He climbed back into his SUV and turned the opposite direction. “Godspeed, boys.”
Somewhere in VA
ROGER ADJUSTED THE heater in the rental car and glanced at the outside temperature readout on the dash. He wouldn’t have thought that 72 degrees would feel cold, but after returning from Pakistan, he figured his internal thermostat would take a few days to readjust.
He slowed the rental and pulled to the side of the road. With a penlight in his mouth, he scanned the map. Bridger said that Gregg would have somebody contact him at specific coordinates, but he was having trouble with the location. He glanced at his phone then up at the nearly empty stretch of road.
“This is the right place.” He glanced at his watch and verified the time. “Right time.” He sighed and slumped in his seat. He had just pulled the penlight from his mouth when a loud bang on the passenger window made him jump.
“Jeezus! Don’t do that!” Roger leaned forward and retrieved the penlight from the floor. With his other hand he clicked the unlock button and watched as the passenger door opened.
A thin brunette slipped into the passenger seat and pointed down the road. “Drive.”
“Yeah, nice to meet you too,” Roger grumbled as he put the rental into gear. “Where are we going?”
“I’ll show you.” She sat quietly in the other seat and although she seemed relatively small and diminutive, Roger felt that she could probably kill him three different ways with just her thumb.
“I’m Roger, by the way.”
“I know.”
He blew his breath out hard and continued driving. He glanced at the small woman and noted her staring out the windows and into the night sky. After a few more miles, he finally opted to break the silence. “You are?”
“None of your damned business.” She pointed to the left. “Take that road.”
“It would help if I knew where we were—”
“I’m sure it would.” She glared at him. “Do you always talk so much?”
“Only when I’m nervous. And yes, you make me nervous.”
“Good.”
Roger clenched his jaw and continued driving while she silently pointed out the roads for him to take. After what seemed like the second time driving around in the same circle, Roger slowed the car. “We’ve passed that building twice that I’m sure of. What they hell are you doing?”
“Making certain we aren’t being tailed.”
Roger groaned. “Paranoid much?”
She pulled her head back into the car and glared at him. “Are you really that naïve?”
“Nobody knows we’re here. I don’t have a fucking clue what we’re doing here. I don’t even know who you are.”
He could see her jaw tick. Her eyes narrowed. “I’m Jay’s wife. Now drive.”
Roger did a double take. “I didn’t know that he was—”
“And does it matter?” she nearly yelled. “Does it change what needs to be done one little bit?”
Roger shrugged. “Maybe if I knew what we were doing I could answer that.”
She huffed. “You’ll find out when we do it.”
“Oh, great.” He slumped in his seat and said in a mocking tone, “Hey Rog, go back to the states and do us a couple of favors. No biggie. Just meet this really scary, mean lady and let her boss you around some.”
The woman twisted in her seat and continued to stare at him. “I thought you were a trained field agent for the FBI?”
Roger snorted. “I used to be. Now, I’m pretty sure I’m a fugitive and all I did was my fucking job.” He gripped the steering wheel tighter then slammed on the brakes, sliding the rental in the gravel of the dirt road. “So tell ya what. You tell me what the hell we’re about to do or one of us is walking back.”
She continued to glare at him and he did his best to glare back. When she didn’t flinch he gave her a soft smile. “Fine.” He turned off the ignition and pulled the key. “Have a fun walk back to wherever the hell you came from. I’ll report the car stolen in the morning.”
He opened the door and felt her thin fingers wrap around the back of his neck like a vice and pull him back into the car. “Start the car and let’s get moving again.”
“Not until you tell me what—”
His words were cut short when he saw the 1911 45 caliber pistol pointed at him. “Just drive.” Her features softened for just a moment then she lowered the gun. “We’re almost there. Then I’ll tell you what we have to do.”
Roger stared at her and waited until the pistol disappeared. He slowly slipped the key back into the ignition and started the car. “The gun wasn’t necessary.”
She nodded softly. “It might be before we’re done.”
He put the car into drive and pulled back onto the road. He glanced at her as he drove; he saw her shoulders finally relax back into the passenger seat.
“I’m Lisa.”
Roger grunted. “See. That didn’t hurt, did it?”
She turned to him again. “The less we know about each other, the better.”
“How’s that?”
“If this goes sideways, we can’t tell them what we don’t know.” She tapped the side of her head with her finger. “They can’t know that the boys are coming. Believe me, it’s better this way.”
Roger swallowed hard and nodded. After a moment he turned to her. “So, you’re married to Jay?”
“Just drive.”
Langley, VA
“YOU’RE ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN that our encryption isn’t crackable?” Darren Chesterfield could feel his hands shake as he spoke on the phone.
“Hey man, nothing is uncrackable. If you have enough cash, everything is fair game.”
He fought to keep his voice from breaking as he spoke. “And how would one go about doing that?”
“Well…” The voice seemed preoccupied. Or stoned. Perhaps sleep deprived. “If you had access to a supercomputer…and our current database of decryption algorithms…and a couple of years, then maybe you could get into it.”
“A couple of years? So…there’s no way to crack them faster?”
“Dude, you trying to get into
