David Kent - The Triangle Conspiracy

Faith flexed and unflexed her hands. “What happened, Sean?”

“Did you see or hear any news this morning?”

“A little bit on the radio driving in. Why?”

“Anything about shots fired at an apartment complex?”

Faith glanced at him. “Yeah, on the northwest side. Neighbors heard a big ruckus in the apartment next door. By the time the cops got there, the girl who lives there was missing.”

Sean covered his eyes with the back of his hand, as if the sun were too bright.

“Sean?” Faith said. “Hello?”

“What did they say about the girl who lived there?”

“What’s this about? Do you know something about this?” Faith tugged his sleeve, making him stop. “Were you there?”

Sean jerked away from her touch. “The girl who lived there! What did they say about her?”

Faith stared at him for a long moment, then dropped her hand. They continued walking, leaving the cathedral behind. “I don’t remember her name. It was something fairly common-sounding, I think. Just that she was young and hadn’t lived there very long.” They reached the corner at Hudson Avenue. Diagonally across the street was the new Metro Transit bus terminal.

“Shit,” Sean whispered.

“Tell me,” Faith said, as they started to cross Hudson.

Sean gathered in a shaky breath. “It’s part of this job I’m doing. Yes, I was there.” They reached the other side of the street. Faith motioned to a bench outside the main part of the bus terminal, and they sat down. Sean put a hand on his sister’s shoulder. “Faith, I need your help. I need to keep this girl safe and out of sight for a while.”

Faith was silent for a while. Behind them, a bus pulled into the terminal, bringing noise and fumes and only half a dozen passengers. “Who is she?” Faith finally said.

“Sorry, I can’t,” Sean said. “If I start talking about it, then the whole thing’s blown.”

“And you think I have a way to help you keep her safe and out of sight?”

“I need a safe house,” Sean said abruptly.

Faith half-turned on the bench. “You need a what?”

Sean tilted his head back, looked at the sky, then looked at the ground. “Let’s cut the bullshit, sister. If you’re working for Department Thirty, you’ve got access to safe houses.”

At the words Department Thirty coming from her brother’s mouth, Faith leaned back as if she’d been slapped.

“Don’t do that,” Sean said. “Come on, you’re working for Thirty. ‘Special projects’ in DOJ? That only means one thing. Federal law enforcement is like a small town, Faith. Even if we don’t all know each other, we’ve all heard of each other, and we all have an opinion of each other. You were always interested in WITSEC when you joined the Marshals anyway. Thirty is just one step through the looking glass from WITSEC.”

“You’re quite the philosopher.”

Sean slammed a hand down on the metal bus bench. “Goddammit, Faith! I need your help!” He lowered his voice. “You do work for Department Thirty, don’t you?”

Faith was silent.

“Jesus Christ,” Sean said. “What do I have to do? Remember in the eighties? People started to hear rumors about this federal department called the National Security Agency-NSA. The joke was that it really stood for No Such Agency, and you didn’t talk about it. You just didn’t. Now the NSA’s got a website. A website, for Christ’s sake, Faith! Thirty is now what NSA was then. I understand that. I don’t agree with what it does, but I guess that’s not for me to say, either. Maybe all of what I know is myth and rumor. Doesn’t matter. I…need…your…help.”

“You’re putting me in an impossible position,” Faith said. “You know that, don’t you?”

Sean shook his head. “No, I’m not. I’m your brother and I need help. I need access to resources you have. It’ll just be for a while.”

Faith bowed her head. “Dammit,” she muttered. She finally looked up and met her brother’s eyes. She folded her hands together and squeezed hard. “I have two safe locations in the metro area. One’s out in the Yukon-Mustang area, and it’s in use right now.”

“The other?”

“A house in Edmond.”

“Where’s Edmond?”

“Northern suburb. It’s the real white-collar suburb for the city.”

Sean smiled. “Kind of like Evanston is to Chicago.”

“We were going to sell the place, for several reasons, but I convinced my boss that we needed more than one safe facility in the area.”

“My baby sister, working in the deepest, darkest of the shadows. How do you like it?”

“That’s not a…” Faith stopped, tapped her foot, unclenched her fingers. Her knuckles were sore. She tried again. “I don’t think anyone likes Department Thirty, except maybe the director and the attorney general. It’s just…it’s what I do.”

Sean waited, but Faith said no more. Finally he stood up. “Well,” he said.

“I’m not sure what kind of furniture is in the Edmond house,” she said.

“Anything is fine. I just need to keep this girl safe and out of sight until I can…”

Faith raised her eyebrows.

“Complicated,” Sean said. “You understand complicated these days, I suspect.”

“That I do,” Faith said.

They started to walk back toward the corner of Fourth and Hudson. “I have the keys in my office,” Faith said.

“I appreciate this,” Sean said. “I appreciate you trusting me.”

Faith kept walking, not breaking stride. “But in return, you need to do something for me.”

“I already said, I can’t tell you anything about her or the job itself.”

“No, it’s not that.”

Sean looked surprised. “Then what?”

“I’m trusting you, now you trust me.” Faith gave him a long look.

Sean shrugged. He put his hands in his pockets again. Before he did, Faith saw his tremors. She pulled out her cell phone, called a number, and said, “We’re coming.”

Faith pointed the Miata north from downtown, then cut across to Western Avenue and turned north again. Just past the quirky Western Avenue strip of antique shops and bohemian boutiques, she pulled into a large parking lot beside an unmarked office building across the street from the sprawling campus of Bishop McGinnis Catholic High School.

She’d been silent the entire way, fiddling with the radio and ignoring Sean’s questions. “Here we are,” she said after stopping the car.

Sean got out, looking around. A few people were milling around the parking lot, some smoking cigarettes. There were a few older, well-dressed men and women, a few guys who looked like laborers, a couple of twentysomething girls who looked like punk rockers, complete with flaming pink hair and multiple tattoos. They all seemed to be waiting for something.

“What is this?” Sean said.

“Come on,” Faith said.

“Sister, what the hell is this?”

Faith led him through a glass door and into a small waiting room. The décor was neutral, with a couple of outdated but clean office-type chairs, a potted ivy, a couple of neutral pictures on the walls.

A tiny blond woman was walking toward them. “Hi, there you are!” she said.

“Hi, Cara,” Faith said. “Cara Dunaway, this is my brother, Sean Kelly. Sean, my friend Cara.”

Dunaway extended a hand. “Hi, Sean. Glad you’re here.”

Sean shook her hand. “Where exactly is ‘here’?”

Dunaway slid a glance to Faith, who only shrugged.

“Why don’t you come on back?” Dunaway said. “We’re about ready to start.”

Sean made more questioning sounds, but followed the two women down a short hallway, which then opened into a large meeting room. Rows and rows of folding chairs were set up, facing a slightly raised platform and podium. In one back corner of the room was what looked like a bar area, except no liquor bottles were visible. Faith and Sean smelled strong coffee brewing.