Talons of the Falcon

by Rebecca York

  His gaze focused on the circles under her eyes. “You do, too.”

  “Later. But maybe I could use some breakfast. I’ll come right back when I’m finished.”

  “Take your time. I’m not going anywhere.”

  She smiled. It was a good sign that he could joke about his situation. “All right.”

  Eden had been to the cafeteria once before. It was downstairs and in the next wing. As she walked down the hall one of the nurses stopped her.

  “Are you after some breakfast?”

  “Yes.”

  “There’s a cart that stops at the station near the elevator. You can get coffee and a Brötchen there.”

  “Thanks for the tip.” A roll was about all her stomach could tolerate at the moment.

  As she stood in the short line waiting her turn, she looked around at the familiar military hospital setting. They were giving Mark one hundred percent here, and she was grateful that he was on his way to recovery. But she was grateful for a lot of things. He was finally safe. And now that the Orion project was secure again, they were going to have the opportunity to obliterate the last of Erlich’s legacy. More than that, there would be time for the two of them to work on their personal relationship.

  Eden was buttering the light-textured breakfast roll when the elevator doors slid open and an orderly came out pushing an empty gurney. He was bald and swarthy. And like many of the other personnel he was dressed in a green cotton uniform. Something about his face stirred her memory. His jaw was set in a hard line, as though he was concentrating intensely on something.

  Her gaze flicked to his hands. They, too, looked familiar. Had he been in one of the V.A. hospitals where she’d worked? she wondered idly as she stirred sugar into her coffee. She followed his progress down the hall, noting the muscular hunched shoulders.

  She watched him head toward Mark’s room. He stopped for a brief exchange with the guard at the door, and she could see him showing his identification pass. He left the gurney outside and disappeared from view.

  And then all at once she knew.

  “My God!” she screamed, and dropped the cup of coffee. The scalding liquid seared her leg, but she didn’t even notice.

  Everyone in the little group around the breakfast cart pivoted in her direction, startled looks on their faces.

  “Take it easy,” one of the doctors soothed.

  “What’s wrong?” someone else asked urgently, rushing to her side. A comforting hand was laid on her shoulder.

  They seemed to think she’d flipped out from the strain.

  “No! Let me go! That man’s here to kill Mark.”

  Fear gripped her chest like an iron vise, and she was running down the hall toward his room even as she shook the comforting hand off her shoulder. A few moments ago she had been thanking God that the nightmare was finally over. Now she had been startled awake to find that the horror was still going on, here, now.

  At the door the guard took in her wide-eyed appearance and stepped protectively in front of the barrier.

  “Let me in. He’s going to kill Mark,” she repeated.

  The guard hesitated, searching her face. Eden reached for the doorknob, ducking and shoving the wooden barrier with her shoulder at the same time. The momentum carried her halfway across the room and she stumbled against the bed.

  Mark’s eyes flew open. “What?” And then he, too, saw who was standing over him. An expletive formed on his lips.

  Wayne Marshall had almost finished injecting the contents of a small hypodermic needle into the tube leading from Mark’s IV bottle. He turned in surprise at the commotion.

  From her half crouch on the floor, Eden reached up and wrenched the IV needle from the back of Mark’s hand. He groaned as the clear liquid dripped slowly onto the floor. Marshall grabbed for the tube, his gaze darting from Mark to Eden.

  “Bitch,” he growled. “I should have finished you off at Pine Island when I had the chance.”

  Mark’s eyes were alert. If he could, he would have taken Marshall on. But in his weakened condition it was a struggle to move. Yet Eden saw him edging away from the deadly needle.

  As she watched, her anger flared white-hot. It blotted any fear for her own safety, and she sprang at Marshall, her fingernails clawing at his head and face.

  But her attack was nothing against his strength. Even with the gunshot wound she knew he had sustained two weeks ago, he was able to throw her off. She landed in a heap against the wall, gasping for breath. Mark was half-out of the bed on the side away from Marshall. Thank God there was a solid object between the two of them now. He hit the floor and muffled his own scream of agony.

  The whole scene from the time she’d entered the room couldn’t have taken more than thirty seconds, yet it seemed like a lifetime. Was this nightmare ever going to end?

  The guard had regained his balance and drawn his gun. Quickly he sized up the situation. “All right, fellow, don’t move,” he commanded.

  He stepped into the room and two other security men followed.

  A look of defeat washed over Marshall’s face. In one swift motion he raised the IV tube and plunged the needle into his own arm. As Eden watched openmouthed, he slumped to the floor. There was a gurgling noise in his throat, and his body convulsed. Then he went completely still. Eden didn’t have to be told that he was dead.

  God, that was what Marshall had planned for Mark! She crawled blindly toward the man she loved so much, tears streaming down her cheeks. Then she was pressing her face against his bandaged chest, and his good arm came up to press her close.

  “Eden, it is over now. I promise you it’s all over now,” he said.

  * * *

  EDEN NOSED the rented Buick down the twisting lane. Through the broad windshield she could see the oaks and maples of the Virginia countryside ablaze with scarlet and gold, and she could feel an autumn crispness in the air.

  When they reached the beveled, wooden No Vacancy sign by the gate, she looked over at her passenger and grinned.

  Mark smiled back. They both knew that the information didn’t apply to them. There was definitely a room ready and waiting for them at the Aviary.

  At the top of the drive Eden stopped the car and went around to help Mark out. The cast was off his leg, and with his hair back to its natural raven darkness, he’d shed the extra ten years he’d taken on as a disguise. All in all, the man in the passenger seat looked handsome and fit in his blue air force uniform. But he was still under doctor’s orders to use a crutch. The edict hadn’t pleased him, but he’d found over the last several weeks that the woman beside him had a great respect for doctor’s orders. The only times she’d bent the rules had been when she’d propped a chair under the knob of the hospital room door and given him her own brand of physical therapy. Of course, with his leg in a cast, she’d been on top of matters there, too. But he hadn’t exactly minded.

  She caught the expression on his face and suspected they might be remembering the same thing.

  “I trust you’re going to leave some details out of your full report to Gordon,” she teased.

  He raised an eyebrow. “Lie to my superior?”

  “No, just protect my modesty.”

  He looked at her for a moment, thinking of everything she had gone through for him, and an overwhelming feeling of tenderness welled up inside him. “I’ll protect you,” he whispered. “And to prove it, I’ll warn you that Gordon’s got a hidden TV camera and mike trained on the entrance to this place. So we’d better quit talking and go in.”

  Eden studied the topiary birds guarding the door, the triangular pediment and the carving around the bull’s-eye window, seeing nothing out of the ordinary. The surveillance equipment was well hidden. But after all she’d learned about the Falcon, she shouldn’t be surprised about the precaution.

  Her thoughts were interrupted as the door swung open, and Constance McGuire came down the steps.

  “Eden, Mark, welcome back,” she said, giving them each a quic
k hug.

  The younger woman returned the greeting with fondness. Through the ordeal of the past several months, Constance had been a touchstone—someone who had planned for everything from her well-dressed spy’s wardrobe to the equipment Eden and Mark had needed for their escape from Pine Island.

  “I’m glad to be back,” Mark said as they followed her down the hall.

  Eden gave him a quizzical look. Her feelings about the Aviary and everything it symbolized were still ambivalent. The Falcon had brought her here to save Mark. Yet when she’d first joined his very dangerous game, she’d been little more than a pawn. It was only later that she’d become one of the decision makers. But that role had carried its own responsibilities. The security of the free world had been hanging in the balance during their private ordeal.

  Spymaster Amherst Gordon was standing where she’d first seen him in the solarium. Cicero was on his wooden perch. To her surprise the brightly colored parrot flapped its wings and squawked a greeting to her as she entered the roomful of tropical foliage. Outside it might be fall. But it would always be summer in here.

  “You’ve just received a high honor,” Amherst Gordon observed. “Cicero doesn’t give his approval lightly.”

  Eden inclined her head slightly as she acknowledged the compliment.

  “I’d like to add my congratulations for a job well-done.” He turned to Mark. “And on your promotion to full colonel.”

  Eden and Mark exchanged glances.

  “Congratulations,” she whispered.

  “Thanks.”

  They pulled up chairs at the wrought-iron table and Constance came in with a tea tray. Eden was struck with a feeling of déjà vu. It had all started like this, she remembered.

  “By the way, the President has been fully briefed on what happened in Berlin. He adds his thanks to mine,” the Falcon said.

  After stirring sugar and cream into his tea, he continued. “I’m sure the two of you still have questions. Let me give you some tidbits that I didn’t dare discuss outside these four walls. I have an informant in Madrid, code-name Raven. He verified that your decoy microdot got back to Moscow. They’re furious about losing their man in the Pentagon.”

  “That almost makes me feel sorry for Rozonov,” Mark admitted.

  The Falcon raised a questioning eyebrow. “Why?”

  “It isn’t in my report, but there’s a good probability that he saved my life.”

  “Undoubtedly he was sent to Berlin not just to get the microdot but also to make an example out of Erlich. That part of his mission must have been successful. I’ll wager the East Germans will think twice the next time they butt into a Soviet Intelligence operation,” Gordon said.

  Eden nodded as a few more pieces of the picture fell into place.

  Mark finally introduced the topic she hadn’t wanted to bring up. “And what about Wayne Marshall?”

  “What about him?” the Falcon asked.

  “How did he get into that military hospital in Berlin?”

  “When I went back through his records, I found he’d done a tour there. So he knew the hospital and its routine. He must have kept his identification card. As for the Kojak disguise, that was probably the easiest way for him to change his appearance with limited time and resources.”

  “We assume he was acting on his own twisted initiative,” Constance added, looking at Mark. “Killing you must have become an obsession with him after you escaped from Pine Island.”

  Under the table, Eden’s fingers gripped the edge of her chair. She knew firsthand how dangerous someone with a twisted mind like Wayne Marshall’s could be. Thank God he wasn’t going to be a threat to her or Mark ever again.

  They went on to discuss Humphrey Strickland’s arrest, along with the arrests of several other agents in his spy network.

  “You’ll be happy to know Ross Downing is in charge of the interrogation,” the Falcon informed them.

  “Poetic justice,” Eden murmured.

  “And what’s your assessment of the damage Strickland did to Orion?” Mark asked, looking across the table at Gordon.

  “By catching him now, we have minimized the damage. If he had gone undetected much longer, the contracts would have been awarded, and it would have been astronomically expensive to change any of the designs. All the Russians have now is overviews that won’t do them a damn bit of good once the project is operational. Downing’s job will be to find out what other projects he may have jeopardized, along with the identities of other Soviet agents we haven’t yet picked up.”

  For the next two hours they discussed other aspects of the operation. Eden couldn’t believe how quickly the time slipped by. It was late in the afternoon when Constance finally asked if they wanted to relax for a few hours before dinner. Several times during the discussion she’d silently slipped out of the room. Each time she’d returned with a preoccupied look on her face.

  Connie’s suggestion could have been made for Mark’s benefit. After all, he was still recovering. Yet from the woman’s expression Eden guessed that the director of the Peregrine Connection and his assistant probably had urgent business they needed to discuss.

  “I’ve given you the Jefferson room, and your luggage is already unpacked,” Connie informed them crisply. There was no pretense of their being assigned separate quarters this time.

  Once they were alone, Eden glanced at Mark. He was a remarkable man, and her love for him knew no bounds. Yet she’d heard the old enthusiasm in his voice when he’d recalled the Orion mission.

  When they’d talked about Mark’s immediate future, Gordon had ruled out fieldwork for him. He was scheduled for three months R and R, during which they would continue his therapy program. When he returned to active duty, he would be assigned as an air force liaison in the Situation Room at the Pentagon. She wondered if that would satisfy his need to be where the action was. He would no longer be in physical danger. But he’d certainly be handling crises on a global scale.

  And if that wasn’t enough, perhaps she could help supply the element of adventure he needed in his life. She’d already started putting out feelers for a job in the D.C. area.

  “Well, where do we go from here?” she asked.

  He looked across at the wide bed with its quilted damask spread. “How about over there for starters?” As he spoke he tossed the crutch against a high-backed armchair and pulled her body tightly to his. As always, she melted against him, and her head tipped eagerly upward for his kiss.

  When his warm lips finally lifted from hers, he splayed his fingers out across her cheeks. “I love you,” he whispered.

  She tucked that knowledge into a corner of her heart. “I love you, too.”

  But she didn’t need to cling to Mark for strength. Over the past few months she’d found a reserve of fortitude she’d never known she possessed. She’d fought for the man she loved, and won. That knowledge made her sure she could do the same with whatever lay ahead in the future.

  ISBN: 978-1-4592-8360-2

  Talons of the Falcon

  Copyright © 1986 by Ruth Glick and Eileen Buckholtz

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