Origin - Season One by Nathaniel Dean James Page A

cross the bay, find a car and drive to meet Cynthia. Sailing down the coast while she was out there going out of her mind would be torture. What he decided to do was neither.
    He started up the engine, walked to the bow and cast off the line. He did the same to the stern line, eased the boat back from the pier and turned her into the harbor. When he reached open water, he pushed the throttles all the way forward and set a course due north for the tip of Halibut Point and home.

Chapter 15
    Boston, Massachusetts
    Monday 17 July 2006
    2000 EDT
    Francis Moore, who still thought of himself as Walter Scott or Harry Fisher, and sometimes Lee Baker, was sitting in the living room of a small rented apartment on the outskirts of Boston. There were eleven names and phone numbers written on the notepad in front of him.
    He picked up the phone and dialed the next number on the list. The woman who answered sounded like she’d been asleep.
    “Hello?”
    “Good evening, ma’am. My name is Daren Hill; I’m with the Boston District Attorney’s Office. I was hoping to speak to Mr. Parker if he’s at home.”
    “Hold on.”
    He heard her shout something. A moment later, a man came to the phone. “Hello?”
    “Mr. Parker, My name is Daren Hill; I’m with the Boston District Attorney’s Office. I’m sorry to be calling at this hour.”
    “That’s all right. How can I help you?”
    “I believe you spoke to one of our investigators yesterday?”
    “Yeah, Henry something.”
    “Harold Waxman.”
    “That’s it, Harold. Nice guy.”
    “I just wanted to call and see if maybe you’d remembered something else. The case we’re putting together is very important and we could really use all the help we can get.”
    “Like I said, I left Allied Bishop three years ago. I haven’t really kept in touch with anyone in that time.”
    “I understand. Well, thank you anyway, Mr. Parker. And if you do think of anything, please give us a call.”
    “You got it.”
    Francis put the phone down and cursed.
    Of all the possible problems the plan had presented, the one thing he had known for an absolute certainty was that they wouldn’t dare retaliate. The danger of exposing the country’s most clandestine assassination program might not have been enough to stop the CIA from trying to find him, but risking a leak to the press of the break-in would. The conclusion was obvious: the drive wasn’t theirs. That led to two other very disturbing questions. Who the hell did it belong to? And what was it doing in a safety deposit box owned by the CIA?
    To make matters worse, he had no idea what was on the drive. And if that wasn’t bad enough, now he didn’t even have it.
    That Gerald could end up being a suspect had always been a possibility, and a risk he had been willing to take. Although never involved directly in the creation of Nova, Ross was the best in the field and had been consulted at one point or another by all three companies who had worked on it. Anyone questioned for long enough would eventually mention Ross. But Ross was also a genius. That much Francis had known from the start. It was the reason he had picked him in the first place. There really was no way to implicate him beyond the circumstantial. And even if the FBI had gotten around to asking him a few questions before they were shut down, a few questions was all it would ever be.
    Francis thought Ross would be all right, at least for now. Cynthia was another matter. He had only met her twice, and then only briefly. But it had been enough to see that Cynthia Ross lived only a block or two away from her next nervous breakdown, an eventuality kept at bay only by a steady regimen of mother’s little helpers. He would have to get to Cynthia, secure the drive and hide her. Ross would have to wait.
    Francis opened the closet in the bedroom, pulled out a black leather motorcycle jacket and dressed quickly. There was a Walther P22 semi-automatic pistol and two magazines in a shoebox on