Cyberking Reclaims His Throne novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Wellness Check

Cops and Stanfield security search her door while he hides, and a thumb drive appears in his jacket.

I pointed at the bedroom with my whole arm, and John went through the door fast, despite his ribs.

Oz grabbed my laptop and every cup from the coffee table.

I took a deep breath and opened the front door with a face I hoped looked bored.

A police officer stood on my porch with his thumbs in his belt.

Behind him were two men in charcoal jackets with a small gold T stitched on the chest.

The taller one had a wire curling from his collar to his ear.

"Ms. Lindeman?" the officer said.

"Sorry to bother you on a Saturday. A man left St. Brigid's this morning with a head injury."

"He signed out on a form with your address."

"My cousin," I said. "John."

"Is he here?"

"He took a bus to Eugene an hour ago. He's got a girlfriend there who's furious with him."

"He had a concussion," the officer said.

"He had a ride to the bus and a very loud girlfriend," I said.

"I'm a programmer, officer. I don't make medical calls."

The tall man in the charcoal jacket smiled at me.

It was a pleasant, empty smile, and it made my skin crawl.

"We're with Stanfield Security," he said.

"Mr. Stanfield is a friend of the family of the missing man, and he's worried."

"A man matching the description was seen with you on a hospital camera."

"Missing man?" I said. "The one on TV?"

"You didn't connect the two?"

"Sir, I haven't slept since Thursday. I connected a guy with a bandage and an annoying cough."

Behind me Oz made a noise.

The tall man glanced past my shoulder at the apartment.

His eyes went to the hallway, to the closed bedroom door, and stayed there a second too long.

"Mind if we take a quick look inside?" he asked.

"Mind if you show me a warrant?"

The officer shifted his weight.

"It's not that kind of visit, ma'am."

"Then it's the kind where I say no."

For a long moment nobody moved.

I could hear my own pulse.

Then the tall man took a white card from his jacket and held it out between two fingers.

"If your cousin turns up, you'll call this number," he said.

"Mr. Stanfield would be generous. Very generous."

I took the card.

"Sure," I said.

They went down the porch steps and across the yard.

I shut the door, locked it and slid down it until I was sitting on the floor.

Oz slid down next to me.

"You were amazing," he whispered. "You were so calm. I almost believed you."

"I believed me, too. That's the scary part."

The bedroom door opened.

John came out with dust on his sweatshirt, and he had been under my bed for nine minutes.

"Sorry about the dust," I said.

"Don't be. I learned some things down there."

He crouched awkwardly because of his ribs and held up one finger.

"The tall one's earpiece is on a closed channel, but he wasn't alone."

"He said something into it before you opened the door: 'Confirm.' And 'Her.'"

"How can you know that?"

"The floor vent. Sound carried."

He frowned.

"And the second one has a phone in his left pocket, pinging your Wi-Fi the whole time he stood on your porch."

"It's trying to get into your network."

Oz went white.

"I already blocked it," John said. "It took six seconds."

"You blocked a phone through a closed door with a broken wrist."

"I didn't even use the wrist."

He sat down on the floor across from us, wincing, and for a moment he looked almost pleased.

Then the pleasure drained from his face.

"There's something else. When I was under the bed, I thought of a radio."

"A radio?"

"A police scanner. In a garage, a gray one with a cracked dial."

"I was maybe thirteen. I'd taped a wire to the garage door to get a better signal."

His eyes went distant.

"My dad yelled at me for it. I can hear him yell. I can't see his face."

"That's a memory," I said quietly. "That's real."

"It's the first one." He looked at me. "It's a stupid one."

"It's not stupid. It's yours."

Oz cleared his throat.

"So Meridian Labs," he said.

"I looked them up while you were lying to the cops. They're huge. Federal contracts, the whole thing."

"Palmer Stanfield is the chairman and owns most of it. Jonas Wray founded the company when he was twenty-four."

"Founded it," John repeated.

"And there's a memorial thing set up on their website. Yvette Vandermeer is running it. She's his girlfriend." Oz hesitated. "Two years."

I looked at John's face and saw nothing there but a closed door.

"I'm going to wash your jacket before it ruins my couch," I said, because I couldn't think of anything else to say.

I took his blood-stiff jacket from the hospital bag and carried it to the sink.

The lining was torn at the collar, and something hard slid against my fingers.

A strip of black tape ran along the seam.

I cut it with kitchen scissors.

A thumb drive the size of a matchbook fell into the sink.

There was nothing printed on it.

Oz plugged it into the old offline laptop he keeps for dangerous experiments.

The screen stayed black for three seconds.

Then a single line of white text appeared in the middle.

HELLO, KING. PASSWORD?

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