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The slide locked back on Bu
But it wasn’t necessary. The gunfire from inside had died.
Bu
Bu
“Clear!” Top yelled as he checked all points of the small main room. He kicked the weapons away from the slack and bloody hands of the Russians. “Secure this and call it in,” he ordered as he pivoted and ran back out into the hallway to check on Big Bob.
Bu
“Damn,” Bu
Top had used a switchblade to cut away Faraday’s jacket shirt and the straps of his Kevlar vest. Bu
Big Bob was unconscious, his eyes half-closed and his lips begi
“Christ, this is bad,” Bu
Top was a lifelong expert in karate and knew a great deal about anatomy. He studied the placement of the wounds and shook his head. “I think the rounds clipped his liver and one kidney. There must be lung damage, but it’s not sucking.”
“Is that bad?”
“It’s not good. Lung could be filled with blood already.”
The sirens were louder now, outside. He heard people yelling and then the pounding of feet as EMTs and uniformed cops ran down the hall toward them. The EMTs pushed past them and began their own wound care, but they listened to Top’s professional assessments.
“We’ll take over from here, sir,” they said, and the agents backed off.
The cops circled them and Bu
Top stood in the doorway and looked at the carnage.
“This don’t make sense,” Bu
“Sounded like it to me. Or close enough.”
“Russian Mafia?” Bu
“Shit if I know, Farmboy. But these guys were pros of some kind. Ex-police or ex-Russian military. They knew how to ambush a door knock.”
On the floor by the overturned table was a device that looked like a PDA. Someone, presumably one of the Russians, had attached it to Gilpin’s hard drive with narrow cables.
“Looks like they were downloading his shit,” said Bu
“No way to know if they were downloading the data to take it or forwarding it on. Maybe they tortured him to get his passwords.”
“All this for a computer hacker?”
“I think we just stepped in somebody else’s shit.”
Bu
“Hooah,” murmured Top. “The captain’s going to take this amiss.”
“We’d better call him.”
“He’s at the cemetery this morning.”
“He’ll want to know about this,” Bu
Top looked at the code. “Uh-oh,” he said. “It’s the big man.” He flipped open his phone. “Sir.”
Mr. Church said, “Operations just informed me that there’s been an incident, that one of ours is down. Give me a sit rep.”
Top told him everything. “EMTs don’t like what they’re seeing. Big Bob’s in the ambulance now. We were just about to call Captain Ledger.”
“Scratch that, First Sergeant. We have a more pressing problem.”
“Sir?”
Church told him about the NSA. “It’s possible you men are off their radar because you’ve been operating with Bureau credentials, but now that this has happened the bloodhounds will be ru
“What do you want us to do?”
“As soon as Captain Ledger surfaces we’ll find you some air transport and the three of you will head west. We’ve lost track of the Denver team and that incident may be separate from this-and it may be a lot more important,” Church said. “I want you two to vanish. Get off the radar and stay off until you make contact with Major Courtland, Captain Ledger, or myself. Don’t get taken. You may use any methods short of lethal force.” He read off a string of possible locations and made Top read them back. “Go to each one in order. Wait ten minutes. If Captain Ledger does not come, proceed to the next one until you rendezvous. He’ll have further instructions.”
“Yes, sir.” Top paused. “But what about Big Bob? We were going to go to the hospital once Jerry Spencer gets here.”
“Agent Spencer will neither need nor want your help, First Sergeant; and as for Sergeant Faraday… he’ll be protected. I have some friends in Wilmington who will watchdog him. I want you and Sergeant Rabbit to get mobile and get gone most riki-tik.”
He hung up.
Bu
“I don’t know, Farmboy, but the man said to get our asses into the wind, so let’s boogie.”
Bu
“Son of a bitch must pay,” Bu
Top nodded. “Hooah.”
Then they were gone.
Chapter Fourteen
Cotonou, Benin
Six days ago
Dr. Arjeta Hlasek sat back in her chair, her pointed chin resting on the tips of steepled fingers. Her expression was a patchwork of doubt, concern, and alarm. The two doctors who sat on the other side of her desk looked road worn and deeply stressed, their eyes hollow with exhaustion. Both of them sat straight in their chairs, their hands fidgeting on the stacks of test results and lab reports they each had on their laps.
“I… don’t know what to say,” began Dr. Hlasek. “This is disturbing to say the least, but what you’re describing… Well, I don’t know.”
The younger of her visitors, Dr. Rina Panjay, leaned forward, her voice low and urgent. “Dr. Hlasek… we’ve done the tests. We’ve had blind verification from two separate labs, and they verify what our own tests show.”
“She’s right, Arjeta,” agreed Thomas Smithwick. “And I can understand your hesitation. I didn’t believe it, either, when Rina first told me. I ran every kind of test I could think of-most of them several times. The lab work doesn’t even vary; it’s not like there’s a margin for error here.”
“But,” Dr. Hlasek said, half-smiling, “a genetic disease that has mysteriously mutated into a waterborne pathogen? There’s no precedent for something like this.”
Smithwick paused, then said, “There wouldn’t be… not outside of a biological warfare facility.”
“You think that’s what you’ve found? A new bioweapon that somehow escaped quarantine and has gotten into the water supply in Ouémé? That’s a lot to swallow, Thomas. Who would do such a thing? Moreover, who would fund research of that kind? It’s absurd; it’s fantasy.”