Free Salem's Cipher by Jess Lourey

her eyes. Fast forward a decade plus, and the girl predictably turns to the safety of computers and puzzles and leaves the world behind. Nearly a shut-in, from what he could tell.
    But now, she found herself in the same boat as her friend, with her mom a blood puddle and a memory for all she knows. Yet, of the two, it was Wiley who was less twitchy. The girl was either going to crash hard, too hard to recover, or she was going to discover she was a different person than she’d imagined all these years. In his thirty years in the FBI, he’d seen it happen both ways.
    And these girls didn’t know the half of what they were in for. According to the phone call, Vida Wiley and Grace Odegaard had been leading double lives, both in up to their necks before they’d disappeared.
    That’s what the man on the other end of the line had told him, and he’d yet to be wrong. Clancy never liked it when he took his orders from the H, as he called them, but such was the reality of government work. He’d do what the power asked him to do. He’d done it before, and he knew where to hide the bodies.
    He jogged back toward the Bucar, the nickname all bureau-­assigned cars received, and crawled in. He held up his phone and pointed at it. “Sorry. Urgent business.”
    His partner, Lucan Stone, glanced at him. At least, he turned his head in Clancy’s general direction. It was hard to tell where he was looking with those mirrored frames. “Asshole glasses” is what they’d called them in training. Clancy’s reflection was bouncing off of them, a tiny version of himself reflected back to him. He’d been told he resembled the actor Ed Harris enough times that he’d come to believe it.
    â€œEverything okay?” Stone’s voice was a deep rumble. The man always sounded like he was about to unleash something.
    Clancy nodded. “Just the wife. Wants to know when we’re gonna be back in DC.”
    Stone turned his attention to starting the car. “Don’t we all.”
    Clancy frowned. He didn’t know what actor Lucan Stone would be compared to. The movies didn’t much interest Clancy Johnson. He was more of a nonfiction guy. Stone did remind him a little of a sculpture he’d passed by when leaving the art institute, though: as black as pitch and carved out of steel.
    Stone had exploded through the FBI ranks but didn’t have that hotshot air most wunderkinds did, and as a KMA—short for Kiss My Ass, referring to an agent still active but past the age of retirement and so who had nothing to lose—Clancy had worked with more than his share of young guns. Stone was quiet, and he did his job. Clancy Johnson liked him better than fine as a partner, but it was still a mystery whose side he was on.
    Given Clancy’s latest directive, he suspected he would find out soon.
    Definitively.
    â€œI’m flying to Massachusetts.” Clancy reached for his Styrofoam coffee cup and took a sip of the bitter, grounds-filled liquid. Like French kissing a goddamned potted plant. “Salem.”
    Stone didn’t respond, didn’t even turn his head. For a crazy second, Clancy Johnson wanted to flick the chisel of the man’s cheekbones. He bet it’d make a solid thunk . Hurt his fingers.
    â€œMakes the most sense, given that’s where the daughters are flying to, and they’re the only assets we’ve got right now,” Clancy continued, as if it was an afterthought. It wasn’t unusual for them to work a case from different angles. He’d intentionally been one step behind Stone during this whole one. Allowed him the freedom to complete his real assignment. “What say you get the task force on track here, and we meet up out East?”
    Stone seemed to be weighing all the alternatives. Hell, for all Clancy knew, he could be mentally alphabetizing his spice rack.
    Stone finally spoke. “I’ll meet you in