Free Gates of Hades by Gregg Loomis Page A

the fire.
    Jason managed a weak smile. “Thanks, Officer, but I’ll be going.”
    He could feel tears that were not caused by the cold on his cheeks as he climbed back into the cab.

 
    Â 
C HAPTER N INE
    Chevy Chase, Maryland
    The next morning
    Jason had found a hotel in Crystal City with a kennel for Pangloss. Both had spent a morose evening: the dog in unhappy confinement, Jason considering calling to get a table at Kincade’s, one of the capital’s better seafood places, before deciding the restaurant was too infested with memories. Instead, he elected to avoid his room’s ever-remindful view of the Pentagon and eat in a dining room that justified every joke that had ever been made at the expense of hotel food.
    A morning sky unmarred by clouds and a sun that turned a city of glass into gold improved Jason’s spirits. Better weather did nothing for Pangloss, who barked most pitifully when Jason left the kennel after checking on him. Renting a car, he was at a nearby men’s store when it opened. After purchasing two sweaters, slacks, and a Burberry raincoat with removable lining, Jason got on the Beltway and headed north.
    When he exited the multilane road, he picked his way carefully, relying on memories two or three years old.Where quaint towns had dotted the landscape, strip centers and outlet malls competed for space. Rolling farms had become subdivisions of McMansions on tiny lots. By equal parts navigational skill and blind luck, he finally saw the snaking brick wall that formed the boundary of the office park he sought.
    Jason scanned the uniform plaques outside each building until he found the one he wanted: Narcom, Inc., one more acronymically named entity whose title did nothing to inform the observer of the company’s function or distinguish it from its neighbors. Its one unique feature was a subterranean parking lot, a seemingly superfluous amenity in an office park where space was readily available. At the entrance to the down ramp, a wooden arm blocked passage until a ticket was taken.
    Any semblance of normality ended with appearances.
    Jason knew that while the car was waiting for the machine to spit out a ticket, scales set into the floor were weighing the vehicle. In less than a second, a computer compared the poundage to the manufacturer’s specified weight, adjustments were made for a possible full tank of gas, and a formula applied for the number of occupants. Should the car exceed what the system deemed normal, a steel curtain would drop from the ceiling, preventing further access while probes extended from the walls to take air samples in much the same way bomb-sniffing dogs operated at airports.
    The machine determined the rental car posed no risk, and Jason drove into a nearly empty basement. An elevator returned him to ground level, and he entered the three stories of smoked glass. Last night’s rain was still a thousand diamonds on the carefully manicured lawn along the flagstone pathway to the entrance.
    Almost all the buildings in the vicinity displayed signs announcing the services of one or more security companies. So did this one. Visibility was, after all, part of security. An intruder would, presumably, be less inclined toinvade the premises of an establishment guarded by the usual electronic devices.
    There were certain differences from nearby similar structures, had one looked in the right places, differences of which no ordinary burglar would have ever heard. But then, it was not the ordinary burglar Narcom wished to deter.
    Jason knew his image was being transmitted inside by a series of well-concealed cameras. One step off the path would trigger sensors buried an inch or so deep under lush grass, green despite the season. The glass of the exterior was reinforced sufficiently to withstand any projectile smaller than an artillery shell. Well out of sight from below, the roof sprouted a forest of antennae. Window shades were rubber lined.