Taking Time by Mike Murphey

Author:Mike Murphey [Murphey, Mike]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781947392922
Publisher: Acorn Publishing
Published: 2020-06-30T16:00:00+00:00

(25)

I LOVE LUCY

Soft but persistent knocking roused Marta from a sound sleep. Understanding what woke her took a couple of minutes. She got out of bed, found the t-shirt that draped down to her knees and shuffled to her apartment door.

“Gillis, for God sake, you can’t possibly think that waking me at this unholy hour will get you an invitation to my bed.”

Gillis smiled and raised his hands as if to ward off a blow.

“Dear, dear Marta, that particular itch was scratched just a couple of hours ago. I come bearing gifts.”

“At two in the morning?” Marta yawned, rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand and stood aside so Gillis could enter.

As he crossed the threshold, Gillis adopted a puzzled look.

“Your apartment personality system,” he said. “I’ve been trying for weeks to figure out how to shut the damn thing off. How did you do it?”

“I didn’t,” Marta said. “I intimidated it.”

“What, it’s scared of you?”

“I threatened to kill it.”

“I’m not sure that would work for me,” Gillis said.

“Well, you do need a certain presence.”

Although their stature and wiry builds were similar, Marta regarded Gillis as almost dainty. She knew from experience he didn’t lack courage, nor did he succumb to the bluster of larger, louder people. He had a fastidiousness about him, though—an understated sort of elegance—which compromised his masculinity. Only when he smiled did he seem dangerous.

“I’ve discovered information related to our discussion about Leonard Rose’s off-campus activities,” Gillis said. “I thought you might be anxious to see it.”

Marta questioned neither his professional capabilities nor his judgment. As an electronic surveillance expert, Gillis was Luxembourg’s senior operative. He knew everything about the cutting edge of espionage technology—both how to operate it and how to defeat it.

“So, you snuck under the wire tonight to meet your friend?”

“Several wires actually. And yes, we had a lovely evening. At the end of which she told me she’d used her cell phone a couple of days ago to surreptitiously take a picture of the man Leonard Rose meets in Superior.”

Wide awake now, she directed Gillis to a small sofa and sat next to him. “Show me.”

“Ah, if you only meant that,” Gillis said with a sigh.

He withdrew his pocket computer and the bent-nosed face of a heavyset man floated before them. The image looked vaguely familiar.

“She doesn’t know his name?”

“No. She tried checking credit card receipts, but he pays with cash.”

“I’ve seen this guy,” Marta said. “I can’t remember when or where, but my gut reaction is that the context wasn’t pleasant.”

“Well, I have one more context to offer,” Gillis said. He produced a sim card and plugged it into one of the computer ports. “I ran the photo though my face recognition software, searching the pirated security video in my system. I’ve only gone back a few weeks, but this is what came up.”

Marta saw a hallway scene, the elevators closest to the projection lab. Marshall Grissom stopped to talk with a stocky man dressed in a suit. The security camera showed the man’s back.

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