12
******
Orlando unclipped the geneticist’s ID badge from a neck strap he’d spotted on her desk and waved it in the air. “Hey! Take this,” he called loudly. On the other side of the glass partition, his partner was trying unsuccessfully to unlock the door through which the three had escaped and was preparing to blast a hole through the lock. The facilities on this floor required higher security access than what was permitted by the badge he’d forcefully “borrowed” from the undersize tech he’d stuffed into a utility closet in the parking garage.
Kwiatkowski—his shirt and lab coat drenched with coffee; the front of his neck blistered and red—raced in to retrieve the key card.
“I’ll handle this,” Orlando said, eyeing the computer monitor. “You go.” He waved toward the metal door. “And put that away,” he ordered, eyeing the man’s Glock.
Tucking the gun into a concealed underarm holster, Kwiatkowski rushed next door, opened the metal door with the first card swipe, and disappeared beyond.
Orlando grinned when he saw a laptop patched into the workstation’s dummy terminal. Shortly after giving up Donovan’s name, the Vatican priest, Father Martin, had since called to inform him of an American geneticist’s involvement in the project too. The cleric couldn’t recall her name, but he’d remembered invoices paid to her Phoenix-based employer, BioMedical Solutions, Inc.
After Donovan had fled his shop, Orlando and Kwiatkowski had scoured Belfast for his motorcycle, with no results. It was while they were ransacking his home that the call came through on Orlando’s cell phone— results from traces run on Donovan’s passport and credit cards. By then, Donovan’s Aer Lingus flight to JFK International had already lifted off Belfast International’s runway.
Though the priest had been one step ahead, they hadn’t been far behind.
Their employer’s private Learjet had swiftly begun closing the gap. While in the air, another credit card trace came through, showing Donovan had purchased a second fare on Continental Airlines. A search of flight manifests had him en route to Phoenix—home of BioMedical Solutions, Inc. The Learjet arrived an hour ahead of Donovan’s flight, plenty of time for Orlando to make a preliminary visit to BioMedical Solutions’s downtown headquarters. While the guard at the security desk provided him directions to the nearest men’s room, Orlando had discreetly stuck a dimesize microphone to the underside of the granite countertop. When Donovan finally arrived, the adversarial conversation he had with the guards had been crisply transmitted to Orlando’s cell phone.
Next, Orlando studied the geneticist’s desk.
Luckily, whatever she had been working on wasn’t on the company’s main server. That saved lots of time and risk in trying to decrypt passwords and navigate sophisticated firewalls. He unplugged the laptop and tucked it under his arm.
Was this woman Donovan’s accomplice? Whatever the case, the fact that she was a geneticist was troublesome. Because if she’d examined the bones ...
His eyes made a quick inventory of the framed photos on her desk. Mostly shots of an older man whose facial similarities suggested he was her father. He snatched the photo that showed her face most clearly.
Next came the desk. In the top drawer, he found some business cards among the paper clips, Post-it pads, and pens. “Dr. Charlotte Hennesey. Executive vice president of genetic research,” he read, impressed. He slipped one into his pocket.
The bottom drawer gave up her abandoned Coach purse. He pulled it out, unzipped it, and rifled through the wallet. The bad news was her credit cards were left behind and there were no keys. The trail would be that much harder to follow. The good news was her Arizona driver’s license had been left behind too, so accessing all her records would be that much easier. He tucked the wallet into his pocket.
Then he hastened through the shattered glass and into the corridor.
Luckily, no other employees had come by during the commotion—less killing, fewer complications. To his right was another solid keyed entryway marked lab 11—level 4 clearance only. To his left, sprawled in front of the elevator, the dead executive lay in a swirled pool of blood, coffee, and brain matter.
“Nice suit,” Orlando said, staring into the man’s lifeless blue eyes. Sidestepping the mess, he calmly made his way to a fire exit sign that pointed to a door at the end of the hall.
13
******
In the genetics lab, Kwiatkowski was attempting to be low-key while trying to figure out where the geneticist and priest had headed. He could tell he was on the right path when one of the female techs became frightened at the sight of him. She grabbed at a phone to attempt a call to security.
Promptly, he strode over and squeezed the thin hand that held the receiver while the middle finger of his free hand pressed down on the base’s disconnect button. “Don’t even think about it,” he growled.
“Don’t hurt me!” the woman pleaded through quivering lips. “Which way did they go?”
Without hesitation, she pointed across the pristine workstations to a
fire door. When he scanned the room and didn’t spot anyone else paying attention, he jabbed his right fist once at the woman’s face, knocking her out cold onto the floor.
Then he sprinted through the stainless steel islands heaped with microscopes and gadgets and slammed through the door. In the stairwell, he paused to listen. Quick footsteps echoed, sounding close to the bottom.
Swearing, he bounded downward, taking the treads in huge leaps.
Just as he passed a placard for the fifth floor, he heard a door slam far below. He swore again and quickened his pace.
By the time he made it to the bottom he could already hear tires squealing. Pulling the Glock, he threw open the door. But the front end of the speeding car swerved to push it right back at him, knocking him down and cranking his ankle sideways. Pain shot up his calf.
He cursed, sprang to his feet, and leapt out the door, crouching for a shot. But the car was just rounding out onto the roadway.
Cursing again, he tested the ankle. Nothing broken, maybe only a slight sprain. That’s when Orlando appeared on the street, spotted him, and came rushing over.
