The Alpha Deception Read online

  “What about the people, goddamnit!” the President blared suddenly. “What happened to the people?”

  Sundowner pressed STOP. “They were attacked, sir.”

  The President leaned over the table, the fear in his face caught by the glow coming off the screen. “You had better be prepared to explain yourself, Mr. Sundowner.”

  “I’m not, Mr. President, and I’m not sure I ever will be able to do so satisfactorily, because what happened to Hope Valley can’t be explained.”

  Lyman Scott moved back into the darkness, safe from the screen’s light. “Your report indicates otherwise. You said symmetrical. You said attacked. But there’s no weapon on this planet that could bring about what we just witnessed.”

  “You mean, sir, there didn’t used to be.”

  Chapter 3

  BLAINE MCCRACKEN WATCHED the Hind-D being wheeled down the ramp from the cargo bay of the C-130 transport plane that had flown it to the Air Force test lab in Colorado Springs.

  “You’re late,” Lieutenant Colonel Ben Metcalf barked cheerfully, striding across the airfield toward him.

  “Next time call Federal Express. They’re the only ones who’ll absolutely, positively do business with bastards like you.”

  The two men met at the foot of the ramp and shook hands firmly. Metcalf’s eyes fell fondly on the Hind.

  “I can’t tell you what it means to us to finally get our hands on one of these.”

  “Forget the plural,” Blaine scolded. “I did this for you, Ben, you and you only. For services rendered, remember?” Fifteen years ago, Metcalf had run interference for Blaine with the brass back in Vietnam so that Blaine’s unit could cut through enemy lines instead of red tape.

  “But in this case there’s the matter of the million-dollar bounty on this bird. That money now officially belongs to you.”

  “Except I don’t plan on claiming it, not when it’ll probably mean having my picture plastered across the cover of some half-assed war-lover’s magazine.”

  “Would probably boost circulation a bundle to showcase that beautiful mug of yours.”

  “Yeah. People’d have to buy a copy to find out if I was human or not. If anyone asks, just tell them you inherited the Hind after it was left in a tow zone.”

  They started walking down the tarmac.

  “You still think about the war, Blaine?”

  “Never stopped. Johnny says I’m obsessed with bringing things to a finish. Maybe in this case it’s because over there we never finished anything; we never really knew we started.” Blaine gazed at the Hind as it was towed toward a hangar. “You gonna keep her here awhile?”

  “Couple months at least. I’m going to take care of the flight testing myself, just as soon as I patch up the holes you put in her.”

  “Wouldn’t mind sticking around for that myself.”

  “You’re more than welcome to but there’s a message waiting for you in my office. From a woman.”

  “And I told her never to call me at the office… .”

  Metcalf laughed briefly. “Figured you’d be a harder man to track down.”

  “Somebody needs me, it’s not that hard. That’s the way I want it.”

  “Message said it was important. No name, just a number. Massachusetts exchange, I think.”

  “Terry Catherine Hayes,” Blaine said, mostly to himself.

  “Know her?”

  “I used to.”

  Ben Metcalf insisted on flying Blaine across the country in an Air Force jet. McCracken sat in the cockpit and tried to remember what piloting a jet was like.

  And what Terry Catherine might be like now. They hadn’t seen each other in over eight years, almost nine, after a brief and intense romantic interlude that had been Blaine’s last. It had been quite an item for a month at least. The daughter of a rich Bostonian banker taking up with a mysterious government agent no queries could find any record of. They had met at a cocktail party when Blaine deliberately mistook her for the woman he was there to protect.

  T.C… . He was the only one who called her that, and she pretended to hate it for those weeks McCracken had shared with her, shared more than he had with most women. Sustained attachments were impossible in Blaine’s chosen profession. Too easy for the woman to be hurt or used as leverage by an opponent seeking any possible advantage. And just as dangerous, attachments could provide too seductive a picture of what the other side of life was like. Normalcy, settling down, living under your real name and without the fear that anyone’s eyes you met might belong to a person about to kill you.

  In this case, though, it hadn’t been McCracken who had broken things off, it had been Terry Catherine. He hadn’t told her much about himself but it was enough to let her know the commitment might last only until the next phone call. T.C. chose to accept the pain on her own terms. She was just twenty-two then, a kid fresh out of Brown University with the whole world before her. McCracken, three months past thirty, knew what the world was really like. Vietnam had interrupted college for him after just one year and he had never gone back. His life was made for him in what Johnny Wareagle called the hellfire, such events as the Phoenix project and the Tet Offensive.

  The emotional hellfire came when T.C. broke things off. He probably would have done so himself before too much longer but understanding the strength it had required for her to do it made him love her more. It was impossible for him to forget her. He wanted her so much more once it was certain that he couldn’t have her.

  They hadn’t as much as spoken in the eight-and-a-half years since parting, which was all the more reason to believe that something in T.C.’s life must be desperately wrong for her to seek him out. He tried to tell himself the fire of her youth’s beauty would be long gone, but he was destined to be surprised by her yet again.

  Their meeting that night was set for the Plaza Bar in Boston’s Copley Plaza Hotel, not far from Terry Catherine’s Back Bay townhouse. The Plaza Bar was located off the hotel’s lobby, on the right of the main entrance. On most nights it featured the nimble piano work of the famed Dave McKenna, his fingers sliding across ivory in the bar’s back right corner. Blaine entered through the handcarved archway just as the last chords of a McKenna favorite were greeted by applause. The ceilings were high, and the fresh smell of leather couches and low armchairs mingled with cigarette smoke and perfume. He scanned the room for T.C., but she wasn’t at any of the nearby tables. He headed for the far wall, where more tables were secluded behind a Japanese screen. As he approached, she stepped out to meet him.

  She was undoubtedly the most beautiful woman in the bar. Her figure had remained tall and lean. She wore only traces of makeup and a dress that highlighted her model’s body. There was nothing pretentious about her appearance. Blaine immediately felt all the old attraction he had tried to forget. She stood there uneasily, her smile slight and nervous, and Blaine knew more was behind the tension than simply their reunion.

  He kissed her lightly on the lips, let his squeeze of her hand linger.

  “You promised me you’d stay beautiful,” he said through the lump in his throat. “And you have.”

  “Still working the old charm, eh McCracken?”

  “Some things don’t change, T.C.”

  “Been a long time since anyone called me that. I still hate it.”

  “Well, Terry Catherine, that’s why I say it.”

  “I see time hasn’t mellowed you in the least. As I always used to tell you, if God had meant us to use initials, he wouldn’t have bothered with names in the first place.”

  Blaine let go of her hand and together they walked to her table, set back against the wall where there was nothing to disturb their privacy. Through a nearby window they could see people passing on the sidewalk outside.

  “I do plenty of things God probably never meant,” he told her when they were seated.

  “And I understand one of those colorful escapades,” she followed without missing a beat, “earned you the title of McCrack
enballs. I was offended when I heard about it. They could have come to me for a reference.”

  “Your memory that good?”

  “Some things you don’t forget.”

  “That ring I felt on your finger means you forgot one promise you made to yourself.”

  She nodded emotionlessly. “An unfortunate misstep. Lasted three years. The divorce was a much happier day than the wedding. I keep the ring as a reminder to avoid similar missteps in the future.”

  “Why bother making one?”

  She didn’t answer him right away, and that gave Blaine a chance to gaze into her eyes. She really was beautiful, even more so now than eight years ago. The little her face had aged made it seem fuller, less dominated by the high cheekbones she had always been sensitive about. She wore her hair shorter now, shaggy, neither in fashion nor out—just her.

  “Because I was scared,” she said finally. “Twenty-seven years old, all dressed up, and nowhere to go. I panicked. Promised myself I’d say yes to the next man who popped the question. Could’ve been worse. It could have been you, McCracken.”

  Blaine winked. “Anything but that.”

  “Anyway, I’m now determined to die single.”

  “But not a virgin.”

  “Thanks to you.”

  “If I was the first, I’ll eat your mattress cover.”

  “You were the first that mattered, the first who wasn’t a juvenile, or who didn’t come ready packaged from my family, or who wasn’t a horny Brown undergrad. It’s the same thing.”

  A waitress came and T.C. ordered a glass of wine by name and vintage. McCracken said he’d take the same.

  “Red and white,” he noted with a shrug. “All just colors to me.”

  “A man in your position really should pay more attention to such things, McCracken.”

  “A man in my position shouldn’t be drinking at all. You should see me. I’m really good at swirling the contents of a glass around so no one can tell I’m not drinking it.”

  “The wine you just ordered is twenty dollars a glass.”

  “I’ll swirl slower.”

  She laughed and looked at ease for the first time. “You’re a hard man to keep track of.”

  “You found me.”

  “I never stopped keeping tabs, you know. I know all about your trouble in England and your subsequent banishment to the office pool in France. Learning of your resurrection was second only to my divorce as the best day ever.”

  “But you didn’t call until now.”

  The waitress came with their drinks, saving T.C. the trouble of responding right away. She sipped. McCracken swirled.

  “I thought it would be much harder to reach you.”

  “I make sure it isn’t for people who know me. It’s what I’m doing these days—paying back old debts, settling scores. Makes me feel I’m worth something.”

  “Doing favors for friends …”

  “Something like that. The freedom’s priceless. I’ve sworn off Washington. But, of course, you’d know that.”

  “I heard.”

  “How’s Back Bay?”

  “Crumbling. Water table rose and the townhouse is sinking. Literally. It’s cost me more in repairs than what my parents paid for it.” She paused. “I found a phone number for you, but no address.”

  “Got six of them—apartments. Two don’t even have any furniture, but they’re scattered conveniently all over the country. What I really want is to own a car. You know I’ve never really had my own. Pretty incredible for a man of my advanced years.”

  T.C. sipped some of the wine, and the goblet trembled in her hand. Blaine grasped her other one in his.

  “What’s wrong, T.C.?”

  “I hate asking you for something, after so long I mean.”

  “Favors for friends, remember?”

  She placed the wine goblet on the table. “It’s my grandfather. He’s … in danger.”

  “Cotter Hayes? You’re kidding.”

  “Not Cotter Hayes. My grandfather on my mother’s side.” She paused. “Erich Earnst.”

  “Hmmmmmm, not your average Boston yankee name.”

  “Anything but. German Jewish. World War II specifically. An escapee from Sobibor.”

  “If the gossip columnists could hear you now… .”

  “It’s one of Boston’s best-kept secrets, I assure you.” Another piano rendition by Dave McKenna ended, and T.C. waited for the applause to die down before continuing. “That Rawley Hayes would consent to marry a woman of Jewish persuasion … well, fortunately the truth never came out. Might have ruined him if it had.” A sad smile crossed her lips. “Truth was, though, that Grandpa Erich was always infinitely more fun and interesting than Grandpa Cotter, especially when I grew old enough to appreciate him and all he’d been through.”

  “But now you’re saying he’s in danger.”

  “Because he says so. And I believe him. It’s all very recent. The police don’t buy it—nothing to go on. I … didn’t know where else to turn.”

  McCracken swirled his wine some more. “I need to hear the specifics.”

  “There aren’t many, Blaine; that’s the problem. He’s certain he’s being followed. He should know, after all he’s been through.” Her mind strayed. “My mother’s not really Jewish. Grandpa Erich found her wandering the streets of Poland and brought her to America with him and his wife. Never forced their religion on her because they didn’t want her subjected to the persecution they had undergone. But, in addition to bringing my mother over, he also brought along a sack of diamonds the size of a tote bag. His gem parlor is still one of the best in Manhattan. The money made his daughter enough of a somebody for my father to take notice of her.”

  “You sound bitter.”

  “I hate pretenses; you know that.”

  “All too well. And that’s why if you believe your grandfather, I believe you.” The relief on her face was obvious. Her need for the wine seemed to evaporate, and she too, began swirling her glass.

  “Trouble is I’m not exactly sure what I can do about it, T.C. This isn’t exactly the kind of work I specialize in.”

  “You could talk to him.”

  “Which I’m sure you’ve done already. You’re a sensible person. Is there anything he says I can make use of?”

  “You’ll ask the right questions. You always do.”

  “Except once. Might have saved you the bother of that divorce otherwise.”

  She shook her head sadly. “It would have happened anyway, Blaine, probably well before the three years were out, and that day would have been a bad one instead of a good one.”

  “In a twisted sense, I suppose that’s a compliment.”

  “Not so twisted.”

  Blaine put his hand over hers. “Call your grandfather. Tell him I’m coming to talk to him.”

  She smiled. “I already did. He’s expecting you tomorrow morning at his gem parlor in the diamond district.”

  “You know me too well, T.C.”

  “Some things don’t change.”

  “Did you also mean to leave us the night?”

  She hedged. “The morning was his idea, not mine.”

  “Then I suppose—”

  “Dinner, Blaine. Some more of this wine probably; I’ll drink while you swirl. That’ll be as far as it goes, but it’ll be plenty far for me because just having you here means enough. I don’t want to spoil it. I want to hold it just the way it is.”

  “I love it when you talk dirty.”

  Chapter 4

  “IS YOUR REPORT READY, Mr. Sundowner?”

  When the scientist answered, his voice was hoarse with fatigue. In the past eighteen hours there had been time only for a quick change of clothes. Once again, the Tomb felt large and devastatingly empty to him. As he spoke, he was distracted by the echo of his own words.

  “I’m not sure it will ever be totally complete, sir,” he told the President, “at least not in the foreseeable future. To be honest, I know no more th
an I did yesterday; I’ve just confirmed my original feelings.”

  The other men in the room—Kappel, Stamp, Mercheson, and Lyman Scott himself—stared at him with laymen’s confusion and disdain.

  “Then get on with it,” urged the President.

  Sundowner didn’t know where to start. Or rather, he did—and that was the problem.

  “It all comes down to the symmetry of the destroyed radius. I’ll spare you the explanatory details. Suffice it to say that the town of Hope Valley was destroyed by a hostile action in the form of a particle-beam weapon fired from between ten to twenty thousand feet above the Earth’s surface.”

  “Beam weapon?” raised Secretary of Defense George Kappel. “You mean like a laser?”

  “Not at all. Lasers fire focused beams of energy. A particle beam fires matter, subatomic particles accelerated to the speed of light. The mass of these particles increases with speed, and the energy produced goes up by the square.”

  “In English please, Ryan,” requested the President.

  Sundowner sighed. “An ordinary television set is actually a particle-beam generator which utilizes a gun to shoot particles in the form of electrons through two magnets. Presto! You’ve got a picture, the density of which is directly related to the concentration of particles fired from the set’s gun. If it was too dense, the beam would obliterate the screen and everything in front of it. Now picture that on a much larger scale with a gun firing particles other than electrons. On the subatomic level almost anything is possible.”

  “As yesterday would seem to attest to,” advanced Secretary of State Edmund Mercheson. “But how could this beam we’re facing leave no trace whatsoever of people’s remains, wood, plants, trees, grass, even rubber and cloth?”

  “Organic matter,” Sundowner stated flatly, rotating his stare from one to the other. “The subatomic particles break up organic matter.”

  “Speak plainly,” ordered Lyman Scott.

  Sundowner swallowed some air hoping the dull fear rising in him would slide down with it. “All life on Earth is based on the carbon atom. The subatomic particles composing the Hope Valley beam have the capacity to destroy the glue which holds that atom together. It breaks down the carbon chains into their basic elements. Separates the oxygen from the hydrogen on a molecular level which reduces organic matter to black carbon dust.”