Diablo Mesa by Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child

Author:Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child [Preston, Douglas & Child, Lincoln]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2022-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

34

AT THE SAFE house he’d been assigned—a well-furnished condominium in the quiet Quaker Heights neighborhood of Albuquerque—Agent Lime looked out the living room windows, gazing with apparent disinterest at the dark, sleepy street. After a moment he closed the curtains, then lowered an inner set of blinds specially fabricated to give off a false heat signature, as well as to block “Havana syndrome” microwaves or signals from StingRay IMSI-catching devices. He walked over to a spare wood-topped desk, sat down, and unlocked the bottom drawer via a hidden thumbprint analyzer. The drawer—lined with a nitrocellulose accelerant that would destroy the contents if any tampering was detected—popped open. Among other things, it revealed five identical phones—arranged in a careful row—and a small lead-lined box. Taking out the box, Lime opened it and removed a onetime SIM card. He slid the card into the flank of the leftmost phone, put the box back in the drawer, and closed it.

The phone was small and without any identifying features. In many ways it was “dumb,” lacking onboard GPS and other features common in recent years. This was by design. In one way, however, it was highly specialized: it used classified technology to bounce an encrypted signal off a network of spy satellites rather than relying on cell towers.

He looked at his watch, waiting for the seconds to tick off until it was exactly seven-oh-five. Then he entered some numbers; waited; tapped in his authentication; then entered another, shorter set of numbers. After a series of clicks, the familiar voice came on the line. “Servandae vitae mendacium.”

“Nemini dixeris,” said Lime, giving the countersign.

“I’ll take your report now,” Colonel Rush said.

Per his training, Lime wasted no words. “My insertion was timely. Agent Swanson has made more progress than expected on Hostile Interdiction Three. Despite the fire, she has aggressively followed up on the remaining evidence.”

“Could this lead to further progress?”

“That remains to be seen.”

“Don’t you think termination would be a wise precaution?”

“With all respect, sir, it might be a little early for that. Swanson is the suspicious type and may be salting her evidentiary trail. We don’t want to skin the rabbit unless we’re sure no scat’s been left behind.”

“A colorful expression. Did you pick it up out there?”

“This morning, sir.”

“I’ll remember it. And you’re confident leaving her in place is the right way to proceed?”

“Yes. I’ve eliminated the biggest, most immediate threat. If something happens to Swanson directly on the heels of that, it will raise questions. In my opinion, sir, the ongoing dig is far most dangerous.” He paused. “May I ask how the debriefing is proceeding?”

“It reached its termination. No further information of use was extracted. He hadn’t identified the location of Alpha, although he did discover that Beta was merely the ricochet location. Their team is currently searching for Alpha.”

“If the group discovers…Well, sir, you know my concerns about the initial extraction being insufficiently thorough.”

“It’s not our place to question the actions of those who came before us.”

“I’d never do that,” said Lime.

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