Chris Jordan - Measure of Darkness

The touch of his fingertip is like a button shutting off her resistance. Less than a minute later he snaps the padlock on the hardened steel door of the secure room in the cottage basement, heads for his vehicle and is soon exiting the gated estate. A few miles west of the rocky coastline, this scenic road will intersect a major highway. Until then he makes sure to keep just below the speed limit. It would be very awkward if one of the local cops pulls him over, wants to see what he has defrosting in the trunk.

Yikes.

Kidder feels content with his purpose-this new, last-minute assignment is going to be fun. Challenging but fun. He glances at Google Maps in his lap and thinks happy thoughts.

I return to the residence walking on air.

Alice Crane, Super Investigator, able to successfully interrogate reluctant neighbors, discover leaf-obscured sandboxes and enter tall buildings in a single bound. Okay, the neighbor wasn’t exactly reluctant, but still, it was my idea and I came away with an eyewitness account that proves beyond doubt, to me at least, that Joseph Keener was the father of a small child. Considering the circumstance, I shouldn’t feel this happy-a kid is missing, what is there to be happy about? — but the success of the mission makes me want to punch the air and shout yes! just like they do in the movies, only Mrs. Beasley might see me and throw a stale muffin at my head. Not that her baked items ever last long enough to go stale, but you get the idea.

Be cool, girl. Like it’s all in a day’s work.

Right, right, let me give it a try. Trying, trying. Nope, never happen. I’ll never be cool. Not unless cool involves shouting, “I did it! I did it!” while bounding up the stairs to the command center.

Only to find the big room hushed and empty.

For one horrible moment I imagine that the mysterious assault team returned in my absence, abducting everyone but me. And then light footsteps come padding along the hallway carpet and boss lady pokes her head inside the door.

“You screamed?” she says, and beckons me to follow.

She and Teddy have been hunkered down at his main computer terminal, all agog over some new spy program developed by our young software genius.

“It’s so simple that it’s almost beautiful,” boss lady enthuses, acting very much like a proud mother. “And it’s functioning perfectly.”

“Simple also means limited,” he reminds her. “We can look but not touch.”

“It’s a kind of invisible, undetectable window into their system,” Naomi explains, attempting to share. “Planted by Jack’s operative at Keener’s company, Quanta Gate.”

“More like a reflection of a window,” Teddy corrects. He manages to look embarrassed and pleased at the same time. Then, as if to deflect attention away from his faux-hawked self, he goes, “Alice? Um, what happened out there?”

“Oh, nothing much. Just proved that the dead professor had a kid, that’s all. With a mysterious Chinese lady.”

That finally gets their attention.

“Details,” boss lady demands.

“I should save it for the next case briefing.”

“Don’t be cute,” she says, giving me The Squint. The Squint means we’ve had our fun but joke-time is over, wisecracks are no longer appreciated. It’s boss lady turning off the friendly switch and getting serious and making you serious, too. And so I give her the play-by-play, including the demon cats and the sandbox, and Professor Keener calling the child his “keyboard kid.”

“Odd that he would call him that,” she says. “I wonder what it means, exactly. It must mean something.”

Riffing, I say, “Maybe if you’re a weird genius that’s a term of endearment. Anyhow, the point is, whatever their names are, the mother and child used to visit frequently, but the visits stopped two years ago. Haven’t been seen since, at least by the neighbor. They stopped coming around. Does that mean the mother broke up with the professor, possibly returned to China?”

“I suppose anything is possible at this point. Whoever this woman is, Keener kept her off the grid. Randall Shane never mentioned anything about the mother being Chinese.”

“He didn’t have time to mention much of anything before the windows got kicked in.”

“Good point. Give Jack and Dane a call, let them know about the boy.”

“Will do.”

Boss lady nods, frowning to herself. “I’d love to know what the ‘keyboard kid’ reference means. We’ll try Googling the phrase, but off the top of your head, what first comes to mind when you hear the word keyboard? ”

I shrug. “Computers, I guess. And pianos.”

“Pianos?”

“Pianos have keyboards.”

“Right! Of course they do. Hmm. Interesting.”

Without formally ending the conversation-a habit she has when distracted-Naomi wanders away, looking even more thoughtful than usual, which is sort of like saying a saint looks even more religious when the halo blinks on.

The good ship Lady Luck currently resides at an upscale marina in Quincy, just south of the city, in sight of the skyscrapers in the financial district, which seems fitting. Speaking of skyscrapers, Jonny Bing’s hundred-and-ninety-foot yacht looms over every other boat in the marina, many of them quite sizable, but nothing much compared to four stories of Lady Luck, gleaming like a huge pile of freshly laundered cash.

Jack Delancey positions his spotless vehicle in the far reaches of the marina parking lot, where it’s less likely to get dinged. He’s just back from Concord, New Hampshire, three and a half hours turnaround, a waste of time, most of it spent behind the wheel, and he’s more than ready to stretch his legs on this last little task before reporting back to Naomi. He happily saunters past a waterfront condo development, which includes a few trendy restaurants and at least one destination bar that’s been cited numerous times for an infestation of noisy, wine-quaffing yuppies. The rent-a-cop at the gate picks up on Jack’s cop vibe and waves him through with a lazy salute that makes the former FBI agent grin to himself. Beyond the breakwater the harbor sparkles under a clear sky, although the view is more than a little restricted by the sheer bulk of Lady Luck.

He proceeds along a system of floating docks. Thirty yards from the enormous yacht, Jack pauses to flip open his cell. By previous arrangement he identifies himself and announces his proximity. Less than a minute later a little Asian dude wearing a faded pink guayabera, baggy shorts and a jaunty gold-braided captain’s hat comes out to what Jack assumes is the bridge and waves him aboard. A red-carpeted gangway delivers him to one of the lower decks, where he waits for further guidance. Almost immediately the little dude with the spiffy captain’s hat leans over a rail of an upper deck and asks, in a distinctive Boston accent, “You wearing deck shoes, Mr. Delancey?”

Jack shakes his head, sticks out a perfectly polished leather shoe. “Morellis.”

“Ten and a half?”

“Eleven.”

“Wait there.”

Minutes pass. The little dude returns with a pair of brand-new Sperry Top-Siders, still in the box. He comes down a curving, mahogany-railed stairway, hands the box to Jack. “Keep ’em,” he says. “We’ve got plenty.”

“You’re Jonny Bing.”

“The one and only,” the little dude says, pleased to be recognized.

Jack unlaces his Italian handmades, slips on the Top-Siders. “Thanks for seeing me on short notice. It’s much appreciated.”