on surveillance here in Hulis. Those vitamin-enriched, preservative-laden military rations could very well end up being her Christmas dinner, as unappetizing a thought as it was.
Surely something was still open. It was dark outside, but it was still relatively early. She should probably head out now before the snow became too thick, not to mention that this was a small town. They probably rolled up the sidewalks right after the evening news.
Her stomach issued yet another gurgling pang, so she decided to give in. She didn’t recall hearing the end of the song, but Burl had finally stopped singing to her about silver and gold decorations, so now was as good a time as any to just get out and clear her head.
“You need a vacation,” she told herself aloud as she sighed, then dropped her hands, lifted her face, and opened her eyes.
That was when she saw it.
The media player was paused, and in the center of the screen was a small, rectangular window. Inside its borders was a winking cursor, and above it a string of text that said, “ENTER ENCRYPTION KEY.”
She blinked just to be sure and then continued staring at the screen. Maybe Occam’s Razor was a little dull this time after all. Now she just had to figure out what the encryption key was.
Behind the newly opened window she could see the original email. The text still read, “HEAVY SYMBOLISM OF THE SEASON. MERRY XMAS.”
She was sure that was a hint, but at the moment it wasn’t much help.
She reached out and rested her fingertips on the home row of the keyboard, keeping her touch light. She thought about the tune that had played when the file opened and then tapped out SILVERAN; however, the DGOLD wouldn’t fit. The field was only allowing eight characters, so the song title probably wasn’t it. It was too easy, anyway. She backspaced and pondered some more. A pair of false starts later she typed in SLVRGOLD. Maybe too easy was where she needed to start. After a bit of trepidation washed over her, she hit enter.
The small window flashed quickly, then the words “INCORRECT KEY!” winked at her in bright red. The rectangular window disappeared and she heard the computer hard drive spin up. Panic rushed in to fill her chest as she imagined the file erasing itself. She considered thumbing the power switch to stop it, but hesitated as the storage device whirred back to silence. After several tense seconds, the prompt returned, “ENTER ENCRYPTION KEY.”
Constance allowed a relieved sigh to flow out of her lungs.
She stared awhile longer, then in a moment of inspiration typed “BURLIVES” and tapped enter.
The laptop whirred, the window flashed, and then once again it displayed the winking red “INCORRECT KEY!”
Disheartened, she sat back in the chair and glared at the screen. After several minutes of staring, she retrieved a flash drive from her laptop case and made a backup copy of the file, mutely cursing herself for not having done so at the outset. Then she stood up, stuffed it into her pocket, and shrugged into her coat. Then after stuffing her feet into her running shoes, she dug out a handful of change from her purse and headed for the door. There was a soda machine close to the motel office, and if this turned into a long night she would be in desperate need of more caffeine. Besides, it was really looking like she’d be having an energy bar for dinner after all, and she’d have to have something to wash it down.
BOTH the wind and the snow had picked up, and even though she was walking beneath an overhang, Constance was forced to turn up her collar and shield her face as she trudged through what was now easily two inches of accumulation on the sidewalk. The movement was welcome though. Even after stretching she was still a bit stiff and definitely needed to move around.
She felt a slight twinge in her dinged shin as she walked, but ignored it. Between the back of her head, her side, and now her leg, she had literally taken a beating while working this case and didn’t even have a suspect yet. Something seemed terribly wrong with that picture.
Having gone as far as she could on the sidewalk, she ventured out from beneath the overhang. Snow swirled on brief gusts and pelted her face as she crossed the parking lot of the blocky U-shaped motel. She couldn’t help but notice that her car was still the only one occupying the otherwise empty expanse of snow-covered asphalt. She began to hurry as the wind rose again and sent a sharp knife of cold inside the loose folds of her coat. Half jogging, she continued the rest of the way across, then followed the VENDING sign and ducked into the small service corridor behind the office.
Finally out of the weather for a moment, she shook off the excess snow, then dug in her pocket for the handful of change. As she stood there in front of the machine feeding quarters into the slot, she mulled over the text of the email.
“Heavy symbolism of the season. Merry Xmas,” she mumbled to herself as she made her selection.
A can of cola audibly clunked its way along inside the humming machine and then thumped into the tray below. She pulled it out and stuffed it into her coat pocket, then began feeding more coins into the slot.
“Heavy symbolism of the season. Merry Xmas… Santa Claus? No. Ten. Too many letters… Yule Log? Seven. Not enough…”
She pressed the button and another soft drink clunked, rattled, and finally thumped as it arrived in the tray. Again, she stuffed it into her pocket and started shoving more quarters into the machine. It could be a long night and she wanted this to be her only trip out into the storm.
She sighed and shook her head. Whoever sent this bizarre file wasn’t making it easy, which either meant the information was extremely sensitive and probably even classified above her grade…or maybe they were just screwing with her. She wasn’t quite sure which option she wanted it to be. The implications that came with the former weren’t very good, and the latter would just piss her off. That wasn’t good either.
She was reaching out to punch the illuminated cola button for a third time when she heard a man’s voice. Speaking in a harsh whisper from what seemed mere inches away from her ear he said, “ It would be your fault that I would have to kill them.”
He was so close that she could feel the moist heat of his breath against her skin. A sharp melange of cigarettes, peppermint, and mothballs invaded her nostrils, making her eyes water and eliciting an involuntary gag in the back of her throat.
Constance’s heretofore preoccupied mind shifted immediately into fight or flight. She knew the service corridor was a dead end and the voice had come from her right, which was between her and the exit. Flight was out of the question, so fight it would have to be. Falling back on training and muscle memory she began her mental count.
Three: Move.
She sidestepped, taking herself in the direction opposite that of the voice.
Two: Draw.
Halfway through the step, metal tinkled bright noises into the night air as the handful of change landed in a sudden shower against the cold concrete. Even before the coins struck, her arm was sliding smoothly along her side, her now empty hand catching the front of her coat and pulling it back in a single motion. Three fingers wrapped comfortably around the grip of her Sig Sauer and her thumb slapped against the release. With that accomplished, she pulled hard, lifting and rotating the weapon on the axis of her wrist, index finger slipping in through the trigger guard. If absolutely necessary she could now fire from the hip.
One: Aim.
She completed her sidestepping turn as her right arm began to straighten, pushing up and forward. Simultaneously her left arm lifted as well, elbow cocked and held close into her side; wrist locked and palm cupped over her right hand’s firm grasp on the butt of the P226. Completing the forward push and locking her right arm straight, she kept a rearward pressure with her left, ending the motion in a textbook Chapman stance, her finger resting on the trigger.
Her heart was racing in her chest as she sighted along the carbon steel slide of the. 40 caliber handgun. She felt as if she was moving in slow motion, but in reality it had taken just under four seconds from the moment she had let go of the coins until she was fully into her defensive posture. However, she knew full well that it took less than a second to squeeze a trigger, and she could very easily have already been dead.
Of course, that was if the man behind the voice was armed, or in this case, even there. At the moment, she was staring straight ahead, locked in a tight stance, with her weapon aimed at absolutely nothing.
