Page 47 of Reclaiming Chaos
I glanced toward the bathroom again. “If you’ll excuse me.”
“Afraid my job is to dance with you for the moment.”
I met the woman’s gaze again. “Did Carlee put you up to this?”
The woman moved us through the crowd toward the edge of the dance floor farthest away from the bathrooms and Russell. “No, not Carlee. A distant relative, you might know.”
“Gwen.” Her name slipped from my mouth, and my shoulders eased.
The blonde winked and grinned. “Your girl, Carlee is clever. FDG doesn’t do favors for just anyone.”
My brows dipped. “You must be confused. I called Gwen for help, not Carlee.”
“You sure about that?” The woman took my hand and guided me from the dance floor. Her eyes softened as she pulled my face down closer to hers like she was going to kiss my cheek. I felt her hand in my pocket. “In five minutes, there’s going to be a distraction. Take the stairs to the second floor. The electronic ID card I just put in your pocket should get you inside.”
She turned to walked away, but I rested my palm on her arm. “What’s on the second floor?”
Her eyes sparkled with mischief. “If you’re lucky, and the plans play out as expected, then that’s where you’ll find Carlee.”
Russell was watching me from across the room. Three more women surrounded him. Yet Carlee wasn’t one of them. I glanced at the hallway toward the bathroom, and Russell followed my gaze. He grinned.
My heart raced over the next three minutes as I waited to make my move. I palmed the card in my pocket. The stairs were on this side of the room, the elevator on the other near Russell and the bathroom.
A man shouted as he got onto the dance floor, falling and tripping over his feet as he plowed drunkenly toward a man and a woman. He pulled the man away, and their voices grew before the first punch was thrown.
Chaos erupted around them. People scurried to get out of the way. Security guards tried to make their way through the crowds. I glanced toward Russell again. He had his phone out, and he glanced toward the elevator only seconds before the lights went out.
I ran toward the stairs, swiping the key card, and raced up to the second floor. I swiped the card again and pulled the door open, stepping inside.
Unlike the floors above—the lab where premonitions and remote viewing took place; the top floor for the executives; and the bottom floor, where it was like a mix between a college campus and hotel lobby—the second floor was much different.
Row after row of computers made up the space with a hallway in each direction. A screen was hanging on the wall. Some algorithm was running on it. Flashes of people on their phones filled the screen. The phone numbers flashed beside them.
“Carlee,” I whispered and jogged through the computer area toward the hallway. Windows looked into the rooms I passed. Rows and rows of computer mainframes filled the rooms.
I jogged toward the light spilling out into the hallway in the last office. Carlee was in a library of sorts. Rows and rows of specialized shelving lined the walls. Each shelf was filled with plastic holders that contained computer discs.
“I knew you’d come.” She tossed me a thumb drive. “Hang on tight to that.”
“What is this place?” I asked.
“He calls it the Sin Codex.” Carlee pulled down a set of discs and set them on the table. One by one, she hurried to open the covers and pulled out the discs, breaking them in two and dropping them to the floor.
“Russell didn’t want just the secrets we could provide him. He wanted all the secrets, and he found a way to get them. He’s tapped into electronics and phones, monitoring conversations and recording people without their knowledge.”
She picked up the remote, pointed it at a screen, and hit a button before she dropped it and began breaking more disks.
A woman was sitting on a coffee table in front of her television, where a little girl playing on a swing set was showing on the TV.
“Sergeant Jones.”
A man’s voice filled the video. The woman on the screen looked around frantically.
“What in the world?” The woman asked as fear laced her face. She picked up her daughter’s teddy bear on the table and clutched it to her chest. “Is this video live?”
“Yes. It’s a live feed of your daughter at the park with her nanny and if you’d like to see your little girl celebrate her next birthday, I have a job for you to do. Succeed, and your little girl lives. Fail, and she doesn’t.”
Fear and panic crossed the woman’s face. “Who is this, and what do you want?”
