there. The general just took a little bonus where he found it. That's the way business is done these days.'
The scar on Geli's face seemed to pulse with fury. 'The army is a service, not a business.'
Skow chuckled. 'I'd never have pegged you as a romantic.'
'Fuck you.'
'Anyway, when Peter decided he needed a secret research site, he called your father. Some money changed hands, and the general found us a nice secluded spot where no one would bother us.'
'Why was I brought in?'
'Peter was looking for a certain kind of person for your job. Your father suggested you.'
Geli began to pace again, blood pounding in her ears. 'He knows about all this, doesn't he? Godin dying, the project going down the tubes?'
'Yes. And he's on board. He has a career to save, too.'
'Well, fuck him. And fuck you.'
'Call him, Geli.'
'Is the secret Trinity site at Fort Huachuca?'
'No.'
She didn't believe him. There were thousands of acres set aside for weapons testing at the remote Arizona base. On the other hand, her father was an expert at covering his ass. He'd have wanted some deniability if Trinity became a liability and so would have been unlikely to put it at his own base.
She slipped on her headset, hit a computer key, and said, 'Major General Horst Bauer. Fort Huachuca, Arizona.'
Skow breathed an audible sigh of relief.
The general's aide-de-camp answered the phone.
'General Bauer,' Geli snapped.
'The general is unavailable. Who's calling, please?'
'Tell him his daughter is on the phone, Captain.'
'Hold, please.'
Skow was clearly enjoying this spectacle. She spun her chair so that she wouldn't have to look at his aging Ivy League face.
As she waited, images of her father rose in her mind. Tall and imposing in the Germanic mold, Horst Bauer had been described by his enemies as a blond version of Burt Lancaster's General James Mattoon Scott from Seven Days in May. This was a fair comparison. Yet the stiff martinet seen by the public was not the man Geli knew. She saw the womanizer who had cheated cease¬lessly on his wife and left several illegitimate children abroad. She saw the brute who, upon finding himself embarrassed by his daughter's 'wildness,' beat her remorselessly with whatever was close to hand. The irony of her life was that she had followed in the foot¬steps of the man she hated. The reason was simple. She'd hated her father for scarring her so deeply, but she'd despised her mother's passiveness even more.
'Well, Geli,' said a deep voice that tensed every mus¬cle in her body. 'You must be in trouble. That's the only time I hear from you.'
She wanted to slam down the phone, but she needed answers. 'What do you know about a certain artificial intelligence project?'
'So much for pleasantries. That's a vague question you asked.'
'You want specifics? I'm in charge of security for Project Trinity in North Carolina. I'm told there's a secret facility carrying out research for that project. What do you know about that?'
A moment of silence. 'I might know something.'
'And you never told me about this because…?'
Dry laughter. 'I wasn't aware we'd started a father-daughter rehabilitation program.'
'You gave Godin my name for this job?'
'How else did you think he found you? But as for telling you about my involvement, Godin wanted every¬thing compartmentalized. You can't be angry about that. You haven't told me anything about your life since puberty. What I learned, I learned from gossip or doctors or the police.'
Some battles never end, she thought. 'There's no point in rehashing the past. I know what I needed to know.'
'And you understand the situation? What has to be done?'
'I've been made aware.'
'Skow has no balls, but he does have a talent for dam¬age control.'
'I'm going now,' she said, yet she remained on the line.
'Go ahead,' said the general. 'I have a feeling I'll be seeing you soon.'
She yanked off her headset and glared at Skow.
'Well?' said the NSA man. 'Are we all on the same page?'
'Get out.'
'You haven't answered my question.'
'What choice do I have? But it sickens me that a man like Godin will be torn down so that scum like you and my father can skate. You're not fit to carry water for Peter Godin.'
Skow colored at last. 'You agree about Tennant and Weiss? We bring them in alive? Tell them it's all been a misunderstanding?'
'Godin's not dead yet.'
'True.'
'And we have no idea where they are. We can't com¬municate with them unless we go on TV and tell the whole world.'
'Also true.'
'I'm still not sure I want Tennant running around telling everyone what he thinks went on here. He knows some powerful people.'
Skow nodded thoughtfully. 'I tell you what. I'll leave Tennant and Weiss to you. If they have to die, we'll make it play.'
'You're damn right you'll leave them to me.' He got up and moved toward the door. 'Any last questions?'
'Just one. Why was Fielding sabotaging the project?'
Skow smiled. 'He didn't believe scientists should cre¬ate things they don't understand.'
'Then why did he sign on for the project?' 'I don't think he believed it would move nearly as fast as it did. He thought we'd have to earn the requisite knowledge about the brain before we could make Trinity work.'
'And did you? Earn that knowledge?'
'Are you kidding? If Trinity does go a hundred per¬cent operational, it will be completely beyond us.'
CHAPTER 25
We chose a cheap motel in Arlington, across the Potomac from Washington, one where the desk clerk didn't raise an eyebrow if a guest preferred to pay in cash. One room, two double beds, a bathroom, a television, a phone. Rachel stripped off her camouflage jumpsuit the minute she got inside and went to the bathroom to shower. I found myself watching her until the bathroom door closed. Her informal attire of the previous day had been startling enough after weeks of seeing her dressed only in skirt suits. To see her walking unabashedly away from me in her underwear transformed my perception of her. Rachel's body was taut and well muscled in a way that only strenuous exercise could maintain. This didn't square with my impression of her as an academic physician, but maybe it fit with her obsessive-compulsive tendencies.
I retrieved our street clothes from the truck, then bought a Washington Post and two bottles of Dasani from machines in the parking lot and returned to the room. The crack beneath the bathroom door exhaled steam.
I changed into my regular clothes, propped myself against the headboard, and switched on CNN. There was no mention of any federal fugitives, so I started scanning the stories in the Post.
We'd begun preparing for our trip to Israel during the eight-hour drive from Tennessee. The first step was to
