The Columbus Code (24 page)

“Are you all right?” he asked in a worried tone. “What's wrong?”

“Everything is wrong,” she said. “Elena is dead.”

“You're coming home,” he responded. “Today. I'm making the arrangements.”

“I can't,” Maria said glancing over her shoulder. “Not right now.”

“Why not?” Austin demanded. “It's too dangerous for you to be there now. Not that it wasn't before. Tell Tejada you're sick. Give me the story and I'll feed it to Snowden. Just get on the plane.”

“Tejada's the one who told me about Elena. If I say I'm that grief-stricken he'll know something's up. I told him Elena and I weren't close.”

“So you're convinced Tejada's in on it.”

“No, actually I don't think he is.”

“Good for him. But you have to get away from Molina.”

“Or I have to expose him.”

“Maria, no. Come on—you don't know how to do this without getting yourself killed.”

“I'm going to find my father. He'll know what to do.”

“So come home and find him. What's he going to do from San Francisco anyway?”

“I need you to do something for me.”

“What?”

“I need you to Google the name Jason Elliot.”

“There have to be a thousand people named Jason Elliot.”

“I know, but see if you can find one who's into anything weird or shady. Maybe he's been arrested—anything like that.”

“Why? Who is he?”

“Somebody Molina mentioned when talking to Schlesinger. He called him Agent Jason Elliot. I'm thinking that may have been a code name.”

“So it's not going to do any good to look him up under that name.”

“Just do it, please.” By then she was at the Catalonia campus. “I have to go. If you find out anything, call me on this phone. Not my cell phone. And no e-mails to my computer.”

“You're scaring me,” he said.

“And don't say anything to Snowden, okay? I need to do some digging around to make sure he's not involved in this.”

“Involved in what?”

“I don't know. I'll talk to you later.”

He was still protesting when she hung up and tucked the phone into her pocket.

Her new office was three times the size of the one she'd used when the Snowden team was there. So big, in fact, the oversized bouquet of irises on the desk looked lost in the space. As she dropped her briefcase beside the desk she studied the room. There were so many places a small rectangle could be hidden she didn't know where to start.

The one thing she did notice were the four divots in the carpet where a piece of furniture had been. Probably the desk she'd requested for Elena.

Okay, she couldn't go there. No time to break down in grief. Right now the name of the game was to stay busy.

Maria disregarded the large desktop computer and plugged in her
laptop. She did turn on the flat-screen TV that took up most of one wall. Tejada said he kept up with local news and it wouldn't be a bad idea for her to do that too.

She turned to CNN, where they were covering a protest somewhere. Obviously not in Spain. She was about to do a channel search when the words at the bottom of the screen read,
G
RASSROOTS PROTEST AGAINST RAISING THE DEBT LIMIT
. A well-coifed reporter was yelling into a microphone but she was still barely audible over the crowd of blue-collar workers waving signs and chanting.

“They're saying, ‘The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting stuck with the bill!'” the reporter shouted. “They're calling out by name congressmen who have argued for spending cuts and then voted to increase the debt limit.”

In the corner screen the in-studio anchorman asked, “Who's behind this, Selena? Have you been able to find out?”

“As far as we can tell it seems to have been fueled—and funded—by the Community Action Committee. And apparently well-funded, Brandon, because these protests have cropped up not only here in Birmingham but in Springfield, Missouri, Huntington, West Virginia, and as far away as Salem, Oregon. They're saying it's irresponsible to raise the debt limit.”

Maria muted the television and went back to her work. Those protests seemed so far away from her life right now. It was important. She knew that. But nobody was being killed over it.

She turned to the stack of files on the desk—the work that was going to keep her mind occupied until Austin called. And until the San Francisco Secret Service opened.

The stack seemed manageable, but the handwritten note on top took her by surprise.

Maria
,

None of this is urgent. Take some time away today if you need to. My home is open to you if you would like to retreat there
.

Tejada

Her phone vibrated. “Yes?” she said, answering the call.

“I'll talk, you just listen,” Austin said. “A Jason Elliot was found dead a couple of days ago in rural Maryland. Out in the middle of nowhere. Apparently a hit-and-run. I am making you a plane reservation for tonight.”

“Hold off on that, would you?” Maria replied. “I'll leave soon but I'm not quite ready for that yet.”

“Maria—”

“I'll let you know, promise, 'kay?”

She hung up before she could hear more and tucked the phone back into her pocket. After fifteen seconds of listening to her heart beat in her ears, she stuffed her laptop back in her briefcase and took it with her as she walked out of her office.

“I'm Maria Winters,” she said to one of the secretaries.

“I know—”

“I'm going to be working off-site today. If
Señor
Tejada needs me, he can reach me on my cell phone.”

The woman seemed nonplussed. She nodded and jotted down a note to that effect. Maria tried not to bolt as she left the building.

She walked for what seemed like miles until she located the library—Biblioteca Sofia Barat. As she hoped, the library had public computers and she sat at one in a back corner. Before she logged on, she fished the temporary phone out of her pocket and consulted her own cell for Snowden's number. It was time to find out what he knew.

He answered on the first ring, though he seemed to have to shout over background noise.

“Bill Snowden,” he said.

“It's Maria,” she said. “I need to talk to you—”

“I didn't recognize the number. Listen, Maria, it's going to have to wait. I'm about to go into a meeting.”

“I just need to ask you—”

Maria heard a female voice say, “Your table is ready, Mr. Stafford.”

“Gotta go,” he said. “I'll get back to you.”

“It's urgent,” she stressed.

But he was gone. Loneliness descended like a shroud.

“Don't go down with this, Maria.” She could hear her mother saying—about science projects that had gone awry and friends who had shunned her and teachers who didn't appreciate her endless questions. She'd even said it the very day she died, when Maria dissolved into tears because Mom couldn't be there to see her win the math prize.

“Don't go down with this, Maria. There will be other times.”

Maria swallowed hard and turned to the computer. She would check the Jason Elliot story herself. But something about her phone call with Snowden bothered her. It wasn't like him to have business meetings in crowded public places. It smacked of Molina and Schlesinger.

She went to Google and typed in
Stafford Washington DC
. Several names came up, but only one stood out—Michael Stafford. Financial lobbyist.

And a fairly influential one from what Maria could tell. He represented the interests of high-end financial enterprises, most of which Maria recognized. She grunted to herself as she scanned the list. These were the people those folks on CNN were protesting against.
That 1 percent of the population who controlled 99 percent of the wealth. Nice guy, this Michael Stafford. He had even lobbied for the interests of foreign corporations, including Belgium Continental.

Maria caught her breath. And Catalonia Financial.

She sat back. Okay, that wasn't a shock, really. Why wouldn't Snowden be meeting with someone who was connected with Catalonia? There was probably something about it in those files on her desk.

But if that was the case, Snowden would've said something to her while he had her on the phone. She had expected resistance from him after she knew Tejada had told him she was coming back to Barcelona, but there had been none. Now she wondered why.

She spent the rest of her allotted time on the library computer digging further into information about Michael Stafford. The only thing that jumped out at her was his previous record of activity every time debt limit debates came up in Congress, and that grabbed her attention merely because of the news report she'd seen that morning.

The screen went black, signaling that she'd used up her time, and Maria pushed back from the computer. None of it made any sense, and it probably had nothing to do with Elena—or Jason Elliot. She wanted to put Austin on this, too, but after the phone call to Snowden, she wasn't sure he was safe either.

Donleavy was probably right—she was getting paranoid. She took a circuitous route back to Catalonia all the while forcing herself not to look over her shoulder.

Tejada was observing the sunset from his home on the hill when Carlos Molina knocked at the open doorway behind him. Tejada was grateful for the interruption. All day long he'd thought of nothing but Maria, and now he imagined he heard Abaddon warning against temptation.

The Master was right. As always. But this was not a temptation of the kind his lord had in mind. He didn't want to be in bed with Maria. He just wanted her company.

“Carlos,” Tejada said, “what brings you here?” He tried to keep his voice even. “News of the Soler investigation, I hope?”

Molina shook his head. “Something else. I think you should see this.”

Tejada followed him into the study, where Molina had his laptop. “This came up today,” Molina said, “from a source Lord Abaddon set up some years ago. The source was told to report any unusual activity to us.”

“Unusual activity? Where?”

“A museum in Seville. Former monastery. They said once you saw this you would know what it was.”

Tejada was mystified but he gave Molina a nod. “Let's have a look at it then.”

Molina clicked on a series of still photos taken by a low-tech camera. The images were grainy, but Tejada could see that they were of a man about his age and a woman probably in her thirties. The man's face was turned away from the camera, though he had a distinctive build with sturdy shoulders, narrow hips, and muscular arms. A physique a man his age would have to work at—something Tejada knew only too well.

“First of all, who is the woman?” Tejada asked. “And second, why is this important?”

“We are running her image through several facial-recognition programs,” Molina replied. “I was told by the guard who supplied these that these two were ‘poking their noses where they don't belong.'”

Tejada was amused at Molina's stilted rendition. “What is it that they shouldn't be ‘poking into'?”

Molina looked over at Tejada. “There are many secrets buried in the past . . .” he said, as if he were reciting a childhood lesson, “things that can destroy us if we do not discover them . . . before someone else does.'”

Tejada recognized those words immediately. They were Abaddon's words. Had he said them to Molina? A man who knew nothing of their meaning? And were these two people the “someone else” Abaddon had foreseen?

“Find out who they are,” Tejada said. “Put someone on them right away.”

“Surveillance only?”

Tejada shook his head. “If they uncover any documents, the documents are to be seized.”

“And these two?”

Tejada glared at him as if to say Molina knew better than to ask that question.