Mystery: Satan's Road - Suspense Thriller Mystery (Mystery, Suspense, Thriller, Suspense Crime Thriller) (12 page)

We were all silent for a moment, digesting the possible scale of this organization.

Rupi continued. “My friends would tell you that J-Day is a joke. But it’s not. These fanatics can pull this off. They can shut down the modern world. Kill the stock markets. Destroy the banks. Stop the trains and subways and power plants. Breakdown safety systems in nuclear power plants. Stop the ATM’s. Who’s going to stop them when nobody believes it? Like you guys. Or if they do believe it, they end up dead.”

I looked at Jann. She looked like a believer now. Where did that leave me, I wondered? She knew all along that there was some connection between this Parkhurst group and the CIA and the dead professors and
J-Day
. But she also knew I would never have believed it if she just told me over the phone. I only had one question.

I put my arm on the seat back and moved closer to Jann. “What do we do now?”

She was off in thought. “What do
we
do?” she answered, looking out into the half-empty parking lot. “Tomorrow at noon, if you believe it’s possible, the Soldiers of Patmos are going to trigger the end of civilization. And then thousands of their soldiers will deploy into the countryside and attempt an armed attack on Washington and the White House. A White House without defenses, by the way, because hackers from all over the world will have disabled our ability to respond effectively.”

“You’re right,” answered Jann. “It does, but think about it, Hyde. What if
J-Day
does cause some of the markets to crash and companies to lose billions? Maybe only some of our systems go down. Then even if Gideon completely fails to win a military battle, his attempt would show the world our confusion and our shame. We would look like a third-world country fighting a coup. It would be an international disaster. Meanwhile, he gains a million recruits to his church because his prophecy came true.”

I was stunned by her perception. Jann was right. Gideon could win a dozen ways, and in every scenario. America might never be the same again.

Rupi sat up straight then and reached across the space separating Jann and me. She was pointing at the bar. Her hand was shaking.

“Inside that bar? There’s a man who can save us,” was all she said.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

The Cavalier was as dark and chilly inside as a subterranean cave.

What looked like windows from the outside were fake portals hung with beer-branded neon signs, providing zero illumination to the inside.

When the front door closed behind me, I had to stop, worried that I would step on someone in the beery gloom. Eventually, as our eyes adjusted, Rupi led us to a booth near the back. Seated there was a white-haired Caucasian male in his fifties or sixties, very tanned. He looked like he had slept in his clothes the night before.
This was our savior?

Rupi made introductions. “Detective Hyde. Agent Stone. I’d like you to meet Professor O’Brien.” This was the man who was supposed to be dead at the bottom of a lake; who had witnessed Chapertah jump to his death from the hotel, the professor whose wife was missing and probably dead. I had to give him credit. He wasn’t a young man, but he clearly looked like he still had some fight left in him.

Jann and I identified ourselves, trying not to draw too much attention from the scruffy lunchtime crowd in the bar. I felt like I was back on the beat again.

I sat down across from O’Brien. “Could you identify yourself?”

“Sure. Here’s my wallet, still a bit damp from a midnight swim,” he said. “Are you going to wand me too?” Two strikes against him already. A smart ass – and a thick Boston accent. My experience is bars bring the worst out in people. He looked pretty tired, but also obviously fuelled by some anger bubbling just under the surface. Something I could relate to – so I cut him some slack.

“We understand you witnessed Dr. Chapertah’s suicide.” O’Brien just nodded.

“Tell us about your wife,” Jann said.

O’Brien rubbed his hands together as if they were numb. I kept thinking – if they wanted to sell more cold beer in here, they should stop giving all the customers hypothermia.

“Some American ex-military fanatic broke into our house last night.” He stopped for a second, his voice raw. “And took her away. Rupi here believes they have her at Parkhurst. I don’t know why, but I hope she’s right.” We all looked at Rupi, who smiled for the first time since I met her.

“Why would they go after your wife?” asked Jann.

O’Brien spread his hands. “Probably this
Revelations
business. I think these Patmos fundamentalists are upset that Chapertah figured out their scam. She knows about it. Read the entire white paper. Probably the only person on the planet patient enough to plow through all that prophecy nonsense.”

“So what happens next?” I asked.

“J-Day, the cyber Apocalypse is Monday …” He could see the skepticism on our faces and stopped. “I didn’t make this stuff up. You asked.”

“Go on,” I said.

“Hackers and booters world-wide have been planning for years to bring the Internet down. So they could say they did it, I guess. The Soldiers of Patmos cooked up a plan years ago to help them. Get them resources. Use bribery and extortion to acquire passwords. These hackers couldn’t do it on their own. And have nearly as much impact.”

Rupi added “So when J-Day kicks off at noon tomorrow, it will get a huge boost from this Gideon Lean, who hopes to leverage the chaos to make war with America.”

“Don’t look so skeptical,” O’Brien said to me. “This has happened dozens of times in the past century. Under far less extreme circumstances.”

Rupi jumped in. “He used to be a History Prof at Boston U. He taught a course on government takeovers.”

“I’m glad students today have that valuable information at their disposal,” was all I said. O’Brien glared at me.

“You haven’t heard of Google, Detective?” We ordered drinks at that point, avoiding an obvious argument.

“Well, what does the FBI have to say about this?” I asked Jann. “You told me they were monitoring Gideon.”

Before she could answer, O’Brien slapped the table. “Nobody’s going to stop J-Day. Not the FBI, not the US Marines. That’s a broad attack that will be global. Coming from everywhere. Booters in Poland, China, North Korea, India. Hell, kids in middle-class homes in Vermont who are bored. And once the system starts to tank, Gideon can then shut down the nodes, because he owns those giant central computers, which will just make everything worse. I read part of Chapertah’s paper too.”

“OK,” I said, my hands in surrender position. “Believe me, I take it seriously. So what do we do? Rupi says you have a plan.”

“Actually, Chapertah had a plan,” she answered. “That was the brilliant part of his research. And probably the reason he’s dead. It wasn’t so much that Gideon didn’t like a bunch of academics figuring out what he was up to so close to launch. It was their ideas on how to defeat him that he didn’t want to become viral.”

Rupi then gave us the bare bones of Chapertah’s solution. I drank my ice tea and listened. Basic psychology 101 with some diversionary tactics thrown in. Plus co-operation with the dark side – the FBI. All very scientific. Jann, the nerd, was lighting up like a Christmas tree. I was an idiot. All along I thought the way to her heart was flowers and a bottle of bubbly.

Then it was time to break up the party.

“OK. We know what we have to do. I suggest we get going. Rupi, you’re staying here. Mr. O’Brien? You really need to go home. You will only endanger yourself and our efforts by trying to interfere.”

“Is that what you would do if you were me?” he asked.

I nodded. He was right, but it didn’t matter. “I wouldn’t like it. You can probably tell that. But getting killed is not going to help your wife. We’ll keep you informed. I’ll make her a priority. That’s a promise.”

O’Brien looked lost, but there was nothing he could say. He also didn’t answer me, which explained what happened later.

I could tell that Jann worried about the professor. “We have other resources on the ground as well, Mr. O’Brien. The FBI has had an interest in this case for years.” I believe that’s what counselors call self-deceit. Jann’s superiors had already told her to stop wasting her time and head back to HQ. I was here on my holidays – sitting in a seedy bar on the outskirts of Boston. I really knew how to have a good time. But Jann was right about one thing – we had to do something. We didn’t have a choice.

As I took my second sip of the ice tea I had ordered, the bar lit up, and three men entered from the main door, carrying bike helmets. As soon as their eyes adjusted, they headed towards our booth.

“I need to speak to you outside,” said the tallest one, wearing a patchy beard and a red plaid shirt. His two buddies were standing just behind him, glaring, trying to look as tough as possible. One was wearing a leather jacket, the other a puffy down filled vest. They weren’t wearing colors. Just a ragtag bunch of Hell’s Angels wannabees.

“You need to say something, say it here,” I suggested.

“You knocked my bike over in the parking lot. There’s a lot of damage.” I knew that was BS. The bikes in the lot were over on the other side from where we parked. But that wasn’t the point. Question was, who were these thugs and what were they up to?

“You got the wrong table, bud.”

“I don’t think so.” With that, Mr. Plaid shirt picked up my ice tea and poured it over my head. Rupi let out a yelp. I looked at Jann. She was staring at the tallest guy, her hand on her holster under her jacket. I shook my head slowly, hoping she got my message.
No need
I thought.
You pull your gun out, and you create enough paperwork to choke a tree shredder.
Don’t waste good bullets on this driftwood.

I stood up slowly, reluctantly, dripping on the worn carpet. We were now eye-to-eye, the hillbilly biker and I. He smelled vaguely of burnt garbage and his nose looked like it had been broken more than once. Good to know.

“You aware you’re talking to a police officer?” I asked. I needed to be sure.

He grunted and looked back at one of his buddies, a big smart grin on his three-day growth of peach fuzz. “Like I give a shit,” was all he said, wiping his mouth.

“Well, you should. I can get the satisfaction of wiping that smirk off your face first, and then arrest your ass. Double the fun for me.” He started to say something, but before he could, I grabbed a handful of the front of his shirt with my right hand and pulled hard. His entire shirt ripped off his body and came away in my hands in one smooth motion. Two buttons flew past me and ricocheted off our table. Even I was surprised by the Houdini-like quality of the move.

And as an extra bonus, the sharp sound of the wool splitting at the seams woke up everyone in the bar.

Hillbilly guy was now standing there, in the chilly air, naked from the waist up, not saying very much. I heard a smattering of applause from the lunch crowd. I then used his shirt to wipe my face and the front of my jeans where he had spilled the ice tea. I looked at him and his buddies. The two in the back were waiting to see what would happen next. The half-naked guy, overcoming his surprise, his little white potbelly now exposed for the world to see, started to move towards me.

So I head butted him.

Now I need to explain something. Nature pretty much custom-built me for this particular line of defense. I have a big high forehead and thick bone above my eyes and more than my share of neck muscles. One ex-girlfriend called me a Neanderthal once during a heated argument, an epithet I will never entirely forget, but she wasn’t far off the mark. So the head butt has always been a go-to option for me. Which Jann knew quite well, having worked with me in the field. It’s a fairly effective game-changer. And I don’t have to risk hurting my hands – in case I decide one day to take up the violin.

Hillbilly guy started gushing blood from his newly re-engineered nose and conveniently collapsed to the floor.

Jann was up and out of her seat at this point, ready to deal with culprit number two, who was now going to the defense of his downed buddy. And bless her heart – no gun was in evidence.

Jann also had a specialty, which I loved to watch in action. She wears these high-heeled leather boots with pointy toes and can high-kick like a ballerina. Those shoes were much more than a fashion statement – they should be registered weapons.

Biker number two, as he started stepping around the bleeder on the matt to get to us, had to spread his stance a little more than was reasonably cautious. Jann swung her long left leg up and out, letting the momentum build, and drove her boot with amazing swiftness into his groin area. Man number two then turned purple and collapsed on top of his friend. He was groaning like a ghoul. The last man standing put his hands up and started walking backwards. I let him leave.

Then I grabbed felon number one by his ears and inspected his face. I’ve never experienced a broken nose myself, but a cop I know told me it was the most painful thing he had ever experienced. He said he would rather be gut shot. This guy was literally crying – tears were running down his face and mixing with the blood and snot pouring out of his nostrils.

“Now you have to tell me who sent you here,” I said. “Or I get to punch you in the face again. Then you’ll pass out from the pain, and when you wake up, you’ll be in jail. Trust me – I’ve had a lot of experience with this.”

“I don’t know who he was,” the guy said. “That’s the point, right? Deniability.” I was impressed. Six syllables from this piece of trash.

“Where?”

“He stopped me in the parking lot. About five minutes ago. Gave me five hundred dollars. Told me to break something. You go to the hospital – I get five hundred more.”

“He paid you too much.”

“Yeah, well, my hospital bill will be ten times that.”

“Should have thought about that when you took the money.” Then I had another thought. “Just me?” I asked.

“Who else? Your dad over there?” He was pointing his finger towards O’Brien. “And I don’t beat up women.”

I laughed. “You say that like you could. How about the guy in the lot? What did he look like?”

The biker snuffled, trying to breath. “Blue jeans. T-shirt. About my age. I’ve never seen him before. And he was on foot. Shit, this hurts.” I let go of his face and stood up.

“Did he pay you up front?”

“No, I’ve got a Bit Coin account. I’m going to bill him in thirty days.” Everyone is a comedian.

Jann was already out the front door. O’Brien and Rupi were both still sitting in the booth, looking a bit shaken. I wanted to call this one in, but that would slow me down by a couple of hours. Hours we didn’t have. I decided I’d leave it up to the bar manager - who probably wouldn’t do anything. Wouldn’t want to chase away any future customers.

I met Jann out in the parking area. She had circled the bar and checked across the street by the time I found her. She just shook her head.

“They knew where you were,” was all she said, looking worried. “And I didn’t see any sign of a tail on the way here. Zero. And I’ve taken that course twice.”

I just shook my head. “If they’ve got a team following us, that’s pretty hard to shake. Or they just got lucky.” And if they had a full team, they were spending a lot of money and time on little ol’ me.

She stepped up and touched my face. “You did good in there, Hyde. Thanks for taking it easy on that biker.” I put my hands on her shoulders and couldn’t help smiling.
God, I missed her.