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  AGENT OUT

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  First Simon Pulse edition March 2006

  Copyright © 2006 by Francine Pascal

  SIMON PULSE

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

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  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  Produced by Alloy Entertainment

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  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  For information address Alloy Entertainment, 151 West 26th Street, New York, NY 10001

  SIMON PULSE and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  FEARLESS is a registered trademark of Francine Pascal

  Printed in the United States of America

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2005933401

  ISBN-13: 978-0-689-87823-7

  ISBN-10: 0-689-87823-0

  eISBN 13: 978-1-439-12095-8

  AGENT OUT

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  002

  Gaia

  Time Stamp: 2:30 a.m.

  [Recorder on] Agent Gaia Moore recording. I can’t give a case number because this case does not exist—not as far as the FBI is concerned. They think Catherine is already dead. Apparently they’re prepared to let her name just fade away on some inactive missing persons list for the next twenty years without lifting another finger, but with all due respect to you, Agent Malloy, I think that’s a crock. You have no idea what’s happened to Catherine, and neither do I. One abandoned laptop and some blood on a lost duffel bag doesn’t tell you anything. You can’t just declare her dead and be done with it—she deserves more than that. Catherine and I have pulled each other through every single day of this training. She never once lost faith in me, and I am not about to lose faith in her. She is more than my friend, she’s my partner, and I doubt very much, sir, that you could write off your partner as easily as the bureau has written off Agent Sanders. I think that’s lousy police work—lazy and shortsighted—and I think I can do better. I’m stating that for the record here, in the hopes that you and the rest of the bureau will understand my motives.

  Eventually you’re all going to see why I had to do it this way—sneaking off base in the middle of the night to find her. I admit I feel a little foolish. I feel like I’m seventeen years old again—sneaking out on my foster parents to dodge some ridiculous curfew. I swore to myself that I’d never be a rebellious teenage cliché again, but there you have it: I am what I am. I know how unprofessional this is, believe me. I would have loved nothing more than to pursue this investigation with your permission, sir; you just weren’t inclined to offer it.

  You’ve probably already declared me AWOL. Someone must have noticed that I’m not in my bed and I’m nowhere to be found on the whole Quantico base. I wouldn’t be surprised if you’d already started proceedings for my termination, but all I can say is … I’m doing what I think is right. I’m doing what I need to do. If you knew more about my past, you’d understand. [Pause] What am I saying? You’re the FBI—you probably know everything about my past. So maybe someone on some disciplinary committee who hears this recording will consider my history and show me some mercy. Maybe you’ll understand, Malloy…. I’m just not going to write off another friend. I can’t. And I don’t see the point of having this badge or this gun if I can’t even help my own partner. I don’t care how hopeless you all think it is. I couldn’t care less. [Recorder off]

  Time Stamp: 2:48 a.m.

  [Recorder on] I don’t know why my foot is still on the gas. I don’t even know why I’m going in this direction. My eyes keep drifting out the driver’s side window—looking for signs of her body in the gravel on the side of the highway. That’s what I’ve been reduced to here. I know it’s irrational and naive, and I should be ashamed to call myself FBI, but that’s what I’m doing. A dog would have a better chance of finding her like this. I need more to go on. I need something to go on. Jesus, I feel like such an amateur talking into this thing. You trained me to take audio notes in an investigation, so that’s what I’m doing. You say it will keep my thoughts organized. You say it will help me flush out the right clue. Like this recorder is going to help me find her out here in the dark on this completely abandoned highway. I don’t think so. I don’t even need a machine to help me keep track of clues. I don’t forget things. Ever. You can call it a photographic memory, but it’s more complicated than that. You might have noticed, Agent Malloy … I’m not like the other trainees. [Pause] Note to self: erase that last part.

  The point is, I’m not really using this recorder to take notes on this case. I’m using this recorder because it’s the only partner I’ve got right now. I need someone to talk to while I look for her … even if that someone is me. I’m alone out here. And I mean that in every sense of the word. [Pause]

  A message for Will … Will, I’m sorry. I’m sorry I stood you up for dinner—I was busy emptying my bank account at an ATM machine, but I know that’s just a lame excuse. But more than that, I’m sorry if you think I don’t listen enough. I know you didn’t want to me to do this, but … Look, most of all I’m sorry for leaving the lollipop case right in the middle of the investigation. I’m sorry for leaving it all in your hands. I hope Malloy doesn’t come down on you too hard. I hope you don’t feel like I’ve abandoned you or abandoned the case or the victims or anything like that. We will solve that case, Will. We’ll find the killer, I’m sure of it. Just give me a little time. If you can carry the case for just a few days … I’ll be back. I swear I will. And I’ll bring Catherine with me. [Recorder off]

  ABSOLUTE NOWHERE, USA

  The sun had risen, but Gaia hardly noticed. Somewhere along the way the sky had shifted from moonlit black to ugly amber to its current shade of ash white. How long had she been driving now? The miles of gas stations and convenience stores had all melted into one big peripheral blur. Her eyes stung like hell from exhaustion, and the harsh glare of the late morning haze was only making it worse. She could practically hear her body pleading for an hour of sleep, but rest was out of the question. All that mattered now were the worn-out street signs overhead.

  She hunched farther over the steering wheel, squinting up through the dusty windshield of Catherine’s Nissan Altima to decipher the faded names. Palmer Street … Mortimer Street … Winslow Road … But no Cherry Lane.

  Where the hell is 1309 Cherry Lane?

  The unfamiliar address had been rattling in her brain for three hours now—ever since Lyle had whispered it nervously to her over the phone. She could still hear his nasal voice cracking with anxiety….

  “I shouldn’t he doing this, Gaia. You know I shouldn’t be doing this. Malloy was just in here asking questions. He’s pissed, Gaia. You know you’re in serious—”

  “I know that, Lyle. I know. The trace. Could you trace the origin of the signal or not?”

  “Hold on.”

  “Lyle, do not put me on hold!”

  “Just hold on, okay? I have to check the doors. They’re searching the whole complex for you, you know.”

  She knew she’d put Lyle in an unfair position. After all, he was just a spindly little FBI lab tech—it’s n
ot like she wanted to make him an accomplice to her unauthorized investigation. But around seven in the morning, somewhere in the middle of Richmond, Gaia had come to terms with reality. Her only legitimate lead was back at that computer lab in Quantico. There was no other choice but to call Lyle on his personal cell and pray he’d already reported to the lab—which, thank God, he had.

  All she had going for her was that cryptic computer program Catherine had left behind. Gaia had found the program still running on Catherine’s computer after she’d disappeared. Gaia assumed it was the high-powered search engine Catherine had been boasting about—a little piece of software she’d created that was supposed to cross-reference all the evidence in the lollipop case and spit back potential suspects. But once Will and Gaia examined Catherine’s computer more closely, they realized that her program was collecting a very different kind of information. Her turbocharged search engine had found something that it had clearly not been meant to find—namely, an index of Latin American addresses that looked an awful lot like terrorist sleeper cells.

  This bizarre discovery had left Gaia and Will in a near catatonic state of puzzlement. But that was just the beginning of the strangeness. Not only was Catherine’s program gathering this explosive information, but someone, it seemed, was still accessing the information in her absence. According to Lyle, even though Catherine had disappeared days before, someone had been using her program as recently as twenty-four hours ago.

  Could that someone be Catherine? Could she be out there somewhere trying to access her own computer? Could someone be forcing her to access it? Or what if it was someone else entirely? Some nameless, faceless asshole who’d already gotten rid of Catherine and was trying to nab the information for himself? These questions were the only thing keeping Gaia’s eyes glued open and focused on the road ahead.

  Will had asked Lyle if there was any way to trace the access. Lyle said he would try, but trying wasn’t good enough. Gaia knew she’d have to push Lyle to get the info she needed—even if it meant taking advantage of his rather obvious crush on her. So with just the right combination of dominance and flirtation, she’d finally managed to coax poor Lyle past his initial anxiety until he’d coughed up an address.

  “Baltimore, okay? The program was accessed from a telephone modem in Baltimore. The Verizon map pinpoints the signal at Cherry Lane near Ditmar Street. The exact address is 1309 Cherry Lane. Someone in that house was logged onto Catherine’s computer in the last twenty-four hours.”

  “You’re a genius, Lyle. You seriously are a goddamn genius. I don’t know how to thank you for this.”

  “Well, maybe when you get back, we could go out for some—?”

  “I’ve got to go, Lyle. We never had this conversation, okay?”

  “You’re damn right, we never had this conversation. I could be fired just for talking to—”

  Click.

  And so here she was, searching in vain for Cherry Lane. She would have asked Lyle to map out a route for her, but she knew she’d kept him on the phone too long as it was. Another thirty seconds and the bureau would have been tracing Lyle’s call, personal cell or not—and she wouldn’t risk getting him in any more trouble. She’d have to find Cherry Lane the old-fashioned way.

  Once she’d made it into Baltimore, she asked for directions at a gas station, but the “attendant” with the faded faux-Nike Just Do Her T-shirt hadn’t been much help. She could only make out every other word he said. All she’d been able to gather was that Cherry Lane was a few miles south and a number of blocks west. But the other half of his unintelligible directions were a seemingly endless repetition of the words “left,” “right,” “old church,” and “Old MacDonald’s,” which, Gaia was reasonably sure, was not an old man’s farm, but rather the term this man used to describe his favorite dining establishment. Eventually she did find her way to Ditmar Street, but Ditmar seemed to go on forever….

  “Jesus,” she breathed through nearly closed lips, surveying the row of crumbling houses up ahead. There was no denying it: America could be one ugly-ass eyesore of a country. It seemed the city council had taken a meeting and decided to give up altogether on the outskirts of Baltimore. Each little house looked more forgotten than the last, from the broken, soot-covered windows to the rusted-out aluminum siding, and to the tattered stars and stripes hanging tenuously over the piles of bricks that stood in for porch steps. This sure as hell wasn’t the lush backwoods of Quantico, Virginia. It wasn’t the pristine sunny streets of California or even the rich, historical filth of New York City. No, this was something else entirely.

  This was Absolute Nowhere, USA. Suburban degradation in all its glory.

  Please don’t let her be in one of these homes, Gaia thought, slowing the car to cruising speed. Maybe Lyle has no idea what he’s talking about.

  She was so distracted by the urban sprawl that she nearly passed right by the magic words. She quickly slammed on the brakes and backed it up a few yards. All her exhaustion drained away once she saw the faded white letters on the rusty blue sign overhead:

  Cherry Lane.

  It’s about freaking time, she thought, slamming her foot down on the gas. The tires skidded with a deafening screech as she turned the sharp corner and picked up the pace, eyeing every numbered address that hadn’t fallen off its facade. And finally, her marathon drive had come to an end. The nine might have slipped its hinge to become a six, but the rotting house before her was most definitely none other than 1309.

  She pulled over to the side of the road and turned off the transmission. The engine sputtered with a long sigh—she could almost feel the Altima thanking her for the much needed rest.

  She sat there for a moment in silence, examining the house from inside the car. Just as expected, it was not a pretty sight. The warped, hospital blue siding had that eerie generic flavor of a house that didn’t want to be noticed. The porch door was boarded up with a thick slab of wood and couched in too much shadow to see clearly. The rest of the porch was bare, with the exception of a filthy black barbecue grill that a family of spiders had long since made their home. There was no front lawn to speak of—just a makeshift little garbage collection on a patch of black dirt. Anyone with a conventional genetic code would have taken one look at this place, locked all the car doors, and called for backup. But Gaia’s genes were far from conventional. She could already feel a hungry buzz in her chest where the fear should have been. She was aching to kick through that knotty plank-of-wood door, but she thought better of it. She’d learned her lesson at Quantico about rash behavior, and she had no intention of repeating her mistakes.

  Gaia might have gone AWOL, but that was the only thing about this investigation that would not be squeaky clean. Authorized or not, she was going to conduct this search like the professional she was. She would bring Catherine back, and she’d do it by the book, and Malloy and the rest of them would have nothing left to say but “thank you” and “you have our deepest apologies for underestimating you both.” She had already acquired a wealth of knowledge at Quantico—probably more than she even knew—and now was the time to put it all into practice. This time she’d be going without the “training wheels”—without the supervision of Bishop or Malloy or Crane, without the unearned respect that the town seemed to afford its trainees, and most of all … without Catherine or Will by her side. This was her show now and hers alone. And she had no intention of screwing it up.

  She made sure her badge was strapped to her belt, and then she pulled her gun from the glove compartment, ignoring the slight hitch in her chest that still accompanied a firearm. Her traumatic history with guns was becoming a little more manageable with each passing day of training. She checked the cartridge and then secured the gun in the holster under her black jacket. She took one last deep breath and then climbed out of the car, slamming the door behind her and locking it with the key chain remote.

  Her approach was quick and deliberate: through the garbage-strewn “lawn,” up the creaky wo
oden steps of the empty porch, and straight to the boarded-up door. She gave the door three stiff knocks and then stepped closer to listen for movement. Nothing. Four more knocks yielded the same result. Pure unadulterated silence.

  She stepped over to the window and tried to peer through the one pane of glass that hadn’t turned completely opaque with dirt, but all she could see was darkness. The mailbox was nameless, empty, and gathering dust.

  This house was positively dead. Just an abandoned hospital blue box in the middle of nowhere. Standing there on the creaky porch, Gaia finally took a moment to ask herself the obvious question:

  What the hell could this decrepit shack on the outskirts of Baltimore possibly have to do with Catherine Sanders?

  She stood there puzzled for another few seconds, but her inertia made her twitch with frustration. She hadn’t come all this way for a dead end. She needed more information. She needed to know the deal with this house. Did someone actually live here? Had anyone ever lived here? She scanned the adjacent houses for neighbors, but each place looked deader than the last. And then finally, a few houses down and across the street, she saw the first signs of life on Cherry Lane.

  There was a diner. Moscone’s. Old and dilapidated to be sure, but open for business. And old was good. Someone in there had to know something about this house. Whatever freak had lived here must have stopped in at least once or twice for a cup of coffee and a slice of pie.

  There were still a few irrefutable facts in this life, and Gaia had yet to see this one disproved: it didn’t matter if it was Moscone’s in the crap section of Baltimore or Cozy Soup ’n’ Burger in the heart of downtown New York. At one point or another, everyone needed a cup of coffee and a slice of pie.

  UNFORCED AND CASUAL

  As Gaia moved toward the diner, the stillness hit her again. It was so painfully quiet on this wide, deserted street. The asphalt was cracked and stained, and a paper cup was rolling in the dark gutter near a broken iron drain cover. Moscone’s Diner was handpainted over a dark metal door with dirty glass inlays. A white do-it-yourself sign with attached black letters in the window read: LUNCH SPECIAL SOUP AND SANDWICH $3.95 FREE COFFEE 12-2. Gaia stepped deliberately forward and pushed on the diner’s door, rattling the overhead bell as it swung inward.