The Final Cut

Realizing the gulag wasn’t in her future, the tears dried up and Tanya became positively chatty.

“Like I said, there was a casting call for a reality TV show on Backonstage.com. It looked totally legit, I swear. I answered it last week, sent my book over, and she called me in and hired me on the spot. Said I was perfect. There’s no reality show, is there? She lied?”

“Yes, Miss Hill, she lied to you. Did she tell you why she wanted you to fly to Dallas?”

“No.”

“What were you supposed to do when you got there?”

“Stay overnight at a hotel near the airport, then fly home whenever I felt like it tomorrow. It was a no-brainer job.”

Mike looked at Nicholas, jerked her head toward the helicopter. They stepped away and she said in a low voice, “I’m thinking even if we take her back to the city, put her through another more thorough interrogation, she’s not going to have anything that will help us.”

“Agreed.”

Her cell phone rang, and she sighed. “It’s Zachery. I better tell him the bad news.” As she spoke to Zachery, Nicholas watched her face change from defeated to triumphant.

She hung up the phone and high-fived him. “They have an active trace on the call Victoria made to you after you defused the bomb. It pinged off a cell tower in Manhattan. Now they know the signal, and they’ll be able to trace it. And even better news. Louisa was treated and released, and Paulie’s awake.”

35

Mike whirled a finger above her head in a circle and called to the tac team, “Back in the chopper, back in the chopper. Charlie, fire her up. We need to get back into the city pronto.”

She turned to the troopers. “Give Miss Hill a ride home, get her phone number and tell her we may want to speak to her again.” Mike said, “I’m being a dreamer here, but tell her if she thinks of anything else about the woman who hired her to give me a call. Oh, yes, the cabbie helped us, so cut him loose and thank him.” Mike pulled a fifty out of her wallet and gave it to the trooper. “He’s a good guy. I hope it’s enough.”

When she took her seat next to Nicholas in the chopper she said, “Zachery wants us to stop off and talk to Paulie, see if he can tell us anything about what happened before she knocked him out. Charlie, can you get us to Lenox Hill Hospital, ASAP?”

“Will do, Mike.”

The chopper whirled into the air and, nose down, flew south toward the city.

“Zachery and Bo talked to Louisa, but she didn’t have anything for them. They held a press conference—Bo said it’s insanity, what with the evacuation, the bomb threat, and the Koh-i-Noor missing. That tidbit was a

Nicholas was tapping his fingers on his leg. “The last thing I’m going to do now is get excited about tracing the call she made to me in the exhibit room.”

“She probably knows how long it takes to get a trace on a wireless signal, so why would she care? Little does she know I have super-agent Gray Wharton on our side, and he has a still-friends ex-girlfriend who’s an NSA analyst. She’ll rush it right through, and we’ll be able to track the phone.”

“Maybe it will work, maybe it won’t, but she knows we’ll trace the call. She wouldn’t keep the bloody phone.” His voice fell off, and he looked out the chopper window at the lights of New York coming into view.

“We’ll see.”

Ten minutes later, Charlie set down on the rooftop helipad of Lenox Hill Hospital. They were met by a nurse in blue scrubs who took them directly to the third floor. They entered the single room to see Paulie flat on his back, arguing with a pixie-haired nurse.

When he saw them, he looked ready to sing hallelujah. “Mike, you’re here at last! Rescue me. Tell her I’m fine. I’ve been hit on the head before; my brother used to thump me all the time when we were kids. I need to get out of here, we’ve got work to do. Zachery told me about Victoria. I want to help. There will be tons of evidence to gather.”

The nurse didn’t spare them a glance. “I’ve told you three times, Agent Jernigan, we have to wait for the doctor. And no matter what you say, he’s already told me you can’t be released until the morning. Trust me, you won’t get out of here sooner. You have a pretty bad concussion from that whack on your head, and we’re waiting for blood work to determine what chemical you were exposed to.”

Paulie frowned at her. “Bunch of vampires. You must have taken ten quarts from me.”

Mike stifled a laugh behind a cough.

The nurse patted Paulie’s shoulder. “That’s right, dear. We are vampires and we live to draw blood. So lie back and relax. I’ve given you a little something to help with the headache, and you’re going to feel so good in a minute you’ll think I’m a fairy princess, not a vampire.”

She patted Paulie’s shoulder again and said to Mike, “I have to go do rounds. Would you sit on him if he tries to get out of bed?”

“Absolutely. Difficult patients are my specialty.”

Mike turned to Paulie, whose face was pale despite his bravado. “Hear her? I’ll sit on you if you don’t throttle down. You should see yourself with that big bandage on your head. You can’t go out looking like that, children will run screaming. So stop squirming and get comfy.”

“Eight stitches, Mike, that’s all. Only a scratch. Wow, what did she put in my IV? I feel like I’m floating. Is everyone all right? I remember Louisa telling me it was a good thing she was a woman, her head is harder than mine.”

Mike sat next to his bed. “Everyone’s okay. We haven’t much time, Paulie, before you go squirrelly, so tell us what happened.”

“Victoria was talking about the curse, told me to be very careful because only women are supposed to handle the diamond. I’d finally released it from the setting and was turning to hand it to Louisa, and Victoria said, ‘Sorry about this,’ and sprayed something in my eyes. Before I could even start yelling for anyone, wham, I was down. I don’t remember much after I hit the ground, outside of hearing the alarms. I’m sorry, Mike.” His voice was getting thready, and she could tell he was trying hard to hang on. His head swung back against the pillow. “Ouch.”

“Careful. Do you remember anything else?”

He shook his head.

“I’m mad, Paulie, really mad. If we don’t find her and get back the Koh-i-Noor, the Brits will declare war and take the White House again. Don’t fade out on me, think. Anything else?”

The drugs were working their magic. Paulie’s lids were heavy. He blinked a few times and his eyes closed.

Mike caught Nicholas’s eye and nodded toward the door.

Paulie’s eyes flew open and he sat straight up. “I remember now. She was talking to herself.”

He fell back, a hand to his head. “Ugh, that hurts. I was going in and out, but I know she said something like ‘Noon at the ark.’”

Mike said, “The ark? Like, Noah’s ark?”

“That’s what it sounded like. It’s all I remember, Mike. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, it’s wonderful information. We’ll track it down. Agent Savich is recovering all the video she erased, so maybe we can get more context. You rest now, okay? I’ll be back to get you in the morning.”

Nicholas’s dark eyes met hers as they rode the elevator down. “Noon. As in noon tomorrow? That would give us less than twelve hours to catch up to her. It’s going to take longer than that to get to Mount Ararat.”

She smiled. “I have faith in Savich. He’s a magician, he’ll figure it out.” She got on her cell as they left the hospital and called Zachery. “Sir, we really need Savich to lift the audio from the feed during Browning’s attack. Paulie heard Browning say something about noon at the ark after she hit him.”