plasma screens.
As Painter waited, Vigor’s final words echoed through him.
Painter shook his head.
Impossible.
Gray sped down Greenwich Parkway into the exclusive Foxhall Village subdivision. He reached the end and made a left turn onto a tree-lined street. He slowed. He let the Thunderbird’s idling engine carry him forward. The safe house appeared ahead, a two-story red-brick Tudor with forest-green shutters, a match to the woods of Glover-Archibold Park upon which the home backed.
With the top down, he could smell the damp forest.
Nearing the house, he noted the front porch light was on, as was a lamp in the upper corner window.
The all-clear sign.
He turned and bumped into the driveway, earning a groan from their injured passenger.
“Where are we?” his mother asked.
Gray braked under an overhanging porte cochere on the left side of the house. A side door to the house lay steps away. He had attempted repeatedly to get his parents to vacate the car, but with every hospital and medical center they passed, they only became more stubborn. Or at least his mother did. His father remained at the same level of muleheadedness.
“This is a safe house,” he said, seeing little reason to dissemble now. “Medical help should be on its way. Stay put for now.”
Gray cut the engine and climbed out.
On the far side of the car, the side door to the house opened. A large shadowy figure filled the doorway. A hand rested on a holstered weapon at his hip. “You Pierce?” the man asked, gruff and short, eyeing the additional passengers with suspicion.
“Yes.”
The figure stepped out into the light. He was an ape of a man, thick-limbed, stubble-cut brown hair. He was dressed in military fatigues. Not exactly keeping a low profile.
“Name’s Kowalski. I have Crowe on the horn for you.” He raised his other hand and held out a cell phone.
Gray headed around the back of the car. He had not been looking forward to this conversation with the director, to explain his blown cover. It was not exactly
Even the guard stationed here seemed baffled by the elderly pair sharing the open convertible. He studied the new arrivals with his brows bunched into a knot over his forehead. He scratched his chin.
“Three fifty-two?” he asked as Gray came around.
Gray could not fathom what he meant.
His father answered from the backseat. “No, it’s a
“Sweet ride.”
Plainly the guard hadn’t been studying his parents, only the car.
Seichan stirred in the backseat, perhaps somehow noting the lack of wind and motion. She struggled weakly to sit up.
“Can you help get her inside?” Gray asked the guard. He noted the lower half of a U.S. Navy anchor on the man’s right biceps as he accepted the phone. Ex-military. No surprise there. If there had been a picture under
His mother opened the passenger door. “Where’s that medical help?” She seemed to find little hope in the large form of the guard, even clutching her purse a bit tighter to her side.
Gray held up a palm, asking for patience.
“Ma’am,” Kowalski said, and pointed to the kitchen. “There’s a medkit on the kitchen table. Morphine stabs and smelling salts. I’ve laid out a suture pack.”
His mother eyed the man with a more studied appraisal. “Thank you, young man.”
With a more withering glance in Gray’s direction, his mother headed inside.
Stepping out of the way, Gray spoke into the phone. “Director Crowe, Commander Pierce here.”
“Is that your mother who just got out of the car?”
Gray searched up and spotted the video camera hidden under the porte cochere. It must be sending a live feed to Central Command. He could feel heat rise at his collar.
“Sir—”
“Never mind. Explain later. Gray, we’ve intel out of Rome, related to our new arrival. How is the prisoner holding up?”
Gray eyed the back of the convertible. The guard and his father were discussing the best way to move Seichan’s limp form. He noted the fresh bloom of blood in the center of her belly wrap.
“She’s going to need immediate attention.”
“Help should be there any minute.”
The trundle of a heavy vehicle sounded. Gray swung around. A large black van turned and headed down the street.
“I think they’re here,” he said with a relieved sigh.
The van reached the house, shifted to the curb, and braked at the foot of the driveway. Gray felt a twinge of unease, hating to be blocked in, but he recognized the van. It was Sigma’s medical response team. The camouflaged ambulance was based on the same design as the vehicle that accompanied the president, capable of handling emergency surgery if necessary.
“Give me an update as soon as their evaluation is over,” Painter said. The director must have spotted the van also.
The side doors of the van shoved open. Three men and a woman, all in surgical scrubs and matching loose black bomber jackets, exited the van with coordinated skill. Two men yanked a stretcher, legs unfolding beneath it. They followed the third man and the woman, who strode forward to meet Gray. The man held his hand out.
“Dr. Amen Nasser,” he said.
Gray shook his hand, appreciating the cool, dry grip. Calm and in control. The doctor could be no older than thirty, yet he carried himself with firm authority. His complexion was the hue of polished mahogany, unlike the woman, whose skin was more the color of warm honey.
Gray studied her.
Though of Asian heritage, the woman plainly sought to downplay it. She had shaved her head to a crew cut and bleached her remaining hair an ice blond. Entwining tattoos also circled her wrists in a Celtic pattern. While such severity had never appealed to Gray before, there remained something strangely seductive about her. Perhaps it was the emerald of her eyes, a feature that needed no other embellishment. Then again, it may have been the way she moved, leonine, muscular, balanced. Like much of Sigma, she must have had some military training.
The woman nodded to Gray. No introduction was offered.
“I’ve been informed of the situation,” the team leader continued, his words precise, plainly foreign-born, with a trace of an accent. “I’ll ask you all to stand back and let us work. We will transfer the patient to the surgical bay inside the van. I will send out Anni with a status report shortly.” He finally acknowledged the woman.
The other two men rushed past with the stretcher. The doctor followed, while Anni remained where she was, leaning on a hip.
The cell phone in Gray’s hand began to vibrate as he stepped aside. The team leader spoke rapidly. Gray finally recognized the accent of the team leader.
Dr. Amen Nasser.
He was Egyptian.
