by Alex Archer
Annja felt the wound growing and saw more blood spilling into the water. She wanted to scream. Sweat broke out under her mask.
Annja chopped down on Heinkel’s hand and broke his contact with the spear.
But that gave Mueller the opening he needed and he drove in, plunging the knife in between Annja’s ribs.
Annja sucked air and water and screeched despite the mouthpiece.
More blood poured into the water.
Annja smashed an elbow into Mueller’s face and he pulled away. She’d broken his nose.
Annja willed the sword back into her hands.
The blade appeared between Mueller and Heinkel.
Their expressions changed and Annja could see the looks of fear.
But fear wasn’t enough to stop men like this.
They both drove in again at her. Slashing and hacking with their knives.
Annja was injured and the water around them became a fuzzy mix of salt water and blood.
She did her best to block their attacks, but she was growing dizzy from fatigue and the loss of blood.
She brought the sword up and swung out at Mueller, who was driving in toward her face again.
She caught him on the underside of his arms, biting into his flesh. He grimaced and fought to get to the surface. How he and Heinkel had managed to hold their breath for so long amazed her.
Mueller was swimming away but Heinkel was still with her.
He came in so hard that Annja felt herself forced back from his onslaught. The flashing steel of his blade bit at her again and again and Annja had only a moment to bring the sword blade up as Heinkel tried to drag her down toward the seabed.
Annja felt her strength slipping. She sucked on her mouthpiece and tried to flush her muscles with the badly needed oxygen.
And in that split second, she found her last bit of strength. She stabbed Heinkel in the stomach, cutting back and forth, tearing him open.
Heinkel clutched at his stomach, and then he was rolling over, drifting up and away.
Annja saw a flash shoot through the bloody water and realized that the great white shark had returned.
Or maybe, she thought on the fringe of consciousness, it was a different great white on patrol.
Either way, Heinkel’s body disappeared in a split second as the shark devoured him.
Annja succumbed to the weightless sensation of drifting and falling into the abyss.
37
Annja awoke surrounded by white light.
But she wasn’t in the water.
She tried to shift and found that she was unable to move. A searing pain bit into her side.
“Easy, Annja. Don’t go tearing those stitches out now.”
She opened her eyes and blinked repeatedly as she tried to adjust to her bright surroundings. “I’m guessing this isn’t heaven.”
She heard laughter. “Hardly. But it might be as close as people like you and me ever get to it.”
She turned her head and saw Vic lying in a bed next to her. His face was bandaged and she saw a lot of tubes going into his body. “Man, do I look as bad as you do?” she asked.
He chuckled. “I’m not going to answer that question, Annja. It might mean I don’t get another chance to take you out for a meal.”
“Uh, I thought that was my line,” another voice said.
Annja smiled as she recognized it. “Hello, George.”
“She still remembers me. I suppose that’s a good thing.”
Annja shook her head. “What the hell happened?” She glanced at Vic again. “I thought you were killed when they stormed the hotel.”
Vic patted his side. “They fished three slugs out of me. Eating solid food might be a problem for a while. But I’ll manage. I’m a survivor. Sorta like you, Annja.”
George peered closer at her. “What the hell were you doing thinking you could take them all on like that?”
Annja tried to shrug but it hurt too much. “No choice. There wasn’t any time left. And I thought that if Vic was dead, the guy they put in charge probably wouldn’t believe me. I had to do it myself.”
George glanced at Vic. “Damned stubborn woman.”
Vic nodded. “And thank God she is. Otherwise, none of us would probably be here right now.”
Annja closed her eyes. She saw flashing images of the last few moments when she thought she was dying in the ocean. “How did they find me?”
She heard Vic’s voice explaining things. “The Coast Guard put some patrols on the water once they found the wreck of the boat you’d been on. They skirted the coast for a while, and then they saw a commotion in the surf ahead of them. They tracked you down to just offshore of the chancellor’s place.”
George’s voice continued the story. “Coast Guard says there were sharks in the water. Did you see any?”
Annja smiled. “You could say that.”
“You could have been killed.”
“Yeah, well, sharks were sort of the least of my worries about that time. I had to stop Spier and his men. They were occupying more of my attention than the sharks were.”
“You were very lucky, Annja,” Vic said.
“We all were,” Annja said. “Did they find Spier?”
“No.”
Annja frowned. “I could have stopped him, but I had to disarm the pearl. I chose the pearl. I had to let Spier go.” She sighed.
“You did the right thing, Annja,” George said. “If that thing had gone off, there’s no telling what sort of damage it would have caused.”
“Did they find the bodies of Spier’s men?”
“Yeah. What’s left of them. Those sharks did a fair number on them before letting the pieces go.”
Annja nodded. “I guess they didn’t much care for the taste of scum.”
“I guess not.”
Annja felt her side. “How bad am I wounded?” She opened her eyes and looked at Vic. “Don’t sugarcoat it, either.”
“You almost lost your spleen. If the knife had gone in a few millimeters farther south, you’d be prone to infection for the rest of your life.” Vic shrugged. “Otherwise, they patched up your thigh, cleaned the wound, which wasn’t bad to begin with thanks to the salt water. You probably feel a helluva lot worse than you actually are, if that helps any.”
“Not really,” Annja said. “So the chancellor is safe?”
“Completely. She left the island this morning, as a matter of fact. Word is you’ll get a commendation.”
Annja sniffed. “Nice of her to stop by and offer it herself.”
Vic laughed. “Yeah, well, don’t count on a politician ever stopping by in person to say thank-you. People like us exist to serve, Annja. Just the way it is.”
“Easy for you to say,” Annja said. “You’re used to that kind of crap. Me? I don’t save politicians’ lives every day.” She shrugged. “Don’t think I’ll make a habit of it, either.”
“Good plan,” Vic said.
Annja looked down to the foot of the bed. George’s face showed epic amounts of concern. “How long until I can get the hell out of here? I’m allergic to hospitals,” she said.
“A week,” George said. “And don’t you dare try to leave any sooner. Or else I’ll get mad.”
Annja smiled. “I wouldn’t want that.”
George waved. “I’ll see you in a few hours. Get some sleep.”
She watched him walk out of the door and then glanced back at Vic. “So, we’re roomies?”
“Yep.”
“How’d you work that?”
“Advantages of being in charge and wounded,” Vic said. “It’s amazing what people will do when you’re still alive after being shot three times.”
Annja sighed. “Did they recover the pearl?”
Vic cleared his throat. “Funny you should mention that. No. They didn’t. They sent a bunch of divers down there, but they never found anything resembling the pearl.”
“That’s not good.”
Vic shrugged. “Nothi
ng we can do about it from here, Annja. Trust me. It was all I could do to stay put while they dug that lead out of me when I knew you were still out there on your own.”
“What happened to Roux?”
Vic frowned. “Uh, I don’t know.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Just what I said. When we went to interrogate Gottlieb, he and George were left behind. George tells me that Roux suddenly said he had to go to the bathroom. The guy got up, walked out and just disappeared.”
Annja sighed. “I’m not surprised.” She glanced at her bedside table. A fresh vase of flowers sat there. “You got me flowers?”
Vic shook his head. “Not from me, sorry.”
Annja saw a card next to the vase. She reached for it and picked it up.
“Glad you made it in one piece—R.”
“Who’s it from?” Vic asked.
Annja looked at the note one last time and then crumpled it up. “No one.”
IT TURNED OUT to be a full week that Annja needed for recovery. She felt like she could have gone home earlier, but George was having none of it. He’d practically stood guard outside her room and took charge of visitors—who could see her and who couldn’t. He’d already run off one of Annja’s colleagues from Chasing History’s Monsters. Annja had finally convinced him that he couldn’t keep her sheltered forever.
“I’ll be going home soon, George. I need to get back to my life.”
“Just remember that you’ve got one,” George said. “And I still intend to collect on our agreement.”
“All right,” Annja said.
Vic left a day before Annja. When he’d finished packing his bags, he came over and sat next to her on the bed. “It was wonderful seeing you again, Annja.”
“You, too.”
Vic smiled. “If you ever manage to get George to stop paying attention to you, I’d like a chance to take you out to dinner myself.”
“Would you, now?”
“Yes. I would.”
Annja nodded. “I’ll keep it in mind. Try not to get yourself killed for the wrong politician. You’re a good man, Vic. You don’t deserve to be expendable just because of someone else’s agenda.”
Vic nudged her. “Neither do you, Annja. We might work for different people, but the game’s pretty much the same.”
Annja sighed. “You won’t get an argument out of me on that one.”
Vic stood and grabbed his bag. “You take care of yourself. I’ll drop you an email with all my contact information. Don’t make me come after you for that date, all right?”
Annja smiled. “Likewise.”
And then he was gone. Back to the shadow world he inhabited. Annja saw a lot of similarities between her world and his. But at least Vic knew who he worked for better than Annja did.
George showed up a few minutes later and Annja knew he’d been good enough to give her and Vic a few moments alone to say goodbye. George might have a mad crush on her, but he was always polite and respectful. Plus, Vic had told her all about how George had assumed command when Vic had been shot.
“He’s got some real good leadership qualities there,” he’d told her. “That guy’s destined for greater things than he knows.”
“Just don’t get him killed,” Annja said.
The next day George helped her pack her bags. “You happy to be going home?”
Annja nodded. “I don’t like hospitals. The sooner I can get out, the better.”
“Been in a lot of them, have you?”
Annja smiled. “More times than I care to recollect. For me, the best care comes from a nice bath back at my loft in Brooklyn. There’s no place like home, you know?”
“Yeah.”
Annja zipped up her bag. “I’m booked on a flight in a couple of hours. Where are you headed?”
“Back to D.C.,” George said. “I used some vacation staying here to make sure you were okay.”
“You did?”
He shrugged. “I wanted to be here in case you needed anything.”
Annja smiled at him. “Tell me something, George.”
“Anything.”
“What have I done to deserve such nice treatment from you? I’ve constantly rebuffed your advances, and yet you’re still so good to me. Why?”
George was quiet for a moment. “Why not? We all need someone, Annja. What good is life if you go through it alone and cold and empty inside? I don’t call that much of a life at all. And trust me, I ought to know. I’ve spent so much time with my machines that I forgot how to interact with people.”
“Seems to me you’re doing a great job.”
George shrugged. “It’s been a struggle. But you know what? You inspired me to keep going. You don’t let anyone’s expectations keep you from living a life that most people simply wouldn’t have the courage to face.”
Annja hefted her bag, aware of the dull ache in her leg. “Thanks, George. I really mean that.”
George eyed her. “Dinner. Don’t forget, okay? I won’t bother you with it now, but once you fully recuperate…”
“I won’t forget,” Annja said. She leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. “I promise.”
They walked out of the hospital together.
38
It took a few hours for Annja to get home from Martha’s Vineyard. The flight from the island to the small airport in Westchester County was rife with turbulence. Annja had spent the majority of the flight thinking how incredibly ironic it would be to come through encounters with sharks, a spear in her leg and multiple knife wounds only to have the plane she was in plummet to the earth on her way home from the hospital.
Fortunately, it stayed aloft, but Annja was thrilled to get off the puddle jumper. She grabbed her bags and walked to the small terminal. At the entrance, she saw a black car waiting and a driver holding a placard with her name on it.
“That’s me,” she said to the youngish driver holding the card. “Who sent the car?”
The driver took her bags. “Your friends at the television show,” he said. “There’s a bottle of champagne on ice in the backseat, if you’d like to spend the drive getting comfortable.”
Annja smiled. “Thanks, but I think I’ll wait until I’m off my medication.”
He nodded. “Looks like you had a pretty bad run-in with a train.”
“You should see the train,” Annja said. “But yeah, let’s just say I’m going to be glad to get home.”
He stowed her bags in the trunk and then opened the door for her. “Well, just let me do the driving and I’ll have you home in no time.”
“Thanks.” Annja ducked inside and slid into the leather seats. The cushioning felt great against her flight-rattled spine. In the foot well, she spotted the bucket of ice with the champagne sticking out of it. Annja reached and lifted the bottle halfway out. It looked delicious. And expensive.
“This is a pretty hefty bottle of champagne,” Annja said. “A 1995 Krug?”
“Clos du Mesnil,” the driver said. “One of only about thirteen thousand bottles produced that year according to the guy at the store.”
“You bought this?”
The driver shrugged. “I was told to make sure you had an expensive bottle to drink at your leisure. I did as I was told.”
Annja looked at the bottle. She knew about the Clos du Mesnil champagne. It was what was known as Blanc de Blanc, coming exclusively from a tiny four-and-a-half-acre walled vineyard that was exclusively chardonnay.
“Well, I will definitely have a nice time with this once I’m better. Thanks for choosing it.”
The driver shrugged. “Just doing my job. But thank you.”
Annja leaned back in the seat and let the rhythm of the car relax her.
She was on several pain medications and had immediately discarded some strong stuff due to its effects on her stomach. But the others she kept. And it did take the edge off, but Annja was always wary of taking too many pills. She’d found they dulled her senses and the last t
hing she needed in her line of work was dull senses.
No thanks.
The driver steered them onto the highway and the engine kicked into a higher gear. The constant hum of the engine put Annja into a drowsy mood.
Before she knew it, she was fast asleep.
“MISS?”
Annja stirred. She took a breath and realized the car had stopped. Glancing out the window, she saw her building.
Home.
“Sorry, it’s been a long trip.”
The driver nodded. “No problem. Glad you were able to rest some on the way.” He held the door as she stepped out.
“Thanks.”
The driver leaned inside the car and came out with the bottle of Krug. “Don’t forget the good stuff, Miss.”
Annja smiled. “You’re a helluva driver, pal. Thanks.”
He touched his hat. “My pleasure. Your bags are right over there on the stoop.”
The driver got back in the car. Within seconds, he was gone.
Annja stood on the front steps of her building and looked up and down the street. “Damn, it’s nice to be back here.”
She picked up her bags, unlocked the front door and walked inside.
She desperately wanted a hot bath.
Inside her loft she put the champagne in the refrigerator. “Got to keep that baby cold,” she said to herself.
She picked up the stereo remote and hit it once. She’d programmed it to always play on shuffle unless she specified otherwise. Instantly, the sound of Cole Porter streamed out of her speakers.
“Nice,” she said quietly.
Annja dumped her bags in her bedroom and then padded into the bathroom to switch on the faucet. She added a sprinkle of lavender bath salts to the water and started to get undressed.
Cole Porter was replaced by Dexter Gordon and Annja nodded approvingly. If the shuffle kept up like this, it would be a good night indeed.
On a whim, she switched her computer on and logged in to check her email. As promised, Vic had sent her his contact information. George had also sent her a note wishing her well.
She saw one farther down from the staff at Chasing History’s Monsters. She opened it. Dear Annja—Hope your flight was good. Love from all!