Dry Ice (30 page)

“Oooh, such strong language,” he said, teasing her. “You called him an oozing wart on Satan’s hairy ass for less than this.”

She smiled, touched that he was trying to cheer her up. “True. Maybe it’s time he graduated.”

“To what?”

“Maybe I should just call him Satan.”

“Seems to fit.”

A comfortable silence grew between them.

“Penny for your thoughts?” she asked.

Nik laughed quietly and set his drink on the table, then leaned a shoulder against the wall, crossing his arms in front of him. “I know I should be thinking about more heavy issues but, truthfully? I’m wondering why you’re really here. Not in my room, I mean at TESLA.” He shrugged. “I mean, why you? Of all people, why you?”

Tess slipped off her shoes and curled her legs beneath her, leaning on one hand, holding the brandy loosely with the other. “Gianni said I was the logical choice, presumably because of my research. I’ve recently become known as a good storm stopper. The flip side to Greg, I guess. Given what’s going on down here, I’d say that Gianni made a good choice.”

“I can’t argue with that.” Nik’s dark eyes were looking straight into hers and the message in them was unbusinesslike and unmistakable. “You look like you could use a little TLC right now.”

“I could,” she said with a laugh, then looked away. She took a deep breath and another sip of the brandy, then brought her gaze back to his face and his eyes, which had grown warmer and darker. “Getting romantic is a really bad idea, Nik.”

“I couldn’t agree with you more,” he said, pushing away from the wall and taking the few short steps to reach her. He took the snifter out of her hand and set it on the bedside table, then helped her to her feet. “But sometimes you get really good results from bad ideas,” he murmured, his mouth close enough to her ear to send a warm flush through every cell in her body. His arms slowly encircled her. Her own crept around his neck.

“Not going to happen, Nik,” she whispered. Her lips grazed the rough stubble on his chin.
Oh my God, he smells good. He feels even better.

“I’m a gambling man, Tess. And I’m willing to bet we’re about to get naked together.”

“You think?” Tess breathed, and would have laughed, but his lips were trailing hot, slow kisses along a dangerous trail that led to her mouth, rendering her unable to engage in even the most basic multitasking.

“Think what?”

“That we’re about to get naked,” she said against his lips.

“Of course I do. Don’t you?” His voice was barely audible.

Yes. Yes!

“No, Nik. I don’t,” she said softly, reluctantly. She slipped her arms between them, placed her hands on the front of his shirt, and applied gentle pressure. He released her immediately, but his eyes were still torrid and his smile still dirty.

“Good try, though,” she added with a grin. “Thank you for getting my mind off the other stuff. And by the way, you haven’t lost your touch.”

“Let’s not talk about touch, Tess,” he said with a sigh as he handed her the drink he’d taken from her a moment ago and leaned against the wall once again. “So, how about those Red Sox?”

CHAPTER
23

In Connecticut, Gianni Barone sat in the darkness of his home office, smoking the in-case-of-emergency cigarettes he’d stashed in his desk when he’d given up the habit years ago. The moon was full, sitting in a sky so clear that it looked like it belonged in a movie.

It was almost three in the morning. Nearly twenty-four hours had passed since he’d heard from Tess. Flint’s army of tech support wizards had spent much of that time running test after test, trying to determine what had taken TESLA off line. Battalions of Flint’s weather and terrain analysts—and the security group—had pored over hundreds of new satellite images in an effort to answer the same question. But the answer he was looking for wasn’t forthcoming. No one could offer him any explanation other than whatever the problem was, it lay within TESLA’s security perimeter.

From the minute TESLA had gone off line, Croyden had been breathing fire at him, blaming Gianni for everything from Greg’s attitude shift to the blackout to Medev’s death. The smirking, sneering telephone conversation Croyden had had with Greg hadn’t improved the old man’s mood. At least Greg was halfway back to the States. Gianni had insisted that the U.S.-bound flight take off early in the morning to get Greg stateside as soon as possible.

There is going to be an ass-kicking like no other when I see him.

He took a deep drag on the first Marlboro Red he’d smoked in five years. The harsh burn of the smoke entering his lungs was like the handshake of an old friend and, as such, he held on to it for a minute.

It had ceased to matter to Croyden that Gianni had kept things humming at TESLA as Greg went down the tubes, that he’d found the perfect replacement for Greg, and that the array was beating all expectations in terms of benefitting the company and trashing the competition. It didn’t matter that the whole project was moving toward profitability faster than even the most optimistic estimates had predicted.

In thanks, Gianni had become the whipping boy. Greg blamed him for the selection of Tess as his replacement. Croyden blamed him for Greg’s attitude. And Secretary Bonner had had a few choice words for him on a secure call late this afternoon. With Medev gone, Flint’s relationship with the Pentagon was in tatters and probably beyond repair.

He took another drag and blew a stream of blue smoke toward the ceiling.

It’s time to start thinking about the future.

*   *   *

On the other side of the country, the northern mountain air had been engaged in a metastatic churn for the last twenty-four hours. Overnight, Thursday’s heavy clouds had cleared and the storm that had trailed them had stopped unexpectedly and was parked on one side of the mountains. The other side, home to Park City, Utah, was graced with a surprising, blindingly clear sky for Friday morning’s first run. The multitude of spring-break skiers packed into the gondolas and the lines waiting for them had been in high spirits, laughing at the turn in the weather that had the TV weather guys stumped while keeping this bastion of sportsmen, socialites, and celebrities a paradise for one more day. Sunny skies, easy breezes, and deep powder, with the promise of more snow overnight, had resort managers beaming and their personnel working overtime.

By noon, the well-heeled skiers still on the slopes and those lunching on the balconies overlooking them were reveling in the warmth of the high-altitude midday sun. Jackets were off, and, in some cases, shirts. The temperatures continued to climb and by late afternoon the conditions on some of the more exposed trails had become slick. Experienced shushers handled it; the inexperienced and the show-offs kept the Ski Patrol and emergency care centers busy with breaks and sprains. A few black diamond runs and the bunny hills were reluctantly closed due to unsafe conditions.

When the sun slid below the high horizon, the expected slide in temperature didn’t happen and the town officials’ initial glee turned to more-than-mild concern. The warm air lingered, in defiance of local memory and natural order. Hotel executives frowned while, oblivious to the worries of their profit-minded hosts, guests lingered outdoors, enjoying their drinks in the oddly warm night air and wondering idly what the skiing would be like tomorrow. Sheriff’s deputies patrolled the streets, braced for a long shift filled with shouting revelers who had no need for an early night and no reason to remain sober.

Not long after the town was finally asleep, the stalled storm began to move. Slowly pushing their way over the Wasatch peaks, the still-heavy clouds encountered the warm air.

It began to rain.

CHAPTER
24

Helena Hernandez had already become used to the near-constant stream of people and interruptions.

But when getting dressed at five
A.M.,
I should be allowed a sacrosanct moment.

With a sigh, she acknowledged the tap on her dressing room door. It could only be her personal assistant. “Yes?” she said, pulling on the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy T-shirt that she favored for working out.

“Ms. President, I’m so sorry to bother you, but Ms. Wonson would like to see you for a moment.”

“Thank you. Send her in.”

The door opened and Maribeth walked in, in a suit, hair in place, makeup flawless, not at all discomposed by seeing her boss in sweats with no makeup and her hair heading in all directions. “Thank you, Ms. President. Candy Freeman called a few minutes ago. She would like to see you as soon as she can.”

Helena was the first president in the nation’s history to have a national security advisor focused solely on the atmosphere and environment. Candy Freeman was one of the few people she could trust to sift through the hysteria and hyperbole that infected every mention of climate and weather. Candy had spent twenty years at the Central Intelligence Agency, first as a weather analyst, then as a supervisor, and eventually as a chief in the directorate of technology and research. She’d brought the nerdy weather research group from career-killing obscurity to career-making prominence, and was leading the way in the emerging world of counter-eco-terrorism.

Candy had cemented her reputation by maximizing her team’s skillful intelligence-gathering and analysis of Hurricane Simone a few years earlier; their behind-the-scenes response to the recent undersea methane release in the Caribbean had been not only impressive but critical to saving millions of lives. Among those intimately familiar with both crises, there was wide agreement that Candy was one of the unsung heroes. In the court of public opinion, though, there hadn’t been any heroes, only villains, and the government’s halfhearted response to the disasters had been the tipping point in the downfall of the previous administration.

Whatever it was Candy wanted to talk about now, it couldn’t be good.

“When’s my next opening?” she asked, tying her workout shoes.

“Now. Your schedule is already overbooked. She asked if you could meet her in the Situation Room.”

Years spent in the public eye had given Helena the ability to avoid showing surprise under the most trying circumstances, but nothing had ever been able to quell the jump in her gut at the sound of certain phrases. “Meet me in the Situation Room” was one of those phrases.

“Did she say what she wanted to discuss?”

“That storm in Connecticut yesterday afternoon and the floods in Central California.”

“What about them? I’ve already declared each area a federal disaster zone.”

“She wouldn’t tell me, Madam President. She said I wasn’t cleared.”

The president’s secretary is cleared for everything.

“Who else will be there?”

“Defense, NDI, NOAA, and—” Maribeth glanced at the pad in her hand. “Someone from the Office of Ionospheric Monitoring.”

Helena frowned at her secretary. “Is that NASA?”

“Pentagon,” Maribeth replied, then looked up and shrugged. “I never heard of them until yesterday. That admiral who committed—”

“Oh God. Don’t remind me.”

“Yes, ma’am. He worked there.”

Wonderful.
Helena kicked off her shoes and shimmied out of her workout pants, motioning for Maribeth to hand her a pair of casual pressed slacks hanging behind her. She ripped off the T-shirt and threw on a cotton sweater. Slipping into a pair of loafers, Helena left the room in search of a hairbrush.

Minutes later, the president entered the main conference area in the Situation Room suite, casually dressed, barely coiffed, and flanked by an aide. Nodding at the small group standing around the table and the larger group lingering near chairs that lined the walls, Helena noticed that the flat-screen monitors lining the walls were alive with images of the aftermath of each of the storms. The scope of the damage was unfathomable.

The storms had been incredibly severe, destroying the heart of each community like a well-aimed bomb, then spreading outward in every direction. Video feeds from the ground, helicopters, and satellites showed the destruction in varying degrees of horrendous detail.

News footage showed the displaced residents wearing the same dazed, disbelieving expressions the nation had seen on the survivors of hurricanes Katrina and Simone as they stood weeping, surveying the complete destruction of their lives and neighborhoods, and sometimes their families. It didn’t really matter whether the cars upturned or floating in the muddy waters were Buicks or Bentleys, or whether the flattened homes had been huge and priced in the millions or tin-roofed shacks. The shock and horror and sense of loss were the same.

Helena took her seat at the head of the table. Before the others had seated themselves, she turned her eyes to Candy Freeman, possibly the only woman in her administration shorter than herself.

“What do you have?”

“Weather manipulation, ma’am,” Candy said without preamble, her deep, West Texas accent sounding curt for the first time ever. “I’ve got a meeting in a little while with a man who might be able to help us out. His name is Gianni Barone. He was the last person to speak with Admiral Medev before his, uh, accident. Barone is an executive with Flint AgroChemical.” She paused minutely. “He’s in charge of their weather manipulation division.”

“I didn’t know they had a weather manipulation division,” Helena replied drily, not liking the plunge her stomach took at Candy’s words.

“Most people don’t. They call it their ‘climate research working group’ when they refer to it at all, which isn’t often. We’ve been watching them for a while. I’m still gathering information, but it appears that we may have even done a little business with them.”

Helena stared at her. “Say that again.”

“We might have availed ourselves of their services. Not the administration, ma’am, or at least not yours, but possibly the Pentagon. I’ve got to get more data on that.”

“Please do.”

“This group, Barone’s group, isn’t like the research groups at other agribusiness conglomerates, Ms. President. Flint isn’t just funding studies to try to find the best conditions and locations for growing their crops.” Candy shook her head, setting her fluffy blond curls into motion. “Flint has been quietly engaging in active and expensive types of applied research. For years they’ve been hiring upper-atmosphere experts and other geniuses, like high-level software developers with deep experience in aerospace navigation, military weaponry, and high-end communications systems. They’ve hired hardware guys who’ve built next-generation weapons as well as some who’ve designed and built deep-space telescopes and other data-gathering equipment.”