Search: A Novel of Forbidden History Read Online Free

forearms, dragged him down.
    Merrit took a deep breath, bracing for his own air hose to be cut.
    Instead he was blinded by a disorienting flash of light.
    In the instant before his vision whited-out completely, Merrit saw two divers with sleek rebreathers that released no air, and impenetrable obsidian lenses that glinted on their full-face masks.
    They’d used infrared to hunt him.
    Their next move was unavoidable. It was what he’d do in their place.
    Kill the enemy.

THREE
    No one looked twice at David Weir as he entered the busy lobby of the Hay-Adams Hotel. Late on a Friday night, even speeding when he could, the drive from Rockville, Maryland, to the center of D.C. had taken him just over an hour, most of that spent bumper-to-bumper on the George Washington Memorial Parkway. He’d had no opportunity to change from the clothes he wore at work—jeans, Nikes, a creased white shirt with his one concession to the lab’s dress policy: a narrow black tie.
    Tonight, a majority of the people in the dark-wood-paneled, amber-lit lobby were clad in Beltway power suits, the exception being a few women in dramatic evening wear. It was that kind of place. Still, since the historic old hotel was located directly across from the White House and attracted clientele from international diplomatic circles, a mix of dress and ethnicities was also to be expected. Neither he nor his jeans would cause notice. Politics ran this town, not fashion.
    He stood in the doorway to the lobby bar, backpack in hand. With its small square tables, soft lights, high upholstered chairs, and a multitude of hushed discussions, it was called Off the Record for a reason. Its sound had a complex, layered ambience that on another occasion David would be recording for his collection.
    He glanced around the room, looking for the contact he had met the last two times—a tall, blank-faced man with a shaved head. Instead, a different figure approached, built like a powerlifter, with a full head of bristling brown-black hair, spiked with gel. The hairstyle was ten years too young for the beefy face beneath it, and the dark banker’s suit with chalk white pinstripes was a good twenty years too old. The whole effect was of a bad disguise.
    “Weir, right?”
    David was very aware he was risking his freedom, and his life, by what he was prepared to do, and had done before. In these circumstances, he wasn’t about to talk to a stranger.
    “I’m waiting for a friend.”
    “Merrit’s not here. I’m taking the meeting.”
    “Where is he?”
    There was a faint trace of Texas in Pinstripe’s husky voice. “On that island you sent him to.”
    David’s suspicion grew. “How’d he know which one to go to?” It had only been five weeks since he’d sold Merrit the second set of files outlining a possible common geographic origin for the nonhuman DNA he shared with a few unlucky others. “I only tracked the second cluster to Polynesia—that’s more than a hundred major islands.”
    Pinstripe’s only response was to tap his suit jacket, where something in the inner pocket made a bulge. “I’ve got your money.”
    David weighed the odds: his need to understand the bomb ticking in his own genetic structure against the risk of being entrapped. If Pinstripe was working for the FBI or Army Criminal Investigation Division, David knew he’d be arrested, guaranteeing he’d die in detention before he ever got to trial. On the other hand, if Pinstripe was a source of new information that could help him—
    “Okay.”
    Pinstripe led him to a corner table with two chairs. There was an empty glass and a Heineken bottle on the white linen cloth. All the cashews had been picked out of the bowl of nuts. Pinstripe had been waiting.
    David sat down, backpack between his feet. A white-jacketed waiter arrived to take his drink order. David chose water. Pinstripe looked at his empty glass, clearly wanting another beer, but he ordered a club soda instead. His left foot thumped