GrayNet Read online

  GRAYNET

  BOOK 4 IN THE SPIES LIE SERIES

  D. S. KANE

  Copyright © 2014 D. S. Kane

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN 978-0-9960591-9-0 (paperback)

  ISBN 978-0-9862321-1-4 (Kindle)

  ISBN 978-0-9862321-0-7 (ePub)

  Cover design by Jeroen Ten Berge [www.jeroentenberge.com]

  Print layout and ebook editions by eBooks By Barb for booknook.biz

  Praise for DS Kane’s Spies Lie Series

  Bloodridge

  “A globe-trotting spy thriller dense with intriguing insider’s knowledge.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “I thoroughly enjoyed this book … It is definitely a page-turner.”

  —Judge, 22nd Annual Writer’s Digest Self-Published Book Awards on Bloodridge

  “This is a sizzler torn straight from tomorrow’s headlines. Bloodridge by D.S. Kane is one you won’t want to miss.”

  —John Reinhard Dizon, author of Nightcrawler and Wolf Man

  “What a wild ride! Filled with adventure and suspense and kept me on the edge of my seat. There wasn’t a slow moment in it. Reminiscent of Ludlum and Follett.”

  —Sharon Law Tucker, Author, How To Be A BadAss, A Survival Guide For Women

  DeathByte

  “Readers who adore action-packed thrillers in the vein of Robert Ludlum’s Bourne series will enjoy its many double-crossings.”

  —Kirkus Reviews on DeathByte

  “This was a great thriller … and the speed of the plot was breathtaking.”

  —Judge, 22nd Annual Writer’s Digest Self-Published Book Awards on DeathByte

  Swiftshadow

  “A must read for lovers of this genre.”

  —Sheri A. Wilkinson, book blogger

  The “Spies Lie” Series by DS Kane:

  Bloodridge, Book 1 (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00K0029J0)

  A globe-trotting spy thriller dense with intriguing insider’s knowledge.” —Kirkus Reviews

  (https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/ds-kane/bloodridge/)

  DeathByte, Book 2

  (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00L2LLKSC)

  “A dizzying spy story for readers with clear minds and steely constitutions.” —Kirkus Reviews

  https://www.kirkusreviews.com/indie/dashboard/review/deathbyte/

  Swiftshadow, Book 3

  (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00MJ5KXKG)

  GrayNet, Book 4

  …with more to come.

  For Steve Schear,

  one of the original cypherpunks,

  a great friend who

  inspired much of this story,

  and Deb, who keeps him happy.

  Contents

  PART I

  CHAPTER 1

  ONE YEAR LATER

  CHAPTER 2 • CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4 • CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6 • CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8 • CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10 • CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  PART II

  CHAPTER 13 • CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15 • CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17 • CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19 • CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21 • CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23 • CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25 • CHAPTER 26

  PART III

  CHAPTER 27 • CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29 • CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31 • CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 33 • CHAPTER 34

  CHAPTER 35 • CHAPTER 36

  CHAPTER 37 • CHAPTER 38

  CHAPTER 39 • CHAPTER 40

  PART IV

  CHAPTER 41 • CHAPTER 42

  CHAPTER 43 • CHAPTER 44

  Appendix A

  Glossary

  Appendix B

  Character List for the Spies Lie series (alphabetical)

  Appendix C

  Additional Reading on Several Related Topics

  Appendix D

  Notes on Predictive Markets

  BONUS:

  The First Chapter of Baksheesh, Book 5

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Disclaimer

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters and events depicted here are the work of the author’s mind. Most but not all of the places are real.

  “Nothing is ever certain.”

  —Alice Sebold, The Lovely Bones

  “If one good deed in all my life I did,

  I do repent it from my very soul.”

  —William Shakespeare,

  Spoken by Aaron, in Titus Andronicus

  PART I

  CHAPTER 1

  87-25 Colonial Road, Bay Ridge,

  Brooklyn, New York City

  June 13, 5:28 p.m.

  The tremors in Sarah Silbee’s hands were worse than ever. Withdrawal. Ann watched her mother, frightened, but she knew there was nothing she could do when mom was like this. Ann’s complaints would usually just get her the back of mom’s hand. It had been either the food or the drugs, and there was just so much cash.

  Ann’s brother Joshua was too young to understand, but Ann was fourteen and had started asking questions about the drugs. Sarah took the book of matches from her purse and lit the crack. She inhaled, and almost immediately, her expression softened. She took a second toke and lay back into the sofa’s cushions.

  Ann watched her mother lift the pipe to her lips. She backed away and found Joshua in the corner of the room, playing with a toy gun. Ann hugged him, then stared across the room, her hands clenching and unclenching, again and again. The hunger pains in her belly mixed with anger.

  Her mother’s eyes appeared to be in another world. How could she not know that her children were starving? Ann had been the surrogate mother to Josh, but this was no way to grow up. She hated her mother.

  Her mother’s arms began thrashing, and her face showed panic. Ann ran to her. “Mom?”

  Sarah Silbee fell over in a heap. Her face reddened, then turned a light gray. Her chest heaved once, then stopped.

  Ann screamed. “Mom!” She pounded on her mother’s chest, but nothing happened. She hugged her mother, rocking her back and forth as she cried. “I’m so sorry I hated you.”

  Joshua came over and tugged at Ann’s sleeve. He pointed to his mouth. All Ann could do was pull him into the hug. After several minutes, Ann began to think. What do I do now? No food in the apartment. Mom gone forever. If we stay here, we’ll starve. Child Protective Services might find us, but they’ll separate Joshua and me. I can’t let that happen.

  She rose and pulled her younger brother with her. “Come, Josh. We have to leave here.”

  The apartment was across the street from Owl’s Head Park. She dragged her brother through the park. She asked several people if they had spare change and gathered a few dollars, not enough to pay for a meal. At least in summer they wouldn’t freeze.

  An old man pushing a shopping cart emerged from behind a hedge. He was muttering something, and when he saw them, he smiled. “You mama near? Could she spare an old beggar some cash?”

  Ann stopped walking, afraid to come any closer. “We’ve got no mama. We’re looking for someplace safe. Can you help us?”

  The old man scratched his gray beard. “Only place I know where you might abide is them tunnels. In Manhattan. You gets there at the north end of the Grand Central. Might be many thousands of homeless there. That’s where I’d go. Safer than the shelters. That’s where I got this.” He pulled the ratty cloth cap off his head and pulled back his hair.

  Ann could see a long scar running from his ear to just under the front of his hairline, about three inches, an angry red color.

  “They cracked me head open. Almost deaded me. Stay away from them shelters
. The tunnels is safer.” He pushed his cart past them.

  Ann turned to Josh. “Come. We’ll scoot up there now.” They walked several blocks to the subway and Ann waited until no one was close enough to see them. She dragged Joshua through the turnstile without paying for a ride.

  Less than an hour later, they arrived at Grand Central Station and made their way to the train track platforms on the lower level. And, just as the old man had told them, at the north end of the platforms Ann could see tracks stretching out into the darkness. She held Joshua’s hand and pulled him with her, down the stairs onto the tracks. They walked north for a few minutes. On both sides she saw lights and heard the murmur of voices. Left or right? She decided to go left. There was a tunnel entrance about two hundred feet in front of them, lit by candles.

  Ann could smell the odors of human waste and garbage, but that meant people were eating food. She faced Josh. “Come. Let’s take a look.”

  Josh nodded. “But where’s mama?”

  Ann said, “Mama’s not going to be with us anymore. Now, I’m your mama.”

  Josh began to cry.

  “Don’t worry. I can take care of us.” She smiled, hoping that would quiet him. She took his hand and moved them further into the tunnels. She could see an intersection that was better lit and pulled her brother that way. There were three alternate paths here and she stopped, unsure of which way to go.

  “Ain’t you a bit young for these parts?” A huge man.

  Ann backed away. He was a lot older than her mother, but not as old as the beggar who’d advised them to come here. He wore a red-check flannel shirt and ripped jeans. His odor made Ann feel like retching.

  He advanced as they backed away. “Hey, girlie, I’m harmless. Why you running?” But he was faster than the two children and in seconds he was on top of Ann, ripping open her blouse. Joshua saw what he was doing and jumped on the man’s back. The man stopped ripping Ann’s blouse and picked Joshua up by the throat.

  She heard a snapping sound, then watched as the man tossed Josh on the pavement. Her brother’s neck was bent so his chin now was on his own back. She realized the man had broken Josh’s neck. She tried to run to her brother, but the man was on top of her, tearing at her skirt and and panties.

  “Whatcha got for me, little one?” He grinned and his breath smelled like sewage.

  He spent less than three minutes on top, taking from her what no one should. And when he was gone, Ann sat next to Josh, sobbing, gasping for breath. All she wanted now was for him to kill her as he had her brother.

  ONE YEAR LATER

  CHAPTER 2

  Outside Penn Station, New York City

  September 14, 5:28 a.m.

  The night train she’d taken from Union Station in Washington, DC, stalled just outside Trenton. Cassandra Sashakovich waited in her seat for over four hours without an explanation. She knew from past experience this happened often.

  Looking out the window into the darkness, she saw her reflection. Her face had been surgically altered to confuse the identification programs of the intelligence agencies’ surveillance cameras. It had gone badly. Dr. Sheldorff had raised her cheekbones and built up her chin. How was he to know she would look like her uncle Misha, the KGB spy she hated? She desperately wanted her original appearance back.

  Was the world now safe?

  The twenty-nine-year-old, athletic, brown-haired woman settled into her seat. On her cell phone she was reading an ebook novel by Barry Eisler, about an assassin, She looked up every so often as the train crept through Manhattan’s west side. The book was almost a mirror of her own last year and she found it comforting to pass time within the folds of such a recognizable world.

  At nearly midnight she looked up and saw the train arriving into Penn Station. Stepping down the stairs from the platform she walked through the familiar passenger labyrinth of the underground tunnels.

  The tunnels connecting Penn to Grand Central were filled with narrow chokepoints ripe for muggers and rapists. Even with her self-defense skills, she thought the tunnels especially dangerous at night. Store windows provided reflective surfaces to watch her back without turning her head. Using this standard counter-surveillance measure, she told herself she was safe. She felt a familiar wrenching feeling in her heart remembering how she’d wandered homeless here, six months ago.

  As she rode the escalator to the street level, Cassandra scanned the area for threats but found nothing. On the street outside the station—even at this hour—cabs waited for fares.

  She hailed a taxi to the Waldorf Astoria Hotel on Park Avenue. The cabby’s Russian accent was familiar to her, because it was the language she heard from her parents. He offered conversation, probably, she assumed, to practice his awful English. “Is late at night, no? Want safe hotel? I know the best!” She shook her head but he continued. “Waldorf too expensive. I take you to the best, small, cheap.”

  “No. The Waldorf please.”

  “You need cheaper hotel.”

  She felt heat surge through her cheeks. “I’m paying you to drive me to the Waldorf.”

  “No, boss. I know safe and cheap. Take you there.”

  What was the easiest way to get him to comply? “I’ll give you an extra five in tip. The Waldorf, please.” She showed him a Lincoln.

  “But—”

  Negotiation wasn’t going to work. Cabs in the wee hours could sometimes be dangerous. She thought for a second and made a decision. She pulled the old Beretta from her raincoat pocket and placed its barrel right against the bulletproof glass separating them. “These are armor piercing shells. You want to die? Take me to the Waldorf. Now. I’ll still give you the tip I promised.”

  She watched his reflection in the rear view mirror. Saw his eyes shift. “Sure, boss.”

  She’d pocketed the gun. The .22 caliber Beretta was one she bought in Harlem the previous year when she was in danger. She owned better, but this tiny gun was a keepsake, and a useful one. Her favorite.

  In three minutes she reached the historic hotel. She paid the driver, added a five to the tip she’d already planned, and watched the taxi disappear into the night. Then she walked to Third Avenue, turned south and hustled into the entrance to Grand Central Station. No one followed. The station looked more like a retro train museum. Cassie found a rest room on the lower level of the station where she smeared eye makeup on her cheeks to suggest dirt and grease. Then she changed from the upscale pants she’d worn during her trip from DC to into shabby ones that would blend in with the homeless. From her suitcase she donned the dirty, stained raincoat she’d used while hiding in the tunnels. She’d kept it, thinking she might be forced to use it again, but being here tonight was her choice. She draped it on over her expensive blouse, stepped into a pair of old sneakers, and pulled on sunglasses and a ratty New York Mets baseball cap. She examined herself in the restroom mirror. This disguise would serve its purpose.

  Her face remained blank. Emotions often led to a field agent’s demise. She opened the suitcase and removed a switchblade, placing the gun and knife in the most convenient pocket of the raincoat. Always be prepared—semper paratus—she thought. Cassie marched out of the restroom and placed the suitcase into a rental locker in the station’s basement.

  Cassie whistled “That Will Never Happen No More,” an old Arthur “Blind” Blake blues tune, as she walked. The memory of her old Martin D-18 guitar reverberated through her head. She’d been forced to abandon it last year when she fled her apartment. But even without the guitar, blues music kept her sane. She strolled onto one of the track platforms where commuters were arriving on early rush hour trains from Westchester and Connecticut. The commuters avoided eye contact. She expected they would see her as just another one of the homeless living in the tunnels north of the platforms. And given her broad, muscular shoulders and the strength she telegraphed when walking, she was sure they feared her. None of them got close enough to realize she wasn’t rank.

  At the end of the platform,
Cassie took the stairs onto the dark tracks and walked north, careful to avoid incoming trains. When she’d walked far from the station along the unlit tracks, she found a safe place behind a girder to wait for her eyes to adjust to the shadows. She could feel her heartbeat accelerating. Not from fear. She was eager to complete this very personal mission.

  After fifteen minutes walking the tracks, lights sparked from the tunnels off on the east and west. Standing there for a few seconds, she oriented herself and remembered the path. She headed west, just as she had done when she’d run for her life. She put her hand in her raincoat pocket to finger the knife.

  Several hundred thousand people allegedly lived in the tunnels. And millions of super-rats prowled and hunted here, some over twenty-five pounds. She scouted for signs of the über-rodents as she wandered the west tunnel. She saw fewer destitute people than she had when she was one of them, but they seemed to be worse off. She walked to where she had first found Ann. No one there. Cassie walked around the area for almost an hour, searching.

  Rush hour passed. Of the few that walked by, no one was familiar. She hung her head and decided to find somewhere to spend the night. A hotel on Lexington where she’d stayed once before. She would resume looking for Ann tomorrow.

  As she turned back toward the station, she saw an old woman she remembered from last year. The hag was carrying two filled shopping bags in one of her arms and, despite her armful, was pressing forward a supermarket cart crammed with her possessions.

  As Cassie closed the distance she caught an overpowering stench of stale sweat and she wanted to gag. She took a deep breath through her mouth.

  The decrepit homeless woman stopped. Cassie approached, eyes downcast, trying not to alarm the crone. “Please, can you help me? I’m looking for someone.”

  “Don’t know no one that’s here.” The old woman reversed course and moved away fast.

  Cassie sprinted in front to block her path. “Wait! I’ll pay you.”

  The woman’s eyes scanned Cassie. “How much?”