MIDNIGHT QUEST: A Short 'Men of Midnight' Novel Read Online Free PDF

straightened up and got back into the cab of the vehicle, moving like an old man.
    Jacko was a fast driver, but driving fast was out of the question. He didn’t have the coordination. He made it to the Pearl and headed toward the gate. His company, ASI, had a transponder system that opened the gates fast when an ASI transponder was within a hundred feet. He loved racing up to the gates, knowing they’d open at the last minute, and roaring into the parking area of his company.
    Now he waited for the gates to open and drove slowly in, clutching the steering wheel with sweaty palms. He was being recorded by the security cams and whoever was on oversight wouldn’t recognize his driving.
    Inside the company the atmosphere was busy but calm, as it always was. Jacko loved the company, loved working there. He felt a big rush every time he walked into the big command-and-control area designed by Suzanne Huntington, the wife of one of his bosses, John Huntington. The Midnight Man.
    But today he didn’t feel anything except numb. He headed toward his desk to add to the file he’d already sent from Tijuana, finish up the details of his report, but his legs wouldn’t carry him to his desk. Instead, he went straight for Felicity, their IT genius, the fiancée of one of his best friends, Metal O’Brien.
    Jacko didn’t know he was going to do this, but his body did.
    He had read once about a guy who’d gone crazy and said his body disconnected from his head. Jacko remembered thinking bullshit . That doesn’t happen. You tell your body what to do. But here he was, with his body in the driver’s seat and his head just along for the ride.
    Felicity was, as usual, pounding on her magic computer that no one else was allowed to touch. To even breathe on.
    He waited for a lull in the typing and reached out to touch her shoulder.
    “Hey, Jacko,” Felicity said without glancing away from her monitor. Word had it her computer had 360° situational awareness.
    Jacko moved quietly. She couldn’t have heard him coming. “How’d you know it was me?”
    Felicity twisted her head around and smiled at him. She was very pretty, though not in Lauren’s league. He was aware that Metal thought the same of Lauren.
    She gave a little laugh. Laughter was something new for Felicity. She’d had it rough in the past and she’d entered Metal’s life by falling wounded and bleeding across the threshold of Lauren’s front door. Now she laughed a lot. Metal had given that to her.
    She swiveled her chair around and looked up at him. “I’d like to say I’m all-seeing—and I am all-knowing—but the truth is that I saw your reflection in the monitor.” She looked closer at him and frowned. “Jacko? Something wrong? You look really…tired.”
    So she’d picked up on something. Not hard, since he was sweating and shifting his weight from boot to boot.
    Jacko nodded to the back wall, where a door led to a quiet corridor. “Can we go to the SCIF?” Pronounced skiff. Secure Compartmented Information Facility. A high-tech room shielded from any kind of surveillance. ASI did business with a lot of three- letter government agencies, and sometimes the briefings were ultra top secret. The government had to know the intel was going to stay inside ASI. “And can you take Puff the Magic Dragon with you?”
    “Sure.” Felicity didn’t miss a beat. She rose, cup of coffee in one hand and Puff, her computer, in the other.
    Nobody gave them a second glance as they walked out of the big control room and into the quiet corridor. The third door to the right had a keypad and Felicity entered the code. She was probably the one at ASI who used the facility the most. Government agencies vied for her services. They’d also tried to hire her away tons of times but she wasn’t interested. As long as Metal was here, she was here. And like Jacko, she loved working for ASI.
    The air of the SCIF felt dead. There were no windows and the walls and the door were