl who cried wolf. But now that the wolf was literally at their door? Now, she was the girl who everyone counted on. What if she couldn’t find the vaccinated populations? What if she couldn’t find a vaccine repository?

  Jennifer tapped Amanda’s computer. The message was clear. Work.

  Unfortunately, Jennifer was right. No point in belaboring the past—it was gone. They had to find Hidden Hand safe houses. Before she could get back to combing through hospital intake records, Devlin pointed to the television.

  “Turn it up!”

  Craning her neck to see what all the fuss was about, Amanda found Anderson Cooper on-screen. So, it was going to be a major announcement. The reporter looked haggard. The usual spark in his eye was dulled. Even makeup couldn’t cover the dark circles. She’d seen it before. In herself. Anderson wasn’t just whipped—he was stricken.

  “Authorities are urging everyone to stay indoors, and I couldn’t agree more. People, this isn’t the time to panic. This is the time to use common sense. Only venture outside if you must get a loved one to a hospital, and even then, wear a mask, or—”

  Anderson stopped as a piece of paper was shoved at him from off camera. His eyes scanned the page once, and then again. He looked up, not toward the camera, but to someone to the left of it.

  “Is this for real?” Anderson asked. The muffled voice answered her agreement. The reporter still asked, “All of it?”

  Again, the muffled voice said, “Yes.”

  Anderson shuffled in his chair, and then his eyes found the camera. “I am so sorry, New York…”

  So sorry about what? Now everyone in the infirmary was glued to the television.

  “The governor has…The governor has declared that New York City hospitals are now closed. They are overrun with plague victims, and can accept no more.”

  Amanda looked at Jennifer. Neither was necessarily surprised. It was simply Step Eighteen in the biowarfare manual. At some point, the health care system would become saturated and completely ineffective, which only accelerated the death count. And not just from plague victims. Now, heart attack victims who could have been saved would die. Even cases of appendicitis or a child’s strep throat could result in death. The body count would balloon from here.

  The only surprising thing was how horribly quickly all this was happening. This should be day three or four into the disease cycle. Not day one.

&
nbsp; Anderson shifted in his seat. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t get treatment. Officials are rolling out a program where antibiotics can be delivered to you. Medics will bring the antibiotics to your door, knock, and you must wait at least a minute before opening your door to accept them.”

  Amanda didn’t see why he was so nervous until he cleared his throat, and then had to cough. It was like watching America’s slow decline into the plague.

  Finally catching his breath, Anderson continued. “They will identify homes in need of antibiotics…well…they are requesting that you put a red ‘X’ on your door. Again, I am so very sorry, New York.”

  Amanda glanced at Jennifer. The “X” was not part of the plan. The plan was a coordinated online request form along with door placards to identify plague victims. However, Amanda could see why the New York authorities had foregone those niceties. Again, they weren’t supposed to get to this point until day three or four. That would have given officials two to three days to educate the public. Get the placards out to the neighborhoods before they were needed.

  Now, though? A bright red “X” probably was more representative of the dire circumstances.

  Jennifer raised her eyebrows. Now, what are we going to do? was the clear question.

  Which was an extremely good question. Amanda thought that she would have hours and hours more of data streaming in from the hospitals, and then the online data from antibiotic requests. How in the hell was she going to track red “Xs” on the doors?

  “I am going to need more bandwidth,” Amanda said as Jennifer’s eyes slid over to Devlin. “And yes, access to the CIA’s database. Can you do it?”

  Jennifer gave a sly smile as she typed like a madwoman.

  Amanda had no idea how her assistant was going to carry out the task ahead. However, if it got her the data that she needed, she didn’t care. Not with the plague on the move.