Chapter 1
A long-ago memory made Hope Herring look off into the distance.
Less than a year ago, she’d stood at the counter slicing tomatoes and arranging them on the salad she was preparing. She was no chef, so the salad was simple—lettuce, cucumbers, carrots, celery, tomatoes. She added the tomatoes, even though Cori, her daughter didn’t like them. They were “yucky,” which meant their texture didn’t meet Cori’s refined tastes, not that Cori had refined tastes. She was a fast food lover, and like most of her classmates and friends, a Big Mac often beat a salad, hands down.
What else could a mother expect in the twenty-first century? The fast food industry spent billions producing the best-tasting food in the world, and billions more on catchy jingles and advertisements.
Hope glanced out the window.
In the backyard, Cori was kicking the soccer ball against the tall wooden fence. Hope knew that the kicking was really for Doug, her husband and Cori’s father. Doug possessed a far greater interest in soccer and other sports than his daughter ever did. Cori would practice only as long as Doug was watching, but it would never last long.
Since she wasn’t invested in developing her skills, Cori was mediocre at best. She wasn’t going to put a lot of time and effort into an activity that didn’t produce a higher payoff. Most of the time, people liked to practice what they were good at, and only the driven practiced what they weren’t good at.
Doug had stood at the grill, tending the hamburgers and hotdogs, or, as he liked to call them, “tube steaks.” Doug had a penchant for making up fun phrases to describe everyday things. That was one of the traits that made him a good writer and an even better reporter. He could reduce something to its essence, to a minimum of words that would fit into a five-hundred-word news article.
Doug liked to say that constraints weren’t bad things because constraints taught creativity. Anyone could write sloppy essays filled with the adjectives and adverbs the author needed because he or she was too lazy to search out the right word. It took a good writer to turn out work under the constraints of reporting and news deadlines. Doug could do that.
Hope had watched as her husband smiled and yelled something to Cori, who shrugged and continued her halfhearted kicking of the soccer ball. It was good to see Doug smile, something he hadn’t been doing a lot of at the time. He was working on a story and the research was taking him places he didn’t want to go.
Not that he told his wife about those places or those people. He said it was better that she didn’t know what he was doing. She was “safer” that way.
To Hope, it sounded as if he was having some sort of affair, but she knew that was the last thing he would ever do. Their family was the most important thing to both of them.
Doug’s mind worked in single lanes. When he homed in on a story, he didn’t think about much else. That meant he would make mistakes about other things—like appointments or the need to call or text when he was running late.
He’d been exceedingly careful about this particular story he was working on. All his notes and his laptop were kept in a briefcase that rarely left his side. At the moment, it was upstairs in his home office in a locked drawer of a file cabinet.
Hope had picked up the salad, walked out the door to the backyard, and set the bowl down on the round table under the large umbrella.
“How are the burgers coming?” Hope asked Doug.
“Just a few more minutes,” he reported.
With a smile, Hope noticed that Cori grabbed the opportunity to stop kicking. She came to the table, her phone in hand. Hope wondered how long it would be before Cori was stoop-shouldered from all the texting. She hoped she wouldn’t have to impose limits on phone use.
“Shoulders back, remember,” Hope said as Cori arrived at the table.
Cori looked up, frowned, and whined, “Mom.”
“You don’t want to be all stooped over when you’re older,” Hope said. “Good posture, or you’ll have to give up some time on the phone.”
Cori made a conscious effort to pull back her shoulders and sit straight, but Hope knew the corrections wouldn’t last. Kids were kids. As soon as they reached a certain age, their hearing went to pot. Hope was talking to the wind. Shaking her head, she joined Doug at the grill.
“Smells good.” Hope put her arm around her husband’s waist.
“Tube steaks and burgers. Can’t be beat. Say, you haven’t been sunbathing back here in the buff, have you?”
Hope laughed. “Right. Why do you ask … because you haven’t noticed my tan lines?”
Her husband chuckled. “Now, that is something I would notice.” Using a more serious tone, Doug said, “Don’t look up, but someone has a drone heading right for us.”
Hope looked up anyway, and sure enough, there was a drone in the air above them.
“That’s odd,” Hope said. “I’ve never noticed a drone around here before.”
Doug frowned. “I told you not to look.”
“Why not?”
“Because, now it will leave.”
As Hope watched, the drone darted off, quickly disappearing as it descended behind some trees.
“It should leave,” Hope said. “I can’t believe someone is trying to spy on us.”
“It’s not the spying that’s worrisome,” Doug said. “It’s not knowing who’s doing the spying.”
“It’s just some teenager with a new toy.” Hope gave a shake of her head.
“You think so? I guess you haven’t been watching lately.”
Hope’s forehead crinkled. “You mean today’s not the first time?”
Doug shook his head. “And I don’t know who’s doing it.”
“It must be a teenager.”
“I don’t think so. For one thing, the drone doesn’t look like some toy from a store. It looks commercial grade, which means it cost way more than what some kid can make from a paper route.”
With a smile, Hope told him, “Nobody has a paper route anymore.”
“You know what I mean. It costs more than a weekly allowance.”
“Okay, then some dad bought himself a new toy.”
“Possibly, but I would think that hovering over our house would not be all that entertaining. I know I’d get bored.”
“We do keep the curtains closed,” Hope chuckled and gave Doug a playful poke in the arm.
“You’re on a roll today. Let’s get serious for a minute.” Doug looked over his shoulder.
“Don’t worry. Cori’s in the zone,” Hope said. “The phone zone.”
“Good.” For a few seconds, he stared at the food cooking on the grill trying to gather his thoughts. “This is about the story I’m working on. It’s a big story. It’s the stuff Pulitzers are made of.”
“I’m impressed,” Hope said.
“Yes, well, not everyone wants their story told, if you catch my meaning. And for your own sake, I can’t tell you everything, but I can share this much. There’s a company. I can’t name which one, and I won’t tell you where the main office is located, but that company is doing some very bad stuff.”
“Stuff that I shouldn’t know about?”
“Correct. Not until the story hits. After that, it won’t make any difference.”
“If it’s so bad, why don’t you go to the authorities?”
Doug’s look told Hope that the “authorities” were party to the “bad stuff.”
“I get it,” she said. “You can’t go to them because….”
“Exactly. The company isn’t acting alone. There are others involved. There aren’t a lot of people I can trust. Therefore, there aren’t a lot of people you can trust.”
Hope nervously pushed a strand of her brown hair behind her ear. “This sounds a little paranoid.”
“Not a little paranoid, a lot. It’s stuff like the drone, like being followed.”
Hope’s eyes widened and her heart rate increased. She kept her voice low. “You’re being followed?”
Doug nodded. “And I think there’s some sort of GPS device on my car.”
A flood of anxiety raced through Hope’s body. “Doug, this sounds like some kind of a thriller movie.”
“Yeah, it does. But you know the old saying, ‘just because you’re paranoid, doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you.’”
Hope looked off across the yard. “I don’t like the sound of this. You’ve noticed someone following you?”
Doug put his arm around his wife. “I think they use a variety of vehicles, including SUVs and vans. And I think they work in pairs. An older couple strolling behind you is much less threatening than a single man in a suit behind a newspaper.”
“Who reads a newspaper anymore?”
“Exactly. I’m not trying to scare you, but I think we all need to practice situational awareness. Heads up, eyes alert. People don’t see what’s coming because they don’t look.”
“You are scaring me. I’m getting really worried.”
“No, no, that’s not what I’m trying to do. You’re safe as long as you don’t know anything about what I’m researching.”
“How will these ‘people’ know that I don’t know?”
“Because if you knew, you’d change your behavior. They’d notice that.”
“But if I changed my behavior, it would be for my own good, right?”
“You’re not in danger, Hope. Neither is Cori. Right now, neither am I, despite the drone. But if I push things, and I am going to push them, then … they might do something.”
Hope stared, not quite sure what to make of things.
“Now, I’ve scared you,” Doug said. “I’m sorry. I just wanted you to know what’s going on. I wanted you to be aware.” He waved his hand in the air. “It’s probably nothing anyway.”
“Now, you’re lying,” Hope said giving her husband the eye.
“Not entirely.”
“Wouldn’t we all be safer if someone else knew that you might be getting into a dangerous situation?” Hope asked.
“I’ve thought about that, but the only real protection is general knowledge, and I’m not ready for that. I need to do more investigative work. The story isn’t ready for publication yet.”
“Are the burgers ready?” Cori asked without looking up from her phone.
“Absolutely ready,” Doug answered. He kissed Hope on the cheek. “Like I said, forget my paranoia.”
“Just keep an eye out for the drones,” Hope deadpanned. “And for old people reading newspapers.”
He smiled. “That’s never a bad idea.”
Chapter 2
Hope blinked and wondered why that particular memory had popped into her head. Maybe, because her students were busy working on an unannounced quiz, the sort they all hated. In the silence, her mind had wandered back to that sunny afternoon, those burgers, that conversation. She and Doug and Cori had been back in Ohio, not in North Carolina where she was now. Doug had been alive.
Alive.
She glanced at the clock on the wall. “Two more minutes,” she announced. “Only two more minutes left so finish up.”
Typically, some of her students looked at the clock as if she was lying to them. Others kept their heads down, working on the quiz. A few, very few, were finished. And she knew which ones had actually completed the quiz and how many had simply given up. Every class had a few students who weren’t going to do the work, no matter how much she helped or encouraged them.
Not everyone valued learning. Hope accepted that. Not many students could see into the future. Most of them couldn’t see past dismissal, which would arrive right after the quiz ended.
Doug. Her heart ached.
Why had that particular memory popped up today? It wasn’t long after that burger and “tube steak” outing in the back yard that Doug had driven off a perfectly dry road on a perfectly clear day and died in an auto accident. At the time, she’d been too involved with the loss and the grieving and the taking care of Cori to remember that afternoon, that drone.
Why did she think of it now? What had triggered that vision? What had prompted her memory? What had prompted the drone? Especially, since she’d moved from Columbus, Ohio to Castle Park, North Carolina … moved precisely because she didn’t want to be triggered by the house and school and the grill she saw every day. What was it about the drone?
It wasn’t the drone. She was pretty sure about that. It was the warning. It was the mystery. It was the “situational awareness.”
That was the message, but why did she need the message now? Something deep down in her subconscious had been tripped.
Why?
Was she feeling threatened? She couldn’t think of anything specific that should worry her. Yet, something had blipped on her radar.
Cori was all right. In fact, Cori was in class, just like Hope’s students, and just like them, she was no doubt looking at the clock and calculating how many minutes she had until dismissal.
Had Cori said or done something to trigger the memory? If Hope remembered breakfast correctly, the discussion had been about Halloween and costumes and trick-or-treating. The holiday was only a week and a half away, and Hope knew it was time to buy a few pumpkins and get out the carving knives. She would have to send Cori into the storage room to hunt down the box of decorations that was somewhere among the many boxes and containers yet to be unpacked. Cori would love that.
Hope tried to focus on the memory, on what Doug had told her. The accident had always bothered her because Doug was a careful driver who had braved the rain, ice, and snow of Ohio weather. That he would veer off a clear road seemed highly improbable. According to his phone records, he had not been talking or texting at the time of the accident, although there was some question about him being between cell towers.
He was alone and not distracted. He was a very good driver. No heart attack, no physical ailment that anyone could find. The coroner had done a toxicology screen, as the insurance company would require, and Doug’s screen came up clean. No alcohol, no drugs, nothing unidentified. He had merely driven off the road.
No, he hadn’t.
Hope was sure he’d had help.
She couldn’t put a finger on the trigger that brought the memory to the surface. Perhaps, it was nothing more than facing another holiday without Doug. That would be stress enough, she supposed.
She glanced at the clock.
“Time. Put your pencils down and turn your quizzes face down on your desks.”
She stood and started down the aisles, gathering the papers.
“Your homework assignment is on the board just as it always is, so no excuses. Robert Hanson, you have board duty on Monday. Please make sure you come in a few minutes early. Have a great weekend, everyone. See you on Monday.”
At that moment, the dismissal bell rang through the school. That was the signal, and the students jumped up. In just a few seconds, they’d gathered what they wanted and flowed out the door. They didn’t crowd or bump, as they knew Hope was a stickler for manners.
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