The Missing Building – Part III

The shower? It didn’t help much. Twenty minutes of hot water, wasted. Beating down on my shoulders, and I still couldn’t figure out what to say to Agent Johnson. Or how to say it. If that was even who he really was. Men in black baseball caps? They don’t carry business cards. Badges. That’s what they have. Real ones. With department names. And badge numbers. Things you can quickly and easily verify.

I toweled off, listening to Gracie moving around in the kitchen. Familiar sounds. Her morning routine. Coffee grinding. Dishes clinking as she emptied the dishwasher. NPR is playing softly in the background on the kitchen radio. Normal sounds. Regular, safe sounds. Everything that the last few hours hadn’t been.

“Paul?” Gracie called from the kitchen. “Honey? Your coffee’s getting cold.”

Pulling on my favorite pair of faded jeans and a Cardinals t-shirt, the one with a hole near the hem. It’s the same shirt Gracie keeps threatening to throw out. Some battles? You choose to fight. This? It wasn’t one of them. Not today.

Gracie was deep into her laptop, the business card propped up against her coffee cup. The tea cups? Washed, rinsed, dried, and put away. While I was showering, she changed into real clothes. Khakis and a blue button-down. Her educator clothes, or teacher outfit. Even though school didn’t start for another week.

“Find anything?” I sat down across from her.

Her scowl said more than I wanted to hear. “Agent Johnson. He doesn’t exist.” She turned her laptop toward me. “At least not in any government database I have access to. FBI. CIA. NSA. There’s nothing. Even the phone number traces to a shell security company in Delaware. Blackwater Holdings LLC. Incorporated three months ago.” Picking up her coffee, she slumped back in the chair. “I’m not sure where to go from here.”

“Yeah.” I rolled my eyes. “That’s not suspicious at all.”

Gracie set her coffee down on the table, snatching up the laptop. “Oh, but it gets better.” She clicked another tab open. “The company’s LLC registered address? It’s a UPS Store. In Wilmington, Delaware. Box 447.”

Picking up the business card, I glanced at it again. It was heavy. Heavier than your standard, cheap business card. This was heavy cardstock. Expensive. It’s the kind you order from a specialty printer. Not Office Depot or Staples. “AGENT JOHNSON” in raised black letters. No first name. No department. Just the phone number.

I flicked the card a few times with my finger. “Gracie? You still think I should call him?”

Closing the laptop, she gave me the ‘look.’ All wives have it and husbands hate it. Why? Because, like it or not, they know their spouse is right. “Uh, yeah. Now more than ever. Ruby knew. She called it. Three minutes,” Gracie held up three fingers to enforce her point. “That’s not a guess. That’s intelligence.”

“Or she led them right to us.”

Gracie sipped her coffee. “Then why come to us? Why run? What good would it do for her to tell us any of it?” She stood up to pour another cup. “Want some more?” she asked. I nodded yes, and she took my cup. “Paul, she’s scared. You saw her face? They did their best to keep her quiet.”

Yes, I saw her face. Swelling. Bloodied. Someone worked her over, but good. “Why come to us, Gracie? Why not just go to a hospital? Or the police?”

“What if she couldn’t go to the police?”

“You think the local law enforcement is involved in this somehow?”

Gracie shrugged. “Maybe.”

“Because?” I asked out loud, not really toward Gracie. She answered anyway.

“Because, Paul. Whatever this is about, it’s not legal. The photograph, your grandfather, that missing building? None of it’s above board.”

“So we’re dealing with criminals, I guess.” I kept flicking the card, nervous to make the call.

“Or something worse,” Gracie said.

I pulled out my phone. “Government contractors. Black ops. People who operate in the spaces between legal and illegal.” I rolled my eyes. “This is like a bad B-rated movie.”  

“You need to stop watching TV. You’ve seen way too many movies.”

“Do I?” I held up the business card. “Eight guys show up at our door at three in the morning. No badges. No warrant, despite what they said. They could have kicked in the door. But they didn’t. They knocked. Asked questions. Then they left. That? It’s not criminal-like behavior. That’s professional. It’s controlled, disciplined.”

Gracie pointed at the card. “Make the call, but put it on speaker.”

Taking a deep breath, I made the call, pressing each number in turn. It rang once.

“Yes.” Not a question.

“Agent Johnson, please. This is Paul Sullivan.”

“Yes, Mr. Sullivan.” His voice was flat. Midwestern accent. Ohio, maybe. “Have you seen the woman?”

“Well, Agent, that’s why I’m calling.” I mouthed to Gracie, I don’t know what to say next. “After you left, I got to thinking. You show up at my door before dawn, looking for someone I don’t know, and you don’t tell me why. So, if you want my help? I need more than what you’ve told me.”

Silence. I held my breath, Gracie holding her finger up to her lips, telling me to be quiet. I counted. One. Two. Three. Four. Five.

“Fine.”

“Great. First, who do you work for?”

“Private security firm.”

“That’s not an answer,” I said.

Silence.

I looked at Gracie. She mouthed, Keep going.

“Why are you trying to find her?”

“She’s a thief. She stole something.” Another pause. “Proprietary information. Industrial espionage. Our client wants it back.”

“And you think she’d come to me?” I played it up. “I don’t even know the woman.”

“Ruby Castellano is your second cousin. She is your grandfather’s sister’s granddaughter.”

I felt my coffee mug start to slip from my hand. Thankfully, I caught it before it spilled. Gracie’s eyes went wide. I’m guessing it was from the coffee cup, not Agent Johnson’s revelation.

“How do you know that? I haven’t seen Ruby since she was a little girl. It’s been years.”

“It’s my job, Mr. Sullivan. I know she talked to you yesterday at Dan’s Diner. Sat at your table for seventeen minutes.”

My mouth went dry. “You were. Watching me?”

“Her. We were watching her. You were. . . Collateral surveillance.”

“For how long?”

Silence. “Mr. Sullivan.” His voice sharpened. “Ruby Castellano is dangerous. She’s stolen classified information that could compromise national security. That’s all.”

“National security?” I halfway laughed. “You expect me to believe my cousin is some kind of, what, spy?”

“She is a thief, Mr. Sullivan. What she stole is what makes her dangerous.”

“Dangerous? A photograph?”

Silence. Longer this time.

“What photograph?” Agent Johnson’s voice quivered, but only for a second.

But his hesitation? It told me everything. Of course, he knew. He knew all about it.

“You said you were watching me at Dan’s.”

“I said she gave you something. I didn’t say what.” He didn’t mention anything about Ruby giving you something, Gracie mouthed at me. She scribbled her note to me on a pad she grabbed out of a drawer in the kitchen.

“You know,” I said, mimicking his tone.

“Mr. Sullivan.”

“My grandfather. Jonathan Sullivan. You know about him, too. Don’t you?”

I heard breathing on the other end. Controlled. Measured. Agent Johnson was slowly losing his cool.

“Your grandfather died in 1993.” His tone, even. Level.

“That’s what I thought too.”

“Because it’s true. I’ve seen the death certificate. The burial records. The man is dead.” Now, Agent Johnson was back to normal.

“Ruby says he’s alive.”

“Ruby Castellano, Mr. Sullivan, is delusional. It’s her condition.”

“Condition?” Gracie also looked puzzled.

“Paranoid schizophrenia. Castellano was institutionalized. Three times in the last decade. Escaped from a Chicago facility two weeks ago.”

Gracie shook her head violently, mouthing, “liar!”

“If she’s so dangerous, why didn’t you break down the door? Why be polite?”

Agent Johnson paused. “Because. You are a civilian, Mr. Sullivan. An innocent bystander. We have zero interest in you, beyond finding Ruby.”

“What about the building?” Gracie’s eyes went wide. I knew I gave Agent Johnson too much information. I grimaced.

Another pause. “Building? What building?”

“In the photograph. It doesn’t exist.”

“Mr. Sullivan,” he said sharply, “I’m advising you to ignore what Castellano told you. Whatever it was, she showed you? Just forget it. They were the ramblings of a very sick woman. Nothing more.”

“Then why do you want the photograph?” I was stalling, Gracie was scribbling.

“I want Castellano.”

“But you know what’s in it.”

“I know Castellano is fixated on your grandfather. She believes in a bigger conspiracy. Secret government projects. Time travel. Alien technology. Pick your poison, Mr. Sullivan. But none of it is real.”

“Time travel?” Gracie nodded, pointing at the exact same words on the pad.

A soft chuckle. “See?” Agent Johnson laughed. “Even you, Mr. Sullivan. You know it sounds crazy.”

No, actually, I was thinking about Ruby’s watch, Agent Johnson. She knew. Three minutes. Not approximately. It was precise. Exact.

“Mr. Sullivan. She will contact you again. And you will call me when she does. You are her only surviving family.”

“What if I don’t?”

Silence.

“You are private security?”

“With government contracts.”

“Is that a threat?”

“It’s a fact. Call me, Mr. Sullivan, if you hear from Castellano.”

“From who?”

CLICK! The line went dead. My hands were shaking.

“He’s lying,” Gracie said.

“About which part?”

“All of it. Ruby’s not schizophrenic. You saw her. Scared? Yes. Hurt? Absolutely. But not delusional. She knew what she was doing. Every move calculated. Timed out to the exact minute. Who does that?”

“The watch does,” I said. “The three minutes. The way she knew about Myrna. That’s not mental illness. It can’t be. That? Is planning.” I stood up, pacing in our kitchen, walking up to the window. Our backyard looked normal. Gracie’s garden. Five bird feeders. The fence we’d talked about replacing for the last three years. All normal. All real.

And yet.

“He knew about the photograph, Gracie. The building, too. His denial? It was too quick. Too rehearsed.”

Gracie glared at me. “He didn’t know about the missing building. But his time travel comment?”

“Misdirection, Gracie. Make us think she really is crazy, just so we won’t believe anything else she says.”

“But what if . . .”

“If she’s not crazy?” I turned back to her. “And my grandfather really is alive? What if that building exists somewhere? Or better yet, some-when. And that’s why. Why can’t we find it.”

“Paul.”

“I know how it sounds, Gracie.”

“Crazy.”

I sat down, picking up the photograph from where Gracie had left it. My grandfather’s face, really his face, staring back at me. The building behind him. Solid and real. And impossible.

“Johnson said Ruby escaped from Chicago two weeks ago.”

“So?”

“So she’s been running for two weeks. Hurt. Scared. And she comes here. To us. To me. Why?”

“Family.”

“We haven’t seen her since she was ten, at my grandmother’s funeral. Why would she think we’d help?”

Gracie studied the photograph. “Maybe she didn’t have anywhere else to go.”

“Or maybe she knew something. About me. About the photograph. About my grandfather.”

“Paul, please.”

“No, it makes sense, Gracie. Doesn’t it? The family dispute. The one separating her parents from the rest of us. What if it wasn’t about money? What if it was about this?” I held up the photograph.

“That sounds crazy, Paul.”

“But is it? My mother never talked about it. Neither did my father. Just that there was a disagreement, and we didn’t speak to that side of the family anymore. But what kind of disagreement lasts thirty years?”

“The kind that involves secrets.”

“Exactly.”

My phone buzzed. Unknown number. Usually, I didn’t answer unidentified calls. My guts said different.

“Hello?”

“Paul.” Ruby’s voice. Soft. Tired. Whispering. “Don’t say my name. Just listen, okay.”

I grabbed a pen and wrote, “Johnson is lying.” Ruby is on the phone.

“Are you hurt?” I asked.

“Is Gracie there?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Johnson called you.”

“Yes.”

“Told you I’m crazy. Schizophrenic. Dangerous.”

“Yes.”

“None of it’s true.”

“I know.”

A soft exhale.

“The building. Have you found it?”

“No.”

“You won’t.” She sighed. “It hasn’t been built yet. I forgot that.”

I looked at Gracie, who was shaking her head, yes.

“When?”

“2031. October. Your grandfather was there. Is there. Will be there.” I wrote down the dates.

“That’s impossible, Ruby.”

“You have proof in your hand. A photograph of a man who died in 1993. Standing in front of a building that won’t exist for another six years.”

“Ruby.”

“I don’t have much time, maybe forty seconds. The building is called the Temporal Research Initiative. TRI. Your grandfather didn’t die in 1993. He was recruited. The body? In the coffin? That was a clone. A genetic duplicate. Good enough to fool the medical examiner.”

“Clone?”

“Paul, they’re going to come for you. Not today. Maybe not tomorrow. But soon. They can’t let you keep that photograph. It’s proof. Proof of what they’ve done.”

“Who’s they?”

“Blackwater Holdings. They recruit people. Like your grandfather. People with specific genetic markers. People who can survive temporal displacement. I have ten seconds.”

“Temporal. . .”

“Time travel, Paul. Your grandfather. And based on that photograph? You are too.”

The line went dead.

“Well?” Gracie asked.

“Pack. Now.”

“Pack?”

“Johnson was right. She will contact us again. And when she does? I don’t want us to be here.”

“Where will we go?”

“Chicago. If Ruby escaped from somewhere, there’ll be records. Papers. Something.”

“And if Johnson’s men follow us?”

“Then we’ll deal with that when it happens.”

Gracie stood. Kissed my forehead. “I’ll get our suitcases.”

“You believe me?”

“I believe you believe. That’s enough for now.”

She headed for the bedroom. I stayed at the table, staring at the photograph. Time travel. Clones. Genetic markers. Twenty-four hours ago, my biggest concern was whether to have a second beer at Dan’s.

Now?

Now I was looking at proof that everything I thought I knew about my family was a lie.

And somewhere out there, Ruby was running. My cousin. The one I barely remembered. The one who knew the truth.

I picked up Johnson’s card. Private security. Government contracts. The distinction gets blurry.

Yeah, I bet it does.

My phone buzzed. Gracie, texting from the bedroom.

“Car across the street. Black suburban. Been there at least 10 minutes.”

I didn’t need to look.

Johnson’s men.

The game was in motion. Are we players or pawns?

I stood up, tucking the photograph into my wallet. Whatever happened next, that photo was staying with me.

Time to find out what happened to my grandfather.

Time to find out why I have his face.

Time to find out what the hell TRI, the Temporal Research Initiative, wanted with the Sullivan family.

First, we had to get out of this house. Alive.