The Adamas Blueprint Read online

  The Adamas Blueprint

  Boyd Morrison

  Kevin Hamilton has a big problem: someone is trying to kill him, and he has no idea why.

  Kevin, a Ph.D. student in chemistry, is stunned by the news that his graduate advisor, Michael Ward, has died in a fire. Then Kevin receives a cryptic email message from Ward, sent just before his death. According to the message, Ward was being chased by someone intent on obtaining a notebook with the results of a supposedly failed experiment Kevin and Ward had worked on together.

  Before Kevin can make sense of the message, Ward’s attackers try to kill him. Labeled a crank by the police, Kevin escapes the gun-wielding assailants and unwittingly draws his girlfriend, a medical student named Erica Jensen, into their sights. Their flight leads them to the notebook, which reveals that Kevin unknowingly participated in one of the most important discoveries of the century, a chemical process called Adamas that is worth billions of dollars.

  Alone and on the run from deadly assassins, Kevin and Erica have to stay alive long enough to prove to the world that Adamas actually works…

  Boyd Morrison

  The Adamas Blueprint

  CHAPTER 1

  September, 1995

  Kevin, no time for details. The same men who killed Stein are after me.

  Michael Ward’s fingers trembled as he lifted his hands from the keyboard. He’d tried calling Kevin three times, but Ward kept getting the damned answering machine, and leaving a message was out of the question.

  He needed a cigarette badly. His hand fumbled through his shirt pocket and removed the pack of Benson and Hedges. Only one left. He’d have to get another pack before they left for the airport.

  He lit the cigarette despite the shaking and took a deep drag, trying to pull every milligram of precious nicotine into his system. He felt the smoke fill his lungs, and the trembling subsided. His attention returned to the words on the screen. He almost laughed at their absurdity, but he was afraid if he started he wouldn’t be able to stop.

  A wave of nausea hit him. Ward shook off the feeling. There wasn’t much left in his stomach anyway, just half a bottle of Pepto Bismol he’d drained when he got home. He’d been spending the Friday in his South Texas University office working and listening to the radio when he’d heard the news of Herbert Stein’s death. The story had been short, but it was enough. An execution-style shooting, the body thrown in a dumpster. Ward got sick twice, once in his office trash can and again before climbing into his Mercedes. Even now, he still didn’t feel like a man who was about retire to the Bahamas with $10 million.

  With the cigarette stuck in his mouth, he continued typing.

  Irene and I are leaving Houston. I think we’ll be safe where we’re going, but I need your help to be sure. NV117 wasn’t a failure, and Clay wants it. The details are in a notebook. I’ve recorded everything you’ll need and put it in a safe place. DA483H3 is the…

  “May we come in, Dr. Ward?”

  Ward jerked visibly at the sound of the voice. He recognized the distinct enunciation of each syllable and his heart started racing. He turned his head to see two men standing in the doorway to his study. David Lobec and behind him, Richard Bern, Clay Tarnwell’s men here to finalize the deal. They were early. The meeting wasn’t supposed to start for another two hours.

  He silently cursed himself for not grabbing their passports and running as soon as he saw his wife. Five minutes, he’d told Irene. Pack whatever you can in five minutes, then we head straight to Intercontinental and get the first flight out. She’d begun to protest, asking if he’d lost his mind. I’ll explain everything in the car, but we need to get the hell out of here. When he’d practically shoved her up the stairs, she’d gotten the message. He was dead serious. Now they were out of time, and Ward’s mind raced for options.

  Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the blinking cursor on the screen and realized that the words on the computer might be seen from the front of his desk. Without glancing back at the monitor, he pressed the F4 key as he turned the chair to face his visitors. The message disappeared from the screen.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Lobec,” Ward said, rising from his seat. “I didn’t hear the doorbell.” The waver in his voice betrayed his attempt to remain calm. He took another puff from the cigarette.

  Lobec smiled and strode in without waiting for the invitation he had asked for.

  “Disgusting habit,” he said, plucking the cigarette from Ward’s lips. He stubbed it out in a heavily stained brass ashtray. “Much better. Now we can all breathe while we talk.” He sat in one of the leather chairs. Bern remained standing behind him.

  “Please sit down,” Lobec said.

  “You’re early,” said Ward, lowering himself into his chair. “I wasn’t expecting you until 6:30.” The clock on the study’s mantle said 4:23.

  “Of course you weren’t. You expected to be far away by the time we arrived. I’m happy to surprise you.”

  He wasn’t tall, no more than 5’10”, but Lobec carried a quiet confidence that made him more imposing than a man six inches taller. His thick ebony hair, a marked contrast to his fair complexion and slate gray eyes, was combed straight back. His gray suit was tailored, perfectly fitting his trim, athletic frame, but otherwise rather ordinary. Lobec was not a handsome man, his nose angled slightly downward and crooked, his chin weak, but his eyes were always alert and focused. Despite being intimidated by Lobec, Ward couldn’t help admiring the man’s presence.

  Lobec’s younger associate, on the other hand, was the same height as Lobec, but about fifty pounds heavier, although Ward couldn’t tell how much of that was muscle. Bern also lacked Lobec’s sense of style, wearing an ill-fitting blue suit that looked a size too large for his bulky frame. His brown hair was cut in a Marine-style crew, and boredom wafted from his perpetual frown and sleepy eyes. Beyond the visual, Ward knew hardly anything about the man. He’d never uttered more than a few unintelligible greetings.

  Ward forced a smile, knowing he’d never be able to overpower either one of them, let alone both. Despite his four-inch height advantage over the two men, his large paunch and fleshy jowls gave him away as a professor whose sole exercise was swinging a golf club. Since the fall semester didn’t begin until next week, he was dressed in the $300 sweatsuit he normally wore on weekends, not the Sansabelt slacks and tight short sleeve shirts his colleagues seemed to prefer. Otherwise, Ward was the archetype of a distinguished professor, down to the thin, graying hair and wire-rimmed glasses. Judging by Lobec’s attitude, he wasn’t much of a threat.

  “I don’t know what you mean,” Ward said. “I was just finishing up some…”

  “You do know what I mean.” Lobec seemed more amused than annoyed. “We’ve been searching for you for the last hour. It seems that you did not take your normal route from the office today. Perhaps you could tell us why.”

  He had suspected they were watching him, and now Lobec’s statement confirmed it. After hearing the news about Herbert Stein’s murder, Ward had taken the precaution of leaving through the subbasement to another building, hoping to elude his observers for just ten minutes. It was all the time he needed to hide the key to his insurance. Apparently, he had been successful.

  “How do you know what route I take?” He was stalling, trying to think.

  “The same way we know that your mandatory tenure has been denied.”

  Ward’s eyebrow twitched. Lobec was trying to shake him. But the decision had been made over a month ago, the same day he had finally decided to sell his notebook on Adamas rather than turn it over to the university. The tenure decision wasn’t common knowledge, but at least a dozen people at STU knew.

  Before Ward could respond, Lobec said, “The same way
we know how you’ve been able to afford a half-million dollar home and a Mercedes on a professor’s salary.” Lobec looked around at the tastefully decorated study, with its mahogany desk, black leather sofa, golf awards, and memorabilia. Over Ward’s shoulder, he could see the 18-hole championship golf course in the final stages of construction. His eyes returned to Ward. “Although lately, your situation has taken a turn for the worse, hasn’t it? Mr. Tarnwell mentioned your successful ventures in the stock market. It’s a pity your appraisal of Genetix wasn’t as shrewd.”

  Ward’s jaw dropped. Ward had gotten lucky on some Internet stocks and cashed out before the crash. Then Ward got a hot tip about a local company called Genetix about to issue a press release about a new drug it was developing. FDA approval was a sure thing, his source had said. Seeing how well other biotechs had done, Ward pounced on it.

  In the first week after the press release, the stock soared to twice its price and Ward was ecstatic. He bought even more shares, leveraging himself to the hilt. But within a month, a report leaked test results detailing serious side effects of the new drug. The probability of FDA approval was virtually nonexistent. The stock plummeted. Ward couldn’t give shares away. Before the deal with Tarnwell came along, he was on the verge of bankruptcy. Not even Irene knew about it.

  As Ward sat dumbfounded, Lobec continued. “I mention these facts merely to impress upon you that our resources for gathering information are quite formidable. Should you and your wife think of leaving Houston, we would find you.”

  Suddenly, Ward remembered Irene packing upstairs. She should have come down by now. He saw a nasty gleam in Lobec’s eyes.

  Ward jumped from his seat. “Irene!” There was no response. He moved toward Lobec. “Where is she, goddammit?”

  Bern tensed and took a step forward. Lobec, the smile never leaving his face, calmly reached into his jacket and pulled out an automatic pistol.

  “Mrs. Ward is quite safe for the moment, but I wouldn’t want any rash behavior on your part to jeopardize that safety.”

  “You won’t shoot me. Somebody will hear.”

  “I know as well as you do that you and your wife are the first, and currently only, occupants on this block. I have a silencer, but there really is no need for it. Now please sit down, or I shall ask Mr. Bern to assist you.”

  Seeing that he had no choice, Ward reluctantly sat. The fear that had gripped him moments before was now competing with the anger seething just below it. Despite their problems, Ward loved Irene, and the thought of these bastards manhandling her was repulsive to him.

  “What does Clay want?” he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

  “First of all, he would like the $10 million you’ve stolen from him.”

  Ward erupted. “I didn’t steal it! He paid me that $10 million. And he’s supposed to pay me another $20 million when he gets Adamas.”

  “Second,” Lobec continued, “we want the names of every person you’ve told about Adamas.”

  Ward’s eyes narrowed. “If you don’t let us go, you’ll never see Adamas, and Clay will come out of this $10 million poorer.”

  “Spare us, Dr. Ward. We already have the details of your process in our possession.”

  Ward sat back as if slapped in the face. That was impossible. There was only one copy of the notebook and it was stored in a safe place. The meeting tonight was to go over the details of the final transaction. On Monday, he was going to retrieve the notebook, copy it, and give the copy to a lawyer before handing the original over to Tarnwell in return for the $20 million. The lawyer would keep it and turn it over to the authorities if something happened to Ward. But something happened to the lawyer first. The lawyer was Herbert Stein, and he was murdered.

  Ward sputtered, “But, you couldn’t…”

  “You’ve been observed for the past two weeks, Dr. Ward. We’ve also had a chance to thoroughly itemize the contents of your office. We have everything we need.”

  Something was wrong. He had hidden the notebook a month ago and hadn’t returned to the hiding place since then. He certainly didn’t keep it in his office. And he doubted even Tarnwell could get the notebook from its hiding place. He needed to know if Lobec was lying. “Then you have the videotape as well, I suppose.”

  Lobec’s irritating smile finally dissolved. “You’re bluffing. There is no videotape.”

  It was Ward smiling now. “So Clay doesn’t have the notebook. That’s too bad. When my friends find the videotape and the notebook, Clay is going to see a billion dollars evaporate. That is, if you don’t let us go.” This time he was bluffing. No one else knew of Adamas or the notebook’s location, and he hadn’t had time to finish the electronic mail message to Kevin.

  Lobec’s smile returned. “Surely you learned what happened to your new attorney, Mr. Stein, or you wouldn’t have led us on this merry chase. I must say, Mr. Stein was quite forceful about his need to protect his clients’ interests. It wasn’t until I removed his second finger that he told us about your attempt to secure his services, in great detail in fact. No doubt your friends will be as obliging with the proper incentive.”

  Despite his horror, Ward tried to feign confidence. “You can’t possibly know who they are.”

  “No, that is correct,” Lobec said, nodding. “But I think you will be most willing to tell us. Especially if you don’t want to see your beautiful wife damaged by Mr. Bern.” Lobec glanced toward Bern and nodded in Ward’s direction.

  Ward’s stomach sank. They would never let him go. They’d torture the information about the notebook’s location out of him. Once they had that, there would be no reason to keep either of them alive. In fact, with him out of the way, there would be no one to dispute that Tarnwell was the inventor of Adamas. With that realization, Ward knew he had to take whatever chance he saw.

  Bern walked around the desk and bent over to grab Ward’s arm. As he did so, Bern’s jacket fell open and Ward saw a semi-automatic pistol holstered under his left armpit. Ward looked up and saw that the bored expression hadn’t left Bern’s face.

  As Bern wrapped his meaty hand around Ward’s arm, Ward sagged as if overcome with despair, his 250 pounds throwing Bern off balance in the process. He plunged his free hand into Bern’s jacket, found the pistol, and yanked it from the holster.

  Bern snapped back and grabbed Ward’s wrist, pointing the gun toward the ceiling. To the side, he could see Lobec aiming his pistol at them but not firing, probably not wanting to kill Ward until he got the information he needed. Bern’s other hand grabbed at the gun. He pried at Ward’s hand, but Ward gripped the gun with tenacity born of desperation.

  Ward tried forcing the gun into Bern’s face. Bern deflected it as Ward pulled the trigger, and a deafening blast rended the air. A chunk of the ceiling hit them as Bern whirled them around and into the wall. He pulled Ward’s arm down, trying to use leverage to wrest the gun away. With one hand still on Ward’s wrist, Bern slid the other up the gun’s barrel and jerked downward. Another shot rang out, and the gun dropped to the floor.

  Bern stepped back to retrieve the weapon. Ward ignored him, his face contorted with agony. A red stain grew on his right shoulder. But instead of reaching for that shoulder, he put his hand to the other one. The pain was excruciating, spreading to Ward’s chest. His eyes cast downward, searching for the source of the pain, but the only obvious wound was from the gunshot. Then he understood. The heart attack Irene had always predicted. The smoking, the greasy foods, the lack of exercise. She’d nagged him for years. Now it was going to keep Tarnwell from getting what he wanted. He tried to laugh, but the sound came out as only a weak gargle. He staggered forward a step and fell to his knees. Bern stood aside as Ward pitched over.

  Ward looked up, his vision tunneling. Through the tunnel, he could see Lobec’s eyes hovering only a foot from his face. Lobec shook Ward and spoke. Although his voice was only a muddy jumble, Ward felt himself responding, not really understanding what he was saying. He saw Lobec’s face t
urn and start searching, stopping when he came to the computer screen. He followed Lobec’s gaze there. The last thing Ward ever saw was the phrase Message sent to: N. Kevin Hamilton.

  CHAPTER 2

  Slamming the apartment door behind him, Kevin Hamilton sprinted to his car. As he ran, he pulled a Rockets cap over his wet, tangled hair and shoved his wallet into the front pocket of his shorts. One of his shoes was still untied, and the laces slapped against his bare ankles. He didn’t dare stop to tie it. If he didn’t get to the South Texas University campus in 20 minutes, his life would be over.

  Kevin had just finished toweling off from a late afternoon shower when he’d begun to read the letters from his South Texas University mailbox. The first one had stopped him cold, and it felt like shaved ice had poured into his stomach. He’d read the letter twice to make sure he’d understood it correctly, then frantically called the number at the top of the letter. Getting a busy signal, he scrambled into the first clothes he could find. The long-sleeved button-downed shirt he’d ripped from a closet hanger was wildly incongruous with the workout shorts and tennis shoes, but he didn’t care. Besides, he’d seen a lot worse on other graduate students.

  He jumped into his Mustang and tossed the letter onto the front seat. As he inserted the ignition key, Kevin rested his other hand on the steering wheel, then immediately pulled it back with a gasp. Even this late in the day, the September sun was still strong enough to heat the steering wheel to scorching temperatures. Gripping the cooler lower part of the steering wheel, he turned the key.

  The Mustang wheezed for a few seconds, then nothing. Kevin swore under his breath. He’d had the car for nine years, won it in a radio contest when he was still in high school. His parents had let him keep it as long as he could make the insurance premiums. He’d gladly agreed and for the first two years lived the teenage male’s dream of owning a flaming red V8 hot rod. But since then, it had started to slowly fall apart. The rear hatch release, the gas gauge, and the right window switch were all broken. The latest frustration was its difficulty starting. Probably a bad solenoid. He’d been meaning to get it fixed, but money had been tight lately.