“Dude, I was worried about you,” Young said. “People are freaking out about you all. Come inside.”
After they entered, Young locked the doorknob, deadbolt, and chain. Chris introduced Sonny and brought Young up to speed on what was happening.
Then it was Young’s turn. “Right now, there’s a battle going on about Hannah — Jim Bob’s cronies and protégés are out to get her, but others in the Agency are on her side. No one knows you guys are back in the States now, though.”
“And no one can know,” Chris said.
“Sure.” Young led them farther into the house. They passed the dining room, where instead of a dining table, there was a pool table. Chris remembered playing pairs those years ago, Little Doc and him versus Hannah and Young. A small smile crept onto his lips and then faded fast. There wasn’t time to reminisce.
Young led them into his living room, and they sat down on a sofa and overstuffed chairs. The trio handed over the laptops, flash drive and other intel, filling up the coffee table.
“This is what we took from Jim Bob, Victor, Mordet, and his man Little Kale. We think Mordet is here in the States to launch an attack, so we need you to help us figure out how to stop him before he does.”
“And then there’s this.” Hannah handed him the meat jerky in the Ziploc.
“What’s this?” Young asked.
“Who’s this?” Hannah corrected him. “One of Mordet’s leftovers. Can you get this analyzed, so we can find out who Mordet has been munching on?”
Young stared at the bag. “Son of a bitch.” He shook his head and put the offending object on the coffee table with the other items.
“I’m going to ask my assistants to help me on what you’re giving me. It’s too much for me to work on alone.”
Hannah nodded in approval. “As long as it stays—”
“Confidential,” he finished for her. “Of course.”
“Do you have any firearms we could borrow?” Chris asked.
Young shook his head. “Sorry, I don’t carry anything,” Young said. He rummaged through a drawer before pulling out a pamphlet. “But you all must be starving.” Young held it out. “Here’s a delivery menu for a pizza place nearby if you want.”
Hannah took it. “That sounds good.”
Young moved the computer equipment to his office, which took up one wall and a quarter of the living room. Then he started up Jim Bob’s, Little Kale’s, and Professor Mordet’s laptops.
Twenty minutes later, a knock came at the door — two sets of two knocks, actually. Although it sounded like a coded knock and Young didn’t seem alarmed, Chris’s muscles tensed. Being unarmed didn’t help, so he looked for weapons of opportunity — a chair seemed the most likely candidate. It’d be bulky to wield but would make a solid hit on whoever it struck.
Young went to the door, looked through the peephole, then returned to his table and retrieved the bag of jerky. The knock came again before Young unlocked the door and opened it. He passed the bag outside. Then he closed the door and locked it.
“Your assistant?” Chris asked.
Young returned to his desktop computer. “One of them. Right now, the others are logged into Jim Bob’s, Professor Mordet’s, and Little Kale’s laptops by remote.”
Chris looked on anxiously. “Does it look like you’ll crack them?”
“Little Kale’s is the easiest. Simple password.”
The pizza arrived minutes later, and Hannah opened the boxes on the kitchen table. The saucy fragrance was the holy grail of food. Chris offered Young a slice.
Young used one hand to type. “No, thanks. I already ate.”
The trio downed pizza slices almost as fast as they could lift them to their mouths.
“Looks like Little Kale tried to delete documents,” Young said, “but my assistant is reconstructing the data from the laptop’s disk sectors.”
Chris swallowed a bite. “What about websites he visited?”
“We’re finding those in the history cache of his browser while we reconstruct deleted emails.”
One by one the pizzas disappeared.
“This is interesting,” Young said.
Chris, Hannah, and Sonny stopped chewing, and their ears perked up.
“On Little Kale’s computer, a location and date keep popping up,” Young said. “Washington, DC in four days. Could be a target and the date of attack.”
Chris wiped his mouth. “That doesn’t give us much time.”
“What about Professor Mordet’s laptop?” Hannah asked. “Have those things appeared there, too?”
Young continued tapping on the keyboard. “His laptop appears clean, but we’re still searching it.”
“And Jim Bob’s?” Chris asked.
“Jim Bob used standard Agency tradecraft to hide his work, but we’re familiar with that and found a UBS bank account.”
“I don’t know whether to be surprised at how much the Chinese actually forked over,” Chris said, looking over Young’s shoulder at the account details, “or surprised at how little the Switchblade Whisper was worth to Jim Bob.”
“Did Jim Bob spend any of it?” Hannah asked.
Young’s mouse clicked a few times. “Doesn’t look like it.”
“Probably wasn’t in much of a condition to make a withdrawal after Chris shot him in the face,” Sonny said with a chuckle.
“We better do our old buddy a favor and take care of his money for him,” Hannah said, a grin spreading across her lips.
“How much?” Young asked.
“All of it,” Chris and Hannah said in unison.
“Where should I send it?” Young asked.
“Open a new bank account just for that money,” Hannah said. “If we send it to an Agency account, a charity, or anywhere else, Jim Bob will try to negotiate for the money’s return. We need to keep it out of his hands.”
“While we’re at it, we should contact the FBI,” Chris suggested. “They’ll be jazzed to take him down.”
“I have a good friend in the FBI,” Hannah said.
Sonny clapped his hands. “Jim Bob is in for a stonking huge surprise.”
Victor’s phone vibrated on Young’s desk. Everyone looked at it. Chris grabbed a piece of paper and a pen and copied the number from the caller ID. He placed it on the desk next to Young’s keyboard. “If you get a chance, see if you can find out about this phone number. And any other numbers that call Victor’s phone.”
Young nodded.
Chris sat back in his seat, his energy sagging. The long mission, jet lag, and a belly full of pizza were bound to take their toll. Hannah and Sonny seemed to move in slow motion, too. In contrast, Young typed furiously as if he could keep at it forever. The three made a watch schedule, and Chris stood the first watch while Hannah and Sonny slept. Young refused to rest and worked through the night.
27
In the morning, they found themselves at Young’s kitchen table, eating breakfast. It was now only three days before Professor Mordet might launch an attack on DC. During breakfast, Hannah made phone calls.
“We need weapons,” Chris said.
Sonny grunted in agreement.
“First we need to go to Portsmouth,” Hannah said.
Sonny scrunched up his face. “What’s in Portsmouth?”
“Fake IDs,” Hannah answered. “We’re still wanted by Homeland Security, and we’ll need the fake IDs to stay off their grid.”
“Do you know somebody in Portsmouth then?” Chris asked.
“I know of someone, but I don’t know him personally,” Hannah said. “The Agency usually takes care of these things for me, but now that the Agency isn’t supporting us, we have to shop the black market.”