Page 69 of Locked Out

“No. man. Like I said I just told him the shit that happened and that was it. I don’t want to be no messenger that gets knifed.”

Cash took a second to decipher that one. Don’t shoot the messenger. He bit back a sigh. “Okay Louis, go find something to do but keep your mouth shut. Find me if anything else weird happens or if you see anything interesting.”

“Will do, boss man.” The kid turned and disappeared down the hallway.

Cash leaned back in the chair and tried to force the pieces together. He was missing some. Had to be. He dropped the chair down on all four legs and went to the conference room. The door was closed, so he knocked. A muffled voice wafted through the door. Archer must be on a call.

Cash waited for a couple of minutes and then the door opened.

“What?” Archer demanded.

Cash raised an eyebrow but followed Archer inside the room. The other man sat but Cash remained standing after he closed the door. “Louis told Davenport everything.”

Archer swore. “Tell Antonio.” Archer leaned back in his chair. “I’ll deal with Louis.”

Cash took a risk. “I hear Mongolia is nice this time of year.”

Archer met his gaze and his lips snagged on his teeth as he grinned, as if he was out of practice. “Yes, I’ve heard the same thing.” The smile quickly left his face. “Anything else?”

“Yes actually. Louis said Davenport had him ask Poppy if she found anything.”

Archer frowned. “Found anything? In regard to what?”

“No idea. Louis didn’t know. He said Poppy said she didn’t find anything.” Cash leaned against the wall. “What would Davenport be asking Poppy to find? Do you think it has to do with the Fitzgerald bible?” He wanted to curse. He’d managed to block Riss out of his mind for just a little while and function like a normal human but now here she was back in the center of his world. Just the mention of something connected to her brought up all the anger and other emotions he didn’t want to examine too closely. Shit.

“I can’t see how the bible would play into it at all unless Davenport wanted to use it to blackmail me and the Society. I think he’s in trouble but I don’t think he’s that stupid. I don’t even know how someone out there knows what’s written in it so I guess I shouldn’t rule it out entirely.” He steepled his hands under his chin. “Cross-reference Poppy’s stays at our facilities with Davenport’s. See if there’s any correlation.”

“There’s one other thing that Louis said he heard. He said Poppy told someone else, ‘the code on the paper is useless. It didn’t work'.”

Archer let out a sigh. “That reference I understand. Davenport claimed a piece of paper was stolen from his room. Later, it was found in the library. I saw it and it was a printout of programming code.”

Cash scratched his jaw. “You think the code doesn’t work?”

“Poppy thinks so.”

“If that’s the code to Jenny, Davenport’s AI model, then no wonder Davenport is so jumpy.”

Archer shrugged. “Could be the code to anything, but yes, that would be a serious problem.”

Cash straightened. “I’ll see what I can dig up on Poppy.”

He made a quick pit stop by the kitchen to get some strong coffee and a snack, and then he made his way to a tiny office in the very back corner of the security section. He got settled and then started running Poppy Bateman through the database. He read through her file as he waited for the query to be completed.

Poppy listed consultant as her occupation. Consultant to what? That was very vague. Normally members were not allowed to get away with being vague. He checked the initials at the bottom of the page. Helen Jefferies admitted her. Helen had a reputation as being very thorough; there was no way she’d let something like this go. Going back over the form on his screen, he stumbled on the answer, Angel Wheaton.

Angel was everyone’s favorite aunt. She had permanently bounced from one Society location to another, and she made the best chocolate chunk cookies. Cash still missed her. But Angel wasn’t her real name and if he looked up her file, all the spaces would’ve been blank. Rumor was she’d done something to help the Society way back and was given membership when she retired from her position in the CIA. Or was it the DIA, or maybe the NSA. There was no point in asking and if Archer knew, he never breathed a word.

So, Angel got Poppy in and Helen let her get away with all the vagueness because Angel told her to. No doubt Archer knew about this. Now things made a little more sense but created more questions. Was Poppy freelancing inside the Society? That would be a huge no-no. She didn’t have Angel’s clout, nor did she make cookies. This was not going to go well for her.

Cash went back to his searches. Davenport and Poppy were indeed in the same place about forty percent of the time. Not enough to stand out if anyone was just taking a casual look but more than enough to ring bells since he was already looking for anything strange. But even more perplexing was the fact that Peter Kirkly was in the same place as Poppy seventy-five percent of the time. Peter and Poppy were also in the same place as Li and other top members a high percentage of the time. This wasn’t looking good. Cash flicked off his screen, popped the last bite of cookie in his mouth, and returned to the boardroom.

“I’m thinking Poppy and Peter are working under the table inside the Society. Spies for hire. They try to glean whatever information someone wants from other members.”

Archer toyed with his pen as he listened. “Angel recommended Poppy. I remember it but I also remember being very clear with Helen to get as much information as possible about Poppy. I should have followed up.”

“You think Angel or Poppy went back in and altered the files?”

“Yes. And Peter is her partner in crime. Mr. Oil and Gas.” Archer snorted. “He is on the books for some British company in the Middle East, but I am equally sure he freelances as you say. I want to see them.”

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