Pandora's Box Read online

  Madison looked up and down the aisle. They were on an airplane. The blonde bitch had to be somewhere nearby. She wasn’t going to jump out of a perfectly good airplane. There hadn’t been a parachute strapped to her slimy back. So Madison settled back in her seat, realizing she couldn’t chase the assassin down and start a fight on a crowded plane.

  Sally? The owner of the name came back to her with sharp clarity. Sally had been her favorite doll, a special birthday gift from her mother. The doll’s head had been ripped off by Rico Baracci’s delinquent daughter. Long forgotten anger surfaced. Now she knew the identity of the Blonde Assassin.

  Roxie. The blonde child with the quick temper and the violent streak had terrorized her on several occasions, each time warning her that if she said a word, Roxie would do the same thing to her that she’d done to the doll. Oh why hadn’t she seen it before?

  Although she’d been miserable when Grainger and his wife had stopped coming to the house, she’d been relieved to discover she wouldn’t be seeing Roxie again. The girl had gone through her mother's private things, she’d broken valuable items and blamed it on Madison, and she’d destroyed every cherished personal possession Madison had had at the time.

  The Blonde Assassin’s personal grudge against her finally made sense.

  The flight attendant handed her a drink. “Sorry it took so long, Sister.”

  Madison asked, “Did you see a tall, skinny woman with short platinum blonde hair?”

  The stewardess shook her head. “Sorry, no. Is something wrong?”

  Madison denied it and forced a smile. There wasn’t anything she could do about the assassin until the plane touched ground. She handed the drink the assassin had given her to the flight attendant without a word of explanation.

  The stewardess walked away, puzzled.

  Madison finished her drink quickly, allowing it to burn a sweet path down her throat. She had a couple more during the rest of the long, uneventful flight. Apparently Tyler did know how to fly a plane. If it wasn’t for Roxie’s appearance, she might have relaxed enough to take a short nap.

  Tyler’s smooth voice droned over the intercom. They’d be arriving in Reno soon. She looked around for the flight attendant to order another drink, but the woman was nowhere in sight, and Madison suddenly realized she had to use the bathroom. Better to do that first.

  She got up, cautiously walked to the back of the plane, eyes peeled for the first sign of platinum blonde hair. She went to open the restroom door and her hand collided with another. She expected to see the blonde terror for a moment, but this man was a total stranger to her.

  A wiry gentleman with dark glasses gave her an apologetic smile. He removed his hand quickly and took a step backwards, gesturing for her to use the bathroom first. Obviously the guy had to go, too. With a few glasses of vodka inside of her Madison felt more generous than usual. She shook her head.

  “You go ahead,” she said. “I can wait.”

  “No. I insist.” He waved her to the door. “Ladies first.”

  Madison shrugged. She wasn’t going to stand around and argue with the guy over who got to squat first. She stepped forward, but she remembered to smile in gratitude at the man and mouth a ‘thank you.’

  She did her business as fast as humanly possible, washed her hands thoroughly, and reopened the door. The man lowered his newspaper. Madison tried to move past him, but he blocked her way in a swift side-step. It didn’t occur to her the man did it on purpose. She smiled at him the way people do when they accidentally get in each other’s way, moving back and forth at the same time like they’re doing an unscheduled dance, a touch of embarrassment on their faces.

  He didn’t return her smile.

  His hand moved fast, heading for her face. A flash of white caught her eye and the scent of trouble. Chloroform. He shoved her backwards through the open bathroom door and tried to cover her nose and mouth with the handkerchief.

  She stomped on his foot, bent his arm behind his back, and shoved him against the small sink. His head cracked against the mirror. A strangled groan emerged from him. He teetered on unsteady feet and the white handkerchief fell to the floor. Seeing it lying there sent a new wave of anger through her taut body. She pushed him out the door, tripping him so he would fall. He went down hard. His head struck the opposite wall.

  Several passengers turned curious eyes on them, but she was beyond caring who saw what. She deliberately pressed her booted foot against the man’s throat just enough to make breathing difficult for him.

  “Who sent you?” she demanded to know. “Who the hell are you working for?”

  Time for answers was cut short as a passenger raced after a stewardess. A couple of men got up from their seats and hovered nearby, obviously waiting for an opportunity to intervene. They probably thought she was a terrorist. If she didn’t get the jerk to give up a name soon, she’d never hear it.

  “I want a name!” she shouted, pushing harder against his throat.

  The man grinned at her with sharp, uneven teeth. He pulled something black from his coat pocket before she could stop him and touched her ankle with it. A blue light flickered. Electricity shot through her entire body from ankle to skull. Her teeth clamped together in shock. She stumbled backwards.

  Pain chased her down to a dark place.

  ******

  Chapter Nine

  Madison didn’t open her eyes immediately upon regaining consciousness. Her well-honed survival instincts cautioned her against moving a muscle until she got her bearings. Her gut told her she wasn’t alone. Her head throbbed and an odd taste haunted the inside of her mouth. The unmistakable feel of a soft pillow beneath her head pit logic against her suspicious nature. If she was in danger, would her captors care about her comfort? Not likely.

  Carefully she searched her memory for the last bit of information stored there. Her fog-wrapped brain slowly cleared starting with the memory of Tyler in a pilot’s uniform. She followed the path to the inevitable conclusion: a fight with a seemingly harmless man. Bastard had zapped her with a stun gun.

  Pain shot through her head, wringing a groan from her. A new voice in the distance responded quickly.

  “Good. You’re awake.”

  She was right about not being alone.

  She opened her eyes a slit, her entire body taut and ready to battle. The room slowly swam into focus. She’d been in enough motels to recognize the furniture layout. One full-sized bed with an unimpressive painting above it, a long dresser with an old television on it, and the open bathroom door. There were a couple of wrapped plastic cups on the sink next to a plastic ice bucket.

  A man stood in the corner of the room beside the ugly drapes which were closed at the moment, probably to keep anyone from seeing what he was doing. He was bathed in shadow so she couldn’t see his face. He emerged slowly, crossing the room to stand next to the bed, but he didn’t say another word, giving her time to study him. His dark eyes glistened with smug satisfaction as he waited for the results of her silent appraisal.

  Temporary relief flooded her system. She knew him. It was Elias Grainger. Once upon a time he’d been ‘Uncle’ Eli.

  Although he didn’t threaten her or try to harm her, there was something off in his stance. The tension in his stocky frame added to her concern. Even though he’d been a friend of her father’s, he smelled like an enemy. She would have to remain on constant guard with him, but she couldn’t let her wariness show.

  Turning her head brought fresh pain and a wave of nausea.

  He told her, “I’m afraid you struck your head on the wall when you fell. I don’t think you have a concussion.” He sat next to her on the bed. The mattress sank with his added weight and she had to move over to keep from rolling into him. He scratched the thick, black beard concealing his chin and said, “I do apologize for my friend’s overzealous employees. You weren’t supposed to be hurt.”

  Tension reclaimed Madison’s body and she inched further away from him, hoping she ha
d enough strength to defend herself if necessary. She felt totally drained, weak as a newborn kitten. A weapon would give her an added edge. Her eyes darted around the room and found nothing useful.

  “Where am I?”

  “You’re safe,” he assured her. “I assume you remember me? I heard you visited my wife in the hospital before getting on the plane. You were always a good girl. I’m sure she appreciated it. She loved you like a daughter.”

  “How do you know I paid her a visit?”

  “A friend of mine has people following you.”

  “A friend?” She was afraid to ask, but… “Anyone I know?”

  “Rico Boracci, the only one of my old friends I can still depend on.”

  So ‘Uncle’ Rico was in on the Pandora’s Box thing too? It didn’t surprise her. Not much did these days. Although, she was a bit stunned that he’d paid someone to attack her. Did that mean the Blonde Assassin worked for him? Roxie was his daughter. It would make perfect sense for the two of them to be working together. Who else had the power to hold her leash? It had to be him.

  “Tell me about this great invention I keep hearing about,” she said. “The microchip.”

  “It’s complicated.” His eyes drifted to the door. “And I’m afraid we don’t have much time.”

  “Why? Are you expecting company?”

  “No, you are.” He smiled again, but this time none of the warmth made it to his eyes. “Your friend was insistent on being close at hand, even when I assured him that I am a trained physician. I convinced him to allow us to bring you to this motel room because it’s across the street from the airport.” He shrugged. “Anyway, my friend’s employees are trying to keep him busy, but I don’t think they’ll be able to contain him for very much longer. He’s an extremely stubborn man, and he seems to care for you a great deal.”

  Madison’s eyes narrowed. “If you hurt Tyler, they’ll need dental records to identify you.”

  “Your young man is fine.” He waved her protests away with a flick of his hand, but not before she detected the fear riding on his voice. He knew she meant the threat literally. Good. Maybe he would give her more answers than he intended to. Sometimes frightened people didn’t know when to shut up. “Rico’s men are talking to him. That is all. Just talking.”

  Grainger began to pace; his eyes constantly darted to the door. For some reason Tyler seemed to worry him more than she did. It could be something as simple as male chauvinism. Madison feared it went deeper. Could Tyler be keeping secrets from her this late in the game?

  As he paced, he talked. “I just wanted to help people. That’s all. I came up with the idea for the invention in college. After I secured financial backers, I started to work in earnest on it until I’d perfected it. Allow me to use laymen terms so that you can understand how it works. I called it Pandora’s Box for a reason.

  “You see, I developed a way to cut out certain memories, goals, personality traits, etcetera and lock them away so the mind cannot retrieve them. Memories never really go away, but you can put them somewhere in the mind where the person can’t easily retrieve them. I put them in separate files like on a computer or in boxes, if you prefer. I can also place commands, sort of hypnotic suggestions in these boxes. When the time comes, the box opens and the person with the microchip will follow the commands as if they were their idea to begin with.

  “Since the microchip is installed using a syringe and the subject can be programmed not to remember anything, it would be a revolutionary way of brainwashing foreign spies. And unlike other brainwashing techniques it can be done in a matter of hours. That’s why the CIA wants control of it. Did you know they tried to have me killed? If it wasn’t for Rico, I’d be dead now. He’s been protecting me.”

  Madison thought back on the friendship that the four men had enjoyed in the past. Elias, Rico, Malcom Law and her father. What had happened to split up the friendship, and did it have anything to do with the microchips? She asked Elias the question, blurted it out before she had time to second guess herself. She watched his facial expression change.

  His dark brows knitted together behind the eyeglasses. His Adam’s apple bobbed a bit. “I rue the day I met Malcom Law and your father. They wanted to use the microchips to further their own agendas. When I wouldn’t allow it, they turned against me.”

  Madison couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Her father hadn’t been the type of man to harm someone just to get ahead. A small doubt niggled at the back of her mind. It couldn’t possibly be true. And she couldn’t see the president wanting to use the microchips for nefarious purposes either.

  Grainger had to be lying to her.

  A multitude of questions surged through her muddled mind. According to Grainger they didn’t have a great deal of time, so it was important for her to pick which ones were crucial to solving the mystery involving her father.

  “I have a chip in my brain, don’t I?” His slight nod seemed reluctant. She swallowed the building lump in her throat and pretended it didn’t scare the crap out of her. She said, “I think something’s wrong with it. I blacked out and woke up in a bar. They say I attacked someone, broke his finger, but I don’t remember a thing about it.”

  “I’m not surprised. The microchips may deteriorate with time. There’s been no long time study, of course.”

  He’d given her a crucial piece of information. She latched onto it. “My chip is old. How old? When did I get it? Whose idea was it to give it to me?”

  “You have the first one I ever created.” Eli’s eyes twinkled with what looked like pride.

  “Who did you sell Pandora’s Box to? Boracci?”

  “I would not sell my life’s work to anyone.” Grainger turned and narrowed eyes on her. “It’s too important. I thought I was doing my country a great service by trying to cure Alzheimer’s and other like-diseases, but the CIA decided they wanted to use my great invention for evil. Unfortunately they didn’t want to take no for an answer. They plotted to kill me.”

  Sadness tinted Grainger’s newborn smile as he said, “In the end, it was your father who warned me. Although he also wanted my invention, he wouldn’t kill me to get it. At least he drew the line there. But he was afraid of Malcom, so he wouldn’t lift a finger to help me. He only gave me a warning and an offer to hide out at his cabin. That’s all I got from him. I had no choice but to turn to Rico.”

  She didn’t like what she was hearing. It flew in the face of everything she’d known and loved about her father.

  “My father was a good man.” She hesitated. “Wasn’t he?”

  “No. Not exactly. I wouldn’t call him good. Duncan tried blackmail and threats to get me to use my microchips to serve his purpose. He and Malcom were in total agreement on that. They only disagreed on how to achieve their united purpose.”

  Another dagger hit her heart.

  If Grainger was telling the truth, she hadn’t known her father at all.

  “Madison!” Tyler shouted through the closed door while beating his fist against it. “Are you all right in there? Answer me!”

  Grainger hurried to the dresser, grabbed his belongings which seemed to include a briefcase and a handful of scraps, and hurried for the door. “Forget about the chips and go home before you get hurt.”

  “No. You should forget about Rico and let me help you. I can protect you.”

  “People in the agency aren’t the only ones after me. Other governments would also like to have the key to Pandora’s Box.” The knocking intensified, and Tyler shouted her name again. Grainger looked like he might piss his pants at any second. His eyes darted from her to the door and back again. “They all want my work, but they don’t mind if I’m dead. They think they can use it without me.”

  Madison tried to get out of bed. Her legs felt like jelly and refused to hold her, so she hovered on the mattress’ edge. “I can help you,” she said. “I can hide you from the agency. If anyone is truly out to get you, I promise to stop them.”

  Grain
ger opened the door to Tyler and hurried through it like a rat abandoning a sinking ship. Tyler hesitated as if he wanted to chase Grainger down and question him, but he joined her instead.

  “You okay?” He smoothed a few stray strands of hair from her face. “What happened to you on the plane? None of the damn passengers could agree on what they saw. Is it true someone used a stun gun on you?”

  Someone? So they didn’t have him in custody. Well, she had the guy’s face forever imprinted on her mind and someday she would track him down and demand a rematch. Another sliver of pain stabbed her from behind the eyes. Bastard was going to pay for attacking her.

  ******

  The drive had taken close to an hour. By the time they arrived at her father’s cabin, Madison was sick to death of small talk. For some reason Tyler seemed reluctant to discuss anything important. So when they drove up the gravel drive and the small log cabin appeared, Madison breathed a sigh of relief.

  The cabin stood two stories high and displayed huge dormer windows. The sight of it took Madison back to better days, time spent with her father fishing and hunting. Tyler parked the rental car on the gravel road directly in front of the cabin. Madison had to turn her head and look away for a moment. Emotion clogged her throat.

  You’re stronger than this! She clenched her teeth and forced the crippling claws of grief away from her heart and mind. Later, after her father’s name had been cleared, she would have a good cry.

  A groan surprised her, sneaking past her lips.

  “Are you okay to go inside?” Tyler asked, reading her expression.

  Pride straightened her spine. “Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?” Tyler’s door opened and he started to get out of the car, but Madison grabbed his arm on impulse. He glanced at her, eyebrows raised. She said, “I’d like a moment alone in the cabin, if you don’t mind.”