Carol Ericson - Code Conspiracy

“Stay right there. I’m serious. I’m coming.” She glanced up at Gray. “ We’re coming.”

He raised his eyebrows and tapped the handle of the spoon against his chest.

Jerrica nodded and ended the call, stuffing the envelope into her back pocket. “You wanted inside information on Denver? Here’s your chance.”

“What’s this all about? Who was on the phone?”

“That was one of my coworkers at Dreadworm.” She downed the rest of her wine. “He thinks he’s being followed.”

“What does that have to do with Denver?”

“Amit was working on delving into some classified correspondence regarding that weapons stash at the embassy outpost in Nigeria.” She grabbed her backpack and slung it over one shoulder. “Denver was on that, wasn’t he?”

“He was, and now your coworker is being followed.” Gray cocked his head. “He’s not…like you, is he?”

She wrinkled her nose. “What exactly does that mean?”

“You know, slightly paranoid.”

She punched his shoulder with a right jab that made him flinch. “Get your stuff. We’re meeting him in twenty minutes at a coffeehouse in the Village.”

He grabbed his flannel and rubbed his shoulder. “Can we walk?”

“Subway. I’ll make a New Yorker out of you yet.”

As they raced down the building’s stairs, Gray poked her back. “Why are we running to meet Amit? If you need to talk to him in person, why doesn’t he come here?”

“He’s scared. I could hear it in his voice. That’s the best time to get them talking.”

“Dreadworm shares information with the world. Are you telling me that its employees don’t share with each other?”

“Employees? We’re not really employees.”

She hiked up her pack and strode down the sidewalk of her Lower East Side neighborhood where people still milled around after their dinners and ducked in and out of shops. Gray kept pace with her.

Jerrica made a sharp right turn to head down the stairs to a subway station.

He followed her down and grabbed her arm as she started to push through the turnstile. “I need a Metrocard.”

“Oh, I forgot.” She led him to a machine and he purchased a single ride.

If Jerrica planned to dart around the city dragging him along with her, he’d better get a pass next time. But really, the woman had enough money stashed away to hire a car service. He did, too, but he felt about as disconnected from his money as she did from hers—probably for similar reasons. Neither one of them had earned the money on their own.

The subway swallowed them up and spit them out somewhere on the edge of Greenwich Village.

“Do you know where you’re going? You haven’t looked at the address since you wrote it down in your kitchen.” He lengthened his stride to match her smaller but more numerous steps.

She patted the back pocket of her jeans. “It’s right here if you wanna have a look, but I memorized it.”

His gaze darted to her backside, shapely in her tight jeans, and his knees weakened for a second before he stuffed his hand in his own pocket. “That’s okay. I trust that brain of yours.”

“It’s not much farther. Probably just around the next corner.”

He didn’t even bother asking her how she knew that. He’d accepted her calculating mind. What he couldn’t accept was her guarded heart, but then he’d exceeded her distrustful expectations by dumping her once he’d found out she worked for Dreadworm. She’d fully gotten and relished the irony of his asking for her help, using the same skills he’d lambasted before.

He could live with eating crow—a lot of it—if it meant clearing Denver and getting to the bottom of this terrorist plot.

Jerrica tugged on his sleeve. “This way. You were about to pass it right by.”

He veered to the right, dodging oncoming pedestrians. How could Amit know anyone was following him with all these people coming and going?

“This is it.” Jerrica tipped her chin toward a building with a blue-and-white striped awning over the front door. “I hope he’s still here and didn’t get spooked.”

Gray lunged past her to open the door, and the soft strains of a guitar melody curled around them, drawing them into a dark space where he caught a whiff of roasted coffee beans. He couldn’t drink coffee at this time of night, but the smells took him back to late-night conversations with Jerrica, who seemed to run on the stuff when she was working on a gnarly hacking job for Dreadworm—when he’d believed she was just a programmer dedicated to her clients.

He glanced at her, eyes closed and nostrils flaring, getting a caffeine buzz off the fumes.

Her lids flew open and she scanned the room. “Damn, I don’t see Amit.”

“Do you want to get something and wait?” He gestured toward the counter. “I could go for a chocolate croissant.”

“You go ahead.” She swung her backpack around and dipped into the front zippered pouch, pulling out her phone. “I’m going to text him.”

As Gray joined the line of mostly college students ordering complicated caffeinated concoctions, Jerrica hunched over her phone.

He reached the counter and ordered his croissant and a slice of lemon cake for Jerrica, even though she didn’t know she wanted it yet. He dipped into his pocket for his wallet and twisted around. “Did he…?”

The strange woman behind him folded her arms and looked him up and down, a pair of pencil-thin eyebrows raised above her tortoiseshell glasses.

“Sorry. I thought you were my…friend. Did you see where she went? Black hair, about yea big?” He held his hand just beneath his chin.

She shook her head and went back to her phone.

“Sir, that’s $6.75.” The barista waited, a patient but trained smile on her face.

He handed her a crumpled ten. “Did you see where my friend went?”

“I didn’t notice.” She lifted her shoulders. “Maybe the restroom? They’re around the corner.”

“Thanks.” Gray stepped out of line and waved his hand at the change on the counter, his heart beating an uncomfortable rhythm in his chest that didn’t at all complement the strains of the folk music from the small stage.

He took the corner to the bathrooms at such high speed, he nearly plowed into a woman on crutches.

“I’m sorry.” He pointed to one of the restrooms. “Anyone in there?”

The woman readjusted her crutch under her arm. “It’s all yours. Good thing since you’re in such a big hurry.”

Gray maneuvered past her and tried the other door. “Jerrica?”

A gruff male voice answered him. “Nope.”

Gray poked his head into the other restroom and confirmed what the woman on crutches had told him—empty.

He peered down the short hallway at a back door with a glowing Exit sign above it. Could Jerrica have gone out there to meet Amit?

He strode down the short, dark length of the hallway and pushed against the metal bar. He stepped into the alley, and held his breath against the odor of garbage coming from the overflowing dumpster to his left.

As he huffed the smell from his nose, a scraping, shuffling noise from beyond the dumpster made him cock his head. Adrenaline pumped through his body with a whoosh that left him light-headed…but just for a second.

His body shifted into gear and he launched past the dumpster.

Jerrica’s face appeared to him as a white oval in the darkness for a split second before the lump crouching at her feet took human form, rose and slammed her body against the wall.

The man drove his shoulder into her ribs as he smashed against her, pushing the air from her lungs. Her attention had been distracted by the appearance of Gray in the alley, but she couldn’t wait for him to come to the rescue.