Return to Atlantis: A Novel (28 page)

He was startled—but appreciative. “No tongue? Ah,” he added as she returned for a second helping, this time with an open mouth. He was slightly breathless when she finally released him. “No sex on an office table?”

She grinned. “Don’t push your luck. But I just wanted to show that now that I’ve gotten you back, I’m not letting you go again. From now on, we stick together, no matter what. You and me, always and forever. Okay?”

He pretended to give the matter deep thought. “I can cope with that. So we’re back?”

“We’re back, baby.”

“And we’re not going to have any more arguments?”

“Well, let’s not say anything
crazy
.” They both smiled. “Anyway, second of all—”

“Bollocks! I knew you’d be straight back to work.”

“Second of all,” she repeated, touching a finger to his lips before becoming more serious, “we need to decide how we’re going to deal with all this. Glas and the statues.”

“The statues are safe, for the moment,” Eddie told her. “I left them with a mate of mine in Chinatown. But if Glas wants ’em destroyed, maybe we should just do that and get him off our back for good.”

“Maybe. But he might still want me dead, no matter what. We need more information; we need to find out
why
the statues are so important. The Brotherhood had some, but it was incomplete.”

“Who else’d know?”

“A very good question. And …” Realization lit up her face. “I think I know who could have the answer. Popadopoulos told me that the only organizations that
might have more information than the Brotherhood would be certain powerful governments. And which is the most powerful government on the planet?”

“Liechtenstein?”

“No, they’re number two. Come on.”

They left the conference room and headed back to the reception area. Lola did a mild double-take. “Eddie, are you wearing lipstick?”

“Damn, the secret’s out,” he said, wiping his mouth.

“Lola, I need you to contact someone for me and put them through to my office,” said Nina.

“Sure, no problem,” the blonde replied. “Who?”

Nina paused before answering. “Victor Dalton.”

“Mr. President!” said Nina with a big fake smile. “So good of you to agree to see us.”

Victor Dalton waited until the Secret Service agent who had just searched the two visitors—and made sure they were not using any recording equipment—left the study before replying. “It seems I didn’t have any goddamn choice,” he said, giving Eddie a glare of deep hatred. “But I’ll warn you right now—I don’t take well to attempted blackmail.”

Nina’s smile vanished as if a switch had been flicked. “And I don’t take well to people trying to kill me. So I think we understand each other.”

Dalton put his elbows on his large oak desk and steepled his hands as his guests sat. “All right. What do you want?”

“Information.”

“About what?”

“About why Glas wants me dead. About the three statues I found that Stikes gave to Takashi.”

Dalton made a dismissive sound. “I don’t know about any of that.”

“But you’re working with Glas. How can you not know?”

“My interest is in getting payback against the Group.
I don’t really give a damn what Glas is up to. Parts of our objectives coincided, and we were in a position to provide mutual assistance, that’s all. I already told Chase as much as I know.” His gaze became piercing, dangerous. “You want to know what I said? Just watch his damn recording.”

“Maybe some more people ought to watch it,” said Eddie.

Dalton jabbed a finger at him over the desk. “I warned you, Chase—”

“Okay, then,” Nina cut in, “tell me about archives instead. The Group apparently knows more about the statues than anyone else. They found out some of it from the Brotherhood of Selasphoros in Rome—where did they learn the rest? Does the US government have any records concerning the statues? Anything connecting them to earth energy, Atlantis, the Kallikrates text—”

The ex-president’s eyes flicked wide at that last. “You know what it is?” Eddie asked.

Dalton considered his words carefully before answering. “I don’t know what it is, but I’ve heard of it, yes. When I was president, the Group would occasionally make requests for information from our top-secret archives. That was something they wanted to see, the Kallikrates file. I remembered it because it’s an unusual name. But I have no idea what’s in it.”

“I need to read it,” said Nina. “How would I go about that?”

“There’s a facility in Nevada called Silent Peak. A lot of highly classified material is stored there. The kind of material that’s so secret, they don’t let it out of the place—not even for presidents. If you want to read it, you have to go there.” A faint smile. “And they don’t appreciate uninvited visitors.”

“Well then,” she said, “you’ll just have to get us an invitation, won’t you?”

Dalton shook his head. “Out of the question.”

“I dunno,” Eddie said, “you still had the connections
to send assassins halfway around the world to try to finish me off in Japan. So I’m pretty sure you should be able to get me and Nina into some library.” He reached into his jacket and took out his phone. “Unless you want me to make a call that gives
The New York Times
their next big headline?”

“Wait, wait,” said Dalton hurriedly. “Let me think. It’s a military facility, so access would have to be arranged via the Pentagon …” He mused for a few seconds. “I know some people who might be able to do it—so long as they can arrange deniability. They wouldn’t just be risking their career by doing this. They could go to jail.”

Eddie waggled the phone in his hand. “They wouldn’t be the only ones.”

The angry lines on Dalton’s face deepened. “You’re asking me to get people who have nothing to do with our differences to risk everything to help you. These are loyal Americans. Patriots.”

“So patriotic they were the first people you thought of when you needed someone to break the law,” Nina remarked, voice cutting. “Look, I’m not asking to see nuclear launch codes, or the names of our spies abroad, or the damn X-files. The Kallikrates text was written over two thousand years ago, so it can hardly be a threat to national security. That’s the only thing I want to see. If you can arrange that, then I’m willing to …” She looked at Eddie. “
We’re
willing to call a truce. We’ll keep the video quiet and make sure it never sees the light of day.”

Eddie’s expression told her that he was dubious about giving up their leverage, but his silence was sign enough that he was willing to go with her judgment. Dalton’s own visage was calculating. “Do I have your word on that?” he finally said.

“Yes. If we have yours that you’ll get us access to this Silent Peak place.”

“
Safe
access,” Eddie added pointedly. “In and out.”

Another pause for thought, then: “I’ll see what I can do—it should be possible.” He leaned back in his chair, the dismissive shift in his body language a clear sign that
he considered the meeting over. “You’ll forgive me if I don’t seal the deal with a handshake.”

Eddie stood, returning the phone to his pocket. “Damn, I wasted a perfectly good stinkpalm.”

“Gross, Eddie,” said Nina as she rose. “We’ll see ourselves out. Good-bye, Mr. President.”

Dalton watched impassively as they left the room. Once they were gone … a tiny but devious smile curled the corners of his mouth.

“I
don’t like this,” Eddie muttered as he and Nina walked toward the security station.

“Well, yeah, we’re taking a hell of a risk,” she whispered. “We’re trying to get into a top-secret government facility under false pretenses—and that’s assuming we can trust Dalton not to have set us up to be thrown into prison for the rest of our lives.”

“No, I don’t mean that.” He tugged irritably at the too-tight collar of his US Air Force uniform, rented from a high-end theatrical costume house in New York. “I meant me, dressed as a fucking crab!”

“A what?”

“It’s the army nickname for flyboys.”

“Why crabs?” Nina asked, puzzled.

“Because their uniforms are the same color as the ointment they used to put on soldiers’ tackle if they caught crabs.”

“I wish I hadn’t asked. Okay, here we are.”

They were inside the Janet facility at Las Vegas’s McCarran Airport, which served a private airline used to ferry workers to the military testing grounds in the desert far north of the city.
Janet
was a jokey acronym from
the days when the US government routinely denied that any such facilities existed: “Just Another Non-Existent Terminal.” Since it was now overlooked by the enormous black glass pyramid of the Luxor hotel, that degree of cloak-and-dagger secrecy had been rendered pointless—but the terminal was still off-limits to all but authorized personnel.

So far, the passes grudgingly arranged by Dalton had got them through the main gate, but more stringent checks awaited. Two armed security men manned an X-ray conveyor and body scanner; another pair of large guards lurked near the door leading to the tarmac. All eyes were on the new arrivals as they crossed the concourse. At this time of day, they were the terminal’s only visitors, the current shift’s workers having departed for the desert hours before.

They reached the checkpoint. “Can I see your passes and flight documentation, please?” a guard rumbled, giving them both looks of institutional suspicion.

“Certainly,” said Nina brightly, taking out her paperwork. “I’m Dr. Nina Wilde; this is Captain Tyler. We’re both going to Silent Peak.” She said their destination as casually as if she commuted there regularly, but in truth, not only did she not know exactly what she would find at the facility, she didn’t even know where it was. Silent Peak did not exist on any maps—at least, not ones available to the public.

The guard took her papers, then turned to Eddie. “And you, sir?”

“Here ya go,” drawled Eddie in an abysmal attempt at a Texan accent as he produced his documents. Nina forced herself not to wince visibly. Fortunately, if the guard had any acting critiques, he kept them to himself as he ran a light-pen over the passes. His companion’s eyes flicked between the couple and his computer; after a moment, he nodded. Dalton had been good to his word, at least so far: The documents had been backed up by the government’s computer network.

“Everything’s in order, sir, ma’am,” said the first
guard, returning their papers. “If you’ll put your case on the belt and step into the scanner?”

Nina placed her briefcase on the conveyor, then walked through the arch of a millimeter-wave body scanner. Again, the second guard scrutinized a monitor before giving a nod of approval. Eddie followed her, with the same result. “Okay, I’ll let your pilot know that you’re here,” said the first man, picking up a phone.

“Thank ya kaahndly,” said Eddie. Nina wanted to deliver a sharp kick to his ankles to make him stop talking, but since they were being watched she could only give a pointed glare.

The guard finished his brief call. “Your pilot’ll meet you at the gate in a minute. Have a nice flight.”

“Thank you,” said Nina as she and Eddie headed for the exit. As soon as they were out of earshot, she hissed, “Will you stop that?”

“Stop what?” asked Eddie.

“Your goddamn John-Wayne-with-brain-damage voice!”

“I can’t exactly talk normally, can I? Might be a bit of a giveaway that I’m not really a Yank if I’m all
Ay up, by ’eck, look sithee
.”

“Then don’t talk at all! Honey, you can’t do accents. Just accept it.”

Eddie huffed, but fell silent as they reached the gate and waited, the other two guards watching them. After a few minutes, a middle-aged black man in a civilian pilot’s uniform arrived. “Dr. Wilde? Captain Tyler?”

“That’s right,” said Nina, with another warning glance at Eddie, who limited his answer to a nod.

“I’m Samuel Abbot—I’ll be flying you today.” He shook their hands. “Okay, if you’ll follow me?”

He led them out onto the parking apron. At this time of year the temperature in Vegas fell far short of the blistering heat of summer, but the combination of the high sun and an unbroken expanse of concrete meant that a wave of hot air rolled over them as they left the air-conditioned terminal building. Eddie tugged at his collar again.

Nina had bigger concerns than personal comfort. She looked around for any signs that their cover had been blown. No security vehicles screamed toward them; no guards raised guns. They had passed the first hurdle.

But there would be more to come.

A Boeing 737 airliner, white with the red stripe of the Janet fleet, was parked nearby, but Abbot took them to a smaller plane in the same livery, a Learjet 35A. Its twin engines were already idling. “Private jet,” said Nina. “Nice to get the VIP treatment.”

“Yeah, but if this goes pear-shaped,” Eddie reminded her quietly, “our next flight’ll be with Con Air.”

The door was open; Abbot showed them inside. The plush six-seater cabin was empty, but Nina saw a copilot already in the cockpit. “If you’ll take your seats,” said Abbot, closing the hatch, “we’ll get this show on the road.” He joined the other man up front.

Eddie listened warily to the pilots and their radio communications, but heard nothing that suggested potential danger. He relaxed, slightly. The engine noise rose. “Okay, fasten your seat belts,” Abbot said over the intercom as the plane began to move. Nina nervously pulled her restraint tight, but Eddie left his belt loose—just in case he needed to make a move in a hurry.

The crew didn’t seem about to turn against them, however. Takeoff was swift, the Learjet quickly ascending to ten thousand feet and heading north. A barren landscape of desert and mountains spread out below. “Hey,” said Eddie after a while, indicating something through a window. “Guess what that is.”

Nina saw a stark, almost circular expanse of pale sand against the russet-browns of the surrounding terrain. A dry lake bed, she guessed; on its southern edge was what looked like an airfield, a long runway stretching all the way across the flat plain. “I don’t know. A military base?”

Eddie chuckled. “Yeah, you could say that. That’s Area 51!”