Allegiance Burned: A Jackson Quick Adventure Read online

  As I follow him onto the elevator, I count the seventh and eighth security camera we’ve passed since getting out of the car in front of the building. A fake name won’t be enough to keep me hidden from those who want to find me, but it keeps my name off the paperwork.

  ***

  The elevator doors whoosh open to reveal a large woman in a lime green pantsuit and a headset awaiting us on the sixtieth floor. She smiles, revealing what I imagine is a piece of her breakfast stuck between her gums and upper front teeth.

  “Good morning, gentlemen,” she says without dislodging the embedded food. “Welcome to Nanergetix. I hope your flight was uneventful.”

  “It was quite good.” Sir Spencer motions to his teeth with his fingers and smiles.

  The woman blinks and runs her tongue along her teeth. She smiles again, silently asking for approval.

  “You got it, dear,” Sir Spencer nods.

  “Thank you,” she blushes and then turns to lead us down the hallway, her high heels clicking on the cream-colored travertine floors. Her hips swing back and forth quickly, matching the rhythm of her feet on the polished stone.

  The walls are lined with photographs of Don Carlos Buell, each of them framed and featuring a plaque detailing the story behind the picture. His smile is nearly identical in each one of them. It’s hard for me to reconcile the man grinning in the photographs with the image of his stunned, bloodied face burned into my memory.

  The end of the hall opens to a large office with floor to ceiling windows looking west toward Eleanor Tinsley Park and the edge of the tree-lined mansion estates of River Oaks. The panorama holds my attention until Sir Spencer grabs my shoulder and turns me toward a woman whose ice-blue eyes are more intoxicating than the view.

  “Bella, I’d like you to meet the man we discussed.” Sir Spencer draws me toward her. “Jackson Quick, this is Bella Francesca Buell.”

  Buell?

  “Hello.” I extend my hand and she reciprocates, eyes searching mine. She’s looking for something.

  “Hello,” she said, her lips spreading into a demure smile. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.” She lets go of my hand and motions toward a seat across from a large glass desk.

  “Will that be all, Miss Buell?” Lime Green Pantsuit asks, adjusting her headset.

  “Yes, Brenda, thank you.” Bella Francesca slinks around the desk and sits on the edge of a large white leather office chair. She grabs the edge of the desk and pulls herself toward it. Brenda leaves the office and closes the door behind her.

  “Buell?” I ask the obvious question without really asking it.

  “I’m his daughter, Mr. Quick,” she says. The kindness in her eyes has given way to a steely glare. “His death left me in charge of his company.” She crosses her legs and brushes the wrinkles from her lavender skirt. Then she fiddles with the oversized Cartier watch on her left wrist, as if the red soles on the bottoms of her shoes didn’t already give away her taste in expensive accessories.

  “I see the resemblance,” I acknowledge through a smile. Her dark hair and strong, attractive features resemble her father’s. Her olive skin is flawless, and she’s maybe thirty years old. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “You were there, Sir Spencer tells me,” she glances at him and then back at me, “and I remember seeing you in some of the news footage.”

  Is that what this is about?

  Sir Spencer is looking down, his eyes pinched between his fingers as if he’s fighting off a headache.

  “Yes,” I admit. “I was there.”

  “I understand,” she shifts forward on her elbows, leaning into me, “you, in turn, killed the man who killed my father.”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me about that,” her eyes narrow. “I’ve read the news accounts, of course, but I want your perspective.”

  “I’m not sure what to say.”

  “I can take it,” she leans back again. “I’m a big girl.”

  I suddenly feel as though the temperature in the room was cranked up fifty degrees. “Well, my girlfriend, at the time turned out to be an assassin, a sharpshooter. She was working for your dad. She had a partner named Crockett. The two of them betrayed your dad. They decided to flip and work for my boss, the governor. I don’t know if it was a money thing or what, but they flipped. My girlfriend was killed.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “Why are you sorry?” I ask. “She flipped on your dad.”

  Bella rubs her lips lightly with the tip of her middle finger as she considers the question. She exhales. “I’m sorry for your loss. I’m not sorry she’s dead.” She’s a straight shooter like my ex, apparently.

  “Fair enough.”

  “So continue.” She waves her fingers at me as if to shoo me away.

  “After she died, Crockett worked on his own. I figured out he was gunning for your dad. I tried to stop him. It didn’t work. I was a couple of seconds too late. But before he killed my boss, I shot him.”

  “So you risked your life.” She points at me. “You put your life in danger to save my father, when he might not have extended you the same courtesy?”

  “Ha!” Sir Spencer interrupts. “Please, Bella! ‘Might not have’? We know he wouldn’t have helped out poor Jackson here. Who was Jackson in the scheme of things? He was considered collateral damage by his mentor and employer. His girlfriend betrayed his trust. Your father, who did not know Jackson, would not have risked his life for anything of the sort. He—”

  “Point taken,” Bella cuts in. “A poor turn of phrase.”

  “Speaking of points,” I interject, irritated with being spoken of as if I’m not here. “What is all of this about? Why am I here?”

  “I was getting to that,” says Sir Spencer.

  “Was this job to play storyteller for the poor little rich girl?” I stand up from my seat, motioning at Bella.

  Her jaw tightens at my description of her. She folds her arms across her chest and leans back in the chair, almost pouting.

  “Unfair,” Sir Spencer says softly. “That’s rude and uncalled for, Jackson.”

  I palm the sweat from my forehead. “I don’t see it that way.”

  “Miss Buell was merely using this opportunity to gain some perspective on the man she wants to hire for a critical role,” he explains. “And frankly, given the death of her beloved father only months ago, I don’t blame her.”

  “I don’t like being called collateral damage,” I huff.

  “She didn’t call you that,” Sir Spencer stands to face me. “I did. And it was in reference to the way in which your beloved governor saw you.”

  “The same governor who hired you,” I said, pressing my finger into his shoulder. “You were working for him when her father was killed. You were on that team. So how is it you’re now in this woman’s good graces? How is it you’re playing headhunter for Nanergetix?”

  “As I’ve told you before,” Sir Spencer says softly, returning to his seat, “I am an equal opportunity consultant. I work for whomever—”

  “Has the most money?”

  “Touché,” Sir Spencer nods. “In many cases, yes. It is also of great import, however, I share a certain amount of fundamental ideology with my partners.”

  Bella abruptly stands from her seat and walks around the desk toward Sir Spencer. “I’m not sure he’s the right man. He’s fiery, yes. He’s smart, agreed. But I don’t think he’s the one.”

  “We have limited options,” Sir Spencer says. “It’s not as though we have people banging on your door to help you. A typical operative wouldn’t be motivated by the amount of money you’re offering.”

  “Maybe I should offer more?” Bella shrugs her shoulders and sits on the edge of the desk between Sir Spencer and me. “This is too big a job for an overly sensitive amateur.”

  “Hold on,” I interject. “I’m right here! Stop talking about me in the third person! And you can’t fire me from a job I haven’t even accepted yet.”<
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  Sir Spencer nods silently and rubs his chin. He sits back against the chair, releasing a whoosh of air from the soft cushion. “We’ve gotten off topic here. And I made a mistake by allowing you to question Jackson about what he saw in your father’s final moments. We need to keep this to the mission at hand.”

  “Which is?” I still have no idea what is going on. I’m here in a high-rise with the daughter of a dead energy titan turned politician and a snake of a kingmaker who holds my life in his hands.

  “It’s complicated,” says Sir Spencer.

  “And why wouldn’t it be?” I ask, the sarcasm oozing.

  ***

  “So you’re telling me I’m going to skip around the globe looking for little pieces of some formula?”

  “It’s not exactly a formula,” clarifies Bella. “It’s more like a process.”

  “Oh,” I laugh snidely. “That’s better.”

  “I understand from your perspective, there’s no difference,” says Sir Spencer, who’s helped himself to a drink from Bella’s office wet bar. “However, given what’s at stake, the subtle differences are important.”

  “Sure. Whatever. Explain to me what’s so critical about this process?”

  Sir Spencer leisurely stirs his drink with his left pinkie and then sucks it dry. “Suffice it to say that the process involves what are called ‘solar neutrinos’. It is world-changing. The scientist who cracked it is dead. He was killed.”

  “Before he died, he took precautions,” adds Bella. “He separated the steps of the process and hid the elements in different places. That way, no one person would have the entirety of the research.”

  “There are a lot of people who want this research,” says Sir Spencer. “People who have and will kill for it.”

  “What does it do? This neutrino process...”

  “It’s energy related,” Bella answers. “And it dips into the communications arena too. There are a lot of layers. I can explain the details later.”

  “Who owns this process?”

  “I do,” says Bella. “Well, Nanergetix does. The scientist who was killed, Dr. Paul Wolf, was working for us in an undisclosed underground location.”

  “Somebody disclosed it,” I say. “Or he wouldn’t be dead.”

  “Therein lies the rub,” says Sir Spencer. “You’re not the only one looking for these disparate parts. It’s a bit of a scavenger hunt.”

  “So I need to find all of the missing pieces and give them to you before someone else finds them?” I ask. “And then my job is complete? Then I can go about my life and start over?”

  “Yes,” say Sir Spencer. “That’s the deal. You find the entirety of the process, deliver it to me, and I become your best friend.”

  “How many parts are there?” I ask, standing from my seat.

  “We think there are four,” says Bella. “But you’re not doing this alone.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m coming with you,” she replies. “You won’t recognize what you’re looking for without me. And I need you to keep me alive.”

  “Uh huh. That brings me back to the question I asked you in the car, Sir Spencer. Why me? Why am I the one who’ll keep her alive? I don’t have those kinds of skills.”

  “I knew that question was again forthcoming,” Sir Spencer wags his finger at me as he backs his way to the wet bar. “The answer is again, quite simple.”

  Sir Spencer pours another three fingers of scotch and takes a healthy sip before answering the question. Bella gives him a look that tells me she’s growing impatient of the theatrics.

  “It is foremost you are motivated by fear, Jackson,” he says, without acknowledging Bella’s glare. “That’s why you’ve survived no fewer than a half dozen attempts on your life in the last four months.”

  “How do you know?”

  “That’s beside the point.” He swirls the highball glass and sniffs the scotch. “Suffice it to say that I do.” He takes a sip. “Then there is your history of travel.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “There was that vision quest across Europe during your less-than-focused early twenties,” he says.

  “The lost years between your failed stint as a radio deejay and the fortuitous foray into Texas politics.”

  “What does that have to do with this? And how do you know about that?”

  “Good man,” Sir Spencer peacocks his way from the bar toward me and takes his seat, “when are you going to learn? My methods are...my methods. How this is relevant is simple. You spent significant amounts of time in two of the cities we believe hold at least two of the pieces to the puzzle. You know the streets, the haunts, ways to extract information. Am I correct?”

  “I dunno,” I shrug my shoulders. “What two cities?”

  “Odessa, Ukraine,” says Sir Spencer, “and Heidelberg, Germany.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Quite seriously,” says Bella, no hint of humor in those hypnotic eyes of hers. “I received a partial message from Dr. Wolf before his death. He gave clues to at least a couple of the hiding places.”

  “This is all a bit too convenient,” I say, smelling a rat. “This scientist doesn’t want anyone to know how this process works, so he spreads parts of the formula all over the world, then he sends you some secret message that hints at where they are?” I shake my head. “It sounds to me like he didn’t trust you either, Bella. Either that, or you’re not telling me the whole story. This whole thing, it doesn’t add up.”

  Sir Spencer exchanges a furtive glance with Bella. Neither of them say anything.

  “I’m out.” I make my way towards the door. “I’m gonna need my bag from your car,” I tell to Sir Spencer without turning around.

  The smiling portraits of the dead Buell blend together as I stride past them to the elevator. I step onto the elevator and wait to turn around until the doors slide closed behind me then glance up at the television monitor above the bank of floor buttons. There’s no volume, but I recognize the scene on the screen. It’s a bullet hole riddled bus, only now the bus is surrounded by yellow crime scene tape and is swarming with police. Large crowds are standing around, watching the investigators try to piece together what happened. The words scrolling across the bottom third of the video read: Early morning shootout, bus crash in San Antonio leaves two dead. Police searching for suspect, consider him to be armed and dangerous.

  The screen fills with a new image and I hit the red emergency stop button. The elevator screams to halt and a loud bell rings an alarm. On the screen, with the words DOUBLE HOMICIDE SUSPECT beneath it is a color surveillance photo of my face.

  CHAPTER 3

  I should have known better. I should have known to rip the bus camera from the windshield and take it with me. But I didn’t. I left the best piece of evidence against me sitting in that bus. It doesn’t matter that the woman on the bus fired first. As far as the cops are concerned, I killed two people and ran. I’m royally screwed. I end up behind bars anywhere in Texas and I am dead. The governor will see to that.

  Against the annoying ring of the alarm bell, I weigh my options. I can continue down to the first floor, exit, grab my go-bag from Sir Spencer’s car, and try to disappear. Or I can head back up to the sixtieth floor and take my chances with a couple of dangerous liars who want to use me in some sick spy game to who-knows-what end.

  Not much of a choice.

  “Hello,” a voice blares through the speaker in the elevator. The alarm stops. “Hello, this is security. Is everyone okay?”

  Think, Jackson. Think!

  “Is everyone okay?” the voice repeats.

  “Yes,” I answer. “I’m the only one in here. I hit the button by mistake. I’m okay.”

  The voice tells me to remain calm and explains which buttons to push to restart the elevator. I take a moment and then grab the phone from my front pocket and dial a familiar number. It rings once.

  “News 4 Houston,” answers the man on the other end of
the call. “George Townsend.”

  George is a television investigative reporter. He helped me send the governor to jail. He’s risked his life right alongside me. If he knows there is a potential story in it for him, he’ll do anything I ask him to do.

  “George,” I whisper. “This is Jackson. I need your help.”

  “When don’t you need my help?” The reporter laughs, clearly not sensing the urgency in my voice.

  “Really,” I stress. “I need you to do some digging for me.”

  “Okay. What is it?”

  “Sir,” the security voice echoes in the elevator. “Do you need me to explain the restart procedure again?”

  “Uh, no. I’ve got it. Thanks.”

  “Where are you?” asks George.

  “In an elevator,” I explain. “Long story.”

  “It always is,” George says. “Is this about the governor? You know he’s appealing the conviction.”

  “No, it’s unrelated,” I explain. “Sort of.”

  “Sort of?”

  “Shut up and listen for a second!”

  “Sir?” The security guard again. “I can override the system from down here if you’d like. It’ll take a couple of minutes.”

  “Okay,” I agree with the guard. “That’s fine. Maybe that would be easier.”

  “You’re stuck in an elevator?” George asks.

  “Yes.”

  “Okay sir,” the guard says through the speaker. “It’ll be a moment and then you’ll resume your trip down to the first floor. Hold on to one of the rails against the wall please, the elevator will jerk into motion suddenly.”

  “Okay, thanks,” I call toward the speaker. “I appreciate it.”

  “How’d you get stuck?” George asks.

  “Not important. You got a pen?”

  “Yep.”

  “Okay then,” I exhale. “I need to you look up Bella Francesca Buell. Find me everything about her I can’t find with a Google search.”

  “The C.E.O. of Nanergetix?”

  “Yes. Also, I need you to do some surface digging into a scientist named Paul Wolf. And if you can, cross reference something called solar neutrinos, whatever they are.”