Page 53 of Soul on Fire
He backdoored into the operating system and mapped each drive. One, two… and there it was, a third drive, unmounted and hidden in the system, only there if someone knew where to look and how to boot it up. He mounted the drive and used the same brute force hack to push through the password request.
Inside the hidden drive, a list of files opened up alongside the option to VPN back to another network.
He clicked the first file.
Names of diplomats from eight different countries. Flight plans. Lists of planes and their tail numbers and photos of each. A spreadsheet listing the official diplomatic travels of Brazil, Cambodia, and Syria, Myanmar, Angola, Rwanda, and China. She’d kept a log of flights going back five years.
It was last updated two days before Emily’s body was found. The day she was murdered.
Down he went, expanding file after file. He hunched over her laptop, breathing quickly. He wasn’t sure what he expected when he flew to Guangzhou, but this wasn’t it.
The VPN teased him. Was Emily a journalist or was she something more? Where would he go if he connected to that network?
Was Emily a spy? Meticulous records detailed the comings and goings of eight nations, their diplomatic travel, trade, exports, imports. Her records were like a spider’s web, mapping something he couldn’t see, not yet. What connected these countries? What brought them together? Why was she focused on these eight?
“Please prepare for landing in twenty minutes.” The pilot’s voice crackled through the plane’s sound system, more static than words. He stared at Emily’s spreadsheet, trying to understand what she’d seen, what she was piecing together. He could only see the strokes; he couldn’t see the painting.
He shut the laptop and slid it into his briefcase, buckled his seatbelt, and waited. They came down through the clouds and the brown haze of Beijing to the government-run Xijiao airstrip. He took a deep breath of the plane’s filtered air as he grabbed his things. The soup in Beijing was thick, a tobacco and exhaust heat that burned the throat and tongue. He’d never picked up smoking, and when he was in Beijing, he’d never have needed to if he had. There was enough smoke in the air when he breathed in.
Bai hesitated, for the briefest moment, when he stepped to the plane’s door. There was a car waiting for him and two men at the end of the stairs.
“Assistant Minister Si requests your presence,” one of them said.
It wasn’t a request.
Nodding, he slid into the backseat as both men took the front. They were silent, maneuvering through Beijing’s northwest neighborhoods toward the Summer Palace. He kept his expression as smooth as the lake they drove past, placid and serene.
Inside, he was a tempest, his thoughts roiling. The Assistant Minister of International Intelligence Investigations never requested anyone’s presence. This was a summons, and a forceful one. These men had collected him from the steps of his flight. Had they thought he’d flee? Did they expect him to run? Where to? And why? This was how political officers brought in their targets, snatching them when there was no chance of escape.
Where had he misstepped? What had he done?
His gaze slid to his briefcase, and to Emily’s laptop tucked inside.
Ten minutes later, they pulled into the massive complex of the Ministry of State Security. The complex was a tight-knit block of tall, rectangular concrete buildings, filthy with smog and smoke and acid rainwash. Each block lay in a single file, housing the activities of a specific division of the MSS. Bai worked in Division Two, International Intelligence.
His silent escorts collected him from the backseat. One took his briefcase, and they walked shoulder to shoulder with him. They didn’t have their hands on him—at least, not yet—but the message was clear:you are under detainment.
They led him to the elevator and within, waving off others who wanted to join. A woman in a blue suit gave him a wide-eyed once over and walked away. The taint of failure was already on him.
The ride to the top floor took an eternity as the elevator clanked and groaned. Did other governments have poor equipment in their facilities? Once, he’d thought the MSS would have the best of everything. He’d been sadly mistaken.
Assistant Minister Si Sha Li stood behind his desk, hands clasped behind him. His office, like all offices of Party officials, had the same decor: a portrait of Mao, photographs of the glorious People’s Liberation Army, and his certificate of appointment from the Party’s Central Committee. Also, there was the required Party slogan, but that was the one thing up to the individual. Assistant Minister Si’s saidRally closely around the Party Central Committee and work hard with one heart.
“Comrade Assistant Minister.” Bai came to a stop before his desk and bowed his head, stared at the ground. “How may I assist you?”
“What were you doing in Guangzhou?” Si snapped.
Bai looked up. Si’s ice-cold stare ran right through him. His breath escaped in a willowy draft.
Si scowled and slammed his palm on his desk. His hair, cut and styled to match the General Secretary’s, short on the sides and longer on top, was gray at the temples. His mouth, lined with deep crevasses from years of smoking, pinched tight. “Answer!”
“Investigating the murder of an American woman, Comrade Assistant Minister.”
“And who ordered you to do this?”
Bai blinked. He pressed his hands together and looked down, fixed his gaze at the corner of Si’s desk. His career had reached a level where he did not need direct orders for each investigation. He’d been trusted. He’d been allowed to investigate where he found irregularity. He’d been commended for his initiative. Not too much initiative. Just the right amount.
He’d made a mistake. “I was not ordered, Comrade Assistant Minister.”
