“Just... another... second,” she said, spacing out the words carefully, so the loud clunk came the instant she finished saying “second.”
“Would you look at this?” she remarked, and I peered through the door to see her stooping to enter a room concealed behind a hatch to the rear of the closet.
I followed her in, beyond a four-inch-thick metal vault door that had been covered in plasterboard so as to blend seamlessly with the understairs wall. The room the door concealed was about the size of a prison cell. There were four bunks and shelves full of supplies.
“Panic room,” Mo-bot suggested, as Sci and Justine joined us in the cramped space.
I nodded. “You think you can open that?”
I gestured to a large floor safe tucked in the corner of the room at the end of one of the bunks.
Mo-bot crouched to check it out.
“Keypad,” she observed. “So, it’s probably between a four- and an eight-digit code. I should be able to do something.”
She got to work, prizing open the panel.
Sci sat on the bottom bed of the bunk opposite. “Imagine living the kind of life where you need a place like this to keep your family safe,” Justine remarked, looking around what was effectively a small survival bunker. “He probably told them it was because he’d been a government minister.”
“Looks like it’s a basic four-digit code,” Mo-bot said. She’d connected her cracker to the safe and was interrogating the keypad. “Here we go.”
She input the code displayed on her cracker, and the safe-locking mechanism shifted open with a clang and a click.
My heart thumped almost to bursting the moment Mo-bot pulled the door open, because a loud alarm sounded and rang throughout the house.
“Shit,” she said. “There must be a kill switch somewhere.”
I didn’t waste any time trying to find it because we’d already given away our presence. Instead, I looked inside the safe to see four phones, passports, cash and half a dozen USB drives.
“Grab that and let’s get out of here,” I yelled above the deafening ringing.
Mo-bot swept everything into her gear bag, and the four of us made a swift exit through the understairs closet and kitchen, before hurrying out of the house and into the garden.
“You go first,” I told Mo-bot.
She handed me her gear bag as we approached, immediately starting to climb the rough rockface, which thankfully had plenty of chunky hand- and footholds.
When Mo-bot was halfway, Sci started up, and then Justine, and I went alongside her, conscious of the twin torch beams of the gate security guards heading toward the Duval home.
When I was two-thirds of the way up, I heard sirens approaching, but we crested the top of the rock wall, climbed over the turnout barrier and were in the car and moving at speed before the cops arrived.
Chapter 56
We were back at the apartment less than fifteen minutes later.
Mo-bot went straight to her workstation and ferreted in her gear bag for the phones and USB drives she’d taken from the safe.
“I’ll get to work on these,” she said, settling into her seat.
“Coffee?” Sci asked, heading for the kitchen.
“You ever known me to say no?” she countered with a smile.
“I don’t suppose there’s any point me suggesting you get some rest?” I asked.
“Ha!” she scoffed. “Jack Morgan playing dad. You know me better than most. You think I’m going to let these little treasures keep hold of their secrets while I sleep?”
Mo-bot was one of the few people I knew who was capable of making me look like a slacker. She was tireless and relentless in her pursuit of the truth.
“Don’t let me stop you though,” she said. “This will take more than a minute, so you should get some rest while you can. Boost your reserves for whatever lies ahead.”
Justine nodded. “The workaholic is right—”
“Hey!” Mo-bot interrupted, feigning hurt.
“We should try to get some rest,” Justine went on. “It’s been a tough few days.”
Sci looked over from the coffee machine, a home version of something a barista might use, where he was making a couple of brews.
“I’m going to run the bank notes and see if we can identify where they were issued. They look fresh,” he said, referring to the crisp euros Mo-bot had found in Duval’s safe.
“Let me know if you find anything,” I said, taking Justine’s hand. “Come on.”
I led her through the apartment to our bedroom and she pulled me into a tight embrace the moment the door was shut.
“Just hold me, Jack,” she said. “Tell me everything is going to be okay.”
“You know it will be,” I replied.
I took in the scents of vanilla and jasmine that infused her hair, my favorite smells in the world.
“I need to hear it,” she countered softly.
“Everything is going to be okay,” I whispered in her ear, before kissing her.
She smiled and sat on the bed to take off her shoes. She looked beat, but then I probably did too.
“I’m going to grab a shower,” I told her, and she nodded absently.
When I stepped out of the steamy en suite bathroom ten minutes later, Justine was curled up under the covers, deep asleep.
I slid into bed beside her and held her. I watched the glittering city and the port lights of the yachts in the distant marina until my eyelids felt too heavy to stay open, and when I finally fell asleep, I dreamed of happier times together.
Chapter 57
“Hey,” Mo-bot said.
I woke to see her standing in the doorway. Justine lay against me beneath the covers, still wearing the clothes she’d fallen asleep in. We hadn’t even had the energy to close the drapes. Morning sunshine now painted the city with bright color.
“You need to see what we found,” Mo-bot told me.
“Give me a minute,” I replied, and she nodded and shut the door.
“Can’t we sleep a little longer?” Justine asked as I got out of bed and started to dress.
She yawned and stretched, while I put on a fresh dark blue linen suit and white shirt.
“I need a shower,” she said, looking down at what she was wearing.
“Take your time, honey,” I replied, leaning down to kiss her.
I left her to do her thing and joined Mo-bot in the living room. She was at her workstation, holding a large cup of coffee. Sci was nowhere to be seen.
“He crashed about an hour ago,” said Mo-bot. “Sometimes I forget you’re all only human.”
“Very funny,” I said, taking the chair beside her. “What have you got?”
Mo-bot suddenly became somber. “It’s not good, Jack. Duval has been at this for years.”
She opened a folder on her workstation showing an email archive.
“This was on one of the USB drives,” she said. “They’re messages from an anonymous account Duval ran, all sent to another anonymous account. The messages contain intelligence he acquired as Monaco’s Minister of the Interior. There’s even stuff in here on Eli Carver — conversations they’d had, likely US policy and attitudes on contentious geopolitical issues. They might call it a secret society, but Propaganda Tre made a spy out of this man.”
I sighed and shook my head. I’d sworn an oath as a Marine to defend America against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and had never felt any inclination to join the Freemasons or other secret societies that I knew operated within the US, precisely because of my oath. I never wanted to be part of any group whose objectives might set me at odds with the vow I’d made to my country. Too often people joined political or social groups not realizing the split allegiance or inherent conflict implied by such a membership. Duval should have been an honorable pillar of his community. Instead, his membership of Propaganda Tre had turned him into a criminal and a traitor.