Jeff Abbott - Fear

‘Let her have her antidepressant, man,’ Nathan said.

Groote gave him a kick to the chest that floored him. ‘I don’t want to hear your whining. I am incredibly tired of you people.’

‘My pill’s in my purse. In the next room.’ She slapped at her chest, as if she were beating back a howl climbing into her throat. ‘I have sedatives too. For Nathan.’

In his frown gone straight, she saw Groote make the decision she calculated he might; he could force a pharmacy down their throats, keep them under control. Groote put the gun on Nathan, hauled him to his feet. ‘Come on, Tin Soldier. Try anything and you get a bad dent.’

She walked to the next room, Groote and Nathan a step behind her. She walked to her purse.

‘Wrong,’ Groote said. ‘Pick it up by the bottom, Mrs. Brent, dump it on the floor. No surprises.’

She did as he asked and her junk tumbled in a pile on the greasy gray carpet: lipstick, the extra rubber bands Miles had brought her, her money clip, a black notebook, an empty pill vial, wallet, her cell phone, switched off as Miles had ordered so the wireless company couldn’t get a reading on her location. She crouched among the junk.

‘Hands away from the cell phone. Kick it to me,’ Groote ordered.

She obeyed. He crushed the phone under his heel, breaking the keys and the screen.

She cranked open the pill vial. Empty.

‘Oh,’ she said. ‘I’m – I’m out.’ But she fidgeted, put her knee over the money clip.

‘Stupid,’ Groote said. She stayed kneeling.

‘Get up, Tin Soldier, on the bed, I’m tying you two up.’

She got up, closing her fist around the clip. She worked the money loose, let the clip drop to the floor. Between the soft, worn bills the sharp bite of her razor nipped at her finger. She folded it in her hand.

Groote didn’t see. He shoved her on the bed across from Nathan. ‘If one of you moves, you die,’ Groote said.

Tie me first, she thought, please. Because Nathan could help her fight him when Groote drew close to her.

But he tied Nathan first, pulling the phone cord loose from the wall, securing Nathan’s hands and feet together, ripping a pillowcase, jamming a near-choking length into Nathan’s mouth.

She told herself: Don’t flinch.

There wasn’t another phone cord in the room, so he snapped loose the curtain cord and came toward her.

She knelt on the bed and stuck her hands out in front of her, as though prepping to be handcuffed, and before he could reach her she said, ‘I have most of the five million that I won. It’s yours. Just let us go.’

And because he thought she was about to beg, not fight, he paused. ‘I don’t give a shit about your money.’

‘I can’t be tied up. Because of what happened to me… when my husband died.’ Not a problem to put fear into her voice. But she was more afraid of what would happen if she didn’t stop him. ‘Don’t tie me. I know where Frost is. Right now.’

‘Where?’

She raised her chin. ‘I don’t want Nathan to hear.’

She figured Groote would steer her into the next room but he was too eager, he leaned closer to her and she might not get close again so she slapped at him. Except the razor was tight and true between her fingers and the blade scored a garish red thread across his face, along his cheek, close to the eye.

He stumbled back in shock and she swung at him again, but he clubbed her arm aside with a low animal grunt that rose into a scream. She darted the razor toward his throat. Groote belted a fist into her temple and she tumbled off the bed. He levered his foot hard on her wrist, forced her fingers open, and the razor slipped free of them.

‘Date with pain.’ His voice sounded broken. ‘That’s right, you cut me, bitch, it better not scar, it better not scare Amanda…’ His voice stopped and she fought him, biting, kicking, his hands clamping over her mouth, and he carried her, headfirst, into the bathroom. He held her upside down; her feet brushed the plaster ceiling.

‘Where is Frost? Where is it?’

‘I don’t know-’ she started to say, and then she saw the open toilet rushing toward her face. She managed a startled gulp of air before he drove her face into the shallow water.

Celeste struggled but he pinioned her legs with his own, her hands with one of his massive arms, and held her head at a precise angle and her face rammed against the porcelain. He’s done this before, she realized in shock.

‘You know! Tell me! Where is it?’ he yelled.

All she could do was keep kicking, make him fight to drown her.

The air exploded from her lungs as though seeking release and she choked, breathed the water, and then he let her go. She fell to the cold tile, spluttering, coughing, tasting her own blood from her lips.

‘Mrs. Brent? Are you well?’

The voice from the phone. Above her stood a fiftyish man, hair dark as coal, skin pale, with the biggest gun she’d ever seen pressed against Groote’s head.

‘Why are we both dead men?’ Miles asked.

‘We know too much. Or rather, people think we know too much.’ Edward Wallace stepped aside and Miles walked into the house. He could see a back wall, dotted with photos. Of Allison. Wearing glasses, hair lighter in color, cut longer.

‘About Frost.’

‘Do you have it?’ Cautious hope lit Wallace’s eyes.

‘No. You do.’

Hope changed to surprise. ‘What?’

‘Allison hid the files on a server here. The day she died.’

‘Oh, Jesus. That explains it.’ Wallace sank against the wall.

‘Not to me, Doctor Wallace.’

‘I don’t have Frost.’

‘But you could access this system where she put the files-’

‘No. Listen, you have to go. Now. You can’t be here when Dodd gets here.’

‘Who’s Dodd?’ Miles remembered having heard the name when Sorenson spoke on the phone in Allison’s office: Dodd doesn’t know. And asking Allison who Dodd was as she hung up on him before she died. Dodd. The missing piece of the puzzle.

‘You can’t be here and you can’t know who he is. Please. Just go.’

‘No. Show me this system where she uploaded the files.’

‘I don’t have the Frost files.’

‘You erased them.’

‘No. I don’t know what happened,’ Wallace said. He set the gun down on the table, ran a hand through his hair, which stuck in clumps as though he’d run his hands through it in unending worry for the whole day.

‘Your wife asked me for help, Doctor. I didn’t help her in time and she’s dead, and the only way to help her now is to make sure whoever killed her doesn’t get away with it.’

Wallace’s half cough, half laugh was a strange sound in the quiet of the bungalow. ‘You. Stop them. I don’t know which side killed her, but you won’t stop them. Listen. Dodd could arrive at any time. We need to go.’

If you’re so afraid of this Dodd, why haven’t you already left? Miles wondered.

‘Dodd wants Frost. Why? Who is he?’

‘If I tell you – will you help me hide? Before they kill me the way they killed Renee.’

This didn’t add up, but the fear on the man’s face seemed real and defined. ‘These people killed your wife. Why don’t you just go to the cops?’

‘I – can’t go to the police.’

‘Explain.’

Wallace took a fortifying deep breath. ‘Dodd was in charge of the original Frost project.’

‘Hurley and Quantrill didn’t create Frost?’

‘No. They built on our findings. I was on the original Frost research team,’ Wallace said. ‘So was Renee.’

‘Why was she living as Allison Vance?’

‘She had no choice – being Allison was her cover story. Dodd forced her. He’s with the government.’