No Place to Hide by Lynette Eason Read Free Book Online Page B

yours?”
    He gave her a slow smile. “Maybe I’ll tell you one day.”
    “So if you’re not going to share your deepest secrets, tell me what all this is about,” Jackie said. “Who wants to kill you and why do they feel it’s necessary to accuse me of being an accessory?”
    Ian took another sip of his coffee and grimaced. “It started with an email meant for another person.” He rubbed his chin. “I think.”
    “You think?”
    He ran his hands through his short-cropped reddish-blondhair and took a deep breath. Jackie nursed her coffee while she kept one eye on him and one on the parking area. She wanted to hear his story, but she didn’t need any surprises.
    “As you know from my Facebook page, I’m in research and development. I’m also a professor at the University of South Carolina Upstate. To put it simply, I spend my days playing with germs and other yucky stuff.”
    “Right.”
    “There are two Ians with Wainwright Research and Development. Ian Peterson, who’s the grandson of the founder of the company, and me. I was in the lab the day before yesterday and got an email. It was password protected.” He flushed but continued. “I closed it out without reading it, then opened it back up. I was tired, I’d been up all night working on what I thought was a breakthrough on a vaccine for malaria.”
    “Malaria?”
    “It’s a huge third-world problem. A vaccine would do wonders.”
    “I thought there was already a vaccine.”
    “No, there’s medication you can take that may or may not help if you go into a high-risk country, but there’s no vaccine. But that’s beside the point. As I was saying, I was exhausted. I needed a break. So,” he gave a self-deprecating shrug, “I hacked into the email and read it.”
    “What did it say?”
    He dug into his pocket and handed her a sheet of paper.
    She read:
    NYonSTBY .
    d,s;;[pcfr;obrtrf.
    H4W9
    aasjl;;
    /fg’g[.jl]]u
    Cnt:T8R sas1sjg2hjha3
    She looked up. “It’s gobbledy gook. Or code. You know what it means?”
    “No idea. I think the first line may mean ‘New York on standby,’ but the rest of it I don’t have a clue.”
    “New York.” She shook her head. “And you’ve been accused of conspiring with enemies of the United States.”
    He rubbed his chin. “I think I’m still just a person of interest. But they’re leaning that way. They’ve all but said I’m a bioterrorist. It’s just a matter of time before it’s an all-out accusation, and if they catch me, they arrest me.” He shook his head. “I can’t figure it out. I’ve wracked my brain trying to decide if I stumbled across something in the lab, saw someone do something and didn’t realize it. Trust me, the loop is endless. The only thing that I can come up with that makes any sense is the hacked email.”
    She nodded. “As soon as you entered the password, it would have notified the sender if he put a read receipt on it.”
    “I’m sure he did. And when he saw the name, he would have realized his mistake. Unfortunately, he decided it was worth killing me over.”
    “Who knows you saw this email?”
    “A co-worker. Daniel Armstrong. He came in while I was reading it. I told him what happened and read it to him. He just shrugged and said it was weird, then asked if I was ready to get back to work. I almost closed the screen without another thought, then paused and hit Print.” He gave her a sheepish smile. “You know how I am about riddles and puzzles.”
    She did know. He couldn’t resist them. “And then what?”
    “I left late afternoon because I had to pick up my dry-cleaning.”He looked around the room. “But they must have been watching because someone tried to kill me in the parking lot by running me over. I managed to get out of the way, though. When they came back for a second try, I ran. I guess they’re not happy they failed.”
    “You think?” She couldn’t help the sarcasm.
    He stared at the email. “I need to figure out what this means.