BRAINSTORM

Chapter Fourteen - Mafia and Mensa.

"How long has this place been on the market?"

Melissa blinked, turning to her client, Nancy Blair, who stared at her with raised eyebrows.

"Um, let me look." Melissa fumbled through her folder to find the information that she should've already had memorized. "One year."

Blair walked to the large glass window, her blonde hair and abundant gold jewelry glowing in the sunlight. The condominium had an amazing view of the National Mall. "So they should be willing to settle on a lower price, right?"

Melissa followed Blair's gaze out the window. Everything seemed so beautiful and calm outside. It was a perfect autumn day. Except that somebody had done something with her son, and that person was out there somewhere. Nick was out there, too, and she missed him, more than she could have imagined she would. Time away from him had made her understand what he had wanted to do for her. Why he'd lied to her.

"Ms. Ryder, I asked you a question."

"Yes, sorry. You should definitely go in lower. It's a great property, but luxury real estate has been moving slow in D.C. and there are no other interested parties right now. You have a good chance of getting it."

"Can you write up an offer?"

"Yes. Yes, of course. What were you thinking?" The part of her that spoke was like the ten percent of an iceberg above the surface of the ocean. The rest was with Sidney and Nick, regretting and-despite everything-hoping.

~~~

Rectangular folders made a pattern across Nick's large work desk that Mondrian would have been proud of. It wasn't a desk, actually, just a large slab of thick walnut secured to a trestle. Nick preferred to lay out his work this way so he could see everything at once. It was another thing Melissa teased him for.

As Nick thought of Melissa, his heart ached. It was an extraordinary feeling to him. He'd loved before, but he'd never actually missed anyone. It was a little unnerving.

He hoped she'd come home soon. She probably was staying at Victoria's until her temper cooled. She hadn't returned his calls, but that was typical when she was angry with him. That was Melissa. She'd run away from him before but had always returned. He couldn't control her, and he didn't want to. But it would be nice if she could learn to trust him with her feelings.

Activity was a good way to refocus. Nick took all the pages out of each file and arranged them according to the primary subject matter covered on that page. There wasn't much room left on the desk, just a few slivers of dark brown outlining the manila folders.

He narrowed down the categories to the mother's history, the mother's school records, foster home care, and some basic intelligence and ability tests that were run on all the babies who came to Sunshine at three, six, nine, and twelve months. There were also the children's medical records and sometimes information about the father when it was known. Then there was the pile of his own notes from his conversations with the foster families.

Got to find the common denominator. He moved the closest heap of papers in front of him, donned his reading glasses, took the cap off his pen, beginning to read.

Nick toiled through each page, underlining all statements and details that seemed repetitive. The process took a while, and frankly, it was tedious.

The first set he worked through included the mother's histories-there were lots of commonalities. Drugs, poverty, and youth were the common denominators here, but he was sure that the mothers of the children who had not gone missing had similar stories.

The process was tiresome, but this was the most important part of any investigation. Having had to do this sort of thing for years had taught him the value of patience and the need to be thorough and meticulous. He went slowly through each page and each pile because there was no way of knowing where the critical evidence would be found. He was good at this. It was a rather lackluster but valuable skill to have, and probably one of the chief reasons he'd had such a successful career in the CIA. What did that say about him? That he was boring?

Finally, he came across something that commanded his interest. Intelligence scores, whenever they were provided, were incredibly high. This was true for both the mothers and the babies. And sometimes, when there was complete information about the father, his recorded IQ was usually Mensa level.

Nick picked up Melissa's chart next. He'd intentionally avoided looking at her part of Sidney's file until he couldn't avoid it any longer. Jesus! She had an IQ of 185. And, she'd never told him that she had gone to all those special schools for the super-gifted. He'd known she was smart, but he'd never realized she was a genius.

Nick pulled his glasses down to the end of his nose. As bright as Melissa was, it hadn't stopped her from getting messed up on drugs. She had never turned into a true addict, so it wasn't a biochemical thing for her. Maybe it had just been a way to quiet her overactive mind at a time when it was difficult to shut off her thoughts and worries.

Nick snorted. Maybe that was why he'd never been bothered too much by his problems. He just wasn't that smart. Oh, he was smart enough to do his work well, but not IQ-of-185 smart. Maybe that made him better off. Or maybe his mind was just shooting off random bullshit.

Laughing off his mini-adventure into psychoanalysis, Nick made a list of all the intelligence scores he could pinpoint -a much more productive use of his time.

The method Sunshine had used to calculate intelligence scores for babies of three, six, nine, and twelve months utilized a test he'd never seen before. Sunshine Children's Homes, or someone who controlled them, must have developed the test. Within its parameters, all of the special Sunshine children scored significantly higher than their peers. The IQ scores of the mothers, babies, and fathers all ranged primarily from 155-195. They were occasionally higher but never lower. Jesus.

Nick grabbed his phone from the desk and typed the same text he had been sending Sam for days: Any identification on the subject?

Nick waited a while, but Sam didn't answer. Recently, Sam had declined to return all of Nick's calls. He might have found out that there was a connection between Sunshine Children's Homes and the man Nick had asked him to identify. Sam had made it very clear that he wouldn't have anything to do with an investigation into Sunshine.

Nick would have to find a different way to get what he needed. Taking out his black leather-bound notebook, he jotted down key points. He'd just begun to write the first item on his list when his phone buzzed. It was a text from Sam: Stay away from Sunshine. They're onto you.

Nick replied: What do you mean?

You're being followed.

That was impossible. Nick knew both how to follow people and when he was being followed. In other words, he would know if he was being followed! He wasn't. Screw Prezziato and his damn Mafia bullshit.