Come and Find Me A Novel of Suspense - By Hallie Ephron Page 0,63

down to the Post-its she’d stuck on the outside of a system box. He’d even brought her tulip chair. It was pulled up to the opposite side of the table.

Sitting on one of the tables was a gray cowboy hat. Diana thought of GROB. Her throat tightened. She’d connected with him, let him in, trusted him. Disappointment and humiliation burned. She still couldn’t believe that GROB was Jake.

“Coffee?” Jake asked. He didn’t wait for an answer, just went to the opposite wall where there was a sink and a makeshift counter, a slab of Formica-topped wood propped on sawhorse legs. On the counter sat a coffee grinder, and beside that a coffeepot, its light glowing.

Jake poured two cups, adding milk from the refrigerator under the counter. He came back and offered one to her.

Diana took the hot cup and cradled it in two hands. As she inhaled the bitter smell of chicory, her heart gave an extra beat. That was New Orleans style, just the way Daniel had liked it.

“This is what you wanted me to see?” She looked around again. It was pretty impressive. “Sure beats a semitrailer.”

“By the way, we won the bid. Vault’s a go.”

It took a moment for her to put together what Jake was talking about. As if any of that mattered any longer.

“They want to meet with us tomorrow afternoon,” Jake said. “I’ll fly out early . . .” As he went on talking, he seemed so far away, like his voice was coming to her from deep in a wind tunnel. On an empty stomach—she hadn’t eaten since that morning—the pill was kicking in fast.

It struck her as so odd that he still thought she’d just keep working with him. He was right about one thing—back in the early days when Gamelan was no more than a dream, Vault was just the kind of client she’d dreamed of having. But she couldn’t go on engaging bigger and bigger clients, just to set them up to be victimized by the people behind Volganet.

Diana watched Jake set up her laptop on the table and plug it in.

“I’m not going to, you know,” she said. He looked over at her. “I’d never, ever work with you and your new partners.”

“New partners?” Jake narrowed his eyes.

“Volganet. Isn’t it obvious?” she said.

“Diana, I’m sorry for everything we put you through. But it’s not what you think.”

“It’s not? Then what is it?” She sipped coffee. The taste brought tears to her eyes. The last time she’d had coffee with chicory had been her last morning with Daniel. None of this would be happening if he were still here.

“Diana, trust me,” Jake said. “I know you’ll be surprised, but I hope you’ll be pleased too. You’ll understand, just as soon as . . .”

Diana followed his gaze up smooth silo walls that grew whiter and brighter as they rose toward the domed roof. About fifteen feet from the top was a small door, more of a hatch really. The metal spiral of stairs that she’d seen outside winding around the silo ended there. Inside there were no stairs, but there were U-shaped ends of rebars—steel bars, dark with rust—that stuck out of the concrete, at regular intervals.

A breeze stirred in the silo, and a sound, like the creaking of a rusty hinge, from overhead sent a chill down her spine. She squinted, shading her eyes as she tried to see past the bright spotlights shining down at her. Just beyond, the little doorway in the silo wall was open. A figure climbed through the opening and sat perched on the ledge.

“Hey, kiddo.”

Electrical sparks shot through her. Fifteen months and two weeks—that’s how long it had been since she’d heard that voice. It wasn’t possible, but there he was, swinging his leg and holding on to the frame of the sill above his head. He let go with one hand and waved to her. Diana’s stomach turned over and she gasped. But Daniel was relaxed, glued to his perch, as sure as an insect that gravity had no hold on him.

She heard a beeping sound, and whirled around just in time to see the door to the silo close. The panel by the door blinked yellow, then steady red. Jake was gone.

Diana started to quake, she couldn’t breathe, and that floaty feeling that briefly had buffered reality was gone. Her insides wrenched and her vision blurred. Her knees buckled under her as she reached for the tulip chair, but it slid