“Who are these guys in real life?” Flint asked.
Wu had his suspicions. “Let’s start with Ares,” he said. “The war god would represent someone brutal and violent. A man with plenty of blood on his hands on and off the battlefield. A man with subordinates who create fear while he inspires bloodlust.”
Patel met his gaze, and understanding passed between them. “The Colonel.”
Wu inclined his head in acknowledgment. “The teams of agents at his apartments in DC and Manhattan haven’t seen any sign of him. He’s MIA.”
“Then the others in the game are his crew,” Flint said. “Which means this has something to do with Nathan Costner’s murder.”
Wu wasn’t ready to follow him down that path without more evidence. “We know the Colonel and Toro were involved in the murder,” he said. “And Toro believes an operative called Doc Tox synthesized the poison used. Beyond those three, we can’t prove anyone else was in on the conspiracy.”
He had been struggling with the complexities of the investigation all night after a midnight call on a secure satellite phone with Paul Wagner, the DHS agent overseeing the Colombian angle. Wagner wasn’t making much headway, and they both agreed it was because Senator Sledge’s insistence that cartels were behind the hit was pure misdirection.
“We can’t rule out coincidence,” he said. “What if Costner had a business on the dark web, and he ripped off the wrong people? Whoever is behind the game took his revenge, and now he’s cleaning house.”
Flint frowned. “He’s killing off the people he hired so they can’t ID him?”
“But why that bizarre hit on Costner?” Patel said. “An exotic toxin that can only come from Colombia?” He shook his head. “Just kill him and be done with it. Better yet, bump him off and make it look like an accident. If it works, there’s no investigation to contend with.”
“Nothing about what this guy does is simple.” Wu pointed at the screen. “Look how elaborate the game is. He could put a bullet in each of their brains, but instead we get a multiple kidnapping and a sadistic game.”
The room grew quiet as everyone contemplated the dilemma.
“You know what this feels like?” Wu decided to share his conclusion after a night of careful consideration. “Revenge. At the bottom of all this is a personal grudge. We’ll find out who’s behind it by digging into the private lives of every player we’ve identified so far.”
“We’ve already done that,” Flint said.
“Then dig harder,” Wu said. “Something connects these people, probably a past crime.”
Patel’s dark brows drew together. “If the original crime went unsolved, we’ll never find the link.”
Wu refused to give up. “If that’s what happened, then we’ll have to solve the old case and the new one at the same time.”
“Without knowing where to look?” Flint said.
“Start with Colonel Treadway,” Wu said. “It’s time to execute that sealed search warrant we’ve been keeping in our back pocket.”
“You want this on the down low?” Flint asked.
The FBI had teams trained to gather evidence without leaving any sign that a search had been conducted. Evidence Recovery Team members would defeat security measures, unlock doors, and take dozens of photos of the space before touching anything. The search itself would be meticulous, with each item replaced in its exact position to match the pictures.
Wu nodded. “I’m sending in the special ERT. Don’t want Senator Sledge to know we’re getting close to him yet.”
A man with the kind of power and influence Sledge had could make trouble for their investigation. In fact, he already had. Right now he believed the FBI was partnering with DHS and the DEA, chasing down the story he was pushing about Colombian cartels. When he found out his closest allies were under a spotlight, Sledge would know they were circling around him.
Like a cornered rat, he would lash out in every direction, and Wu was certain to be in his crosshairs, professionally and perhaps literally, judging by what had happened to the senator’s chief of staff.
CHAPTER 44
Dani checked both ways before entering the narrow corridor after climbing the ladder to the next level up. Toro raced ahead, apparently anxious to put distance between themselves and the others. They turned a corner and quickly scaled a flight of cement steps. The metal door at the top swung open, surprising her.
“This is almost too easy,” she said to Toro. “After forcing us together, Nemesis is letting us spread out again for some reason.”
“Maybe he knows if we all stay together, the game will be over quicker,” Toro said. “Can’t stop all the fun too soon.”
That could explain their situation, but she still sensed a trap. Her instincts had saved her life in the past, so she chose to heed her blaring internal warning system.
She noticed tiny red lights at regular intervals above them.
“Look at this,” Toro said, pointing his chin at the metal rungs of another ladder, this one leading up to a closed hatch in the ceiling. “We’ll never get out of here if we don’t keep going up.”
“I’ll check it out,” Dani said, pulling out her tactical hair clip and tossing it against the metal to see if it was electrified. When nothing happened, she picked up the clip and shoved it back in her hair before wrapping a hand around one of the rungs.
Toro stayed below, watching her scale the ladder. When she got to the top, she reached up to grasp the latch.
“It’s locked,” she called down to him.
“You sure?” he said. “Try pushing harder or see if there’s a second release.”
She climbed back down and gave him a look. “Have you been paying attention?” She gestured around. “This whole thing is about solving puzzles and fighting to survive while trying to escape.”
“You’re saying we’ll have to solve a clue to unlock the hatch.” He made it a statement.
She glanced around the corridor. “First we have to locate the clue.”
They both walked down the passageway, looking high and low. There was a metal pipe attached to the wall with brackets above their heads. She hadn’t paid much attention to it before but now saw three black plastic buttons in a row above a section of pipe, almost blocked from view. Each button had a cartoon drawing of a monkey etched in white.
Toro came up behind her and studied the buttons. “What do you think happens when you press them?”
“Something unpleasant . . . or they could unlock the hatch,” she said. “But it won’t be anything straightforward.” She turned to him. “Give me a boost. I’m going to get a closer look before we touch anything.”
He interlaced his fingers and held out his hands. She put a booted foot onto his palms and steadied herself against the wall as he heaved her upward.
“You look lean,” he said, grunting. “But you must be solid muscle.”
“Suck it up, Toro. If you drop me, I’ll get up and kick your ass.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She focused on the buttons and saw nothing distinguishing about them except the monkeys. The first monkey was covering its mouth with its hands, the second covered its eyes, and the third covered its ears.
She felt along the pipe. The edge of her palm hit something, dislodging it.
“Something fell,” Toro said. “Looks like a folded piece of paper.”
She hopped down and stooped to pick it up. “This will be a clue.”
FOLLOW THE ANCIENT JAPANESE PROVERB. MIZARU, KIKAZARU, AND FINALLY IWAZARU WILL GUIDE YOU. OUT OF ORDER, THE MONKEYS BRING YOUR RECKONING, FOR YOU HAVE COMMITTED ALL MANNER OF EVIL.
“Looks like Nemesis is still dishing out retribution,” Dani said. “We only get one chance to push the buttons in the right order.”
“This is the whole ‘see no evil, hear no evil’ thing,” Toro said. “I never knew it came from an old Japanese proverb.”
“Neither did I,” she said. “And I didn’t know the monkeys had names. How are we supposed to tell Mizaru from Iwazaru?”
“If I had my cell phone, I could answer that question in about ten seconds,” Toro said. “But there’s no way to look it up. Maybe we’re supposed to guess.”
“So far Nemesis has been all about logic and deductive reasoning,” she said. “Let’s try that before we start pushing random buttons.”
“Are they always shown the same way?” Toro asked. “Because I don’t recall what order they’re normally in.”
“How about the order of how much most people use each of their senses?” Dani asked, thinking out loud. “People who have use of their vision tend to rely on it most, so it would be first.”
“Working that way, hearing would be next,” Toro said. “Then talking.”
“That’s not the way the monkeys over the buttons are lined up,” she said. “Which makes me think we’re onto something. Nemesis wouldn’t put them in the correct order.”
“Unless he was using reverse psychology.”
“I don’t think so,” she said.