32. Angel
Chapter thirty-two
Angel
With Daisy’s back pressed to my chest, I wrap my arms around her waist as Owen tells Bennett about what he’s learned concerning Brad. No detail is left out.
“What’s that?” Bennett asks, pointing to the phone next to the computer.
Okay, so one detail was left out.
Owen looks at the device. “Oh, this? It’s Brad Callahan’s cell phone. An onsite fingerprint analysis confirms it. Currently, I’m using a code that will crack the encryption.”
Bennett comes closer, careful not to touch the phone. “What do you expect to find?”
“A clue to Genevieve’s location. Something. Anything that will point us in the right direction.”
Bennett begins pacing around the room, mulling over what we’ve told him. “What I don’t understand is why you think you’re the next target, Daisy. While you fit the description of the missing girls, you’re much too old.”
“Thanks,” she replies. “That’s just what every woman wants to hear.”
He dismisses her comment with a wave of his hand. “That’s not what I meant. If what Kenneth told you was true, then these girls are being experimented on. The question is: why? They’re all between the ages of 14 and 18. That has to be significant, and no offense, you’re twice that age.”
“Fair enough. Are you honestly going to tell me that you had no idea what Dominion was up to? The wife of the CIA director is one of the missing girls you showed us, Bennett. I find it hard to believe that you missed that.”
“I’m more or less on a ‘need to know’ basis,” Bennett retorts.
“My directive was simply to contain the backlash and suppress media attention around the abductions to protect Dominion. I didn’t ask questions or investigate.
Looking back, I should have. I was merely showing up to play my part and be a presence to keep a lid on things.
Protecting a CIA resource like Dominion was the priority.
I’ve answered your question; now please answer mine. Why do you believe you’re a target?”
I step forward, keeping Daisy’s vision a secret.
We need Bennett to be a part of the team if we stand any chance of getting a lead on Dominion, not have him question her sanity.
“Daisy has been hunting her whole adult life for the man who took Sadie. She told you this. Now that she’s closing in, her life has been at risk three times.
There’s no reason for us to believe differently.
She has the rest of us watching her back. Are you willing to do the same?”
Bennett bobs his head twice. “Of course.”
Roger’s phone rings, and he informs the group. “It’s Jerry.”
Daisy gets excited. “He’s usually more of a bearer of good news rather than bad.”
Bennett sneers when he registers the name of the caller. “After our last conversation, I can’t say that I’m his biggest fan. He hates me.”
I shake my head. “He doesn’t know you. Jerry hates what you stand for, Bennett.”
“Yes. The CIA is the villain in every movie or book; lucky me. It’s not like I’m the one who went after his wife and six kids.”
He really doesn’t get it. It’s about his values and the fact that his moral compass, and the CIA’s, are pointing due south.
Roger grits his teeth, doesn’t respond to the rude comment, and puts the call on speaker. “Hey, Jerry. What have you got for us?”
Jerry says, “Not sure. I’m sending Owen a file I composed of everything I found on Emily Bloom.
Make of it what you will. For now, I’ll give you the CliffsNotes version.
When she died, she was in her senior year at the University of Colorado.
And get this: Emily was majoring in neuroscience and had been working on her capstone project since her junior year.
The title of the paper is Cognitive Autonomy Under Pressure: Susceptibility to Coercive Persuasion During Late Adolescent Neurodevelopment. ”
“Brainwashing,” I say.
“In a nutshell,” Jerry replies. “The paper is actually quite fascinating.
Teenagers, especially from 14 to 18 years of age, have a brain that, in the physical context, is nearly fully formed.
However, in a neurological context, the prefrontal cortex is one of the last regions of the brain to mature.
Daisy’s eyes widen as she looks at me. “Now we know why it was a targeted age range.”
Jerry continues. “At that age, they’re in a heightened stage of neuroplasticity, meaning their brains are rewiring.
During their teen years, they are at their most vulnerable point for behavior changes beyond the early stages of infancy.
On average, the human brain can process an entire visual scene in roughly 13 milliseconds. ”
“How long is that?” Scott asks.
“Ten times faster than a blink of an eye,” Jerry responds.
“At least that’s what Emily’s paper says.
In one second, almost 80 images can be cataloged, stored, and processed.
We’re not just talking about an image of an apple on a table.
We’re talking about information down to the finest detail like the grain of the wood in the table.
Irrelevant information is moved to the subconscious to be processed later.
One example Emily uses is a dream state where a person you’ve never seen before in your life plays a significant role in that dream.
But in fact, you have seen them. Maybe they were mowing a lawn and you caught a glimpse of their face as you drove by. Or they passed you in a supermarket.”
“You’re talking about subliminal messaging,” Bennett says. “That’s nothing new.”
“No, it’s not,” Jerry says. “Emily proposed that teens who survived traumatic events in their youth could still recover by having those memories not only suppressed but replaced with new memories that come from a repeated process of subliminal imaging. She also proposed that extreme cases may require methaqualone, a drug that acts as a sedative and hypnotic. In some instances, even a state of euphoria.”
Daisy shakes her head as if the thought doesn’t sit well. “That doesn’t make any sense. The girls who have been abducted so far have come from all walks of life and taken from their families. While some may have suffered some form of trauma, there was no guarantee of that.”
Owen raises his hand to divert our attention to himself. “I have a theory for that, but that’s all it is; a theory.”
“Go ahead,” Roger says. “Nothing is out of the realm of possibility.”
“What if Dominion got hold of her capstone paper and changed the scope of the project?”
Jerry gives us another piece of information. “I hadn’t got to that part yet, but you should know that Emily Bloom was offered a position at Dominion, set to start post-graduation, and a grant to fund her research and pay for her Master’s degree.”
Owen absorbs the new information. “That makes my theory more plausible. Dominion Atrix Group is creating puppets by brainwashing these girls and strategically aligning them with men who are poised to be in positions of power, or those who have become a prominent voice in the political arena. They used Emily’s project to create a cell of honeypots, whispering in the men’s ears to guide actions, sway votes, or elicit material for blackmail to be used when beneficial. ”
Bennett scoffs. “That’s a pretty wild theory. How does one go from a project in behavioral cognitive therapy to something as far-fetched as global puppet-mastering?”
“Emily’s death,” Owen says bluntly. “Her research project was meant to overwrite a person’s mental code for the purpose of erasing trauma.
While unethical on several levels, it’s still with good intentions.
According to Kenneth, Eva’s story outlines exactly what Dominion does to the girls.
It sounds an awful lot like Emily’s work but for more nefarious purposes; only Emily wasn’t going to go along with it.
Maybe she jumped off that cliff because she knew what her work would be used for and couldn’t handle the guilt, or someone pushed her. Like I said, it’s just a theory.”
“Brad Callahan,” Bennett says. “He worked for Dominion under two names and was present at the time of her death. Alibi or not, he’s the guilty party. After all, alibis can be bought.”
“Well, while you figure it out, I have a plane to catch,” Jerry says. “I’m headed to Colorado Springs to meet with a woman named Tonya Petras.”
“Who’s Tonya?” I ask.
“I was tracking down Logan’s former classmates and spoke to Tonya.
As it turns out, she was Logan’s high school girlfriend.
She told me that her photos from that time in her life and her yearbook are in a storage unit full of junk.
She isn’t going to spend hours trying to find them for me, but she said I could sift through the boxes if I were so inclined.
I’m on my way to find out who Logan Bloom really is.
I should have an answer for you in the next 12 hours. ”
Almost as soon as Jerry hangs up, the computer beeps to notify Owen that the encryption on the phone has been broken. He puts on a pair of latex gloves before picking it up and searching the device.
“There is only one message, which is better than nothing.”
“That can’t be right,” I say.
Owen frowns. “It can. If the messages were set to disappear after opening, then they’re gone for good. The Signal app doesn’t keep a copy on its server as a backup, so there’s nothing for me to hack. That’s what makes it such an effective tool to evade surveillance.”
After Owen looks at the message and then types something on his computer, a map appears on the screen with a red dot. Owen zooms in and says, “The reason why this one is still on the phone is because Brad sent the message to himself. Odd. They’re coordinates for the west entrance to the mines.”
“Why would he send a message to himself?” Daisy asks.
It’s a good question, and I can only think of one reason for it. “For reference, so that it doesn’t get deleted.”
“Or it’s a trap,” Bennett says.
I walk over and look at the image on the screen. “Pull up the location where Brad hid the ATV he took from Grants Pass.”
Owen does as I ask, and I point to the map.
“He parked three miles north of the campground and then traveled east on foot to the highway. That’s where my family lost his trail.
” Then I point to the spot where Genevieve was taken and Daisy was hit with a tranquilizer.
“In order to keep his tracks hidden, he would have had to walk on the highway almost four miles: three south and then three east to the road where he had the electric ATV stashed.”
“Where are you going with this, Angel?” Daisy asks.
“It doesn’t make sense to me. Why not just use the highway for the first ATV that he stole to reach the second one?
Why go through the trouble of hiking? Brad would have had to spend at least an hour, if not two, walking on a road where he would have risked getting caught.
We still would have lost his trail here,” I say, pointing to the location where my family had to spread out their search.
“He’s not working alone, which we already suspected,” Daisy says as she heads over to the wall where a topographical map is pinned.
“The mines are ten miles to the west of our current location, which would be roughly 13-15 miles on foot if Brad headed south and then turned westward to go to the coordinates. On a known hiking trail, that alone can take four to five hours. But if he stayed off trail, moving slowly over rough terrain to cover his tracks and navigate downed trees, then we’re talking no more than one mile per hour.
And with him carrying a week’s worth of supplies and water for two people?
Definitely no more than that, even for an experienced hiker like Brad. ”
Scott says, “I concur with that assessment. It’s been 18 hours since the abduction, with only 14 hours of daylight.
The darkness would have slowed him down because using a flashlight would have been like shining a beacon.
Based on the timing, it’s likely he’s already at the mines, or he will be shortly. ”
Bennett holds up his hands and waves them around.
“Rather than making assumptions, why don’t you just fly your drone over the area and see if there’s an electric ATV parked near the entrance?
That should answer your question of whether or not Brad Callahan is working alone.
You said it yourself, all the evidence points to Brad.
He has motive, means, and opportunity. This Logan guy you’re looking for is a ghost.”
“Not for long,” I remind him. “Jerry will find out who he is soon enough.”
Bennett sighs. “And while we wait, a girl’s life hangs in the balance. I say we move forward with your plan now that we have a location. Once Brad is in custody, you can interrogate him to your heart’s desire.”
Sounds like a good idea to me. “Let’s gear up.”