Douglas Preston - Gideon's Corpse

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to avoid the subject.” He tried to cover up his runaway interest by adopting a slightly accusatory tone. “It’s just that I thought your father was going to help us. Now he’s running away.”

“He has helped us! He’s not running away, either. Look, we’re safe here, we can use this as a base to find out who framed you. All we have to do is track down that man Willis. It makes sense that he and his crazy cult are behind this. He’ll be caught, the hunt will be over, and you and I will be cleared.”

Gideon nodded, feeling awful all over again. “Yes. I’m sure that will happen.” He gulped the rest of his drink.

She sat back. “Gideon, are you ready to talk? Or are you just trying to forestall it with all these questions about my father? I don’t want to force myself on you.”

He nodded dumbly, attempted a smile. He was already wishing for a second drink. “Sure.”

“I hesitate to bring up a painful subject, but… Well, you know I’m direct. I say what I think, even if I put my foot in my mouth. I hope you know that about me by now.”

“I do,” he croaked.

She drew closer. “I know you may have a fatal condition. That doesn’t frighten me off. I’m ready to make a commitment to you. That’s what I’ve been thinking about. That’s what I’ve wanted to tell you. I haven’t felt this way about a guy…well, ever.”

Gideon could hardly manage to look at her.

She took his hands in hers. “Life is short. Even if it’s true, and you only have a year—well, let’s make that year count. Together. You and me. Will you do that? We’ll roll up a lifetime of love into one year.”

Fordyce followed Millard through the sea of desks and cubicles that formed the new command and control center. A glorious dawn was breaking outside, but in the converted warehouse, the air was dead and close and the lighting fluorescent.

Millard was a true company man, thought Fordyce; always pleasant, never sarcastic, tone of voice mild—and yet, underneath it all, a raging asshole. What was the word the Germans used? Schadenfreude. Taking pleasure in the misfortune of others. That described Millard’s attitude perfectly. The moment Millard had phoned asking for a meeting, Fordyce had been able to guess what it was about.

“How are you feeling, Agent Fordyce?” Millard asked, his voice laden with false empathy.

“Very good, sir,” Fordyce replied.

Millard shook his head. “I don’t know. You look tired to me. Very tired, in fact.” He squinted at Fordyce as if he were an object behind museum glass. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. You’ve been working yourself too hard.”

“I don’t think so. I’m really feeling fine.”

Millard shook his head again. “No. No, you look exhausted. I appreciate your team spirit, but I simply can’t allow you to go on working yourself like this.” He paused, as if gathering himself for the kill. “You need to take a vacation.”

“You already told me to take a few days off.”

“This is not a—how should I say it?—a quick break. I want you to take some serious time off from the job, Agent Fordyce.”

That was it—the line he’d been waiting to hear. “Time off? Why?”

“To recharge your batteries. Regain an objective outlook.”

“How long are we talking about, exactly?”

Millard shrugged. “That’s a little hard to say at present.”

An indefinite leave of absence. That’s what they called it. Fordyce realized that, once he was out the door, that would be it. If he was going to do something, he had to do it now—right now. They only had one day .

“Novak is dirty,” he said.

This was such a non sequitur that Millard stopped short. “Novak?”

“Novak. Chief of security for Tech Area Thirty-three. He’s dirty. Take him in, sweat him, do what it takes.”

A long silence. “Perhaps you’d better explain.”

“Novak’s living a lifestyle way beyond his means. Luxury cars, a big house, Persian rugs, all on a hundred and ten thousand a year. His wife doesn’t work, and there’s no family money.”

Millard looked at him sideways. “And why is this significant?”

“Because there’s only one person who could’ve planted those emails in Crew’s account, and it’s Novak.”

“And how do you know all this?”

Fordyce took a breath. He had to say it. “I interviewed him.”

Millard stared at him. “I’m aware of that.”

“How?”

“Novak complained. You barged into his house after midnight, no authorization, didn’t follow any interview protocols—what did you expect?”

“I had no choice. We’re out of time. The fact is, the guy lied to investigators, told them it was impossible to plant those emails. He forgot to mention he’s the only one who could have done it.”

Millard stared at him long and hard, his lips compressed. “Are you saying Novak framed Crew? For money?”

“All I’m saying is, the guy’s dirty. Take him in now, sweat the bastard—”

Millard’s lips became almost invisible. The man’s skin seemed to tighten across his face, as if he were drying out. “You are out of line, mister. Your behavior is unacceptable, and these demands are improper and, frankly, outrageous.”

Fordyce couldn’t take it anymore. “Improper? Millard, N-Day is tomorrow. Tomorrow! And you want me to—”

A loud commotion erupted at the main door. A man was shouting, his shrill manic voice echoing in the warehouse space, rising above the hubbub of voices swirling around him. He had apparently just been brought in, and as his outrage rang out, Fordyce heard disjointed accusations of police brutality and government conspiracies. Clearly a nut case.

And then Fordyce heard Gideon’s shouted name mingling with the incoherent mix.

“What the hell?” Millard flashed him another look. “Don’t you go anywhere. I’ll get back to you in a moment.”

Fordyce followed Millard to the front, where the man was haranguing a large group of agents. He was shocked to see it was Willis Lockhart, the cult leader. He hadn’t been brought in, it seemed—he had come in on his own. But what a change: he was wild, his face haggard, spittle on his lips. From the outraged, furious rant, Fordyce gathered that Gideon Crew had showed up at the ranch the previous night, kidnapped Willis at gunpoint, brought him to a grave he’d dug in the woods, brutalized him, tortured him, threatened to kill him, all the while demanding answers to questions about nukes and terrorism and God knows what else.

So Gideon was still alive.

Willis screeched about how it was all a plan, a plot, a conspiracy, before his rantings dissolved into incoherency.

At that moment, Fordyce was suddenly and utterly convinced: Gideon Crew was innocent. There was no other explanation—none—for why he would have gone to the Paiute Creek Ranch and done what he did to Willis. He had been framed. Those emails had been planted. And just as clearly, it meant that Novak was in on the terrorist plot. Even though he already half believed it, now the conclusion was inescapable.

“Hey! Hey, you!”

Lockhart’s scream interrupted this epiphany. Fordyce looked up to see the cult leader staring at him, extending a shaking finger. “It’s him! There he is! It’s the other guy who came up to the ranch last week! They started a fight, trashed the place, left my people hurt! You son of a bitch!”

Fordyce glanced left and right. Everyone was staring at him, Millard included.

“Fordyce,” Millard said in a strange voice, “is this another man you interviewed?”

“Interviewed?” Lockhart shouted. “You mean brutalized! He attacked half a dozen of my people with a chain saw! He’s a maniac! Arrest him! Or are all of you part of it as well?”