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Reaching the end of the watery course, Monk swung the pole to the front and prodded it deep. He bolstered it with his shoulder and stopped the raft. This is where they'd make their stand.
Borsakov sat next to the airboat's pilot. The seats were perched high above the flat-bottomed aluminum hull. Ahead of them crouched two of his soldiers; one ma
After five hours of searching, Borsakov's ears ached from all the noise. Behind him, the engine rumbled as the giant fan spun. The broken metal guard over the blades rattled and banged with every turn. The prop-wash that propelled the craft shook reeds and branches behind the boat.
The pilot wore the only set of earphones. He rested one hand on the steering stick, the other on the throttle. The smell of smoke and diesel fuel masked the mossy dampness of the swamp. They idled through a shallow section of open water.
The searchlight swept the reeds that rimmed the edges.
Over the course of the night, they'd seen wild boar and elk, scared eagles from nests, glided past beaver dams and through clouds of insects. Their searchlight had reflected off thousands of smaller eyes, denizens of the swamp.
Still, they'd seen no sign of the escapees.
And on their last tank of fuel, they had until
A simian scream cut through the engine's rumble. It came from the right. The soldiers at the prow heard it, too. Both searchlight and rifle swung in that direction. Borsakov touched the pilot's shoulder and pointed.
In the flash of light, something large swung across a narrow gap in the treeline, then disappeared into the forest. Borsakov knew one of the laboratory animals had also vanished with the children. A chimpanzee.
The engine roared louder as the pilot pushed the throttle stick forward. The boat sped toward the gap, gliding up on a cushion of air. The craft slowed as they reached the edge of the open water. The reeds here were bent, where someone had pushed through to reach a side cha
Finally
Borsakov pointed ahead.
Past the gap, a narrow cha
Someone had definitely been through here.
Borsakov waved the pilot to a faster clip, sensing his targets couldn't be far.
The course ambled in gentle curves. The boat followed swiftly, sweeping right and left.
The searchlight revealed more debris floating in the water, bits of trash and more bottles. Too much. Something was wrong here. Their prey had never been this foolish. Suspicious, Borsakov reached to the pilot and squeezed his shoulder. He motioned him to slow down.
Monk heard the engine's roar lower to a rumble.
Crouched with the children, he watched the airboat glide into view around the last bend in the cha
Not good.
The searchlight speared forward, gliding across the water straight at them. They would be spotted in a second. Their only hope
from out of the dark forest to the left, a dark shadow leaped headlong over the boat. It flew high, clearing the blades, but from its clenched feet, a handful of dark objects were tossed at the boat.
They struck the giant fan like bomb loads.
The shotgun shells from the cabin.
Monk heard them pop against the blades. The fan sliced through the plastic casings, which didn't ignite, but which still exploded outward with stinging birdshot.
Cries erupted, half surprise and half pain as the crew was struck by flying pellets. The pilot, high in his seat, ducked and dropped in fear. He hit his stick, and the engine roared to life. The boat kicked forward like a stung jackrabbit, off kilter by the turn. The pilot wrested the control stick.
The searchlight blazed down the cha
Too late, buddy.
The two soldiers in front were suddenly flung backward. They struck the others.
Tangled in a group, they hit the metal guard at the rear of the boat. The airboat jackknifed into the air and barrel-rolled.
Monk heard a scream of agony and a stuttered grind of blades. Blood and bone sprayed out of the back of the fan like a contrail then the boat struck the water upside down, landing hard with a gasp of diesel smoke and a drowning choke from its engine. The searchlight still glowed out of the murky water.
Monk turned away. Earlier, with the children's help, he had braided fishing line from the cabin into a translucent rope as thick as his finger then he rigged it shoulder-height across the cha
From out of the trees above the raft, Marta dropped and landed leadenly to the planks. Pyotr was immediately in her arms. She sat on her haunches, gasping, panting. Still, she hugged Pyotr. Her eyes, though, were fixed on Monk, glassy and bright in the moonlight.
Monk nodded to her, grateful, yet at the same time, slightly u
He had needed the airboat to fly up the cha
She had done her job brilliantly.
Pyotr clung to her. After explaining the plan earlier, the boy had sat with
Marta and held out the shotgun shells. He spoke slowly to her in Russian, but
Monk suspected the true understanding between the pair arose from much deeper.
In the end, she had taken the shells in the toes of her feet, leaped into the trees, and vanished.
Monk poled out across the next cha
But he had no choice.
Millions of lives were at stake.
Still, Monk studied Marta and the three children. To him, with no memory of another life, they were his world. They were all that mattered. He would do all he could to protect them.
As he urged the raft along the current, he recalled the painful flashback at the cabin as he had half drowsed.
The taste of ci
What life had been stolen from him?
And could he ever get it back?
12:04 A. M.
Washington, D. C.
Just after midnight, Kat hung up the phone and stood up from the table. She glanced toward the window into the neighboring hospital room. She had finished a conference call with Director Crowe and Sean McKnight. The two were up in
Painter's office, waging an interdepartmental war from their bunker. Both men were engaged in a power struggle across the various intelligence agencies.
All over the fate of the girl.
Kat, with her own background in the field, had offered what counsel she could, but she could do no more. It was up to the two of them to find some way to thwart John Mapplethorpe.
Kat knew where she could do the most good.
She crossed toward the door that led into the hospital room. It was guarded by an armed corpsman. She paused by the window of one-way glass and stared into the room.
Propped by pillows in the bed, Sasha sat with a coloring book in her lap and a box of Crayola crayons. With an intravenous line still in her arm, she worked on a page, her face intent but calm.
Sasha suddenly glanced up from her work and stared straight at Kat. The glass was mirrored on the other side; there was no way the child could see that she was there. But Kat could not shake the sense that the girl was looking at her, could see her.