by Ronie Kendig
“Do what?”
“Promise Brooke you’d watch after Evie.”
He didn’t have time for that conversation. Ever. “Grab your things.” He turned to Cell, relieved when Haven hurried to get whatever she needed. “Should be back in an hour.”
Cell nodded, monitoring the data. He pointed to a laptop. “Message from Ram—he wants you to swing by the professor’s place.”
“Roger,” Tox said. “Keep hunting down Abidaoud.”
“Uh, aren’t we worried about getting bombed again?”
“Every day. But if we stop? They win. We’re not going to stop.” Tox patted his shoulder. “Besides, you know how not to get caught, right?”
“Copy that.”
Tox and Haven made the drive to the hospital in silence, his mind hopping from their visit with Tzaddik to the mission ahead—finding Abidaoud and Kaine while Dr. Cathey and Tzivia searched for the missing censers, but it invariably landed on the incident on the plane. Which ticked him off. He didn’t need distraction.
Was there time to save Evie, even if they found a cure?
“I shouldn’t be doing this.” Only when Haven looked at him did he realize he’d spoken aloud. “She thinks I’m dead.”
“A certain text of yours changed that.”
He smirked, remembering the pseudo-threatening message he’d sent more as a warning to Galen. He’d never hurt Evie. “Forgot about that. Just don’t want things to be awkward or weird.” But not being in her life since her birth sort of wrecked that.
“Relax,” Haven whispered. “She’s in a coma, remember? She probably won’t know you’re there.”
Like most of her life.
“Hey.” Haven touched his arm. “What’s wrong?”
“She found out I was alive two weeks ago, and now she’s fighting for her life.” Why was that bothering him so much now? It was better for her safety. Tox stretched his jaw as he navigated a roundabout. “If she’s not conscious, why are we going to see her?”
“Scientists believe the unconscious can hear us, but even if that weren’t true, it’s for us, Cole.”
He glanced at her.
“Tell me it won’t help you to see she’s still alive.”
“What I’ll see is a twelve-year-old fighting for her life because of me.”
“No, she’s fighting for her life because of the AFO.” She braced as they turned a corner. “Besides—as you said—you promised Brooke.”
Man, she was good, bringing that up again. “Cheap shot.”
“Only if it doesn’t work.”
He gritted his teeth and spotted the sign for the hospital. As he drove down the street, eyeing the multistoried building, he realized what a perfect death alley the street formed. He scanned rooftops. Perfect for snipers or those with phosphorus arrows. Just like in Israel.
Made sense. Target his brother’s daughter. Wait for them to show up. Pick them off. With the way the AFO was connected, they would also escape without notice.
A light touch to his arm gave him a start. He glanced at Haven.
“You’re rubbing the wheel,” she said, nodding to his hand where he flexed his wrist up and back, over and over as the car glided beneath trees and between cars parked along the curb. “Worried?”
“Always.” Tox slid past the hospital, not comfortable with the parking arrangements. As bad as climbing stairs. They’d be fish in a barrel.
“You passed it.”
He whipped the wheel to the left and swung around into the emergency entrance beneath the portico. “Wait.” Out of the car, he hustled around, scanning the area, rooftops, other cars as he opened the passenger door. He pressed close. Not because he wanted to, but because he wasn’t going to give them a clear shot at her. “Okay, quickly.”
Haven stepped out. He wrapped an arm around her waist. “Stay close. Walk fast.”
“You’re terrifying me.”
Tox ushered her through the sliding doors of the emergency entrance. Inside, he kept Haven snugged against his side, hurrying into the main portion of the hospital. He called Galen. “We’re in the ER. How do we get to you?”
“I’ll send a security detail down.”
With his back to a wall, Tox turned Haven toward him.
“Did you see something?” Her voice grew husky in anticipation of danger.
“You rarely see it coming.” He managed a half smile. “I think we’re okay.”
“No, you don’t.”
Tox met her gaze, surprised that laughter hid in her words, yet there was no mirth in her face.
She swallowed. “I see it all over your face. Your body language.”
He kept forgetting she was a deception expert. “Always anticipate danger. Stay alert and you have a better chance of staying alive.”
“But you went on edge when we drove down the street.”
“It was a well—perfect vantage on both sides for snipers, no easy egress. Perfect for Tanin to set up on a rooftop and pick us off.”
Haven processed the words. Slowly nodded.
Two suits emerged through a small door. One of them peeled off toward the entrance and Tox’s car.
“C’mon.” Hand on her shoulder, Tox guided her toward the other Secret Service agent. He wanted out of that waiting area and out of sight. They were ushered to a deserted third-floor wing run by a limited staff. It was creepy. Like something out of a horror movie, with the silence broken by hissing machines. At the far end, his brother turned at the sound of their footsteps.
Haven rushed forward and hugged Galen. Something about that twisted Tox into knots. Wouldn’t be the first girl Galen had stolen.
Of course, she’d have to be Tox’s to be stolen. And she wasn’t.
“I’m glad you came,” Galen said, hugging her.
“Me too.” Haven stepped back and indicated the glass wall separating them from Evie. “She looks so pale.”
Tox moved to the wall. His niece had gotten big. And yet she also looked so fragile lying there, machines and tubes threading in and out of her body.
“How’s she doing?” Haven asked.
“With the induced coma, they slowed the progress of the disease.”
Tox couldn’t help but think of all the doctors and scientists working night and day to stop the spread of the New Black Death. “Any word on an antidote from India?”
“Benowitz said they’re getting close—thanks to the blood of that archaeologist.” Grief weighted Galen’s voice and shoulders.
He heard what his brother wasn’t saying. Close might not be good enough. Tox looked at Galen, really seeing him for the first time in decades. He had more gray than Tox had realized. A little heavier, but maybe that was just maturity. He was the spitting image of their father, the disapproving, grave man who’d shaped Tox into the rebel he was. Worry lines had carved into Galen’s brow after years of being a single father while he ran a country. Without his wife. Without Brooke. How would Brooke handle this, seeing her daughter at death’s door? She’d shriek at them both for putting Evie in the hospital.
His mind slid into the past. Blood gurgling in her throat. Shock bulging her brown eyes. “Promise me . . .”
Strangling a cry, Tox nodded as he cradled her broken body in his arms. “Anything.” Sticky warmth slid through his fingers. Blood. Her blood.
“Watch”—she coughed, red-tinged spittle hitting him—“Protect Evie and . . . Haven.”
“I . . . shh. You’ll be fine.” He couldn’t do what she asked. This mission, his actions, dictated his isolation for the rest of his life. But he’d do whatever she wanted if—“Just fight, Brooke. Live!”
“Promise,” she demanded, blood bubbling in the corners of her mouth.
“Okay.” No, he couldn’t release her. “Yes. I promise.”
“Cole?” the soft soothing voice and touch called him back to the present.
Broken all over again, he steeled himself as Haven’s presence saturated his awareness. She nodded behind him. He gritted h
is teeth when he saw Barry Attaway coming down the semi-darkened hall.
“Can we talk?” Attaway asked, piercing Tox with a glare.
Bring it, old man. “I’m here for my niece. Then I have to hunt down the dogs who did this to her.”
“Yeah, about that . . .” Barry bobbed his head to the side then started walking away.
“I—”
Haven joined him. “Maybe he knows where Abidaoud is.”
Tox’s fingers curled in. He clenched his fists and conceded the point.
“You don’t have to like him to get information,” Haven whispered, making him turn from his anger to her. “We have to save Evie. He might have the key.”
His gaze flipped to the private hospital room that held his niece, and he nodded. Focused on the empty hallway. Which room? To the right, three rooms up, a door stood open. Tox headed there and checked around the corner.
“We don’t have much time,” Attaway said.
Tox stepped into the hospital room full of bare beds and curtains flung back. Blinds shut. A black feed dome hung from a corner tile. Not live. “Time for what? Shouldn’t you be holding down the fort back home?”
“We were scheduled for a diplomatic trip anyway. Just came a few days early. Besides, I’d think you’d be grateful I could manage things here while your brother worries over your niece.”
No way would he give this guy an inch in his life or mind. “You wanted to talk.”
Hands stuffed in his suit pockets, Attaway huffed. “I have information.”
Wasn’t that obvious if he wanted to talk privately? What didn’t he want the others to hear? Who was he trying to keep something from? Tox had learned long ago not to give anything away with words. Silence tended to make people uncomfortable, forced them to talk.
“Almstedt said you were heading out to find the members of the Arrow & Flame.” Attaway’s eyes narrowed slightly, as if he wanted Tox to react.
He didn’t.
“I’ve had people digging into the AFO for years.”
This should be telling. If he had people looking into them for years, shouldn’t he know Abidaoud’s location? “What put them on your radar so long ago?”
“Their fingerprints are on several major events—the bombing of the Rosenberg, the collapse of the metro lines two years ago. I even think they might’ve had a role in Kafr al-Ayn.”
Interesting.
Barry shrugged. “Many other major events have been suggested by my task force. The AFO is not above catastrophic results, thousands dead. One might even say that’s their signature. The bigger the impact, the more likely it’s the AFO. They aren’t about flash. Just the aftermath.”
“To what end?”
“Power. They have key players in most every government.”
“American?”
“Without a doubt.” Attaway ran a hand through his thinning hair. “Just haven’t figured out who. We’re narrowing in.”
“Good.” AFO members who’d infiltrated the U.S. government needed to be burned at the stake before someone nuked the daylights out of his homeland.
“But like I said, my team has been digging for a while, so trust me when I say I’d be looking elsewhere.”
Suspicion crowded Tox. “Like?”
“Naftali Regev.”
Tox’s phone buzzed and he extracted it from his pocket. Ram.
“Look into Regev,” Barry said. “I might be wrong, but I’d wager that’s where you need to start.” He patted Tox’s arm and swept past. “I’ll catch you later.”
Not if I can help it. He put the phone to his ear and pivoted, surprised to see Haven outside the room. “Ram.” Thank goodness he had a reason not to talk to her. He wasn’t good at staying within the lines of his own rules, especially when they were alone.
“Where are you?” Ram asked.
“Hospital.”
“You need to get back here.”
39
— Day 13 —
London, England
Tzivia wandered into a small room at the back of the farm estate outside London. “What’s that?”
Dr. Cathey looked up, delight in his eyes. “When we were at Mr. Tzaddik’s, I asked to read a journal. These are my notes.”
Sliding into the chair beside him, she eyed the notes. One name caught her attention. “Thefarie. That name keeps coming up.”
“Unusual, isn’t it? Since we found that mark on the leaf and since Akiva mentioned it when I visited him, I asked Ti if I could look at his copy of the journal.” He scattered the pages across the table. “It is as I thought—Thefarie searched for the censers during one outbreak. It took him decades, but he only found three.”
“The three we found in the wooden chest! With the Templar cross on it.”
“Yes, my belief also. But with only three . . .”
“He couldn’t stop the plague.”
“No.”
“But why did he tear a page from the Codex? I thought he’d have respect for it rather than mark it up.”
“I’m not sure he tore it from the Codex.”
“Then how did it get there?”
Dr. Cathey pointed to a phrase he’d written.
Tzivia sucked in a breath. “‘God knows.’” The words the Stranger had spoken to her before Kafr al-Ayn.
He smiled at her. “He wrote that when he wondered at the fourth miktereth’s location.”
“That’s what Tzaddik said to me in France.” Her brain cramped. “Who is he? Why was he there?”
“That’s a question for later.”
“Is it?”
“Yes. Plague first.”
She scratched her forehead, frustrated. Confused. “But—but the fourth censer, the leaf was sealed to it by a red cord and wax with the Templar symbol. If Thefarie didn’t do it . . . how’d it get there?”
With a long, frustrated sigh, Dr. Cathey groaned. “Oh, I have no answers for you there, my dear. We have more questions with each step we take.” He nodded. “I fear I must speak with Akiva again.”
“Why?”
“Something Thefarie wrote in his journals.” He shook his head. “It is probably just the imaginings of an old man.”
****
Cole emerged from the darkened hospital room like a storm. “Let’s go,” he said, aiming for his brother. “Got a call. Time to head out.”
Galen turned. Something flickered through his eyes that slowed Kasey, but she felt Cole’s hand at the small of her back. “Tox—”
“Sorry.” Cole nudged Kasey toward the elevators. “To save Evie, we need to get on this.”
At those words, anger bubbled through Kasey. It was true, they had to work to find someone with answers to the disease, but leaving here, rushing out wasn’t directly related to that.
“Security moved your car.” Galen’s words were clipped and loud.
Cole stopped. “Where?”
“In the garage.” Galen nodded to a suit who stepped out of an elevator. “Mark will take you down.”
Kasey removed herself from Cole’s possession—for that was what it felt like—and hugged her brother-in-law. “Let me know if there’s any change.”
Galen lowered his head and whispered, “He’s trouble, Haven. Don’t let Tox bend your mind.”
Heat climbed into her cheeks. She patted his arm then backed away. “Call if anything changes.”
They made it down to the garage in two minutes and were pulling into the warm London afternoon within five. Cole navigated the streets like a pro.
“It was cruel to use Galen’s concern for Evie to get us out of there,” she chided.
“I wasn’t using anything. It’s true. We have work to do.”
“Then you could’ve just said that.”
Cole kept his eyes on the road, one hand hooked over the wheel, the other resting on the gear shift. “Why were you snooping on me and Attaway?”
Surprise tugged at her. “I wasn’t—I mean, I didn’t intend to snoop.” She would not lie to hi
m. “Galen asked for you, so I came to find you. Noticed Barry’s posture. Saw the twitch in his face.”
“It’s his job to lie to people.”
“That’s a pretty cynical view.” Yet he was probably right. “But he wanted you to know something, and I knew it had to be important because he pulled you away from Galen and me.”
Cole eased up to a red light, his expression stony.
“What’re you thinking?” she finally asked once they were under way again.
He opened his mouth. Froze.
Tires pealed as the car braked hard. THUNK!
“Get down!” His hand cuffed the back of her head then grabbed the gear shift.
He rammed it into first and nailed the gas.
Kasey bent away from the windows, her mind registering several things in that split second: someone was attacking them, an arrow had struck the hood of the car, and Cole hadn’t flinched once.
“Here,” Cole barked as he flung his phone at her, then worked the gearshift and whipped the car around to the right. “Call Ram.”
The car veered right. Then left. Her head smacked the console. Right again. The glove box clipped her ear as Kasey worked his phone, trying to find the contacts. Last call—his last one had been from Ram. She pulled it up. “Number’s blocked.”
Cole rattled off a series of numbers, and she quickly entered them and hit the call icon.
Crack! Another three-sixty, and she was flung against her window. The phone flipped from her hand. Kasey hauled herself upright, reaching for the device, but it slid.
The car spun around. Clunk-clunk-clunk!
Kasey whimpered, trying to reach the phone and avoid having her head banged to a pulp. Her fingers grazed the edge of the device. She grunted and pushed forward, stretching. And caught it.
She lifted it. And saw a blur of black.
Cole cursed.
In a dizzying, terrifying instant, she saw the grill of a truck barreling toward her. Kasey screamed.
40
— Day 13 —
London
Metal and glass flung into a whirlwind. Crunching and groaning pervaded Tox’s hearing. The world spun into a blur of silver and black. His head felt like someone had taken a hammer to it. With a deceptively soft rocking motion, the car stilled. The world fell out of warp.