She sank to her knees next to Painter, checking vitals, the few that remained.
“I can stay with you,” Gray said at her shoulder.
“No. I think more than one quantum computer might interfere with the results.”
“Too many cooks in the kitchen,” Monk agreed.
“Then let me stay,” Gray said.
Lisa shook her head. “We’ll only get one shot at this. If it takes focus and will to heal Painter, it might be best if the mind directing that focus was a medical doctor.”
Gray sighed, little convinced.
“You did your job, Gray. Gave us an answer. Gave us hope.” She stared up at him. “Let me do mine.”
He nodded and stepped away.
Monk leaned down to her. “Just be careful what you wish for,” he said, his words fraught with levels of meaning. He was not so much the dumb oaf he pretended. He pecked her on the cheek.
The pair left.
Marcia called from the console. “Pulse in one minute.”
She twisted around. “Raise the blast shield.”
As the gears ground below her, Lisa leaned over Painter. His skin had a bluish hue—then again maybe it was just the Bell’s glow. Either way, he was moments from expiration. His lips were cracked, his breathing much too shallow, his heartbeat sounded more murmur than beat. Even his hair. The roots had gone snow-white. He was failing at an exponential rate.
The blast shield rose around her, closing them off from the rest of the group. Voices beyond, hushed already, grew muffled then ended as the shield locked into the roof.
Alone, with no one looking, Lisa leaned over Painter, resting her forehead against his chest. She didn’t need to focus her will in some meditative verve. It was said there were no atheists in a foxhole. It was certainly the case here. But she didn’t know what God to ask for succor at this moment.
Lisa remembered Anna’s discussion of evolution and intelligent design. The woman had insisted it was quantum measurements that ultimately collapsed potential into reality. Amino acids formed the first replicating protein because life was the better quantum-measuring device. And if you extrapolated that further, consciousness, which was an even greater quantum-measuring device than life alone, evolved for the same reason. One more link in the evolutionary chain. She pictured it.
AMINO ACIDS »»» FIRST PROTEIN »»» FIRST LIFE »»» CONSCIOUSNESS
But what lay beyond consciousness? If the future dictated the past through quantum measurements, what desired consciousness to form? What better quantum-measuring tool lay further in the future, dictating the present? How far into the future did this chain go? And what lay at its end?
AMINO ACIDS »»» FIRST PROTEIN »»» FIRST LIFE »»» CONSCIOUSNESS»»»???
Lisa remembered one other cryptic statement from Anna, when Lisa had confronted her about God’s role in all this. While quantum evolution seemed to remove the hand of God from sudden beneficial mutations, Anna’s last words on the matter had been you’re looking at it the wrong way, in the wrong direction. Lisa had attributed the cryptic statement to the woman’s exhaustion. But maybe Anna had pondered the same question. What did lie at the end of evolution? Was it merely some perfect and incorruptible quantum-measuring device?
And if so, was that God?
She had no answer as she leaned over Painter. All she knew was that she wanted him to live. She might hide from the others exactly how deeply she felt for him—maybe even from herself—but she could hide it no longer.
She opened her heart, allowed her vulnerability to shine.
As the Bell hummed and its glow swelled, she let go.
Maybe that’s what had been missing in her life all along, why men seemed to fade from her, why she ran. So no one would see what could be harmed so easily. She hid her vulnerability behind an armor of professionalism and casual dalliance. She hid her heart. No wonder she was alone on a mountaintop when Painter stumbled into her life.
No longer.
She lifted her head, shifted over, and kissed Painter softly on his lips, putting into action what she had sought to hide.
She closed her eyes as the last seconds counted down. She opened her heart, willing the man a future, wishing him to be healthy, hale, and whole, and mostly praying for more time with him.
Was that the ultimate function of the Bell? To open a quantum conduit to that great quantum-measuring tool that lay at the end of evolution, a personal connection to that final designer.
Lisa knew what she had to do. She let go of the scientist inside, let go of her own self. Her goal was beyond consciousness, beyond prayer.
It was simply belief.
In the purity of that moment, the Bell burst with a blinding light, joining them together, turning reality into pure potential.
3:36 P.M.
Gray flipped the toggle, and the shield began to lower. They all held their breath. What would they find? The motors grumbled. Everyone gathered around the shield wall.
Monk glanced to him, his eyes worried.
In the silence, a small chime sounded, coming from the left.
The blast chamber slowly cleared into view. The Bell, quiet and dark, rested inertly in the center—then Lisa appeared, crouched over Painter, her back to them.
No one spoke.
Lisa slowly turned, rising. Tears, held suspended by lashes, poured down her cheeks. She clutched Painter under her arm as she stood. He looked no better. Pale, weak, debilitated. But he lifted his head on his own and spotted Gray.
His eyes shone sharp and focused.
Relief spread through Gray.
Then the small chime sounded again.
Painter’s eyes flicked in its direction—then back to Gray. Painter’s lips moved. No words came out. Gray stepped closer to hear.
Painter’s eyes narrowed hard on him. He tried again. The word was faint and made no sense. Gray worried about the man’s mental status.
“Bomb…,” Painter repeated hoarsely.
Lisa heard him, too. She glanced in the same direction as Painter. To the body of Baldric Waalenberg. She then shoved Painter toward Monk.
“Take him.”
She headed to the man’s twisted form. At some point, unseen, unmourned, Baldric had finally expired.
Gray joined her.
Lisa knelt down and shoved up the man’s sleeve. He wore a large wristwatch. She turned it over. A second hand swept over a digital readout.
“We’ve seen this before,” Lisa said. “A heartbeat monitor tied to a microtransmitter. After his heart stopped, it began a countdown.”
Lisa twisted the man’s arm so Gray could read the number.
02:01
As he watched, the second hand swept over the number twice more. It sounded the familiar chime as it dropped below 02:00.
“We have less than two minutes to get the hell out of here,” Lisa said.
Gray took her at her word and straightened. “Everybody out! Monk, radio Khamisi! Tell him to clear all his men as far away from the mansion as possible.”
His partner obeyed.
“We have a helicopter on the roof,” Lisa said.
In seconds, they were all running. Gray took Painter from Monk. Mosi helped Brooks. Lisa, Fiona, and Marcia followed.
“Where’s Gunther?” Fiona asked.
Brooks answered. “He left with his sister. He didn’t want anyone to follow him.”
There was no time to search for him. Gray pointed to the elevator. Monk’s group had jammed the doors open with a hall chair, to keep anyone from using it to come after them. Mosi yanked it out one-handed and threw it down the hall.
They piled inside.
Lisa hit the top button. Sixth floor. The elevator slowly began to rise.
Monk spoke. “I radioed our man up top. He doesn’t fly, but he knows how to turn a key. He’ll get the engines warmed up.”
“The bomb,” Gray said, turning to Lisa. “What do we have to expect?”
“If it’s the same as b
ack in the Himalayas, it’ll be big. They’ve developed some quantum bomb using that Xerum 525 material.”
Gray pictured the tanks stored at the deepest level.
Crap…
The elevator continued to climb, passing the main floor, which was deathly silent. And upward they went.
Painter stirred, still unable to hold his own weight. But he caught Gray’s eyes. “Next time…,” he whispered hoarsely “…you go to Nepal on your own.”
Gray smiled. Oh yeah, Painter was back.
But for how long?
The elevator reached the sixth level and opened.
“One minute,” Marcia said. She had had the presence of mind to note and monitor the time.
They raced up the roof stairs and found the helicopter waiting, blades spinning. They ran for it, supporting one another. Once under the rotors, Gray passed Painter to Monk.
“Get everybody aboard.”
Gray ran to the other side and climbed into the pilot’s seat.
“Fifteen seconds!” Marcia called.
Gray cranked the engine speed. Blades screamed. He yanked on the collective, and the bird lifted its skids off the roof. Gray was never so happy to leave a place. The helicopter took to air, rotoring up. How much clearance would they need?
He adjusted his blade pitch and fed more power.
As they swept upward, he yawed the bird a bit. He searched the grounds around the estate. He saw Jeeps and motorcycles racing in all directions away from the mansion.
Marcia started a countdown. “Five, four—”
Her precision was slightly off.
A blinding light suddenly blazed beneath them, as if they were lifting off the sun. But the most disturbing effect was the total and absolute silence. Unable to see, Gray fought to hold the bird in the air. But it was as if the air had vanished beneath him. He sensed the helicopter plunging earthward.
Then the light fell away around them with a loud clap, shedding like a wash of water.
The rotors suddenly found air again, bobbling in the sky for a long moment.
Gray stabilized the craft and banked away, frightened to his core. He stared back to where the mansion used to be. A massive, smooth-walled crater lay below, cut cleanly through rock and soil. It was as if some mighty Titan had taken a giant ice-cream scoop to the mansion along with most of the surrounding gardens.
Everything was gone. No debris. Just emptiness.
Pools and creeks, cut in half, poured over the lip in trickling waterfalls.
Farther from the edge, Gray spotted vehicles stopping and people glancing back, some walking closer to check. Khamisi’s army. Safe. The Zulu people gathered along the borders, claiming back what they had lost so long ago.
Gray flew the chopper over them, banking to circle the crater. He remembered the missing drum of Xerum 525, the one marked for the United States. He toggled the radio and began passing a long chain of security codes to reach Sigma Command.
He was surprised to hear someone other than Logan pick up the line. It was Sean McKnight, the former director of Sigma. Fear iced through Gray. What was he doing there? Something was wrong. McKnight quickly briefed him on what had happened. The last came as a blow to the gut.
He finally signed off, numb and shocked.
Monk had leaned forward, noting his growing consternation.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
He turned. He had to face his partner when he said it.
“Monk…it’s about Kat.”
5:47 P.M. EST
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Three days had passed. Three long days settling matters in South Africa.
Finally, their plane had landed at Dulles International after a direct flight from Johannesburg. Monk had ditched Gray and the others at the terminal. He had hailed a taxicab and taken off. Then the taxi hit congestion near the park. Monk had to force himself not to yank open the door and run on foot, but eventually the bottleneck broke up, and they were moving again.
Monk leaned forward. “Fifty bucks if you get me there in under five minutes.”
Acceleration threw Monk back into the seat. That was more like it.
In two minutes, the jumble of brown brick buildings appeared. They flashed past a sign that read GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL. Tires squealed into the visitors’ parking lot, almost sideswiping an ambulance.
Monk threw a fistful of bills at the driver and leaped out.
He squeezed sideways through the automatic door, impatient when it opened too slowly. He ran headlong down the hall, dodging patients and orderlies. He knew which room in ICU.
He ran past a nursing station, ignoring a yell to slow down.
Not today, honey.
Monk winged around the corner and spotted the bed. He ran, fell to his knees in the last steps, and slid in his sweatpants up to the side of the bed. He hit the lowered side rail rather hard.
Kat stared at him, a spoonful of jiggling lime green Jell-O halfway to her mouth. “Monk…?”
“I came here as soon as I could,” he said, panting, winded.
“But I just talked to you ninety minutes ago on the satellite phone.”
“That’s just talking.”
He shoved up, leaned over the bed, and kissed her square on the mouth. The bandages were wrapped around her left shoulder and upper torso, half hidden by a blue hospital gown. Three gunshots, two units of blood lost, collapsed lung, shattered collarbone, and lacerated spleen.
But she was alive.
And damn lucky.
Logan Gregory’s funeral was set for three days from now.
Still, the pair had saved Washington from a terrorist attack, gunning down the Waalenberg assassin and stopping the plot before it could come to fruition. The ceremonial gold Bell was now buried deep in Sigma’s research labs. The shipment of Xerum 525 intended for the Bell had been found at a shipping yard in New Jersey. But by the time the U.S. intelligence agencies had tracked the shipment—encumbered by the vast web of Waalenberg-owned corporations, shells, and subsidiaries—the one last sample of Xerum was found degraded, left too long out in the sun, gone inert due to improper refrigeration. And without the fuel source, the Bells, even those recovered from other embassies, would never ring again.
Good riddance.
Monk preferred evolution the old-fashioned way.
His hand drifted to her belly. He was afraid to ask.
He didn’t have to. Kat’s hand covered his. “The baby’s fine. Doctors say there should be no complications.”
Monk sagged again to his knees, resting the side of his head on her stomach, relieved. He closed his eyes. He snaked an arm around her waist, gently, careful of her injuries, and pulled tight to her.
“Thank God.”
Kat touched his cheek.
Still on his knees, Monk reached to his pocket and lifted out the black ring box. He held it out, eyes still closed, a prayer on his lips.
“Marry me.”
“Okay.”
Monk opened his eyes, staring up into the face of the woman he loved. “What?”
“I said okay.”
Monk lifted his head. “Are you sure?”
“Are you trying to talk me out of it?”
“Well, you are on drugs. Maybe I’d better ask you—”
“Just give me the ring.” She took the box and opened it. She stared silently for a moment. “It’s empty.”
Monk took the box and stared inside. The ring was gone.
He shook his head.
“What happened?” Kat asked.
Monk growled. “Fiona.”
10:32 A.M.
The next morning, Painter lay on his back in another wing of Georgetown University Hospital. The table retracted from the doughnut-shaped CT machine. The scan had taken over an hour. He had almost fallen asleep, having rested very little over the past few days. Anxiety plagued his nights.
A nurse opened the door.
Lisa followed her inside.
Painter sat u
p. It was chilly in the room. Then again, he was wearing nothing but a threadbare hospital gown. He sought some manner of dignity, tucking and snugging, but finally conceded defeat.
Lisa sat down next to him. She nodded back to the monitoring room. A clutch of researchers from Johns Hopkins and Sigma had their heads bent together, the focus of their attention on Painter’s health.
“Looks good,” Lisa said. “All signs of internal calcification are receding. Your lab values are all returning to normal. You may retain some minor residual scarring to your aortic valve, but possibly not even that. The rate of recovery is remarkable…dare I say, miraculous.”
“You may,” Painter said. “But what about this?”
He ran his fingers through the white streak of hair over one ear.
She reached up and followed his fingers with her own. “I like it. And you’re going to be fine.”
He believed her. For the first time, deep down, he knew he would be okay. A shuddering sigh flowed from him. He would live. There was still a life ahead of him.
Painter caught Lisa’s hand, kissed her palm, then lowered it.
She blushed, glanced to the monitoring window—but she didn’t pull her hand from his as she discussed some technical matter with the nurse.
Painter studied her. He had gone to Nepal both to investigate the illnesses reported by Ang Gelu and as a personal odyssey, a time for private reflection. He had expected incense, meditation, chants, and prayers, but instead it had turned into a hellish and brutal journey around half the globe. Still, in the end, maybe the result was the same.
His fingers tightened on her hand.
He had found her.
And though they had been through so much together in these past days, they still barely knew each other. Who was she really? What was her favorite food, what made her let out a belly laugh, what would it be like to dance with her, what would she whisper when she said good night?
Painter knew only one thing for certain as he sat in his gown, all but naked next to her, exposed down to the level of his DNA.
He wanted to know everything.
2:22 P.M.
Two days later, rifles fired their last shot into the blue sky, cracking brilliantly across the green slopes of Arlington National Cemetery. The day was too bright for a funeral, a glorious day.