3 Ciphers

3 CIPHERS

by Carol Ritz

Copyright 2018 Carol Ritz

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-938659-14-0

Published by Bard Publishing at Smashwords

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

To Bernie for making this book possible.

To my family for making my dreams possible.

Title and Copyright Notice

Dedication

Chapter 1 Last Words

Chapter 2 The Alpha and Omega

Chapter 3 Secrets of the Dead

Chapter 4 The Message

Chapter 5 Old Friends

Chapter 6 Florida Keys

Chapter 7 The Sign of Seven

Chapter 8 Long and Winding Road

Chapter 9 The Rotunda

Chapter 10 First Contact

Chapter 11 Keeping Watch

Chapter 12 The Beale Box

Chapter 13 The Priest

Chapter 14 Jefferson's Secrets

Chapter 15 The Beale Cypher Coalition

Chapter 16 Dead and Buried

Chapter 17 Off the Grid

Chapter 18 Cousins

Chapter 19 Secrets and Lies

Chapter 20 The Stranger

Chapter 21 The Rabbi

Chapter 22 Dollar Love

Chapter 23 Ancient Secrets

Chapter 24 Lapin Agile

Chapter 25 Secret History

Chapter 26 Missing Links

Chapter 27 Tunnel of Gold

Chapter 28 On the Edge

Chapter 29 An Ancient Code

Chapter 30 Curses

Chapter 31 The Beale Bible

Chapter 32 Hands Off

Chapter 33 Presidio La Bahia

Chapter 34 Wild Child

Chapter 35 CyberCorps Inc.

Chapter 36 No Need to Know

Chapter 37 In Enemy Hands

Chapter 38 Full Disclosure

Chapter 39 Inside Information

Chapter 40 An Uneasy Truce

Chapter 41 Cryptologia

Chapter 42 Killing Time

Chapter 43 Proprietary Code

Chapter 44 A Matter of Trust

Chapter 45 High and Dry

Chapter 46 The Lowdown

Chapter 47 The Edge

Chapter 48 Treasure Trail

Chapter 49 Getting Close

Chapter 50 Undercover

Chapter 51 Stone Cold

Chapter 52 Family Secrets

Chapter 53 Standoff

Chapter 54 Descent into Darkness

Chapter 55 Reunion

Chapter 56 Resurrected

Chapter 57 In Plain Sight

Chapter 58 Execution

Chapter 59 Rite of Passage

Chapter 60 A House Divided

Chapter 61 The Vault

Chapter 62 Secret Bonds

Chapter 63 Off the Record

Chapter 64 The Exchange

Chapter 65 Light and Perfection

Thank You for Reading

About the Author

Chapter 1

Last Words

The air held a silent chill that October night when Simon Blake waited on the tarmac of Leesburg Executive Airport with General James Thornton—his biological father. Side by side, they stood under the stars, unsure what to say to each other. Simon studied his father's face as he had countless times, noting the similarity in their features—the square jaw and broad forehead, the lidded eyes that obscured all inner thoughts. Technically they were family, but Simon had grown up living with his mom. Though he'd spent at least one weekend a month at the General’s home, his father's job as the director of the National Security Agency—meaning overseas assignments and endless security briefings—limited his presence. Years of sporadic interaction had left them with little in common.

Physically Simon towered over his father, yet it was the General who commanded a greater space when he walked into a room. The old man's regal bearing and booming voice were intimidating as hell—so intimidating that Simon had never been able to call him Father, Dad, or anything other than General.

In contrast, Simon came across as loose-limbed, casual, and disheveled. He was neither large nor small, fat nor thin, athletic nor sedentary. In almost every sense, his appearance was extraordinarily ordinary. He guessed it matched what the General thought of him.

We may come from the same gene pool, Simon thought, but the only thing we share is Quentin.

Thank God Quentin was on his way. The thrill about his half-brother's return pumped hot blood through Simon's veins. At the same time, an anxious knot formed in his throat.

Quentin loomed large in Simon's life, in part because he was seven years older. When Simon was meeting preschoolers for playdates, Quentin was meeting girls at middle-school dances. When Simon was struggling in Little League, Quentin was scoring double-doubles in high school basketball. And, when Simon was getting detentions in geometry class, his brother was earning medals at West Point. At twenty-four years of age, Simon had a responsible job, but Quentin was directing secret overseas missions. At times Simon felt as if he were running a race he could never win.

Yet, seeing Quentin only at Christmas for the past two years was a lot more painful than Simon liked to admit. He couldn't wait to be together again, eating junk food, playing video games or making jokes around the fire as Quentin spun stories of far-off wars and narrow escapes from the jaws of death. Just days ago, he learned that the secret mission overseas was over. Quentin was coming home.

Simon was the first to spot his Cessna circling in for a landing.

He's here!

Something seemed off—tiny flickers of light flashed orange around the plane.

A fireball brightened the night sky. An explosive roar came next, followed by the shrill whine of a deathly dive.

No, no, no. Simon thought he was shouting but couldn't hear his voice. He raced toward the woods, stumbling over branches in the darkness, as if he could stop the horror if he got there before the plane hit ground. He couldn't.

The Cessna ripped through the trees. Branches cleaved the right wing from its body, and the plane spun out of control. Instinctively, Simon shielded his face with his arm. A deafening crash sent a massive shock rippling through the earth.

Simon was close when the flames flared against the night sky. It was a miracle that Quentin survived the fiery blast. Simon's heart thumped against his chest as a hulking form burst from a cloud of smoke that smelled of burning diesel fuel, pine, and rubber. He almost didn't recognize his brother. Quentin was covered in soot, his square jaw hidden by a closely cropped beard, his skin charred in patches like meat left too long on the grill. Simon's hero stumbled forward and grabbed Simon's arm, ignoring the jagged metal jutting from his own chest.

With blood dripping through his fingers, Quentin pressed a cell phone into Simon's hands. Beale, Quentin's words came croaking from his throat. Thomas Jefferson Beale.

The meaningless name echoed in Simon's ear but all he could focus on was the blood. Too much blood. Thick and viscous on his skin. Filling the air with its flinty aroma.

A body blow shocked him back to his senses. Simon was on the ground, his arms pinned to the wet forest floor, his gut flattened by the weight of his brother's linebacker-like body.

"Tell father. No one else. They have the codes. If they find Beale's treasure…" Panic flashed in Quentin's eyes.

What the hell are you talking about? Simon struggled to move.

With the back of his broad hand, Quentin smacked Simon hard across the face.

"Listen, damn you! The Beale ciphers. The treasure isn't about the gold...The cross is the key! Tell father. No one else. Promise me!"

There was fear in Quentin's voice. The gash from the metal in his chest was deep and blood was leaking fast onto Simon's shirt. The jet-fueled bonfire spewed black choking smoke. Fear and fumes and the weight of his brother's body sucked at his breath. Were there other voices?

Simon thought he heard footsteps. He couldn't be sure. His brother’s grip relaxed and Simon rolled away. Without warning, a sharp jab pierced his neck. Against the distant jet-fueled bonfire, a pulsing black spot appeared in the center of Simon's vision. Like the negative image of a flash of light, rays of darkness shot forth from the spot along with circles of black in an expanding, wavelike pattern.

He had no idea why he blacked out.

He knew only that one moment he was in the woods near Leesburg Airport, with his brother's body pressing him to the ground and Quentin's blood wicking through the weave of Simon's shirt. The next moment, in a burst of darkness, Simon's consciousness blanked to nothing.

Chapter 2

The Alpha and Omega

Four years later—Key West, Florida

Today is the day. Chisel in hand, the marine archaeologist tapped it against the rocky shell. He worked slowly, taking great care to preserve the integrity of the pistol inside. After centuries on the sea floor, the iron innards of the gun had disintegrated to slush, leaving only an outer metal skin, delicate as an eggshell. One wrong move and it would crumble.

The trick to reconstructing a weapon was to fortify the outer shell by filling the hollow cavity with liquid acrylic while the rocky encrustation was still intact. The acrylic was now solid, and the pistol was ready to be unveiled. After a few targeted hits, the outer shell cracked, and two hundred years of encrustation fell from the artifact inside.

The pistol’s outer shell was so perfectly preserved that the archaeologist forgot for a moment that it was no longer a working weapon. He turned it over and ran his fingers over the barrel. The gold plate had been the first thing he’d spotted on the ocean floor. Gold stood out. Clean. Everything hated the stuff. No rust, corrosion, or coral, thank goodness. Yet encrustation on the non-gilded surfaces had obscured the inscription. At last he could read what was etched in the gold: Captain Thomas Jefferson Beale.

Holy Ghost, he whispered. Beale was on the Ifigen. The pistol proved that an American soldier had boarded the Spanish ship in 1818 before she sank to the bottom of the sea. Dr. Carlton Gates felt giddy, as reckless as his younger self, who once sped along on his high-tech salvage boat, pitching into steep troughs and riding the crests of the advancing waves, screaming above the wind, Today is the day! Ten years ago, the Ifigen was his siren; he would find her or die. It was an arduous journey, riddled with legal battles and setbacks, and when he finally found her, the treasure—tons of bullion and jewels—was missing. Residual lead embedded in skeletons and stray shot in the ship’s timbers told the tale.

Pirates.

It was a miracle his investors didn’t yank his funding. Gates shuddered, picturing the monsignor’s face, strong, with drooping lids, heavy bones and thick powerful lips. Gates was not fooled by the shadowy sadness that overtook him when a venture went sour. He had seen the remains of others who’d betrayed the unholy priest.

Steer clear of him, mate, a colleague had warned. Some said the monsignor had been born without a conscience. Others claimed his soul had a black spot burnt into it by the house fire that took his family in his youth. But after raiding junk ships for contraband in ‘Nam, Gates trusted his instincts to get him out of just about anything. Besides, the man was a priest—a monsignor. Just one rank below a Bishop, for God’s sake. They had met at a religious retreat in St. Petersburg. In a dark confessional, the archaeologist had spilled out his fears. How he was swimming in debt, about to lose his lab, his reputation, all he’d worked a lifetime to achieve.

God has brought you to this place, the monsignor had said. With a voice smooth as a glassy sea, he’d described a Christian consortium seeking religious artifacts from Spanish shipwrecks. Within a week, the archaeologist had an offer for full funding. He’d praised God, but would probably have accepted cash from a pimp, a shylock, or the devil himself.

A noise, the tiniest of creaks, froze Gates in place. For privacy, he’d given his staff the day off and was expecting no one. Gates scanned the recovery lab for hints of movement. The only sound was the gurgling of a dozen waist-deep tanks where odd-shaped chunks of coral smoldered in caustic chemical baths. He circled the lab, double-checking the doors. Locked.

He focused on the symbol engraved beside Beale’s name. A number seven, topped with the sign of infinity and flanked by two Greek letters, alpha and omega.

"I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last," the archaeologist whispered, quoting from the Bible. The symbol held no meaning for him, but it was an important clue to the religious artifacts lost on the Ifigen—and the priest wasn’t the only one looking for them.

A government spook had arrived at the lab days after the Ifigen recovery began. It was obvious he was no treasure hunter, nor an archaeologist for that matter. Built like a Navy Seal with a tree-trunk sized neck and erect, military posture, he loosened his tie, presented his National Security Agency credentials and introduced himself as Officer Quentin Thornton.

He’d offered a substantial reward for Beale’s pistol, engraved with the mysterious symbol. It was all he wanted from the dig. It’s a matter of national security, he said in a grave voice. How a 200-year-old pistol could affect America’s safety, he didn’t say, and asking was out of the question. In ‘Nam, Gates had investigated phony manifests and false ID’s for navy intelligence, and the idea of returning to clandestine operations for his country was over-the-top thrilling. The monsignor be damned! Gates was a patriot. He’d deliver the pistol to NSA.

He opened the bottom drawer of his desk and foraged through old papers for an envelope he hadn’t touched in four years. Inside, he found the elaborate security code, provided by Quentin the spook. Gates opened his laptop and typed in a message: Confirmed. The pistol belonged to Beale. It has the symbol. Come to the recovery lab at once. He deleted it. Composed it again. Send it damn you, he thought. The monsignor will never know. He punched in the security code, typed in the spook’s name, and entered the code. It took just moments to transmit the message.

As soon as it was gone, tiny pricks traveled up Gates’ spine. Had he made a terrible mistake?

Better hide the pistol. He checked the lab once more. No signs of movement. Gates squatted beside a double-paneled cabinet secured by a serious combination lock. His personal safe. Hunkered down, working the dial, he no longer felt young. A paper-pusher’s bulge pressed against the seams of his khaki shorts, and his shoulders and arms had long ago lost their muscular strength. You’re not what you used to be, Mate.

The final tumbler fell into place and the cabinet doors unfolded. The archaeologist removed an iron box secured by a brass lock. With a quick turn of the key, he lifted the lid, and a golden glow reflected from the interior. After removing a massive 24-karat gold money chain once worn by a Spanish aristocrat, he placed the pistol inside the box.

There was a snap, followed by a flash of priestly robes. Gates whipped around and knocked the box to the floor. It landed with a crack, followed by the clatter of gems and gold.

Holy Christ. The monsignor! Did he see the pistol? On instinct, the archaeologist dropped to his knees to gather his illicit treasures back into the box. He was shaking. How did the priest know? Did God himself betray Gates’ secrets? Using his body to block the monsignor’s view, he reached for Beale’s pistol.

A booted foot stepped on his hand. The priest wrestled the pistol from the archaeologist’s fingers.

"Thomas Jefferson Beale," the monsignor whispered, reading the inscription. The symbol seven with the alpha and omega seemed to hold no meaning for him. What others have seen this pistol?

No one, the archaeologist said. I did the recovery myself.

To Gates’ horror, the priest turned to the laptop, still open to the recent transmission addressed to Quentin Thornton. As he read, the monsignor ran his fingers through the jewels from Gates’ secret stash. He made the sign of the cross, and a solemn sadness fell over his features. The shift in mood sent a ripple of panic through the archaeologist’s body.

The priest lifted the golden money chain in his hand.

Such a pity, he remarked. "A single link of this chain would pay for an entire voyage. Yet, when the Ifigen went down, its owner was dragged to a watery grave by his own bloody greed."

Cold metal fell against the archaeologist’s throat. The monsignor was choking him with the chain! He struggled for breath, but couldn’t force his flabby fingers underneath the golden links. The chain jerked. There was a crack and a stabbing pain. Gates’ vision narrowed. From high above, he saw his body go limp.

Today is the day, he thought, and then there was nothing.

Fat, greedy pooh-bah! Octavio Vega took Gates’ puffy wrist in his hand and checked the pulse. It was weak, but steady. Good. The archaeologist must be alive when he entered the water. Vega pulled Gates’ collar high up on his neck to hide the ligature marks. He then draped the archaeologist’s flabby arm over his shoulder. When he heaved the man to a standing position, it was a struggle to maintain his balance.

Irritating that the old man had let himself go. At well over a hundred kilo, Gates would be an awkward load to drag across the parking lot. At least Vega needn’t worry about the security cameras—his benefactors had seen to that. Still, things could get complicated if the odd tourist happened along at the wrong time. Best to keep Gates upright, to pretend the man was drunk.

It was a reasonable ruse. Scuba diving was Gates’ favorite pastime, and he often drank heavily before he took his dip into the sea. Vega had been on enough of these junkets to have a good idea of the man’s habits—where he kept his gear, his liquor, and the hunting knife he used to dress fresh-caught tarpon or grouper.

The parking lot that separated Gates’ lab from his diving vessel was small—no wider than a bull ring. Yet, the Florida heat made it a difficult trek. Vega prided himself on his physical conditioning, but halfway across the asphalt his hair was plastered to his head in a wet mass and his shoulder ached from Gates’ dead weight.

Worse, the odor of sweat and garlic from his comatose passenger hung stale and dank in the air. Silently, he railed against Gates’ stupidity. Fool! The Beale treasure is mine! If this fat, heavy pooh-bah had fulfilled his contract, Vega would be in Seville right now, sipping on a fine sherry, raising a secret toast to his final achievement—his golden ring.

Instead, the arrogant bureaucrat had tried to freeze Vega out of what was rightfully his. A part of him understood Gates’ yearnings and the allure of a private stash. Vega himself had spent years pilfering gems to support a secret, more lavish lifestyle. But petty thievery wasn’t enough—would never be enough—to afford Vega’s passions. In quiet moments, he saw himself in his father’s place—the master of an elegant estate, the talk of the village. Only, instead of a winery in Spain, the setting for Vega’s fantasy was a far-off land where gingerbread cabins overlooked snowy slopes or parrots nested in the parks. He would arrive anonymously amid whispers of the mysterious stranger of untold wealth. It was the life he was born to—the life ripped from him. To get it back, he needed more than stolen trinkets, squirreled away like some tedious miser. For the life he dreamed of—the life he deserved—he needed the Beale treasure. His golden ring.

Vega had reached Gates’ research vessel, the Down Under, which was tied to the dock on the lee side of the island. Vega slipped his arms around Gates’ chest from behind, hauled him aboard and deposited the traitorous mass of flesh beside the diving platform.

All seemed quiet. The tops of the palm trees were silent and still, the sky was clear and windless, and the sea stretched out wide and empty beneath a relentless sun. Vega gazed out across the shallow, transparent water. Dark shadows darted about, just below the surface.

A rush of warmth and a rising excitement engorged Vega’s limbs. Gates had often bragged about the bull sharks, drawn to this remote strip of sea to hunt the fish trapped by the sandbar. He’d even demonstrated how a small bucket of chum would trigger a feeding frenzy.

It was important that Vega move quickly, while Gates was still unconscious. He disappeared into the hold and returned with Gates’ bathing suit, snorkeling gear, and a hunting knife with a serrated blade. With speed and efficiency, he stripped off his old business partner’s clothing. It took effort to pull the bathing trunks over Gates’ widening middle. Vega dipped the snorkeling mask and fins into the salty water. He slipped the fins onto Vega’s feet, pulled the mask snug over his eyes, ensuring a good seal, and stretched Gates’ lips open to insert the snorkel. It pleased Vega that the man’s phony smile was permanently erased from his arrogant face.

To avoid soiling his own robes, Vega stripped. He gripped the serrated blade in one hand, grasped Gates from behind with the other, and pulled him into the water. Gates’ dead weight dragged Vega beneath the briny sea and the taste of salt invaded his lips. No time to waste. He plunged the serrated blade between the first and third ribs; it went in sideways—clean, without touching bone. Gates’ body lurched, but Vega held him firmly in place, their two hearts thumping in a chorus of death and predation.

When he slipped the knife from the open wound and drove it into Gates’ soft underbelly, blood pumped in spurts onto Vega’s face. He wouldn’t wait for the pump to grow cold. The sharks would not be long.

He dropped the knife and hoisted himself onto the diving platform, just in time. Black-finned ancient predators already darted toward the chum. Gates once had told him a shark can smell a single drop of blood in a million drops of water. Vega guessed the spreading pool of red was quite the lure.

He dried himself quickly and was getting dressed when his cell phone rang. The chime was startling. Vega clicked on.

Yes. Albemarle Airport, he repeated the destination to the lone pilot of Jake’s Charters—the one place where he could rent a private plane and count on the owners’ discretion. He wanted no troubling questions. Not that he had much to worry about. The sharks would feed quickly. A few yards away, Gates’ blood still colored the water. Soon, there would be only a stain of green, the pleasing color of fine absinthe. By the time he was on the plane, there would be nothing left to see.

In a few days, Vega calculated, what was left of Gates’ body would wash ashore, a nice shock for the tourists. Identifying the remains would be a challenge for a good forensics expert and a competent dentist. The few who knew Gates would mourn him, and his death would be written off as a tragic accident.

By then, Vega would have completed his business in Virginia and turned over Gates’ secret stash to his superiors in Seville—after pocketing a few gemstones for himself. He would have booked a room at the Alfonso, drunk quite a lot at the bar, and met with his favorite agent to negotiate the intricacies of the black market. Vega would then, at last, reach for the golden ring.

Chapter 3

Secrets of the Dead

Beale. The Beale ciphers. Tell no one but Dad.

His brother’s voice reached out from the past and clutched at Simon’s throat. To calm himself, Simon twisted the ring on his finger, a nervous habit he’d picked up during the interrogation about his brother’s death. Simon never told them about the ring. Crafted of silver and etched with a stylized flower, it was simple, but precious. His little secret. The ring had appeared on Simon’s hand that night. Quentin must have placed it there before he died. For four years Simon hadn’t removed it from his finger.

As he drew near the director’s conference room at the National Security Agency, the door loomed like the iron bars of a torture chamber. It was the first time he’d been here since he was interrogated about his brother’s death, and the silver ring wasn’t his only secret. There were also the cell phone Quentin had pressed into Simon’s hand the night of the accident and the mysterious words he’d uttered before he vanished into the flames. Simon had said nothing about any of it.

When he entered the conference room, the aromas of lemon-scented furniture polish and old paint seemed as heavy as the mystery he’d carried for the last four years. Today, he was here as a member of the Math Mafia—elite brainiacs who devised and broke the most complex codes—but he couldn’t concentrate on the presentation he was supposed to deliver to the top field directors and officers. His mind was a kaleidoscope of dreadful memories: polygraph machines and men in suits with scowls or smiles, playing bad-cop or good-cop, grilling him on what he had seen and heard the night his brother was murdered. To preserve his sanity, Simon had latched onto details: the grain of the table, the number of lights in the ceiling, the fabric of the chairs and the signatures on the wall plaques. Anything that wasn’t the color of the blood staining his shirt or the aroma of sweat and death and fear. Anything to block his mind from the pain—to focus on keeping Quentin’s secrets.

The Beale ciphers. The cross is the key.

Simon poured himself a cup of coffee. Breathed in the aroma in a long, steady rhythm. For four long years, he’d secretly scoured NSA’s vast data stores looking for clues to Quentin’s death. He’d worked his way up in the ranks of the Math Mafia, trapped in a warren of SCIFs—Secure Compartmented Information Facilities—an arid stretch of locked doors, steel-walled windowless offices, time locks, combination locks, cipher locks, retina scanners, and fingerprint analyzers. Hell, if NSA had its way, the water cooler alone would be secured by a dozen systems. Now he was a super-user—with access to the core of NSA’s databases. He had more security clearances than Edward Snowden, but he hadn’t found one intelligible clue to his brother’s killer.

Voices sounded from behind him. Laughing. Joking.

Fuck. Simon wasn’t in danger, yet his palms felt damp. The big man with the beer-keg chest was Brad Harris, the leader of a powerful clique of field directors. The ops director for the Horn of Africa, Harris was also the star hitter for the inter-agency softball team. Worse, he had played the bad cop in the interrogation about Quentin’s murder.

The brew tasted bitter on Simon’s tongue. Harris was just doing his job. Simon had struggled to put the past behind him, but could barely tolerate the sight of the man at company functions. Here, at the scene of the interrogation, old memories sprang to the surface: Harris’ broad face, stern and hard. Why didn’t you call for help? He was your brother, for God’s sake…You hated it that he was better than you. Let him die on purpose…

Each accusation had knocked wind from Simon’s lungs. He’d expected insults—a classic pride and ego down maneuver, designed to put him on the defensive—to get him talking. It still took all he had not to break Harris’ nose. He’d pressed his lips closed. Focused his eyes on the jagged grain of the mahogany table. Kept Quentin’s secrets.

Officially, the agency had written off the crash as an accident. According to the report, the fire had burned at such a high temperature, it incinerated Quentin’s body, as well as all evidence as to the cause of the accident. They found Simon passed out near the crash site. Why he’d lost consciousness that night remained a mystery, but when he awoke, there was no blood on his shirt, no evidence that Quentin had spoken with him after the crash. No one except Simon suspected foul play—or that an NSA insider might be involved.

Simon alone was determined to get to the truth, but he’d exhausted every digital resource at NSA without finding a single clue. His last hope was to get inside Harris’ inner circle.

For a year, he’d applied—and been rejected—for every available field position. The next step was to befriend the field directors by working Crypto-City’s office parties and softball leagues. Simon would rather be water-boarded than suck up to Brad Harris. To stomach it, he thought of it like a mission. After all, getting chummy with your enemy is what spies do. Months ago, he’d joined the softball team. Last week, he’d lost a fly ball in the sun and it hit him in the face. The bungle cost them the game. He couldn’t let it blow his chance to find Quentin’s killer.

Hey Brad, nice hit last Sunday, he called out.

Brad turned with mild curiosity and lifted an eyebrow. Heeeey…Simon isn’t it?

Simon’s collar felt tight. After hours of interrogation and months of being on the same team, this prick still pretended not to know his name. Yeah, it’s Simon. Simon Blake.

Right, right. Quentin’s brother. He looked Simon up and down and shook his head. Y’know your brother was quite the hitter.

Another field director joined in. Quentin was on the team? Wow. I would’ve liked to see him play. Hear he was some athlete. Wasn’t he a running back for Navy?

Yeah. Simon’s throat felt dry. Images of Quentin, bleeding on the ground, flashed in his head.

Brad shifted uncomfortably and glared at his colleague before he turned back to Simon. So, you’re in the hot seat today, eh? Some crypto thing?

Cubic algorithms.

Right…right. Fascinating stuff. Good luck. With a dismissive smile, Brad patted Simon on the shoulder and turned back to his companions.

What a disaster. Left alone in the crowded room, Simon glanced at his watch and headed to the front to take his seat near the podium. His insides were burning. At every turn, his goal seemed blocked—almost as if his failure were orchestrated from above.

From above? It struck Simon that there was one person with the authority—and the motive—to do exactly that. One man who, to protect Simon, seemed determined he be permanently assigned to the virtual prison of intractable equations that squeezed Simon’s lungs down to the size of his fists.

The director of NSA himself.

As if on cue, the director, General James Thornton, entered the room with an air of storied authority, the product of a half-century of military and NSA service, a war hero turned Kremlinologist turned legend. No matter how long Simon had been with the intelligence community, he still found it hard to comprehend that this powerful general was also his own father.

Chapter 4

The Message

Tell no one but Dad. Simon studied the General’s expression, but he’d never learned to read his father’s emotions. No surprise: General Thornton had a well-honed poker face after decades in the spy game.

Even on that long-ago night, when NSA told him that Quentin had died in the flames and that Simon was being interrogated for his own brother’s death, Thornton had been stoic as stone.

In contrast, Simon had been a hot mess. By the time Thornton intervened, his youngest son had already endured hours of questioning. Even now, hot blood raced to his face when he thought about it—how he’d nearly collapsed as soon as they were in his father’s car. How he’d begged his father for answers only to be confronted with that rock-like stare. Only once, a slight splinter of dread appeared in Thornton’s expression—when Simon mentioned Thomas Jefferson Beale. Forget you ever heard that name, his father had commanded. Simon had tried to protest, but the General was immovable. Never mention it again. That’s an order.

They hadn’t spoken of it since. Once, Quentin was all that he and the General had in common. Now they shared nothing.

Sit, sit, the General said, cranking his arthritic legs toward the conference table with the aid of his signature cane, a wooden number with a carved lion’s head at the handle. He eased himself into a seat across from Simon. Good afternoon, gentlemen—and ladies.

The General added this last acknowledgement almost as an afterthought, nodding toward the few women in the room. In the corner, Simon spotted Jacqueline Morris’ distinctively elfish features. Damn. He knew she was invited but had hoped she wouldn’t come.

I’d like to start today’s training with our lead analyst on key management, General Thornton continued, who will explain his latest theories on combinational games and key codes.

Simon was in his element now, relieved to be focused on something he understood—anything other than his father and his brother. When the General motioned him toward the podium, the curious crowd gave a polite round of applause. Simon’s reputation as a genius preceded him, though it was unlikely his ordinary appearance matched their expectations. No doubt he looked like he felt, not even close to the crisp, alert soldier favored by the intelligence community’s inner circle. Only his eyes, wary and watchful like a cat’s, betrayed the mind behind the façade—or so he was told.

The audience leaned in. Let the show begin. Simon raised a scrambled Rubik’s cube, started a stopwatch, and twisted the cube as he addressed the crowd.

This cube is seen as a toy, he said. Simple. Familiar. Inconspicuous. No one would suspect its potential as a coding device. A Rubik’s cube has over 43 quintillion—that’s a billion, billion—configurations, yet an average field agent can learn to solve it in two to three minutes. A trained agent can solve it far more quickly.

With a final twist, the colors of Simon’s Rubik’s cube aligned perfectly. Simon punched the stopwatch. He’d solved it in sixteen seconds. Polite applause rose from the audience.

The only ones not clapping were Brad Harris and his entourage, who huddled together and spoke in low tones, unaware that Simon could read their lips.

Can you believe that’s Quentin’s little brother? one man asked.

Half-brother, Brad said. Emphasis on the half.

I can see the family resemblance.

Yeah. Too bad it’s only skin deep. Can you imagine this crypto-geek, spearheading Black Eagle?

The applause had died down and the men fell silent. It struck Simon that these powerful men were just like his own father. They might even be colluding with him. No matter what Simon did, what he said, he’d never be accepted into their circle.

Damn them! It took all Simon had to focus his mind on his presentation. Mathematically, a key code based on the Rubik’s cube would be sufficiently complex for ordinary security, but for NSA, or any other organization with a sufficient number of high-speed computers, even a key code with 43 quintillion combinations would be vulnerable to a brute force attack. NSA’s thinking machine could probably solve it in less than ten minutes.

On autopilot, Simon went on to propose a more powerful key code system based on a 6x6x6 cube, called the v-cube 6, instead of the usual 3x3x3 Rubik’s cube. Instead of quintillions, the number of possible combinations would be 1.57 followed by 116 zeros or 157 septentrigintillion combinations, a number so high it sounds made up. At our current processing speeds, the sun will explode long before we could calculate them all.

At the end of his speech, he received another modest round of applause. With each clap, he imagined the word outsider being branded more deeply into his forehead. Simon looked for Brad Harris and his entourage, but they were already gone. The General shot Simon a nod and lifted himself awkwardly out of his chair. Without looking back, he limped toward the door, listing like an old battleship caught in a storm.

Simon forced himself to answer questions from the audience members who remained and then escaped to the sanctity of his SCIF.

Once inside, he noticed something on his screen.

What the hell?

He gripped the edge of his desk for balance. Blinked to make sure he was reading the message correctly.

Impossible! This was no routine message—it was captured from his brother’s old cell phone—the one Quentin had pressed into Simon’s hand four years ago, just before he vanished from Simon’s life.

The memories Simon had been holding back all morning flooded his mind. He was back on the tarmac in Leesburg. His brother’s Cessna in the distance. The fireball. The deathly dive. The blood.

Thomas Jefferson Beale. Three ciphers. The cross is the key.

After Quentin was gone, Simon had secretly kept his brother’s phone active. As a super-user, he was able to track any activity. For four years, he’d monitored the number, but he’d never before intercepted a single call or message.

Now, for the first time, there was a text meant for Quentin. Encrypted. Tough for an ordinary person to decode, but with NSA’s resources, Simon could decipher it in seconds. After a few keystrokes, plain text appeared on his screen.

Confirmed. The pistol belonged to Beale. It has the symbol. Come to the recovery lab at once.

Simon typed in a few codes and tracked the origin of the message: Dr. Carlton Gates’ archaeology lab in Key West, Florida. Beside the