With the child doing better, Lisa’s usefulness was about to come to an end.
Then what?
She remembered who had assigned her to this job in the first place, picturing his kind face, his soft words.
Anger raged inside her against that cool, calm demeanor of Robert Gant. She knew how much pain and suffering and loss it cost to bring this special child into existence, to this place and time. Still, she could not blame the child for such atrocities. The boy might have been born out of blood and heartbreak-but he was still an innocent.
The child finished suckling, the bottle was empty. Those big eyes drooped, heavy with milk-sodden drowsiness. Lisa let him drift into slumber, oblivious to the horrors beyond the clear plastic walls of his incubator.
She turned to Edward and limped over to him, favoring her aching ankle. Up on the wall, a camera tracked her path, swiveling to follow her. She wondered if Robert Gant watched her or merely some bored guard.
Exhausted, Lisa was beyond subtlety or subterfuge. “Edward, what are you trying to accomplish with these triple helices?”
He swung around on his desk chair. “Ah, I can’t speak to the goal of my financial benefactors. All I know is my purpose in the grand scheme of things.”
“And that’s what?”
He raised an eyebrow, belying the hubris that followed. “To forge the key to life itself.”
He gave her a tired smile, and, surprisingly, she echoed it.
“As lofty as that might sound, PNA
Edward stared toward the child in the incubator. “But all that will come later. For the moment, we have only one goal engineered into this first strain of PNA, a simple thing really.”
Lisa felt a sick turn to her stomach. “What goal?”
Edward’s eyes never left the sleeping boy, the doctor’s expression a mask of wonder and also sadness.
“Immortality.”
Lisa couldn’t hide her shock.
“Do not be so surprised, Dr. Cummings. This child is not the
1:07 P.M.
Washington, DC
Painter had returned to his own office, leaving the president with his daughter below, guarded by his Secret Service contingent. They were under the five-hour mark until James Gant would come out of hiding and pretend to be recovering from major surgery. Everything to maintain that ruse was already in place.
He found Kowalski sitting inside, his feet propped up on Painter’s desk, his arms folded over his belly, snoring.
Painter shoved his legs off.
The man snorted awake. “We ready?” he asked.
“As we’re ever going to be.”
Painter grabbed a holstered SIG Sauer from a cabinet. The rest of the strike team’s gear was waiting at the airstrip, a jet warming up. As he secured the shoulder harness and holster in place, his eyes caught on the picture of Lisa on his desk, smiling softly, hair glowing in the summer sun, lips parted slightly. His love for her was a tangible thing, not a thought or a feeling, but a weight in his heart, a pressure in his chest, a stirring of heat in his veins.
At that moment, he knew the truth.
Motion at the door drew his attention. Tucker stood there, shadowed by Kane.
Painter gave his holster harness a final tug, cinching it snugly, and faced the man. “Captain Wayne?”
Tucker stepped inside. “Sir, I’d like to join you on this mission.”
“I appreciate that, captain, but we hired you to find Amanda. Your obligation to us has been fulfilled.”
“Understood, sir.” Tucker’s countenance remained hard, rocky. “But not my obligation to Amanda. I left her baby back in Dubai, and I want a chance to correct that mistake.”
“We can certainly use the additional manpower… not to mention your dog’s nose. But we’ll be
Airspace above the presidential estate was restricted. The no-fly zone had been established before James Gant was president, going back decades, a courtesy of the state of South Carolina for the largesse of the clan.
Painter’s plan was to sweep in close, parachute out, and glide low onto the grounds. And those grounds were
That remote, rough terrain would serve to hide them, allowing them to hoof it overland from their drop point.
Tucker seemed to have no problem with parachuting onto the estate. “Kane and I have had plenty of jump time,” the man assured him. “I have my dog’s harness system with me.”
“Then welcome aboard.”
Kowalski stood, stretched, and headed out the door with the others. “This place is really going to the dogs.”
Painter set off down the hall. He had been expecting another teammate to arrive by now, but the latecomer would have to meet them at the airstrip. Time was ticking down. Jason Carter would take command at the communications nest in his absence and coordinate efforts from here. It was a lot to place on his young shoulders, but Painter knew he could handle it. Jason had already gathered his own intelligence team in preparation, ruling the nest of older agents with an enthusiasm reserved for the young.
Painter reached the elevators as the doors opened.
Inside the cage stood the last member of their strike team. Kat’s husband adjusted his new prosthetic hand, securing the cuff with a twist and wiggling his fingers. Monk must have already stopped by R &D to get the upgrade Painter had ordered for him, a prosthetic specifically designed for this mission, to help with the infiltration of the Lodge.
“About time,” Painter said.
Monk glanced up, meeting his gaze, his face fierce. “You try to find a babysitter on the Fourth of July… now let’s go get our women.”
1:25 P.M.
Blue Ridge Mountains
“And you’re claiming this child can live forever?” Lisa asked. “That he’s immortal?”
Edward continued to sit in his cubicle in the medical ward. “Barring accidents or disease, yes, he could live a very long time. I imagine it will take further tinkering to achieve true immortality. But in the end, like I said, he’s not the first immortal born to this world.”
“What do you mean?”
“Since we have time until Petra finishes her evaluation of the boy’s genetics, I’ll do my best to explain. It’s the least I can offer you for saving the child.”
Lisa was prepared to listen.
“Many scientists, across a scope of professions, believe immortality will be achieved in our lifetime. The dates bandied about all seem to center around the middle of this century, 2045 or so. That means children born today will
