Gray Box Headquarters, Northern Virginia
11:45 a.m. EDT
Castle was the only person Kit had made inroads with. More or less.
For him to abandon her in this place for two minutes had her stomach flipping over.
At the park, he’d shielded her from gunfire, keeping her safe. And in the car, he’d sworn to protect her, like a man who made a vow and kept it no matter what. But getting lured in by gallantry and ignoring the fact that he had an ulterior motive—she glanced around the room, reminding herself—would be a big mistake.
Bottom line, she needed to get out of Area 51 for spies without being in handcuffs or a body bag. Castle was her best chance, even if what he represented scared her spitless.
If only she could be nicer to him, less defensive. But something about him—the way he was a walking, talking challenge—made her want to fight and win, not cooperate.
The door opened. A young woman entered, fair-skinned and sylphlike, holding a notepad.
“This is Willow,” Alistair said, introducing the very pretty woman. “She’s our crypto-techie. Willow, meet Kit01Y0L0.”
Willow wore a winter-white blouse and rose-pink skirt, her chestnut hair coiffed into an impeccable ballet bun. She had the kind of flawless, makeup-free skin that women on NYC’s Upper East Side, where Kit grew up, would’ve sold their souls to have.
Kit ached for a shower.
No eye contact from Willow. No greeting. Maybe their techie was shy. She was definitely wicked-smart.
Thousands of real-time only IRC channels were like shipping lanes in an ocean. To fish a message out of the dark web, or Tor, that had multiple layers of security, you had to cross the right lane as it was broadcast, but to do so targeting one keyword was exponentially harder. Tack on the fact Kit had used a secure Pastebin—a web application for sharing text, source code, and log files with others on a virtual clipboard that vanished after the recipient read it—as the digital boat to pass her message through, and that should have made grabbing the texts almost impossible. There were no connection logs, the messages to Hodges had been encrypted, and the pasted data wasn’t stored on the server.
“How did you find and decrypt the message?” Kit asked.
“That’s classified. You’d need a level-5 security clearance and need-to-know for me to give you that answer.”
Kit’s first instinct had been to send the message with Ricochet or Signal, some end-to-end encryption tech, but Gary didn’t use them. And neither software would’ve provided an additional layer of protection while running searches for Z-1984 on Tor.
Willow slinked around the table, taking a seat beside Kit. A stunning black bird pendant, tasteful in size and studded with diamonds and pearls, hung from a delicate chain around her neck. Her left hand, still pressed to the pad, bore a unique engagement ring. Rose gold with two pearls, surrounded by an infinity loop of diamonds.
Whoever her fiancé was he had exquisite taste and had paid a mint for that ring.
Willow smoothed her skirt down and set her pad on the glass table. Her nose crinkled. She looked around, sniffing the air. “What’s that smell?”
Fudge. Their techie also had a hypersensitive olfactory system.
“Something stinks.” Willow sniffed the air, tracking the stench straight to Kit. “You smell horrible.” The young woman lurched back, looking appalled.
Kit ran her tongue over the inside of her cheek, refusing to squirm under the humiliation. All she could do was own it. “Try rolling around in a rancid pile of garbage and not showering for two days and see how good you smell.”
Unable to return to her apartment, she hadn’t had enough cash on hand for a hotel, and they always asked for a credit card at check-in for incidentals. She’d washed up in public restrooms, but the smell clung to her hair and clothes.
Willow changed seats, picking one next to smirking Alistair. “Why would you roll around in garbage?” she asked.
“Not literally. I had to hide under bags of trash. It was either that or a bullet to the head.”
“Hide from who, luv?” the James Bond wannabe asked.
Goose bumps tickled Kit’s skin as she met Alistair’s penetrative stare. “Didn’t you agree not to speak?”
“I won’t tell if you won’t,” he said, his accent as plummy as if he were part of the royal family. “I think you’re good for a secret or two.” A grin brimming with mischief brightened his face. “Did the men in the park today try to kill you before?”
The best way not to get boxed into an answer was to spin the asker in circles. “Your posh accent is impressive for a Scouser.” That meant Alistair was from Liverpool, had grown up speaking like the Beatles.
Alistair’s smile burned out like a blown light bulb. “You’re the only one to notice. What gave me away?”
Why the pretense in the first place? “Your dialect, specifically your use of cob on.” Kit’s mother had been a linguistics professor at Cornell University. Her family had spent every summer in Europe until her world had unraveled—the first time.
His tone darkened along with his features. “You’ve got a good ear.”
It wasn’t a compliment. Well, so far, the seminar she’d taken a few years ago on How to Win Friends and Influence People wasn’t paying dividends.
The conference room door opened. Kit held her breath, hoping Castle would walk in.
A man in his late forties—maybe early fifties—strode in, shifting the air in the room. He wore an immaculate dark suit and stern expression. Deep-set lines creased the corners of his brown eyes and mouth. Average in height and well built, he was far from small but nowhere near Castle’s stature. A bow tie graced him with a touch of elegance. He radiated some ineffable, intangible quality that unnerved Kit. This was the man in charge.
A woman followed him inside. Her hair was a fusion of red and blond that cascaded around her shoulders in beachy waves. With bright blue eyes, a girl-next-door cuteness, and boho-chic dress, she looked the sort who made her own granola. Namaste was written all over her.
Castle came in and closed the door.
Kit exhaled with a modicum of relief as he sat beside her, handing her a bottle of water.
Granola Girl snagged a chair beside Willow.
The boss sat at the head of the table. “I’m Bruce Sanborn, the director. This,” he said, gesturing to Granola Girl, “is Emily Duvall, our CDC liaison. Most folks here call her Doc.”
Kit clenched her fingers in her lap.
“Castle briefed me on the events at the park.” He slid a folder in front of Kit. “Inside are nondisclosure agreements. Sign them and I can answer some of the questions you raised with him. But before you do, I’ll need to know your name so we can verify your identity.”
No way in hell was she giving up her identity. “That’s not going to happen, Mr. Sanborn.” Kit pushed the folder back toward him. “Not without a lawyer present.”
“Simply Sanborn will do.”
“Are you supposed to be like Nick Fury from the Avengers? Just call me Fury.” Aside from Alistair lighting up like a kid in a front-row seat at the circus, everyone else stared at her like she was a lunatic. Get a grip on your nerves and your tongue. “Listen, let me call my attorney, and while we wait, you fill me in on what’s going on.”
Simply Sanborn cracked a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “It’s not wise to play games with me. Easy enough for Willow to run your picture through our facial recognition program. We’ll have your driver’s license from the DMV within the hour. Then a passport record at the Department of State. An old college ID. Even a Facebook profile.”
Shit. Shit. Shit. She stayed off social media, and although she was a trust fund baby, she wasn’t a socialite featured in the tabloids. But he was right about everything else.
Who were these people? What program culled through a mountain of data in an hour?
Kit opened the water bottle and sipped, nonstop. Stalling. Silence hung heavy in the room. The weight of everyone’s gaze on her set off an avalanche of jitters while she guzzled every drop. She wanted to hold the last swig in her mouth forever.
As she squashed the bottle, the crinkle of plastic broke the dead quiet. All she could do was press for a lawyer, dodge questions, and roll the dice for the best.
“Willow,” Sanborn said, “pull her picture from the surveillance feed and run it.”
Kit had to get out of there before the results came back. If they found out about her link to the Outliers and what her group had been up to, she was hosed. Game over.
“That won’t be necessary, sir.” Willow looked up from the table. “I know who she is.”
Kit’s stomach turned over, cramping in panic. But there was no way this chick knew who she was. Kit’s circle was small and tight…had been small and tight. Now it was nonexistent. And she kept a low profile outside the hacker community.
The crypto-techie finally made eye contact with Kit, her expression impassive, like this wasn’t a life-or-death moment for one of them. “You’re Katherine Westcott.”