Chapter Twenty One

Present Day…

Agent Deeprose rushed to the office to meet with Deputy Director Fischetti on Monday morning.

Don’t come off as over eager. Don’t get excited. Be professional…

Deeprose believed she had successfully tied Arthur Moreland a.k.a. Clayton Artemus Montgomery to the Meese Corporation, thanks to Fischetti’s mysterious Mr. X. Bursting with excitement, she squeezed herself into an elevator that travelled directly to the top floor of the F.B.I. headquarters. Not one of the black-suited men made room for her, forcing her to use her body as a plow.

She kept up a steady mantra as she rode:

Start at the beginning. Keep your voice low and level. Take your time. The sixty-four thousand dollar questions are the followin’: Is Montgomery, havin’ had access to Meese’s scientists and labs, responsible for the development and distribution of this drug and if so, why would he intentionally leave us a clue that might solve the crime? Why was he hangin’ around the museum incognito? Last, but in no way the least, why would he want to point the finger at a senator? Oh shoot! My brain hurts.

Shania was too absorbed in thought to notice the soft ding of the elevator announce their arrival. A few men made an obvious show of frowning at their watches and sighing with impatience. One elbowed her in the ribs.

“Y’all have a super day, now!” Sometimes Deeprose took a perverse pleasure in annoying the hell out of her fellow New Yorkers with her perkiness and thousand-watt smile. Especially in the morning.

What this city needs is a dose of good manners. And an enema.

Walking quickly past Liz, Deeprose mouthed, “Ah’m expected”.

Liz, his first line of defense, was single, statuesque, and stunningly beautiful. Her custom-made suits hugged long, lean curves in colors that whispered class and style. She had porcelain skin, sable hair, and lips that matched her fingernails perfectly. And she was absolutely loyal to Bill Fischetti and the Bureau, in that order.

Ah just hope that after a lifetime of workin’ fifteen hour days, nights and weekends tryin’ to land him, her tombstone doesn’t wind up readin’, ‘Elizabeth Perry. She gave at the office.’

Deeprose ignored Liz’s habit of treating her like something that crawled out of the sticks. As a rule, she exuded chilly condescension to everyone, if only to remind them who had the power to let them in and show them back out of the executive office. At first, Shania accepted it with her usual good grace, but it got old, fast.

Liz shot out of her chair as Deeprose raced by, raising her voice. “Wait just a moment! You can’t go…”

But Deeprose had already cleared Fischetti’s office door and let it slam closed behind her. Smiling a hello, she dropped into the seat opposite his desk, allowing herself a momentary and slightly petty delight at the sound of Liz’s muffled muttering on the other side.

That oughta start off her day with a bang.

He was winding up a phone call, so she got back up and made a pot of his gourmet coffee, thinking about her report. Not long after, he hung up, rubbed his eyes, and sighed. He helped himself to a fresh cup, nodded, and attempted a smile that looked far more like a grimace to her.

“Good. I’ve been waiting for you, Agent Deeprose. Did you find out anything we can use?”

“Yes, sir, Ah sure did!” Ignoring her own advice to remain calm and professional, she plunged right in, talking a mile-a-minute. Waving the copy of a news clipping around for emphasis, she blurted out the results of her online search without explaining how Moreland, the obituary of Clayton Artemus Montgomery, and Montgomery’s late wife Arleen had anything to do with Meese. She also left out the bit about not being able to connect any of it to their investigation at the museum, the drug, or the extreme alt-right meetings known as the Collective.

“This is all too coincidental, sir.”

Fischetti made several desperate attempts to ask questions. Finally, he had to raise his hand to stop her. “Agent Deeprose, just who in the hell is Montgomery, why do I care if his wife was murdered in Queens, for God’s sake, and why is this all way too coincidental? Now, start from the beginning and go slowly for those of us who haven’t seen the episode yet.”

Oops.

She gave him a copy of the obituary, sat on her own hands and told him the whole story again, this time from the beginning and in perfect order.

“O.K., I’m following you so far. You think the temporary curator, Moreland, was actually Montgomery, a career man with Meese, come back from the dead. And you think he deliberately steered you toward the ballerina painting, knowing we’d think it was a clue and that it would lead us straight to Michael’s neighborhood. Well, well, well…very neatly done…”

She looked slightly worried. “Ah don’t know yet exactly what part he plays in all this, sir, but Moreland – uh, Montgomery - did leave us that clue on purpose. Ah think Ah should check in with Agent Carter and make my report to him, sir. Ah really shoulda done that before Ah came up here.”

Fischetti rubbed a hand across his razor stubble thoughtfully. “Yes…yes... I mean, NO! You did the right thing coming to me, first. Carter can wait. Until we know how, if at all, Michael, Montgomery, and the drug all fit into the picture, Agent, we know nothing except a bunch of facts we can’t tie together, whether your gut says so or not. And for God’s sake, Agent, from now on, let’s just refer to him as Montgomery. It’s too confusing to keep using both names.

“Did you say his wife was murdered?” Deeprose nodded as Fischetti plowed on. “That could point to motive and opportunity for setting up these grisly killings, you know that? If he stole the drug from Meese and attempted to frame them and the government, maybe it was because he thinks Meese was responsible for her death. We need to know why he’d have reason to believe that and if it’s true.

“Look here, Agent, a man doesn’t simply walk away from a career like that, fake his own death, and create a new identity just because he’s grief-stricken unless the place he worked was the cause of his grief. The connection has to mean something. Just has to! I wonder which of their holding companies he worked for. Agent Deeprose, you’re heading to Virginia on a fact-finding mission.”

“Yes, sir.”

Fischetti nodded once more. “We’re on shaky ground here, and we have to tread lightly. I don’t have to tell you we have absolutely no evidence to back up an official visit. You’ll have to pretend that we believe Montgomery is really deceased and gauge their reaction.

“Try to find out what they know and don’t know. I want you to ask for the manager of the personnel department, when you get there. Do not, under any circumstances, speak to the head of human resources or public relations, and do not contact them at all before you show up at the front desk of their corporate headquarters. Are you writing this down, Agent Deeprose?”

“Yes, sir. Writing.”

Do not, do not, do not…

“I have it, sir.”

“Middle managers are very cautious, Deeprose. They’re not easy to manipulate unless you luck out. We’re going to have to hope that the manager of personnel will tip Meese’s hand unknowingly, will actually volunteer information she should not divulge, or will leave you with the definite impression that she is truthfully in the dark. If she really has nothing of value to share with you, we’re screwed.

“Since you’re new here, and this case is extremely unusual in its nature, I’ll spell this out for you, Agent. No illegal search or seizure will be tolerated. You’re going to be savvy. Subtle. Make your contact a friend. Are we crystal clear, Agent Deeprose?”

“Perfectly, sir. Ah apologize for losin’ my cool with Senator Pressman. It won’t happen again.”

“Yes. Well. All right, Agent. I’ll have Liz email you the plane tickets and Meese’s address in Langley. Remember! Speak to no one but the manager of personnel, make sure no one else sees you walk into or out of that office, and keep H.R. and P.R. out of it. If those idiots know anything worth mentioning, they’ll only gum up the works trying to put their own spin on it. We don’t want to tip our hand.

“I want you to confirm that Montgomery worked there under his legal name. Use the news clipping as a visual reference; it’ll give you more credibility. Find out if he resigned or was fired. If you think you can do it without raising a red flag, find out why. If you can’t find out why, find out if there was some trouble between him and management or anyone else there. I also want confirmation that he’s listed as deceased on his personnel record and if the manager seems to believe that’s the truth. Are you keeping up with me, Agent?”

“Writing, sir.”

“If Personnel clams up and wants to send you to the head of Human Resources, thank them for their time, tell them you’ll ask you supervisor to make that call, and make a clean exit. I’m hoping they’ll warm up to you and dish a little. Your main concern is to make sure the person you speak with is not afraid to open up to you. He or she needs to believe that what you want to know is not that big of a deal, that there’s no real reason to bother management with it, and that there’s something in it for Personnel if they help you out. Use something that would appeal to their sense of vanity. Make this person feel important. Then, if we’re very, very lucky, we’ll know which way the wind is blowing and have enough to bring Montgomery in for questioning.”

Deeprose hesitated.

Fischetti looked up. “Questions? Concerns?”

“It’s just that Ah thought our asset, Red, might have an address for the next meetin’ by now. Maybe Ah should check in with him before Ah leave town. Ah don’t want him to leave a message on my phone or send me an email. Shouldn’t Ah pay him a quick visit before Ah leave, sir? He’s probably back in the city by now, seein’ as how it’s Monday an’ a school day for him.”

“No, Agent. Your orders are to proceed to Virginia, immediately. Red and Carter can both wait a day or so.”

“Can Ah at least take a few minutes to see how Agent Seacrest is doin’? Is she down in the lab, or…?”

“She’s in the lab getting her blood tested. I want Carter there when she figures out exactly what that drug is and what it’s for.”

Fischetti broke off and began talking about what he’d asked Seacrest to do for them. “God only knows what that fucking drug did to her. If there’s any lasting brain damage or side effects, it’ll be my fault. My responsibility.”

Then, just as suddenly, he cleared his throat and was all business again. “You have your orders, Agent Deeprose. You will go to Meese alone. There’s no need to burden Carter with this now. I’ll fill him in once we know Seacrest is out of the woods. If she doesn’t…well, if it goes south, it won’t make any difference to him whether he’s been briefed or not.

“And the D.O.D. will just have to be satisfied with the half dose we give them this morning. I couldn’t care less whether they believe we have the other half or not. Happy Monday, Agent Deeprose.”

Deeprose knew she’d made a mess of her report this morning.

He didn’t thank me, but he sure as hell didn’t fire me, either.

She slipped out his door, doing her best to ignore the smug look of satisfaction plastered all over Liz’s face when she left.

Eaves-dropper.

Before she left the building, she went down to the lab.

Ah hope Jill’s all right…

She took a brief moment to prepare herself before pushing past the swinging doors. Peering through their small, square windows on tip toes, she saw Carter stroking Jill’s hair. It was a tender moment, and she didn’t want to intrude.

How could she volunteer to take that drug not knowin’ what would happen? Ah’m sorry, but duty doesn’t include poisonin’ yourself to death - or worse - to push along an investigation. That’s a little too nuts, even for me.

They were sitting by the big video screen Seacrest had used to show the film of the Emerald Roach Wasp.

My God! What do Ah say to Jill after takin’ that drug? Ah don’t think there’s a Hallmark card for somethin’ like this…

Seacrest initiated the conversation, saving Deeprose from making an ass of herself. “Agent Deeprose, it’s good to see you.” Seacrest was surprisingly lucid.

“I made it; I’m O.K. I was a little over the top, according to Carter. He had to cuff me to the bed. I remember feeling madder than I ever felt before. It was rage, really. Fight without the flight feelings. I remember an irresistible urge to kill and the feeling of being unstoppable, but it was all directed toward some kid from my past that I barely knew.

“Something else had to have been used to direct that impulse to a specific target. If there’s no companion drug, they didn’t need one. There was a small window of time between ingestion and psychosis when I felt like I was slipping into a dream state. That’s what makes this drug so valuable; the subject can be programmed through the use of a post-hypnotic suggestion during that window of time. The result? One human killing machine to be aimed at anything desirable with hardly any memory of it or any feelings of guilt or remorse. The question is, can we get Michael to admit where he got it and does he know why he was sent to kill the old curator?”

“Y’all said you had barely any memory of it. But that means you did remember most or all of it, doesn’t it?”

“Yes. Some people will be able to resist the drug, but most won’t without the kind of help I had last night. Of those that don’t resist, some will remember what they did, but again, most won’t. If the user resists the programming and goes after someone else, our chances of finding it out are slim to none. There are potential hordes of 48-hour killers out there, and we have no way to find out who they are, stop them, or connect them to any of this. Unless they got 100% of the drugs at the meetings. That’s our only hope. If it’s not available on the street and we can get a list of all attendees, we might see a pattern that leads us to the real Silver Man. But getting that drug out of circulation is only half the problem; we have to make sure it can’t be duplicated, and that means finding the scientist who developed it and destroying any existing documentation that describes where the natural compounds were found and how to reproduce them synthetically.”

Carter had a depressing thought. “Jill, getting a list of past attendees may not help as much as you think. The ones that remember anything won’t have the drug in their system anymore. That’s their only proof that they actually attended a meeting if – and that’s a big IF – we can prove the meetings were the only place to get it. We wouldn’t be able to tie a crime to the drug or the meeting, even circumstantially.”

“True, but some of them will have the drug still inside them, and those are the ones who can help us find the source of it all. We need a lot more to go on than what we have now, and the clock’s ticking. Right, Carter?”

Deeprose was incredibly impressed with Seacrest’s insight into her own experience and her ability to articulate a hypothesis and discuss its provability. The purpose for using the drug at the meetings began to make sense, finally. The meetings were just a way to get a lot of angry, unhinged people together at one time. The drug gave the Silver Man an army to command.

When Seacrest finished speaking Deeprose started to ask her more questions. Jill stared into space before responding. When she finally did, she spoke in a dull monotone, like an automaton. Then it was like a clock stopped ticking. Seacrest simply turned “off”. She was entirely mute and stared straight ahead without any expression of any kind. Deeprose and Carter exchanged a quick, terrified look. He gathered her in his arms before she could fall, and Deeprose sprang into action. She whipped out her cell phone and punched in 911.

Carter stood rooted to the spot. Deeprose grabbed Carter by the shoulders and shook him like a rag doll. “Agent Carter, you have to do something; there’s no time for an ambulance! Carter!!”

He ran to the bathroom carrying Seacrest with him and dumped her into the shower stall. Ice cold water on full blast might do the trick. Deeprose stood by, ready to do C.P.R. if she had to.

Jill started to come around. “I’m having suuuuch a nice dream. It’s summer in Boston. We’re dancing on the lawn in the rain.” She raised her arms in the air to feel the rain better. Then she started yelling. “Hey! I’m in the shower! Why am I in the Goddamned shower?!”

Deeprose ran to find anything handy to dry her off and warm her up. She started throwing open closets and drawers. Carter slipped down to the floor with her, all wet, and clutched her to him.

“Get off me, Carter! I can’t breathe! Carter!” Her voice was soft and filled with wonder. “Carter…you’re crying!”

Deeprose plopped herself down on the floor, too, soaking herself. She hugged them both and then she said, “All for one!”

Seacrest laughed. “And one for all.”

At that precise moment a trinity was born that would never be broken – a trinity of heart, mind, and courage.

***

Deeprose left to scrounge up a spare set of sweat pants and a sweater that she always kept in her office. After Seacrest was comfy cozy, they sat around sipping really bad coffee. Seacrest said what all three of them were thinking. “I wish we had some whiskey.”

“Amen to that. Oh shoot, Ah almost forgot! Deputy Director Fischetti said not to bother stoppin’ here first, but as long as Ah did, Ah might as well give you an update before Ah catch my plane. Arthur Moreland, the temporary curator at the Cloisters, has somethin’ to do with this.”

Carter interrupted. “What makes you believe that, Agent Deeprose? If he knows who the killer is, why use a painting to send us a clue? Why not just tell us what he knows? Now slow down and start again.”

“Damn! Everybody’s tellin’ me the same thing today.”

She reached into her pocket and pulled out a crumpled up copy of a newspaper article. It was an obituary. “Ah have here an obituary for a Mr. Montgomery, of the Meese Corporation in Langley, Virginia. Take a look at this photo. It’s a few years old, an’ he looks quite different now, but that’s the spittin’ image of Mr. Moreland, sure as Ah’m standin’ here. Dontcha see? Montgomery is posin’ as Moreland. Montgomery’s wife was murdered a short while before he resigned; it was never solved. If he thought Meese had anything to do with it…”

Carter was confused. “Wait a minute. Are you saying he may have stolen the drug for revenge or blackmail? But then why would he want the curator dead and why help us find Michael?”

“To point us in the right direction! My theory is that he helped us find the ballet school and Michael to lead us to the manufacturer without involvin’ himself. He couldn’t have known Michael had another vial, but he’d have known Michael would still have it in his system when we picked him up.”

Seacrest was all ears. “Okay, I’ll bite. What makes you think the Meese Corporation had anything to do with Montgomery’s wife’s death? Why assume the drug came from there just because Mr. Montgomery worked there?”

“Deputy Director Fischetti told me to see if I could connect Meese to the drug and Montgomery’s disappearance. His job at the museum where Michael committed the murder and who was in possession of the drug is too coincidental to be overlooked. Mr. Montgomery’s wife died horribly. It may provide us with motive and opportunity, but y’all are right; we need to know why the curator was specifically targeted.”

Carter stared at Deeprose and asked her in a soft, calm voice, “When did Fischetti tell all this to you?”

“Yesterday morning when Ah got back from Senator Pressman’s office in D.C., Ah came in to make my report. He said he received a tip on Meese from a source he referred to as ‘Mr. X’. After that, Ah headed straight home and started combin’ the web to find answers. Ah came in this mornin’ to give him an update on what Ah found, and all of a sudden Ah’m on my way to the airport again. This time to Langely, Virginia on a fishin’ trip.”

“That bastard! He intentionally kept me out of the loop. If you hadn’t stopped down here by chance, I’d never have known you even left! Agent Deeprose, moving forward, I want you to keep me in the Intel loop every step of the way, and I want that Intel before the deputy director gets it. He’s using Seacrest’s experience this weekend as a convenient excuse to take advantage of your rookie status. He also knows you can’t say no to him, and I don’t like it.”

He started to pace. “I am very concerned, Agent Deeprose. There are more questions here than you know. Why does the deputy director believe this tip and who exactly is this Mr. X? How can we be sure we can trust him? This doesn’t feel right. Not right at all.”

Is this Sunday, for heaven’s sake, or ‘Freaky Friday’? Did they switch bodies while Ah was in D.C. and forget to tell me? Carter’s losin’ it and Jill is grounded. This musta been one helluva weekend.

“Agent Carter, Ah admit Ah had some serious doubts about Fischetti when Ah first came on here, but he stepped up to the plate for us, sir. He fought Breen, bullied Jill’s supervisor for extra lab time and broke the law six ways from Sunday to keep half of that drug for us to examine. Ah don’t think we can dismiss that so easily.

“Ah’m not sayin’ he isn’t a fox in the henhouse, but for goodness sake, give him the benefit of the doubt! The only reason you weren’t filled in was because you had your own hands full. He’s sick with worry about Jill. He said it was his fault if anything happened to her. Ah really don’t think he’s tryin’ to leave y’all in the dark.”

Her comment had the immediate effect of a slap in the face. “I apologize. You’re right, of course, but he is responsible for letting her take that drug, and he should be worried sick about it. How can I be sure she’s going to be O.K?”

He stopped talking to take a few slow, deep breaths. “All right. All right. I don’t like it, but I have no say in it. Proceed with extreme caution, and contact me if anything, and I mean anything, happens that you can’t handle alone.”

Seacrest derailed them both with a new thought. “You know, it occurs to me there’s another question we need to answer, based on my own experience with the drug. What if Red only thinks he left the Collective without ingesting the drug?”

Deeprose pressed her lips together. She hadn’t had time to process Jill’s assumptions, and now she was frightened for Red. “Ah see where y’all are headin’ with this. He may have taken the drug and committed a murder; we have to face that. Ah’d like to be the one to check on his whereabouts before he came to the jazz club on Friday night. It shouldn’t be too difficult to retrace his steps.”

“Fine. Oh! Before you go, I want you to have this.” Carter rummaged around in his wet pockets.

“Ooooo! What’s that?” Shania marveled at the sparkling brilliance of a deep green-black gem in Carter’s hand.

“The stuff that stars are made of, Agent. This little stone was part of a meteorite that crashed here over a thousand years ago. It’s called Moldavite, named for Moldavia, where it landed. It’s almost completely mined out by now and very hard to get. I want you to have it because it’s got an extremely high energy content - one you can actually feel. Here, hold it lightly between your thumb and forefinger in your non-dominant hand. Feel it? It is said to increase mental focus and clarity of thought. I want to know you’re carrying it with you. We both do.”

“Thank you!” She held the stone in her palm for a few moments, feeling its slight buzzing motion before placing it in her pocket. “Ah never believed in this crystal stuff, sir, but this feelin’ is real! Thank you; I’ll cherish it. Jill... take it easy, O.K.?”

As Deeprose left the building, she expected to smell dried leaves mixed with earth in the dry, chilly air. Instead, she smelled the heady scent of garbage mixed with exhaust fumes from a million old cars jammed up on Church Street.

Funny, Ah was the one who originally felt Fischetti had somethin’ up his sleeve. Ah was sure he wasn’t tellin’ me what he was tellin’ Agent Carter. Now Agent Carter feels the same way.

***

Deeprose sipped coffee in Jane Kerrington’s cozy, little office. She was Meese’s personnel manager. The woman knew her business, and Shania didn’t have to be a veteran to know she’d have to outsmart Ms. Kerrington if she was going to get anything out of her. It was against the law to divulge information from personnel records without a court order; they both knew that. Deeprose planned to come on very subtly using Kerrington’s own sense of pride to soften her up; her sense of sympathy and duty to open her up; and her spill the beans. It was a fait accompli.

Ah hope.

“Thanks for sittin’ down with me today, Ms. Kerrington. Ah’m told y’all have teamed up with the surroundin’ feeder colleges and high schools to work out new curricula that will help residents obtain jobs 21^st century jobs right here at home.”

“Yes, we have, and it’s worked out better than we hoped.”

“Reachin’ out to the local communities meant making a conscious decision to put a name and face back on a relatively anonymous organization. Are you enjoyin’ that end of recruitin’?”

Kerrington was surprised and flattered that the F.B.I. noted and admired her P.R. campaign at the school level. “I do! I enjoy it very much. We conduct presentations at local universities, advertise on online job sites, use job placement specialists, and utilize social media for recruiting sand staffing purposes. We also work with college and high school administrators and teachers to develop courses that will prepare students for careers in research and development, design and engineering, and the sciences and mathematics. We’re a true part of this community now.”

Deeprose felt this was the time to come to the point. “Speakin’ of the local community Ms. Kerrington, perhaps y’all can help us in a current case of some importance.”

“Me?”

“Ms. Kerrington. Y’all have a relationship with the surroundin’ communities. The executives provide input, Ah’m sure, maybe they do some mentorin’ here and there, but you’re the face of the Meese Corporation, am Ah Right?”

Kerrington blushed outright. “Well, I guess you could say that…”

“This case has nothin’ at all to do with Meese, but it could be of extreme importance in solvin’ it. It requires a break in normal protocol, but this investigation goes up so high that Ah gotta be sure Ah can trust my source implicitly. The person who helps us break this case will receive the Congressional Medal of Honor.”

“The what?”

Reel her in, Shania. Fast!

“Ah need to verify the date of death for a past employee. One little date, and you’d be a national hero, Ms. Kerrington. If Ah go through proper channels, our man’s gonna get away. Once Ah leave here, Ah can’t risk comin’ back. Ah need the date now. Will you help us?”

“I can’t help unless I know who it is you’re talking about. If it’s commonly known information, I can discuss it without opening a file.”

She can? Holy shit! The manager of personnel is also the office gossip! Oh, pleeeeease make this common knowledge…

“His name was Clayton Artemus Montgomery. He resigned and passed on shortly afterwards.”

The color drained out of Kerrington’s face.

She knew him! Let’s see what else she knows.

“He’s got no survivors and no distant relatives. You can help us get justice for him, Ms. Kerrington. If I can get that date of his death and the details y’all are obviously familiar with, Ah can help catch his killer.”

Kerrington whispered, “Killer? You mean he was murdered?”

“Ah do, Ms. Kerrington. What can you tell me?”

“Mr. Montgomery left the company at least a few years ago. We don’t keep files that old here, so there’s no hard data to pull.”

“But the records are all in a central database, aren’t they? And you’re in charge of the online records, too. It’d be perfectly O.K. for y’all to go into the database lookin’ for Artemus and accidentally come up with Artemus Montgomery, wouldn’t it? Ah mean, that must happen all the time. Slip of the wrist.”

She paused again. “The thing is, Agent, non-disclosure law is very definite concerning personnel records. That information is protected even after the death of an employee. I could lose my job…”

Hurry up, you’re losin’ her!

Deeprose appeared completely without guile. “Yes, you could. And work for the highest bidder, instead. Maybe start your own high-end recruitin’ and staffin’ firm. Or just kick back and enjoy all those interviews on the mornin’ shows and C.N.N. Or write a book and retire.”

She rushed ahead. “Ah’m not tryin’ to be facetious, Ms. Kerrington; all Ah need is a teeny tiny answer to my one and only question. How about it?”

“Well…what is it you want to know? I can’t promise I know anything of value.”

In a pig’s eye.

“If you can’t recall date of death, can you tell me anythin’ about his state of mind when he resigned? Was he upset or angry about anythin’?”

Kerrington began to see the trap she set for herself and tried to back off, stuttering and blinking her eyes rapidly. “He worked at one of our pharmaceutical research facilities, not here at the corporate office.”

Rush her with questions, and don’t give her time to think before she answers.

“Was there a misunderstandin’, disagreement, or fallin’ out between Mr. Montgomery and the folks he worked with? What was the nature of the misunderstandin’?”

Kerrington’s face reddened. “There was no problem from a corporate standpoint. Back in his day, we maintained a committee that voted on which of our projects would receive further funding to conduct the research and development needed to present to the military for purchase. However, it only required one vote to kill a project that would have been in the preliminary stages of development for years. This practice was put in place strictly for failsafe purposes and Mr. Montgomery was well aware of that. We wanted to prevent a majority vote from approving a project if even one member saw it as a potential danger. There may have been some ruffled feathers in the past between Mr. Montgomery and the board when a project was shelved, but it’s their call and no one else’s. In any case, they were disbanded a few year ago. Most researchers are able to move on to other projects when theirs are rejected. Sometimes one or two don’t bounce back, but that’s nobody’s fault.”

Don’t jump on that one yet; get the dates she does remember, first.

“Do you remember when this board you spoke of was disbanded? That might give me a timeframe to work with.”

“Oh, that was about two years ago.”

“So, approximately two years ago Mr. Montgomery was still here. He left before they were disbanded. That helps. Who’s on the board?”

“I’m sorry, I don’t…”

“No problem. But you did say he resigned because one of his researcher’s inventions was turned down for fundin’. Who was the scientist?”

Kerrington blushed. “I didn’t say that at all. I just wanted to explain his position here as a project manager of military biologicals and the framework in which he operated. There would have been no reason, to the best of my knowledge, that Mr. Montgomery would have had any issues with Meese. His position was never in jeopardy, even if his researchers’ projects were rejected, and he moved steadily upward in the ranks of management. It would have been a very rewarding job, Agent.”

Ah’m sure it was…

Deeprose paused and glanced at her watch. “Well, Ah think that’s all Ah need for now, Ms. Kerrington. Thank you so very much for your time and help. It is most appreciated, and please feel free to contact me with anythin’ else that comes to mind.”

Kerrington looked vastly relieved. “That’s all? All you wanted to know about was the nature of his job? Why, anyone who knew his title could find that out on our jobsite. There’s no law against that.”

The two women rose. Deeprose shook her hand and got the hell out of there before Kerrington realized what she’d just told her.

Ah see they’re still givin’ out diplomas at Moron University. Hmmm, a mysterious board of approvers who had him by the short hairs combined with a favorite researcher who got the ax and his wife’s murder. Well, now Ah know why Montgomery resigned and when. It won’t be difficult to find out whose projects got the ax before he left. There’s always a disgruntled employee somewhere dyin’ to give you the lowdown.

She was antsy to get back to New York to check on Jill and to see if Red might have tried to reach her with a location of the next meeting of the Collective.

He has an awful crush on me. An’ now he trusts me. Ah only hope we don’t wind up on the opposite side of the fence when this is over and done with.

The sudden thought of a crush reminded her that Wilson might have been trying to contact her over the weekend. Deeprose hadn’t checked her private messages in a few days. After searching her texts and email, she finally found his messages in her spam folder.

Oh my, he’s goin’ to think Ah’m just terrible.

Deeprose smiled. Sometimes it wasn’t such a bad idea to keep a gentleman waiting.

Guilty as charged.

***

The door to Clara’s apartment flew open. Eliza cursed a blue streak and flopped down into a chair to tell the girls everything that had happened to her and Michael since the last time they’d all been together.

“I’ve been knocked around, given the third degree by everyone and their brother, and sent to the hospital. And there’s some lady F.B.I. agent who’s not so convinced that I don’t know Michael from Adam. I’m hot, tired and thirsty.”

Alison answered her as she walked into the kitchen to get her a glass of wine. “Well we still have a few problems, Eliza, even with Michael out of the way. The Silver Man’s people will be looking for you, I still have to be cleared, and Clara’s still being hunted. So, you’re the only one of us who can get the next meeting address without getting killed or arrested. Can you get invitations to the meeting for us or not? They’ll have to assume, if you answer next invitation, that you don’t recall being dosed or your instructions to kill. They’ll be anxious to get you back there again, don’t you think?”

“I have the link for the new website already. They emailed it to me today. Hang on while I get in to see if the invitations are there for me. Eliza flashed a twisted smile. Oh, yeah. We’re in.”

Alison nodded.

***

Deputy Director Fischetti leapt at his phone. He’d been waiting all day to hear the special ring tone that signified an incoming urgent message. The call was from the Special Operations Unit. He began to pray.

Please God, make it good news.

“It’s a go, sir. We have the location of the next meeting.”