Nods all round.
“You had me worried there, Jack. I thought you were going to crack a joke.” Cath tapped the whiteboard, displaying several mages of Wiley. One was a sketch.
“Is the sketch from Sheila?”
Cath smiled. “Yes. Pretty good, hey?”
Jack nodded.
Cath pointed at Sheila’s sketch. “This one started doing the rounds on social media last night.”
“What’s the blank one up there for?” Jack asked.
“Judith Black.” Cath replied. “We’re having problems tracking her down and finding a picture. She doesn’t have accounts on any of the popular social media sites.”
Jack’s coffee appeared in front of him. “Thanks, Sally.”
“Was Judith Black just mentioned?” Sally asked.
“Yes, just waiting for the team to come up with an image of her.”
Sally gave a dry cough. “I followed her up as you requested. She is deceased. Just got the message while I was making the coffee. Suicide. Early last year. I was going to follow up the coroner’s report after the meeting.”
Silence.
“Team, I think the more we dig into Thomas Wiley, the more we’re going to be exposed to a dark, dark network. I only hope this network doesn’t extend to the secret society he belongs to. If it does … if it does, I think we’ll be exposed to a sinister undercurrent we didn’t realise existed”
Jack looked around the room. Silence and nodding.
“Sally, follow up on the coroner’s report. Read it closely and look for any hints that the suicide was suspicious.”
Cath looked at Jack. “We know already, Jack.”
Jack frowned.
“Judith Black was an amber person. She was searching.”
The other team members looked puzzled. They needed to explain their theory to the group.
His phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out and looked to see who was calling: Counter-Terrorism Investigation Group. He indicated that he needed to take this call and left the meeting room.
“Jack, speaking.”
“Rob here from Counter-Terrorism Investigation Group. Your team sent an email to Gavin Sargent recently. Just wanted to let you know he’s on leave at the moment, so it was forwarded on to me.”
Email? What email?
The caller must have sensed his thoughts. “It was to do with the following up on someone acting suspiciously regarding the use of drones and the payload they could carry.”
“Yes, I remember. I thought it was something your group might want to know about.”
“It is. As it happens, we had a covert operation underway in Noosa with another agency, but it was thrown out of whack by the earthquake. We had some spare time and resources and drone attacks are becoming a concern for us, so we thought we’d look into your suspicious person.”
Jack had no idea where this was heading.
“We use drones for surveillance activities, and we have a video you may be interested in. I’ll email it to you, and the address where the footage was taken. You’re in for a little surprise.”
“Okay, Rob. I look forward to it. Not sure if I should thank you or not. I don’t like surprises.”
“You will.”
His phone beeped. Jack opened up his email account, saw the email, forwarded it to Matt, and walked back into the meeting room. Matt’s phone beeped.
“Matt, could you open that email and display the video on the big screen for us. Apparently, we’re in for a surprise.”
A sun-bleached image appeared on the screen. It was a bit jerky, then it settled. Ocean and sand appeared, then some shrubbery, then the image hovered over a sandy path with boundaries indicated by a black aluminium fence. There was slight movement at a gate and more hovering. The top of a person’s head came into view. The person looked up.
Wiley.
Sheila was a great artist.
Jack presented the team with their two options: they could go after Wiley now, or dig deeper into the society he belonged to. They decided to dig deeper. They didn’t anticipate Wiley would go anywhere and agreed there wasn’t an imminent danger to human life, although he must know they were looking for him. Jack tasked Matt with requesting regional support to monitor Wiley’s activity.
The meeting ended, and Jack asked Cath to have a coffee with him.
Two white ibis—bin chickens—wandered around the outdoor café where they were seated. Jack ran a finger around the top of his coffee mug as he watched one of the ibis picking up food scraps while the other scanned the ground for that extra special treat. They were the city cleaners. He was sure they’d be competing with robots in the future.
“Any more news on your dad, Cath?”
