CHAD PICKED UP the telephone on his desk. He expected his buddy, Rafe Kalama to be calling him back with the info on Devon Summers’s DMV application. It wasn’t Rafe on the phone. Instead he heard Archer Danson’s terse voice.
“Yo, Langston call this number from a secure line.” Danson rattled off a number and hung up.
“I’ll be back in a minute,” Chad told Ane as he left.
Across the street at the Ala Wai Boat Harbor, he used the public phone booth to call Danson. Undoubtedly he was at a public telephone, too, so no one could trace their calls.
“We’ve got trouble,” Danson announced the second he picked the telephone. “Big trouble.”
“Okay. Shoot.”
“I had another operative testing the device.”
Chad wasn’t surprised. The “device” which had yet to have a name was too revolutionary to leave the testing to one person.
“Like you, he was no longer in the military, out-of-the-loop,” Danson continued. “Last night someone slit his throat and stole the device.”
“Jesus! Any idea how they found him?”
“There’s a leak at the DARPA. I’ve got an operative on it, but nothing much so far.” Obviously frustrated, Danson huffed. “Where’s your device?”
“At home.” He didn’t add that it was sitting on his night-stand where anyone could grab it, if they searched his house.
“Lock it up when you’re not testing it.”
“I have a safe,” Chad replied. “If they have the tracking device, why would they bother to steal another?”
“It’s like the drone.”
“Son of a bitch! Why didn’t you tell me?”
DARPA had developed the Predator drone in total secrecy. Only one set of plans for the unmanned aerial vehicle had existed. It was tested in total secrecy. When DARPA revealed it, the military was astonished. The Predator became a huge success, saving untold numbers of lives.
“Langston, you worked at DARPA. I assumed you would know this device is every bit as revolutionary as the drone.”
“I expected it to have flaws,” Chad admitted, “and to be years in the testing.”
“This is the final round of tests.”
“Are the plans safe?”
“Absolutely. Couldn’t be safer. But whoever took the tracker may want to disassemble one to see how it’s set up while leaving the other intact. If that’s the case, they’ll go after yours.”
“Makes sense. Any idea who ‘they’ are?”
“Terrorists probably, but I could be wrong. Could be a rogue military group.”
Chad took that to mean the CIA. Friction between the Central Intelligence Division and the Defense Department ran high.
“They could only know about me from the payroll records. Right?”
“Yes. Your military service file has been deleted from the deactivated database. The only record is in the payroll department. It shows you’re a private at Fort Hood.”
“I guess that would throw them off track. To be safe, forget paying me. I’ll do it free. Just say it’s my way of paying back the country.”
“Great. I’ll delete your name from the payroll and delete from the system the records of the payments we’ve already made,” Danson told him with a smile in his voice. “I want you to watch your back just the way you did in Black Ops.”
Chad resisted the urge to correct Danson. He’d performed a number of covert operations, but he’d been trained to call them Special Ops. Black Ops sounded like the CIA, when it was up to no good.
“There wasn’t any need to kill my operative in order to get the device. It was done for sport or something.”
“Uh-oh.” Chad wondered if he knew the guy. He was probably ex-military, too. Danson wouldn’t tell him, but if he watched the news, he might find out.
Chad hung up, cursing himself. Years in laid-back Hawaii had blunted his well-honed instincts. He couldn’t blame Danson for not warning him. He knew DARPA didn’t go to outside sources for testing often. He needed to hunker down into military mode again.
Think danger.
Think death.
If he didn’t, he could be the next guy with his throat slit.
By the time Chad returned to his office, Rafe had called. Chad could have hacked into the DMV database himself, but it was cleaner to have a policeman log in his badge number and get the information. Since the police routinely checked DMV records, there was little chance the inquiry would ever be noticed.
He dialed Rafe’s cell, and his friend answered immediately. “Can you talk?”
“Sure. I’m just filling out paperwork. Here’s what was on the driver’s license application Devon Summers filled out.”
Chad jotted down the info, then asked, “What’s the date on the application?”
He listened, thinking Devon had lied to them. She had been in Honolulu a full month longer than she’d told them. What had she been doing?
He thought about the way Devon had come out of nowhere to apply for a job, when she undoubtedly could have gotten a job at one of the resort hotels for more money. Why? Had she known his office was opposite Walt’s? Could she be after the second device?
If Devon Summers was after him, she had more talent than most. She had him believing she didn’t give a damn about him. He thought about what Keke had said. Sometimes playing hard-to-get worked wonders. Female operatives were often much more successful than men because they had a gift for deception.
He thought about Danson’s warning. Watch your back. One man had already been killed. That should justify what he was about to do.
It took him a few minutes on his computer to remember exactly how to access the major credit reporting agencies. It was illegal, of course, but it could be done. DARPA and other government agencies did it to check on terrorists and drug kingpins who usually paid for everything in cash, people who didn’t have credit histories like hardworking Americans.
“Hey, what do you know,” he muttered under his breath.
There was Devon Lynn Summers. Charge accounts at Marshall Fields and Bonwit Tellers. A car loan on a Beamer. An American Express Card. A Visa. A student loan that had been paid off several years ago.
Conscious of not breaking the law for any longer than possible, he exited the program and shut down his computer. She had an excellent credit history—back there—but she hadn’t done anything here. Why not?
THE FIRST DAY of the show was almost over, and Brock managed to smile at the group clustered around his Gull Wing, but his gut was churning like a snake pit. Three times as many people were crowded around the caper-green Gull Wing across the way from him. Horst was standing beside Jordan, preening as if he owned the one-of-a-kind car.
Shit! What if Jordan sold the Gull Wing to Horst? Brock wouldn’t allow that. He wanted that car as much as he’d wanted anything in his entire life.
His cell phone vibrated, and he pulled it off his belt. It was Operative 77, the up-and-coming agent he’d sent after the gadget DARPA had developed. He walked away from his Gull Wing toward an open space where he could talk without being overheard.
“I’ve got it.”
“Great. Did you…”
“Numero Uno, I took care of things like you told me to.”
Perfect! This was the kind of operative he liked. Someone who did exactly what he was told. Not a fuckup like the woman who blew it in Santa Fe. What’s more, the guy was smart enough not to say he’d slit someone’s throat while they were talking on cell phones.
“Got anything else for me?” 77 asked.
Brock pivoted and watched Jordan laugh at something Horst had said. “Not right now, but maybe later. Hand deliver the device to Obelisk on Monday.”
Brock strolled back to his car cheered by the news. With this new gadget in his possession, he could write his own ticket at Obelisk.
His phone vibrated again and he pulled it off his belt. Kilmer Cassidy, the CEO of Obelisk, was on the line. What did the prick want now?
“Anything on that Robbins woman?” Cassidy asked for the hundredth time since the bitch had disappeared.
“I’m working on it.”
“No progress at all?”
Brock detested the way Cassidy talked down to him as if he were some flunky. “We’ve eliminated several states. I’m working on the others.”
“How?”
“Checking new DMV records.”
“WITSEC gives every witness a new birth certificate and social security card. They must get a driver’s license on their own. Right?”
“Exactly. I’m relying on AgeComp to tell us if she’s altered her appearance,” Brock replied, referring to the age-progression software that had been developed to change the appearances of missing children as they grew older. Cassidy had heard all this before, but the greedy cocksucker had nothing better to do than harass Brock and check the offshore accounts.
“What if she’s in some big city where she doesn’t need a car?”
“That’s always a possibility, but a remote one.” He explained—yet again—how he’d figured Samantha Robbins was out west. “The only city where she wouldn’t need a car is San Francisco. WITSEC usually puts witnesses in less charming spots.”
“Santa Fe has plenty of charm.”
“True, but—”
“I say we tap her sister’s phone. I’ve said so all along. Do it.”
Cassidy hung up before Brock could reply. He cursed under his breath. Wire tapping the sister’s telephone probably wouldn’t help. Unless Samantha let something drop that would tell them where she was, they could spend eons listening and get nothing. Worse, they might be caught.
Every listening device—no matter how sophisticated—emitted a tiny electronic signal. He would bet his life WITSEC had their special software program monitoring the sister’s telephone. He needed to come up with a better plan. The key to finding someone was in their habits. You could change a lot about a person, but habits stayed constant.
BY THE TIME Devon finished the last chair and said goodbye to Keke and her sisters, it was almost eight o’clock. If Chad had returned home, he hadn’t come out to see them. She drove across town, thinking about him, her eyes on the rearview mirror to see if she were being followed.
Watching, all instincts alert, she checked the cars behind her, beside her, and even those in front of her. Experience had shown trouble could come from any direction, from out of nowhere. When you least expected it.
She had a cover story ready. Would Chad buy it? He was intelligent, and she wasn’t a very good actress. She was better now than before, Devon silently admitted. Being in WITSEC had transformed her into a person she no longer knew.
A person she didn’t like or trust.
The cell phone in her pocket vibrated. Her shoulders jerked back as if she’d received a shock. She had another phone in her purse, but since she’d been here, she’d received only a few calls—days apart. All of them had been from Warren. She fumbled in her pocket and pulled out the cell phone.
“Where are you?” Warren asked.
“I’m on South King Street on my way to get Zach. He’s still at the office.”
“Meet me at King Kamehameha’s statue.”
“Do I have time to pick up Zach?”
“No.”
Suddenly she heard the dial tone. Cold prickled her scalp and sweat dappled the back of her shoulders. Something was wrong.
She parked her rusted-out Toyota at the Federal Building near the Aliiolani Hale, the State Supreme Court building. The building’s stunning architecture had surprised Devon, when she’d first seen it. Instead of being built of coral, the way many of the original buildings were, this one was a Spanish-California design. She supposed it was a testament to the way the island had succumbed to foreign influences over the years.
In a square facing King Street stood King Kamehameha’s statue. The black and gold monument of the imposing warrior-chief who united the islands was remarkable for its feathered cloak and tall spear. During the day, tourists flocked to the area to have their picture taken. It was dusk now, and a few Japanese tourists lingered, garlands of cameras around their necks.
She didn’t immediately spot Warren, but she’d met him here often enough to know he would let her wander around for a few minutes before he casually joined her. She strolled through the area, alert for anyone she’d seen somewhere else. The people seemed to be a tour group from Japan. They scuttled across the street to visit the Iolani Palace, which in contrast to the Aliiolani Hale, was a Victoria monument complete with a Coronation Bandshell.
From her left, a shifting shadow caught her attention. Her ability to synthesize as much information as possible in seconds had become a survival skill. Warren, she realized, and her tense muscles relaxed.
“It’s getting too dark to look at the palace,” she whispered to him.
“S’okay,” he replied. “checkeId. It’s a Nippon-Paradise Tour that’s running late. No one in the group is a threat to you.”
Warren was thorough. She would give him that. He wasn’t as friendly as Derek, but he took his job seriously.
“WITSEC just alerted me,” he told her, his voice low even though there wasn’t anyone within earshot. “Someone accessed your DMV records.”
She drew in a deep hitching breath. When she’d been warned someone was trying to access her records in Santa Fe, it had been the harbinger of trouble. More than trouble. Romero’s throat had been slit, and the poor man had bled to death just for being her friend.
No matter what Curt Masterson had claimed, Devon believed Rutherford and Ames had obtained confidential information on her, either by paying off someone inside WITSEC or hiring a top-notch hacker.
“DMV records are fairly secure.”
“Define fairly,” she relied, bitterness burning in her tone. Once she would have believed him, but her experience in Santa Fe had proved how vulnerable she was.
“It takes a police ID number, usually a badge number to get the info. Cops need it for traffic violations.”
“Great. All it would take would be a legit number to access the database.”
“True, but it isn’t all that easy. The officer has to put down the reason. Officer Rafer Kamala went into the DMV records two hours ago. The reason he gave was ‘illegal parking.’ That’s common downtown.”
“I never park illegally. I haven’t gotten a ticket,” she said, her mouth suddenly dry with apprehension. “You warned me to be careful.”
He studied her for a long moment as if trying to decide if she were telling the truth. “Positive?”
“Absolutely.”
They had reached the end of the walkway and had turned back. They moved along in silence for a few minutes. Devon watched the people around them, while appearing not to do so. No one seemed interested, but she’d learned the hard way that looks could be deceiving.
“With a name like Kamala, I’d say the cop is from the islands. Wonder where he went to school?”
She saw where he was going with this. “You think he knows Chad Langston.”
“It wouldn’t surprise me. The islands are tight. An ‘us’ and ‘them’ attitude prevails. ‘Them’ being—”
“The tourists.”
“Right. I’ve been here seven years. I’m not a tourist, but I’m not quite accepted yet.”
“I understand.”
Warren stared down at the pavement for a moment before lifting his gaze to meet hers. “Look, we’ve done our best to protect you,” he said, his tone apologetic for the first time since she’d known him. “We even did something we’ve rarely done to make Devon Summers a real person. We created a credit history for you.”
She knew this wasn’t standard policy. WITSEC gave everyone a new identity but it was up to the individual to get credit. Without a previous history, it was difficult. Masterson had done it for her because he wanted Devon Summers to appear to be a real person—should anyone check.
“I know. I don’t mean to sound ungrateful…but I’m frightened. You see, this is beginning to feel like Santa Fe all over again.”
The image of Romero flashed through her mind. She stared at the statue, then looked back at Warren. “I don’t want anyone else to die. I don’t want to leave, either.”
“You said you had a plan. Run it by me now, or I’m relocating you ASAP.”