Of course, he couldn’t do that. “She lied in there about signing for me,” he said. "It's something she does from time to time."

  The agent brightened. “Good, I thought she might have. Do you have proof?”

  Landon shook his head. “It would be a pretty naive system if we left proof, wouldn’t it?”

  Her smile fell. “So no proof. Not even a stamp or something?”

  “No." He swallowed, sifted the thing through in his mind. "What evidence do you have on your side?”

  She sat back in her chair and exhaled slowly. “Well, we have a shipment that went missing for almost twenty-four hours. Your company claims that was an innocent mistake. It was intended for the Department of Defense and arrived a day late. Which is no big deal unless you're talking about a potential war crime.”

  “That was a shipping error,” Landon said. “The company did a significant investigation. It ended up being a relatively trivial matter.”

  “Who conducted that investigation?”

  He blew out a long, slow breath. This had occurred to him, but it wasn't as simple and Carter probably thought it was. “Ms. Bruman, along with the Director of Operations for the plant in question and our Director of Technology.”

  “You weren’t directly involved?”

  “I read the executive summaries prepared for me. Nothing seemed especially out of the ordinary. It was in capable hands. Not only Ms. Bruman, but my Directors of Operations and Technology.”

  “Because you’re a busy man.”

  He put his hands up. “Even for a sensitive pharm like Phobos, I wouldn't handle something like a shipping error unless it seemed necessary after an initial investigation. There did not seem to be a need according to the report I received.”

  “Can you provide me with that executive summary?”

  Landon bit his lip, shrugged. He took his comm out of his pocket. “Where would you like it sent?”

  She told him, and he took a few minutes to find the message on his company server. The whole operation came off without a hitch and soon the file was sent. Carter was waiting for it on her tablet and opened it immediately.

  It only took her a few minutes to scan the document. “This is it? This is all you looked at?”

  He had to fight down a sigh. “It wouldn't be a very good summary if it took a long time to read, would it? I put people I trust in charge of the investigation. I didn’t see the need at the time to confirm any more than what is provided there.”

  She looked at him skeptically.

  He sat up straighter. "It had to be signed off on by all three of them. It isn't like there's a single point of failure on this."

  Carter nodded, her bright eyes still narrowed. “Did you interview the employees she claims to have interviewed?”

  “Not personally. That would be redundant." He shifted in his seat. "I suppose you could bring them in to talk if you believe it would help.”

  She waived her hand. “It’s already eight o’clock. She’ll be sprung by the time I have anything on that front.”

  He nodded. They needed hard evidence of something or there was no way Bruman was getting charged. He wracked his brain for any tidbit that might help.

  “What made you so sure you wanted her brought in, anyway?” she asked. "You had to be confident. By my research, you've known Bruman for a long time."

  He sat up straight. Of course. Known.

  “Did you confiscate her comm when you brought her in?” he asked excitedly.

  "No," she said, brows arched. "But we could get a warrant for it in a snap. Why?"

  He could feel his pulse throbbing in his throat. “Get it and run all the IDs she’s called or messaged with in the last two days," he said quickly.

  “Why?”

  His fists clenched. “Because someone who broke into my safe house and tried to kidnap me told me she was involved. If she is, there's going to be contact information for someone else there. I saw the guy's comm and can do a Recall for the comm's ID.”

  Carter’s jaw dropped, then snapped up like a hand caught in the cookie jar. She recovered her composure. “Did you say someone tried to kidnap you?”

  "Yes. It's not important right now."

  "Where is this person?"

  “I don’t know," he said with a wave of his hand. "He escaped.”

  Her expression, a mixture of shock and a scowl, told him she didn't want to drop it so quickly. “And you didn’t feel the need to report this to the authorities?”

  “There wasn’t a good opportunity."

  "There wasn't a good opportunity for you to call the police? But you had a comm. I talked to Kristina on it."

  Landon stared at her heard, his face very still. Had he just said too much? Was she really going to hold things up over Roy's escape?

  “Do you want to bust her or not?” he asked at last.

  Finally, she heaved a deep breath, her chest rising and falling dramatically. "Good lord, you people. This is why I'm out of vodka."

  "I'll get your next bottle."

  Her expression brightened. That seemed to cheer her up, at least. “What am I looking for?” she asked.

  “Pre-paid IDs. Things you can’t trace. She has to have something.”

  “You want me to trace the IDs?”

  He shrugged. “That can’t be too hard for you.”

  “No, but it will take time to get one of the techs free, even once we have the device. We're understaffed for these kinds of things.”

  Of course they were. Government offices always claimed they were understaffed for everything. But his mind jumped nimbly through several solutions almost at once. “Threaten a geo-location on any unidentified number as part of your investigation.”

  Finally, her face brightened. "A bluff? You think she's protecting someone?"

  "Maybe."

  She pressed her lips together hard, thinking the matter over. Then pulled her comm up on her desk.

  “You're right," he said, straightening up the lines of her suit. "I'm putting the order in now. Then we go back in.”

  CHAPTER 25

  It took her less than ten minutes to write up the express request for a warrant. From there, it was straight back to interrogation.

  They were there before he was ready for it. Carter stopped outside the door and dug through her pocket, then pulled out a thin white disc he recognized immediately as Nvigorate.

  She cocked a brow up at him. "Sorry I didn't offer you any, this is my last one."

  He watched as she put it to her lips and inhaled.

  "It's really good stuff, by the way. I have no idea how Andersen prefers coffee."

  Landon kept his face blank. "How do you know Kristina prefers coffee?"

  Carter smiled. “We all do a little research, don’t we?”

  “I suppose we do.”

  Carter held his gaze for a moment, then gave a last shrug. All expression fell from her face. She opened the door and stood aside. Landon walked in.

  The room seemed even smaller than before. Blank white walls with cameras at the middle of each side. Bruman and her attorney sat at the same dark metal desk. Now that he looked at it, it might not even be metal. Might be one of those metallic polymers they used for imitation metal. This one was dark and shiny like onyx. Its sheen was unblemished thanks to the smudge-resistant coating they had started using on these. The look was almost like a prototype you might see on a screen.

  Landon took a seat on his old-fashioned folding chair. Across from him, Bruman wore an angry scowl on her heavily made up face, her red-brown lips turned nastily. She wouldn't even look at him. Beside her, her silver-templed attorney looked ready to pounce.

  Carter took her seat beside him and didn't waste any time. “The FBI has received information that you’re cooperating in a criminal operation to kidnap Landon Tatum,” she said.

  The attorney reeled back as Carter continued.

  "The FBI is currently in the process of getting a warrant to seize your communication device and extract information contained both therein and within the cloud. That will include identification information for all calls incoming and outgoing, as well as messages. I don't anticipate any trouble with this request. In fact, I am confident the warrant will come through before we are done here. While we wait I want to ask: do you think we're going to find anything of interest?"

  Bruman stared back defiantly. "This sounds like a dreadful invasion of privacy far beyond what I agreed to in coming here."

  Carter leaned back. "However dreadful you may think it is, the agency believes it's necessary to our investigation. I anticipate the court will agree."

  "I will be having a word with the company's contacts in the Defense Department," she said. "This treatment is most unusual."

  "Be my guest."

  Bruman turned to her attorney. "Surely I do not have to surrender my comm?"

  The man's brows went up over his beady eyes, then he turned to Carter. "I thought we were here to discuss a delayed shipment, Agent Carter. It seems that was merely a pretense."

  Carter shook her head. "The case has evolved. At this point, we believe conspiracy to kidnapping is also a relevant charge."

  "So is she being charged or merely questioned?"

  "At this point it's an investigation. But that may change pending information found on the comm." She turned briefly to Landon, then leaned forward across the desk. "So I'll ask again: will we find anything?"

  "I see no incentive to cooperate any further in this voluntary questioning at this time."

  Carter leaned back in her seat. Landon could practically feel her eye roll. She was really selling this hard.

  "You and I both know that buys you about thirty minutes," she said.

  The attorney pressed his lips together. Landon watched the man carefully. He knew that Carter had him on this data if there was something there, and he had no idea what that data might be. That had to make any defense attorney nervous.

  His eyes went to Bruman and his throat tightened up into a knot.

  She'd gone glassy-eyed, like a blackout drunk at the end of the night. This was not normal at all.

  "Do you really want to piss me off right now?" Carter said.

  "My client has rights under the law, Agent Carter, and I intend to pursue those rights by ending this voluntary interview immediately."

  Landon swallowed hard, unable to take his eyes from Bruman's face. It had become a death mask, frozen in place. It was like she hadn't even heard the attorney.

  In a spasm, she turned to the side and bent down, disappearing under the desk.

  His fists clenched. What was going on? He turned to Carter to see if she had noticed this, but her eyes were locked on the attorney. That left Bruman free.

  Suddenly, an otherworldly sound of someone breathing heavily filled the room.

  It took him a moment to place the noise, even though it was coming from right in front of him. She popped up above the desk again with panic buzzing behind her eyes. Her mouth hung open like a fish out of water. Very little air seemed to be finding its way to her lungs.

  Both Carter and the attorney shot out of their chairs with a loud scraping sound.

  “This is intimidation," the attorney cried. "You're causing my client to have a panic attack!"

  Landon ignored him and leaned forward, still seated. He tried to catch Bruman's eye. But Bruman's eyes were locked on the pristine, black table in front of her. He swallowed hard. This wasn't a panic attack. He didn't know what it was, but it was something other than normal panic. He'd seen that before.

  It was then that he noticed the black case in front of her. Her eyes weren't locked on the table. They were on that case.

  That case was the size of a comm. And it looked like . . .

  That wasn't a case.

  Carter leaned forward. "What are you doing?" she cried.

  Landon's heart fell as he realized what he was seeing. That wasn't just a case. That was one of those Wipers sold by privacy freaks. When he squinted, he could see the button at its center. A button that, if pressed, would wipe the comm's cloud data instantly, along with making the device permanently inoperable.

  A button Bruman pressed.

  Just like that.

  Amazing what destruction could look like.

  Her eyes rose in slow motion and met his, just for an instant. They were cold and calculating.

  "It was business, Mr. Tatum," she said quietly. "I'm sure you understand."

  His breath went still. He didn't understand.

  But Bruman continued on, transitioning to Carter, her lips twisting nastily. The death mask was gone, snapped in half. This felt like another person.

  "I suppose you know what you have to do," she said, every syllable a sneer.

  She put her wrists together and slammed them on the table without another word.

  Landon reeled. His eyes went to Bruman's attorney. The gray-haired man looked distraught.

  Then his attention went back to Bruman's face. The force of her conviction on this was shocking. Why was she doing this? What could they find that she would want to avoid?

  Destroying evidence like that right in Carter’s face...this was basically a confession to everything that had been talked about. Kidnapping. The shipment of Phobos. Attempted murder, even. Why not at least take her chances with a trial?

  "Jenna Bruman, I am taking you into custody on suspicion of obstruction of justice."

  From somewhere to his left, those words came. Probably Carter. Landon sat in his seat as activity swirled around him. People may have entered the room, or maybe not. Eventually someone tugged at his arm and he stood, went back into those sterile, labyrinthine halls.

  It didn't add up. Betrayal he could understand, stomach even. But why? What did she have to gain from getting him out of the picture? What could she want?

  Someone always wants something. What did she want?

  CHAPTER 26

  The cafe disappeared in a blur as she worked.

  Or rather, she had faith it was still there, but where before it had been a welcome white noise distraction, it ceased to be even that. Nothing—not the cafe, not the baristas, not the background music, not the ceramic table, not even her body—existed. The only things she was conscious of were the screens she flashed through in building her case.

  She'd built up half a dozen points on Brantley that would need following up if Carter could give her anything. Just one confirmation and pieces would fall in place. There were potential connections all over the place with Moonlight. Too much sketchiness going on for it to be coincidence. Something was there, even if it didn't involve the case. Which it probably did.

  And she still hadn't even found another link with the motel. That place was incredibly suspicious, even outside of what had happened earlier. How were they staying open? Money laundering? Seemed dumb with all the regulations on motels, but if you had the right contacts in the city . . .

  Her comm buzzed from somewhere else.

  She looked around for it and felt a sudden displacement at her disconnect from the screen. Should have hooked her comm into her tab.

  Finally, she found the device. It was Landon.

  Excitement flared through her body as she put the device to her ear. “I think I have something here with Brantley," she said by way of greeting. "It's connected to Moonlight. He has a step-brother who—”

  “Don't bother.”

  Kristina froze. The lights in the cafe shone bright but her vision narrowed for a moment and the whole world was in motion, all of it all around her. She blinked and realized her breaths were coming short. She gripped the comm tight.

  “What do you mean?” she asked weakly. "Don't bother why?"

  “She's guilty." He took a deep, audible breath on the other line. "They threatened her with extracting the info from her comm and she pulled out one of those Wipers and destroyed the thing right in Carter's face."

  Kristina tried to picture it. The audacity of doing that...those were illegal to even carry into an FBI office. What could she have been thinking?

  "But I have all this material on Brantley—"

  "It's over, Kristina. I was there. Nobody does that just on principle. Certainly not Ms. Bruman."

  She blinked. The sounds of the coffee shop—clashing dishes, whirring of the coffee grinder, the low-key music—happened around her. The world continued.

  "But why?" she asked.

  A delay.

  "I don't know," he said. "She said it was business. Maybe the contents of the comm would make things worse for her somehow."

  "But if she was protecting someone . . ."

  "Who, though? Brantley? Do you really think she would take the fall for him?"

  The two of them were silent for a moment. Possibilities raced through her mind like cars in the night, but she left them all unsaid. Nothing was going to get through to him right now.

  “So,” Kristina said finally. “What now?”

  She could practically hear his shrug. He seemed to be considering his answer. “I...don’t know exactly."

  "Do you think this is over?"

  "For now, yes. Even if someone was looking for Bruman, they would have to see this as a golden opportunity to lay low and regroup."

  She took a deep breath. There was something here with Brantley...but if Bruman were connected to Brantley, there is no way she would take the fall for him. No. Way. Brantley wasn't the type to inspire loyalty like that.

  "Wake up tomorrow and begin managing the public relations fallout," Landon continued. "I imagine. Get ready for that culling we talked about at dinner . . .”

  He trailed off, the conviction in his voice falling with very syllable. It was a feeling she understood well.

  Kristina closed her eyes. Maybe this was over. For now, anyway.

  “Where are you?” she asked.

  Horns blared through her comm. Landon didn’t answer.

  “Landon? You’ve just had a big shock. Where are you?”

  Another deep breath. “This is tough to swallow.”

  “Landon, where are you? I want to see you.”

  “I’ll pick you up," he said. Some conviction had returned to his voice. "Where did you get set up?”

  She looked out the window, as if he were about to show up in an instant. “Camus. It’s an espresso bar at Halsted and Grand.”

 

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