Salem's Cipher Read online

  A spiral staircase immediately inside the door and to their right led to the second-story bells. The steps were so narrow that Bel and Salem had to climb single file. Salem was too scared to glance behind and see if any of the supplicants were watching. What would she do if they were? At the top, they crawled out a door so small they barely fit and emerged into the jasmine-scented night air.

  Salem risked a glance down. They were as high as they’d been on Lu’s fire escape, give or take, with no dragon below to land on. The wedding must be starting soon because the crowds outside the basilica were thin, and the catering van had pulled around to the side. No one seemed to be glancing their way. The only sounds were the occasional car passing or the chatter of a distant conversation. Above, in the wall of the second story of the mission, three bells were mounted in alcoves.

  “Which do you think it is?” Bel remained in a crouch.

  Salem pointed at the middle bell. “The San Francisco. Lu said it’s the only one mounted in its original rawhide and wood bind.”

  Bel turned to watch the sparse crowd below. “Then get to it. You know the drill.”

  “Yeah,” Salem muttered. “Find centuries-old messages in wood, copper, and bronze. Easy peasy.” Except Beale’s note couldn’t possibly be inside the bell because that would affect the sound. It had to be concealed in the wood. Right?

  “Can you kneel here? I need to stand on your back.”

  Bel quirked an eyebrow but obliged, dropping to all fours in front of the tiny door so Salem could reach San Francisco’s ancient harness. She climbed on Isabel’s back and managed to shove her knee into one side of the bell’s alcove, using her hand to hoist herself onto the rim of the cavity.

  “Hey!” A man pushing a stroller stopped near the church door and hollered up at them. “You’re not supposed to be doing that!”

  “It’s okay,” Bel called down. She stuck her hand through the balcony and waggled it at him. “This is part of an all-city scavenger hunt. We’ll be careful.”

  He wasn’t buying it. He yanked his phone from the top of the stroller, next to the sippy cup, and started punching in numbers, pausing every second or so to glare up at them. His toddler protested the stop.

  “Hurry,” Bel commanded.

  Salem struggled to focus. She reached for her phone and turned on the flashlight function so she could light up the alcove, but her hands were slippery with sweat, and she dropped the cell in the recess. She had to dig through bug carcasses and pigeon feces until she located it. She tried again, this time succeeding.

  She ran the light over the bell.

  San Martin and San Jose were big bells, colored a silver-green with age, nearly three feet long from crown to clapper, but San Francisco was half the size, more harness than bell. Her light didn’t reveal anything she couldn’t spot from the ground, so she shoved her cell into her pocket and began exploring with her hands. The bell’s metal was cool. She touched it gently to hoist herself higher, toward the ancient wood, smooth and grooved from decades in the elements.

  “The police are on the way,” the man with the now-screaming toddler informed them matter-of-factly, raising his voice to be heard over the wails.

  “Thank you, sir!” Bel called down. “I’m sure the people being burglarized and assaulted will understand the reallocation of resources to two women in a harmless scavenger hunt.”

  “Bah.” The man waved his hand and walked away.

  Salem heard sirens. “That could be for anything, right?”

  “Could be.”

  Salem examined the face of the wood, holding her body at an impossible angle. There were no visible hiding spots, but of course then they wouldn’t be hiding spots. She strained to touch the back of the harness, grunting at the effort. She started at the bottom and ran one hand up, swallowing her pain as she embedded a splinter deep into her middle finger. She switched hands so the wounded one could anchor her, and ran her other hand up the back.

  The sirens were drawing closer.

  “Anything?” Bel’s voice was strained.

  “Not yet,” Salem answered. “Can you be any taller?”

  “Not on all fours.”

  Salem tried to grow. She needed to reach the rawhide at the top of the mount, but it was an inch beyond her grasp. She stretched, adjusting her knee to buy length. She was almost there, the rawhide kissing her fingertips.

  Then she slipped.

  Her hands wheeled in the air, scrabbling for any purchase.

  It was happening too quickly to scream.

  Her phone fell out of her pocket in the panic, crashing below.

  She grabbed the lip of the bell, catching herself at the last possible second. It donged solemnly.

  Her sweaty fingers dug into the alcove, gaining purchase, and she hugged the wall as her pulse pounded in her ears.

  She paused, eyes closed, nauseated from terror.

  “Salem. We don’t have to do this.” Bel’s voice was urgent, worried. The police sirens were almost on them.

  Salem steadied her breath. She rearranged herself so she was back on her knee. She balanced so she could use both hands to feel the wood. She retraced her pattern on the face of it. This time, she felt the smallest, cross-grain bump on the upper left corner, just below the leather harness. Her bleeding finger was the closest, so she pushed with it, biting back the pain.

  A drawer popped open.

  Salem grabbed the cool metal cylinder inside, the size and shape of a magic marker, didn’t pause to close the drawer, and slid off of Bel’s back.

  “I have it.”

  The police cars turned on the end of Dolores Street, screaming directly toward the mission.

  Bel crawled toward the tiny door leading them back into the chapel, pushed it open, scuttled through, and reached back to help Salem. Everyone inside was most definitely staring at them now. Salem and Bel stood to their full height once inside, Bel’s back and Salem’s knees creaking, hurried down the spiral stairs, and hopped onto the main floor.

  A priest was whispering to a woman at the head of the sanctuary. She pointed at Salem and Bel. The police sirens were just outside. A panic attack bubbled in Salem’s belly, battery acid eroding her safety and balance. She needed to run, or yell, or simply collapse.

  Bel grabbed her, her eyes darting to the front door and the back, calculating the best escape route.

  The police sirens passed.

  Salem and Bel exchanged a look of surprise.

  The priest was walking toward them, his face a mixture of displeasure and kindness.

  “Front door,” Bel said, tugging Salem after her.

  “Sorry!” Salem called over her shoulder. “We didn’t hurt anything!”

  Outside, people were moving normally. No one was staring. There were no police. Salem grabbed the pieces of her phone from the ground and glanced up at the bell. She wished she’d closed the tiny drawer. You couldn’t spot it from the street unless you were looking for it, but still. She patted the cylinder inside her jacket pocket.

  “Excuse me!” Bel said to a man who bumped into her. Salem’s attention was drawn back to the moment. She glanced at the man who’d pushed Bel.

  Her heart stopped.

  She recognized him.

  78

  Twelve Years Old

  Daniel’s Last Week

  “Who’s buying that dresser?”

  Pick-up day is the first Wednesday of every other month. On that day, a white van drives down the alley to Daniel’s shop, furniture is loaded out of sight, the van motors away, and Daniel’s space is cleared for new furniture. During the school year, Salem never sees the pick-up happen. In the summer, Daniel makes sure she’s absent on those Wednesdays, but on this one, she’s sick.

  A fever, nausea.

  The stomach flu.

  She stays home. She promises
her father she won’t come outside.

  But her stomach ache turns for the worse, and she’s scared to throw up without her dad nearby. So she tiptoes to his shop.

  She lets herself in. A fat-fingered man carries one end of a dresser, Daniel the other. Salem stands in the doorway, guilty, curious, sick.

  “Who’s buying that dresser?” she repeats.

  Daniel drops his end of the furniture. The fat-fingered man doesn’t change expression, but his eyes walk over Salem’s twelve-year-old body like flies. Salem’s face grows hot, and she glances down to make sure she’s still wearing clothes.

  “Salem!”

  She looks back up. Daniel is scared. The fat-fingered man looks satisfied. That makes no sense. Salem runs back into the house, and she throws up.

  Her dad finds her over the toilet. He wants to tell her something, she’s sure of it, but instead he holds her hair away from her face and rubs her back until the spasms stop.

  In the end, all he says is, “I’m sorry.”

  They never talk about it, and Salem never sees the fat-fingered man again.

  At least, not that she’ll let herself remember.

  79

  Mission District, San Francisco

  The fat-fingered man stood in front of Mission Dolores, solid, wearing that same satisfied pick-up-day expression that stripped Salem fourteen years ago. His fingers were grotesque, rippled and scarred, as large as bratwurst but evilly muscled, disappearing into Bel’s flesh deeper than they could possibly go without snapping bone. Bel cried out and grabbed at his wrist, trying the same move that brought Ernest to his knees in Amherst, but the solid, powerful man didn’t flinch.

  Salem pushed him. It was like shoving a concrete wall.

  Another man appeared from the shadows and walked toward them. He had the same eyes—those snake eyes—as the man and the woman from Amherst but completely different features. His face was gorgeous, stunning, the immaculate image of a Renaissance angel, too perfect to look at except in short bursts. He smiled and its prettiness hurt. Salem was suffocating in his sugar.

  She moaned. She couldn’t force the fat-fingered man to release Bel, and she knew he intended to kill her. Salem would rather die a thousand times herself than watch it, but she felt utterly helpless. All she could was scream from the bottom of her lungs.

  A voice called out from across the street. “Salem! Isabel!”

  80

  Upper East Side, New York

  The Audubon Society was a pet project of tonight’s host. He was charging $75,000 a plate for guests to mingle, dine with Senator and presidential candidate Gina Hayes, and learn about the blue-throated macaw. He’d first learned of the bird on a hunting trip to Bolivia when one of the gorgeous creatures followed his party, flying particularly close to him. When he learned the birds were endangered because their ecosystem was being destroyed by cattle ranchers, he’d asked his billionaire father to buy him a nature park in the country. He’d also taken his passion—and several birds—home with him.

  On the drive to the fundraiser, Matthew Clemens labeled their host a silver-spoon hippie. “Imagine if he used all that money to save people rather than birds.”

  Senator Hayes watched the city stream by outside. “He’s using it to help us.”

  Matthew would not be mollified. “I bet he serves chicken for dinner. Idiot.”

  Matthew was entitled to his opinion, but Senator Hayes didn’t share it. Tonight’s host wasn’t spending his money on cars, or planes, or things. It was being spent on the environment, and she could use all the help she could get on that front. Besides, she was tired. No, she was past tired, through exhausted, and taking up residence in walking dead. She didn’t have the luxury of rest, however, not this close to the election, so she strapped on her game face and stepped out of the car immediately behind her security detail.

  Photos were snapped, quietly. She walked the blue carpet leading to the apartment, thinking it was a bit much. On the way, she shook hands and smiled. Inside the door, she let a woman in a black-and-white French maid uniform take her coat. “Thank you.”

  Hayes was led into the main room. Over one hundred people were drinking cocktails, many of the women wearing hats. Fascinators encouraged, the invitation had read. Hayes knew Matthew would be itching to speculate where all the feathers in the hats had been procured. He was too professional to say anything in public, of course. He was already lining up the meet-and-greet list. Hayes would not stay for the dinner. She would spend an hour inside this Upper East Side mansion, speaking with the prescribed people, and then she would leave for her next event.

  She would raise $1 million in that hour.

  “Senator Hayes.” Matthew appeared at her elbow, his voice level. “I don’t believe you’ve had the pleasure of meeting Carl Barnaby.”

  Hayes turned.

  That Carl Barnaby was first on the list meant that he had paid an extra $100,000 for this meeting. Hayes owed him three minutes. She’d seen photos of Barnaby—a grandfatherly man, hair white and slicked back in that way men of the previous generation favored, shoulders still strong, clothes immaculate—but she’d never met him in person. She was surprised he’d arrange their first meeting in so public a place.

  She’d imagined she’d be afraid if they were ever in the same room together. She discovered, instead, that she was curious. “Mr. Barnaby.”

  Hayes had learned about the Hermitage at her father’s knee. They’d tried to buy his ear. She didn’t think they had, but with politics, even with her father, you couldn’t be sure. She’d never doubted the conspiracy theories that surrounded the organization, had in fact witnessed firsthand proof of their power and reach. The Hermitage was the very skeleton of the political system in some countries and certainly at least a kidney in the United States government, with loyal members in the FBI, CIA, and NSA. She suspected the Hermitage was behind the Iowa assassination attempt. She knew they’d historically executed leaders of the Underground, an organization that she’d been born into and that she, along with Vida Wiley and Grace Odegaard, currently ran.

  He took her hand and shook it. “It’s a pleasure, Senator. Thank you for your time.”

  Her eyes sparked as she realized that not only was she not afraid, she was exhilarated. Oh yes, she was up for this challenge. “Do you prefer small talk, the truth, or political bloviating, Mr. Barnaby?”

  His gaze narrowed. “I was hoping we could chat about the Afghanistan mineral rights bill you plan to vote down. That would be a mistake.”

  “Really, Mr. Barnaby. Please tell me more.” She examined him as he spoke, taking his measure. If she lived to reach the Oval Office, it would be because the Hermitage’s attempts to kill her, an organization Carl Barnaby headed, had failed.

  She would give him the three minutes he had paid for, nothing more. That would be enough to take his measure.

  81

  San Francisco

  Someone in the wedding party stepped outside of the basilica to see what the commotion was about. The priest also walked out of the adobe mission. The street was suddenly very crowded.

  The fat-fingered man gave Bel one last squeeze, then jogged to a car parked at the curb. The beautiful man followed him, rage contorting his features. They were pulling away when Agent Stone reached Salem’s side.

  Stone’s hand was inside his coat, eyes on the departing car. “We have to go somewhere.”

  Salem didn’t spare him a glance. “Bel?”

  Bel was ashen, gripping her arm. It hung loosely in the socket. Her voice was hoarse. “He dislocated it. He only used his thumb, and he pushed it out.”

  Stone stepped between Salem and Bel. “Hold her,” he ordered Salem.

  She grabbed Bel around the waist.

  Stone held up both hands, palms out. “I’m going to touch you. This will hurt.”

  Bel nodded.
r />   He placed his right hand on her good shoulder. With his left, he jerked and pushed her loose arm in one swift movement. Bel’s knees buckled, but Salem held her upright.

  Stone pushed back the cloth of Bel’s jacket, revealing her shoulder. Her skin was contused, a deep purple circle over the joint. Four matching circles ridged Bel’s shoulder blade.

  “There’s a coffee shop up the street. She needs to sit down, and we need to talk.”

  “Tell me what’s going on.”

  Salem held a steaming mug of tea. Bel drank black coffee. Some of her color had returned, but she was still nursing her shoulder. Neither of them responded to Stone.

  “All right, I’ll start.” He loosened his tie and scanned the room. “Your mothers were leaders in an organization called the Underground. Their job was to take down the Hermitage. Same with the other five women who were murdered. The Hermitage got sick of their interference and started taking them out.”

  He studied both women. “Ah, I was right. I wasn’t sure about that last part.”

  Salem was too exhausted to be either excited or scared by his presence. “Are you going to arrest us?”

  His eyes landed on her. “You’re up against the Hermitage? You probably want me to arrest you. While following you here, I called in some favors to find out what the organization has been up to. Safest place for you is in jail.”

  “Why did the SFPD raid Lu’s?” Bel’s voice was sullen.

  “NSA sent them, near as I can tell. They’ve been watching Golden Lucky for quite a while. With Senator Hayes coming to San Francisco in two days and a lot of suspicious comms leaving the factory, they had to follow through. No choice.”

  Bel nodded.

  “Has either of you heard from your mothers?”

  “We’ve each received a text from one of their phones,” Salem said.

  “But at least one of them was a lie because one of our mothers is dead,” Bel muttered.

  “Bel!”

  Stone rested his palms on the table. “How do you know?”