ANOMALY.MIL (The Conspiracy Series Book One): A Romantic Suspence Novel (28 page)

CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

Ansel glared at his sister over Seneca's head. She of all people knew how hard it had been, still was, for him to get over her. But what was he going to do, let Seneca walk around at night all by herself?

"No problem."

He set his drink on the table, thinking he was going to kill his sister when he got back.

First, she ambushed him by not telling him that Seneca would be here. He damn near dropped his beer when he saw her walk into the kitchen. And then, at dinner.
Jesus
. That was fucking torture. And to top it all off, Dave goes and asks Seneca about Ben, and he could barely breathe.

Shit
! He still couldn't breathe, because she never answered. Probably because they were dating.

Asshole.

Ansel held the front door open for Seneca to get this over with.

"Where are you parked?" he asked, cutting to the chase.

"Down the street."

"How far?" Would he have to walk with her?

"Not far." She sounded sad. They walked a couple of steps. "I was surprised to hear that you left the army."

"I told you the day we met that I was thinking about getting out. The army has been good to me, but I need…"
You.
"Something different."

"I'm sure you’ll do very well in your business."

"I wish I were as confident as you."

She stopped in the middle of the street, and looked up at him, saying, "No, I mean it, Ansel. You're going to do really well. I know you will."

I would do better if…

"I liked your baby gift," he chuckled. They were at her car.

"Well, I thought of you wh—"

"Do you?" He couldn't let her go without knowing.

"Do I what?"

"Think of me?" he asked, holding his breath. She looked down and he could see her chest rising and falling, but she didn't answer. He didn't want to know, but he asked anyway, "Are you seeing anyone?"
Ben
. That prick.

"No!" She was insulted, but he did not know why. "It’s only been three months since…"

"You broke my heart."

Seneca looked up at him. "Did I?" She had tears in her eyes.

"Yeah,” he nodded. “Crushed it, actually."

"I didn't mean to hurt you, Ansel. But I was…scared. And I was afraid you were just asking because of the situation and not because of me.” She started to cry. “And just the thought of losing you—"

He kissed her, and when she kissed him back, he knew. Knew that it wasn't over. He kissed her long and deep, pulling her against his body. Aching to make her his, and even more anxious for her to claim him as hers.

"Come home with me," he pleaded. He was afraid if she didn't, he would make love to her in the car.

"Yes," she breathed between kisses.

Ansel sped to his apartment, then made love to her all night, and she made love to him. They fell asleep in each other's arms and when he woke up, he'd never felt more content.

"Should we call and tell your sister you're not coming back to the dinner party?"

Ansel chuckled. "I think she figured it out."

“God, that is so embarrassing,” Seneca buried her head in his chest. “I have to see her at work tomorrow.”

That made him laugh. "Just tell her you spent the night with the perfect man.
Literally
.”

“Uh.” She looked up at him to break the news. “I don’t think you fall into the ‘perfect’ category, if they have to make such
major
modifications.”

“So you don’t want me to be perfect?" Ansel smiled into her hair.

"God, no." She snuggled deeper against his chest. "You're arrogant enough as it is."

Ansel chuckled and pulled her closer, but she pulled away from him, sitting up.

"What about me," Seneca said, sticking out her bare chest. "Are there any enhancements you would make to me?" she asked.

Ansel sat up, then looked her straight in the eye so she would know that he meant it when he said, "Not one little thing," before rolling her on her back and showing her how much he meant it.

<<<<>>>>

CHAPTER ONE

The University of North Carolina

Psychology Lab

Thursday, May 5th 

11:53pm

“We have a problem." The professor sighed and the smell of stale coffee wafted up to him, adding to the distaste he already felt for the guy.

Malcolm crossed his arms over his muscular chest to intimidate the arrogant prick. “It better be a big fucking problem to justify me driving five hours in the middle of the night just to get here.”

"Well, Major McGowan." The white professor went as pale. “It’s more of a…” The man searched the floor for the right words. “Breakthrough, that caused a problem.”

Jesus Christ. He was in no mood for this bullshit. “What’s the problem, Professor Hayden?”

“As you know,” the man held up a forefinger like he was lecturing him. Malcolm wanted to shove it up his ass. “I have been studying people’s dreams at this university for the past twenty years.”

Why was the guy telling him things he already knew?

“And the United States Army gives you a considerable amount of money to do so.” Malcolm glanced pointedly at the expensive lab equipment littering the cavernous room.

“What I haven’t told you is that I have been working with the neuroscience department for the past two years.”

The major sniffed, once, because he was annoyed. “The neuroscience department doesn’t have top secret clearance.” Malcolm knew, because he was the one that gave it.

“Yes, I’m aware of that.” The professor hastened to add, “But we have been using their technology, and therefore, the interdepartmental cooperation did not need to be disclosed to you.”  

“Next time...” He quirked a dark brow. “Ask.”

Rust colored lashes blinked over the professor’s rustier eyes. A reaction to the rage radiating off of Malcolm in ominous waves. “My apologies, Major McGowan.” 

Malcolm did not want a fucking apology, he wanted this arrogant asshole to follow protocol.

“Why am I here?” he asked, for the last fucking time.

The professor became animated, sitting down at his computer to explain, “The neuroscience department has recently developed a method for recording images based on human thought.”

Hmm. He had read several articles back in…he had to think, 2009 about this research. However, he was pretty sure it had been a university in Tokyo conducting the experiments, but the neuro-images captured by them had been rudimentary at best.

"Like the Japanese?"

"No." The professor shook his head. “Our method of imaging is…groundbreaking.”

“How so?”

“The neuro images we’ve been able to record are very clear.” When he did not respond with the appropriate amount of enthusiasm, the professor explained, “I have theorized for years, that every face in a person’s dreams is not randomly generated. Rather, it is an image of a person seen at some point in the dreamer’s life. At the mall, the grocery store, a doctor's waiting room. Wherever. The face is then recorded by the brain, available to be accessed when the person enters a dream state.”

“Interesting,” the major muttered, trying to consider all the implication. He would miss some, so he asked, “What are you hoping to do with this research?”

“Well.” The professor was smiling, his tiny eyes sparkling with excitement. “We were hoping to present this information at our annual review meeting with the Armed Forces Committee once the theory has been proven.”

Jesus Christ. Get on with it. “But?”

“But recent events have made it…” The professor bobbed his head from side to side. “Impossible to wait.”

“Why?”

“Well.” The man turned to his computer, typing on the keyboard. “We’ve been recording the dreams of the same fourteen subjects for the past two years.”

“Who are they?” Malcolm stared at the list of names over the man’s left shoulder.

“Psychiatric interns who are receiving a course credit for participating in the study, but that’s not the important part.”

“Then what is?”

“We’ve taken the recordings of all of those dreams and run them through the Department of Defense’s facial recognition software.”

The back of his neck began to tingle. And if he had been alone, he would have had a hard on. “Go on.”

The guy pulled up a map of the United States with hundreds of red dots clustered in various locations around the country.

“This is subject one’s results from the dream study.” The professor pointed at the computer screen. “He’s from Pittsburg.” The colonel looked at where Pittsburg should have been on the map, but it was completely covered with dots.  “Ninety-three of the people in his recorded dreams are from Pittsburg, his hometown. His grandparents, whom he spent his summers with live in Columbus, Ohio.” The professor pointed. “Forty-eight faces in his dream file can be traced to Columbus. And these twelve faces in Orlando, Florida…” The guy grinned. “Subject one vacationed there as a kid.”

“You can trace---“

“A person’s entire life with this technology,” the professor nodded. “We can even give you a time line.” He pointed at a dot in Florida. “The kid had a dream about a girl in Orlando. Turns out the woman worked as a princess at a local theme park when she was in her early twenties. She’s now forty-two years old.”

Fuck me. His mind was spinning in a million different directions. “But couldn’t he just have seen her on television?”

“No.” The professor shook his head, explaining, “The image must be seen three dimensionally in order for the brain to accurately reproduce it. So, basically, you have to see someone in person in order to dream about them.”

“Okay.” And then, Malcolm remembered. “So, what’s the problem?” he asked, because the research sounded fucking amazing.

“We have recorded one of our subject for the last two years, just like all the others.” The man pinched his thin lips together. “She’s a thirty-year-old Chinese-American doctor from New York City, who’s here at UNC working on her Psychiatry specialization.”

“So?”

“So…” The professor turned around after having brought up a picture of a man that looked like it had been taken with a telephoto lens. “This is one of the men from Regan Fang’s dream. He’s an outlier and it took us a while to identify him, but we did identify him with the help of the Pentagon.”

“Who is he?” The major waited for the punch line, and he was not disappointed.

“The man in the image is General Zixin Chen, the spymaster for the Chinese People’s Liberation Army.”

A slow smile spread across the major’s face as he stared at the elusive Chinese general they had been hunting for years.

“Professor.” The major slapped the man on the shoulder. “I think you just got yourself a new grant.” He grinned, before dialing a number on his encrypted phone, saying, “You’re not gonna believe this.”

<<<<>>>>

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