Distant Memory (35 page)

To Massey, who sat in the stolen truck that he had again parked in the shopping center lot across the boulevard from the hospital, the situation seemed impossible, but he would not be deterred. His impulse was to simply walk in, find the woman, put a bullet in her head, and then make the best escape he could. But Massey knew that acting on impulse always led to failure.

He faced a couple of problems that he continued to mull over. One, he had no idea which room she was in. He thought of calling the hospital and asking for her, but he was certain that the switchboard would have been alerted to such calls. That would certainly be the case if he were in charge of her safety. Two, the police were there. How many were in the building he couldn’t know, but he had to assume that there was at least one and maybe more. A frontal approach would be a disaster. He had only a few rounds left in the clip of his weapon. He would be facing better-armed men, and the uniformed officers would be wearing bulletproof vests. Even if he sacrificed his life for the cause, there was no guarantee that he would achieve his goal of killing the woman.

Massey needed another idea. Time was passing quickly, and every moment he wasted increased the chances of his being seen. Yet despite his keen intellect, his years of intelligence experience, and his overwhelming commitment to success, he could conceive of no way to enter the hospital undetected.

“If the obvious doesn’t work,” he finally told himself, “then look for the obscure.” The wheels of his mind turned furiously. Then it happened. An idea surfaced unexpectedly, a gift from the gods. But to make it work, he would need a few things.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather sleep?” Nick asked. “I know I’m exhausted.”

“I’m too tired to sleep,” Lisa replied.

“What? That doesn’t make sense. How can you be too tired to sleep?”

“It’s something my mother used to say.”

Nick raised an eyebrow. “Really. You remember your mother?”

Lisa nodded slightly. “A little. I can’t remember her name or where we lived, but I can see her face.”

“Well, that is a step up, isn’t it? Your memory really is coming back. What else do you recall?”

“Nothing, and you’re changing the subject.” Lisa had been pushing for an explanation. Some things about Nick and the events of the day bothered her, and she wanted answers. So far he had been evasive.

“No, I’m not. I’m genuinely happy that you’re starting to remember things. I just think you’re a little confused.”

“Things don’t add up, Nick. Your being an NSA agent answers some questions, like why you were on the scene of my accident and why you seemed like anything but a truck driver.”

“What more is there?” Nick looked frustrated and weary. Lisa felt guilty about grilling him, but she needed answers.

“At your home,” she said. “In your sister’s bedroom, there was a radio alarm clock.”

“That’s not unusual,” Nick protested. “Nearly every bedroom in the country has a radio alarm clock.”

“But this one was just like the one I saw when I woke up in the Pretty Penny Motel.”

“It’s a common model.”

“Perhaps so,” Lisa persisted. “But everything in that motel room was old and battered. The alarm clock was new.”

“So they’re not much on renovation. Lisa, I don’t see what this has to do with anything.”

“It nags at me, Nick. Why does it nag at me?”

“Because you’ve had a very upsetting day.”

“No, it’s more than that. I know I’m being a pill about this, Nick,
but I need to know that I can trust you. Hearing you say that you were something other than what you told me is upsetting. You’ve been lying to me all along.”

“Only to protect you, Lisa. And that’s the truth. You were in shock when I found you, and I didn’t want to add to that.”

“What about the dinner you fixed? You told me you had nothing in the house, but when I came downstairs, you were cooking up a storm.”

“It was just huevos rancheros. How hard is that? Eggs, beans, tortillas, and sauce from a can. It’s not a gourmet meal. It’s one step removed from fast food.”

“Then we ate outside, just in time to see the vapor trail of a rocket fired from Vandenberg Air Force Base. For some reason, seeing that shook me to the core. Were you using that to jog my memory?”

“And what if I was, Lisa?” Nick said defensively. “Don’t you want your memory back? Don’t you want your life back?”

“Why couldn’t you tell me that?” Lisa asked with exasperation.

Nick shook his head. “I’m not an evil man, Lisa. I’m just a man with a job to do. I’m someone who wanted to help a woman in trouble, a colleague at that. We’ve been through a lot over the last twenty-four hours. Let’s not turn on each other now.”

“I’m right about the clock radios, aren’t I?” Lisa asked.

“Why are you so fixated on that?”

“Because something caged in the back of my brain wants out, and I think that may be the key. I know it sounds strange, but I can’t shake the feeling.”

Nick didn’t answer.

A thought popped into Lisa’s mind. “It’s a spy tool, isn’t it?” She closed her eyes trying to get the innocuous, fleeting image in her mind to settle. “Surveillance cameras,” she said flatly.

Nick remained silent.

“Hidden surveillance cameras,” Lisa said. “Of course. You can buy them on the Internet, although I imagine yours are a little more sophisticated.
They put cameras in everything now: wall clocks, smoke detectors, pictures.” The crack in the dam of amnesia widened, and a few more memories leaked out.

“Ours,” Nick corrected. “You work for the same organization I do. You know this stuff because you worked in the field.”

“You had a hidden camera in the motel room and in your sister’s room where I slept and changed.”

“It’s not what you think, Lisa. Your condition was fragile; I had to keep an eye on you. It was for your own protection. I placed the one in my sister’s room to see if you had any distress. What if you passed out and fell to the floor? It could be hours before I came looking for you.”

Lisa felt betrayed, manipulated. “And you just happened to have such a device at your home?”

“Yes. That’s what I do, Lisa. That’s my job. I spy on spies. I investigate the lowlifes who try to sell our country out. It’s what I do, and it’s what you do.”

Can that be true?
Lisa wondered.
Can I be the same kind of person as Nick? Is spying really my game?
She knew about the hidden surveillance cameras in the clock radio. Not many people would know such a thing. Her head began to pound, and she felt sick. There was too much to take in, too much to absorb.

Nick must have noticed because he said, “Hey, are you all right?”

“I want to be left alone,” Lisa said, closing her eyes.

“I never meant to upset you, Lisa.”

“Please, Nick. Just go. Let me sort these things out.” She opened her eyes long enough to see Nick amble from the room on his crutch and close the door behind him. The sight of the wounded man broke her heart. He had fought gallantly for her, and she had just sent him packing. But he had lied to her, pulling her strings as if she were a marionette.

Closing her eyes again, she sighed deeply. Some of her memories were returning, but she felt no better about her situation. “Oh, Lord,”
she prayed. “What now? What do I do now? Whom do I trust? Where do I turn?”

Massey found what he needed less than a half-mile from the hospital. A pool supply store, which had been set up in a converted house, was situated off the main street in a quiet, oak-lined neighborhood. Locating the store had been easy. He simply looked in the yellow pages for the address. The small-town phone book had a complete map of the community. Ten minutes later he was driving away in the stolen truck, his newly acquired items in the back. The beauty of small towns, Massey thought, was that they were so trusting. The proprietor had not bothered to have an alarm installed. It took less than five minutes for him to lift the bathroom window out of its slide, climb in—which, because of his bulk, was the most difficult part—and find what he wanted. He then walked out the rear door and loaded the booty in the truck.

He smiled to himself. Years of desk work had not taken the edge off his cunning. He was beginning to enjoy the work again, something he was trying to avoid. He was above this now, no longer one to hide in the shadows, arrange secret meetings, and use force when he didn’t get his way. But fate had dealt him this hand; he would play it through.

The hospital appeared on his right, and he headed in the drive to the rear parking lot. It was nearly deserted, populated only by a few cars that he assumed belonged to doctors and nurses.

Massey’s earlier reconnoitering was paying off. He knew exactly where he wanted to park and every step that would come next. By his estimation, it would take five minutes for the setup and another five minutes to implement the plan. Less than fifteen minutes later, the Keller woman would be dead and he would be on his way out of town.

If things went well, he might even get away. But if he didn’t, then he was prepared to pay the price of arrest. Somehow, someway, Moyer
would get him out of jail and safely tucked away. He would have to begin a new life with a new identity, but he had done that before. He trusted Moyer completely.

It was all set. Moyer allowed himself the luxury of a moment’s satisfaction. The satellite was in place and all its systems were operational. The process of uploading the software commands had been completed, and the on-board computers acknowledged their receipt. He was ready, the satellite was ready, and soon the world would be too.

The only thorn in it all was Massey. He had yet to call, and Moyer was fearful that he had failed. If he had, then everything was in jeopardy. If Massey had been arrested, he could be trusted to keep quiet, but if the woman was alive, if she spoke about what she knew … Moyer shivered and cursed Lisa Keller for her interference.

M
assey moved quickly but not hurriedly. The parking lot was empty of people, and the warm night air was filled with the sounds of machinery—sounds that were music to his ears. But before he could attend to those sounds, he had something else to do. The hospital had five exits, two at the rear of the building and three at the front. The rear exits were double, metal-clad doors, as were two of the ones at the street side of the building. The lobby exit was made of glass.

Using some nylon cord he had taken from the pool supply store, Massey tied the handles of one set of rear doors together, stringing the cord through the stainless-steel loops. He repeated the action with the other rear exit. He was unconcerned about the doors at the front.

The next part required more physical effort. Pulling the truck next to the rear wall, Massey climbed in the pickup’s bed, removed two plastic pails and two large plastic bottles, and placed them on the roof of the vehicle. He then climbed on top of the cab. The tall truck enabled Massey to reach the hospital’s parapet, which ran the perimeter of the flat roof, and he hoisted the buckets and bottles over its edge. Then, as quietly as possible, he scrambled onto the roof. The effort tired him. He was a large man who could hold his own with anyone, but hauling his bulk up was not something he did often. The task was more than difficult; it was painful. His arms were deeply bruised, and the effort made
his injuries hurt all the more. He comforted himself with the thought that getting down would be easier. He derived even greater pleasure from the knowledge that his mission would be over in the next quarter-hour.