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I nodded. “It’s sort of like an auction, but he won’t necessarily sell it to the highest bidder. You have to pay to stay in the marketplace. He’s going to close the door on me soon.”
“You can’t let that happen.” AJ sounded alarmed.
“What do the Project Compass files have to do with this flight? I don’t see a connection.”
“It’s there. Believe me.”
I was tempted to slam the laptop closed, but I didn’t want Jelly Bean Jack to lock me out permanently. I had to tread carefully inside his shop.
“I don’t want to beg you for this. We’re supposed to be working together. At least for now.”
“The connection is you.”
I was only half listening to him. I scrolled through the messages. I read the comments faster than I’d read anything in my life. There was an elite group in the room. The kind of names that made my spine crawl. Names that elicited fear. These were the darkest, most dangerous players in the underbelly of the dark web that I had always managed to avoid. I didn’t approach them. I didn’t make contact.
I kept reading.
“This flight is part of what Jelly Bean Jack is selling,” I whispered. The pit in my stomach was big enough to swallow me whole. I started to shake. “They-they promise to deliver Silver Siren with the files.” My eyes shot to AJ. “I’m Silver Siren, aren’t I?”
He didn’t want to answer. “Look, I—”
I wanted to strangle him. Push him into the aisle. Yell and scream for all the pain he had caused me. For the way he abandoned me. Holy shit he had known I was in danger and had kept that from me too. He had lived for the past six months with that secret. With that knowledge and never bothered to tell me.
I was wrestling with the idea that I had a different code name outside of the net. Silver Siren. It was obviously linked to my podcast. Either labeled as an ode or an ominous dark joke.
“You’ve got to figure out how they’re controlling the flight. Is it an explosive? Can they control the computer system in the cockpit? What is it they are doing?”
“The man shadowing me. Who is he?” I asked. AJ and I focused on different paths. I could see so many things he couldn’t.
“I told you I don’t know. I’m less worried about him and more worried about whether I need to disarm a device on the plane. If that’s the leverage they have, I can locate it and give control back to the pilots.” His clenched his jaw. “There is a way I can climb into the cargo cabin, but I need to know what I’m looking for. The flight crew is going to have to be in on this. I can debrief them quickly. Maybe they’ll let me talk to the captain. It would help to have Beechum cooperate.”
“There isn’t a device,” I responded. “Stop talking about bombs,” I whispered. “Someone is going to hear you.”
“There isn’t one?”
“No.” My voice was cool. I didn’t know how I was keeping it together.
“You know the threat, don’t you?”
My eyes floated to AJ. I closed the laptop. “The threat is on board, but it’s not a bomb.”
“Fuck, Syd. What is it?”
“No. You tell me what the hell is going on. Tell me now.” I felt a sudden amount of power that maybe I shouldn’t have.
His eyes hardened. “You’re playing with everyone’s life on this flight.”
“You’ve been playing with mine for six months,” I fired back. “You owe me this.”
“This is a dangerous game.”
“You’re the one dragging me back into a dangerous world. I didn’t ask for this.” My eyes darted back and forth as if I could scan his retinas for more clues. More answers.
“It seems like you never left.”
My eyes narrowed. “You’re the one who did the leaving.” I instantly regretted saying it.
“How did we get here? Fuck, Syd. How do we get out of it?”
