an ordinary steel door on the right. They did not stop but continued on to the wall at the very end. This wall was as smooth and unbroken as all the rest in the dank sub-sub-basement. Simply the end of the corridor, apparently.
Victor Tremont took a small black box from his suit-jacket pocket.
Nadal al-Hassan, his weapon ready, watched warily back along the side corridor.
Tremont pressed a button on the box. The entire wall slid heavily to the left, revealing a hidden vault door made of the strongest steel available when it had been built on Tremont's orders at the time he had Blanchard's operations moved to the Adirondack Wilderness. Tremont was shaking. He spun the combination lock, and the massive door rose a few millimeters up on pneumatic lifts and slowly swung open.
“Clever,” Jon said as he stepped from the main corridor, the Beretta held steady in both hands. He aimed it at the two fugitives, who looked up. While Mercer Haldane had been speaking to the stunned crowds, Jon had watched Victor Tremont slip away. Caught in the mass of bodies, Jon had been unable to work his way as swiftly as he had wanted. But in the end, it had not mattered. He had found Tremont.
Nadal al-Hassan never hesitated. A thin smile spread across his narrow face. He swung his Clock and fired before the echo of Jon's voice ceased.
The bullet missed Smith's throat by the thickness of a hair.
Jon did not hesitate or miss. All the horrors of the past two weeks swept over him in an unforgettable second. He pulled the trigger, and al-Hassan fell forward without a sound. He lay spread-eagled, his blood pooling on the gray concrete floor at the side of his head.
Victor Tremont's bullet did not miss either. It stabbed like searing ice through the upper part of Jon's left leg. It hurled him against the wall, which caused Tremont's second and third shots to fly past and ricochet, whining away along the main corridor.
Propped against the wall, Jon fought to stay conscious. He fired again. His bullet hit Tremont's right arm, knocking him back against the half-open door and sending his pistol flying with a metallic clatter to the floor. It bounced and skidded, and the sound reverberated away along the secret corridors like a dying cry.
Dragging his bloody leg, Jon advanced on the mass murderer.
Tremont did not cringe. He lifted his chin, his eyes glowing with the certainty that any man had his price. “I'll give you a million dollars! Five million!”
“You don't have a million dollars. Not anymore. You're dead. They'll electrocute you.”
“They won't find me.” He jerked his head behind him toward the half opened door. “I destroyed the plans. No one knows an exit is here. I had it built by foreigners. The money's already transferred where no one can find it.”
“I thought you'd have some plan.”
“I'm not a fool, Smith. Thev'll never find me.”
“Not a fool,” Jon agreed. “Just a ghoul. A murderer of millions. But that's statistics. The world will have to deal with you for that. But you killed Sophia, and that's personal. I get to decide what to do. You ended her life with a wave of your hand: Eliminate her. Now it's my turn.”
“Half! I'll give you half.! A billion dollars. More!” Tremont shrank back against the massive steel door, his long body cowering.
Jon limped forward, the Beretta steady in both hands. “I loved her, Tremont. She loved me. Now?”
It was Randi's voice behind him. “No, Jon. Don't. He's not worth it.”
“What do you know? I loved her, dammit!” His finger tightened on the trigger.
“He's finished, Jon. The FBI is here. The secret service. They've got them all. The serum's on its way to stop the dying, and they've confiscated all the antibiotics. Let them deal with him. Let the world deal with him.”
Smith's face was fierce. His eyes glowed like coals. His chin jutted. He took another step closer, the Beretta steady, inches from Tremont's trembling face. The arrogant executive tried to speak again, to say something, but his mouth and lips and tongue were too dry. All that came out was a whimper.
“Jon?” Randi's voice was suddenly soft, close.
He glanced back over his shoulder and saw Sophia. It was her lovely face, her large, intelligent eyes and sweet smile. He blinked. No, it was Randi. Sophia. Randi. He shook his head to clear it. He knew what Randi wanted, and what Sophia would have wanted.
He made himself take another deep breath. He glared once more at the shaking Tremont. Then he lowered the gun and stumbled away, his wounded leg dragging. He brushed past Randi and pushed through the ranks of FBI and secret service. Some of the agents reached out to stop him.
“Let him go,” Randi said gently. “He'll be all right. Just let him go now.”
Jon heard her behind him, but a rush of tears was blinding his eyes. He could not stop the tears. Did not want to. They poured silently down. He turned into the main corridor and hobbled on toward the distant stairs.
EPILOGUE
Santa Barbara…. Land of palms and magenta sunsets. Of diving seagulls and glossy yachts with white sails afurl on the turquoise channel. Of lovely young women and handsome young men in the briefest of swimware. Jon Smith, M.D., formerly of the U.S. Army, tried to occupy his mind with the languid beauty of this soft paradise where effort seemed trivial and appreciation of life, nature, and dreams was all.
It had been a fight to resign his commission. They had not wanted him to go, but he knew there was no other way for him to find a reason to live. He had said good-bye to his friends at USAMRIID, pausing a long time in Sophia's former office. Already an eager young man with a closetful of credentials had scattered his things where her pens, notes, and perfume had lain. Jon had stopped in his own office, which was empty, waiting for its next occupant, with less sadness. Then he had gone to say farewell to the new director. As he had stepped inside the office door, he could almost hear the noisy bombast of General Kielburger, who had turned out to have a strain of decency no one had suspected.
Then he had paid a company to pack up his house and put it on the market. He knew he would never be able to live there again, not without Sophia.
The whole sordid incident of the Hades Project had occupied the news media for weeks as more and more revelations of Victor Tremont's plans were made public and more arrests of once-respected private and public officials were reported. Legal charges against Jon Smith, Randi Russell, Martin Zellerbach, and a mysterious Englishman were quietly dropped. All refused interviews or any official gratitude for their roles. Details were swept under the mantle of national security. He was not pleased when an enterprising newswoman dug up some of his history at USAMRIID, Somalia, West Berlin, and Desert Storm and tried to draw a connection between it and his ability to face down the criminal activities of Victor Tremont and his cohorts. He was consoled by the fact that time would pass, other news would take over the headlines, and if he went far enough away and severed his ties as completely as he had managed… interest in him would dwindle. He would not be considered for even a footnote in history.
He had stopped for a day in Council Bluffs, Iowa, to see once again the river town of his birth. He walked through the downtown park with its water fountain and big graceful trees and went out to Bennett Avenue to sit in the parking lot and stare at Abraham Lincoln High School, remembering Bill and Marty and the days of their youth. It all had been so much simpler then. The next day, he had flown on to California to this tranquil resort pueblo with its distinctive red-tiled roofs and easy ambience. He had rented a beachside cottage next to the Remaks' house in Montecito and played poker twice a week there with a group of university professors and writers. He ate at local restaurants, walked the breakfront, and never struck up a conversation with strangers. He had nothing to say.
Today he was sitting on his deck barefoot and wearing shorts as he stared out at the cloud-rimmed islands. The air tasted of sea salt, and although the day was cool, the beaming sun seemed to warm him to the bones.
When the phone rang, he picked it up.
“Hi, soldier.” Randi's voice was bright and cheery. In the beginning, she had called nearly every day. There was the business of disposing of Sophia's belongings and condo, which the two of them had worked through as
