Matthew took a step toward him, shoving Cindy in front of him. Cindy didn’t make a sound, but Nicholas knew she was petrified. She was staring at him, her eyes wide, pupils dilated.

Nicholas said, “She’s going to make it. Amazing for a woman who’d been shot in the chest and left for dead in a burning building, don’t you think? Did you or Andy Tate set the fire?”

“Andy wanted to, but as I told him, I didn’t want to burn down the whole block.”

“Like I said, you can speak to her out here, not in the room.”

“Is Vanessa really in there or is it one of your agents?”

“You let Cindy go and you can come over here and see her. Red hair and all. You’re in luck, she’s awake right now.”

“Have her call out to me to prove it’s really Vanessa and this isn’t a trick.”

On cue, they all heard Vanessa’s voice come from the room—weak, sounding a bit blurred with drugs, and angry. “It’s me, Matthew. I didn’t believe them when they said you’d come back to try to kill me again. I didn’t think you were such an idiot. But here you are. Well, what are you waiting for?”

Spenser went white. His hand holding the knife at Cindy’s throat began to tremble. Not good. He began shaking his head back and forth. What did he think? Vanessa’s voice was coming from the grave?

Nicholas studied Spenser’s face. He watched him lose more control with each passing second. His arm began to fall. Cindy, smart girl, dove to the floor and rolled against the nurses’ station into the fetal position, covering her head with her arms. She didn’t move.

Spenser exploded into action. He ran toward the door, shoving Nicholas out of his way, screaming, “You bitch! You should be dead! You deserve to be dead—look what you did to me!”

Nicholas shouted, “Mike, now!”

Spenser came racing through the door as Mike stepped out of the bathroom and shouted, “Stop!”

But he didn’t.

Carrie rose up, her Glock in her hand, as he sprang toward the bed, arm in a wide arc, the blade flashing red as it slashed down. He screamed, “You’re not Vanessa!”

And the knife kept coming.

Mike pulled the trigger three times, quick succession. Spenser spun around to face her, eyes wild, jaw working. She’d clipped him twice in the hand and once in his arm. He hugged his arm to his body, and moaned with the pain, but somehow he still clutched the knife. He stared at her, then turned slowly to look at Carrie. “I don’t understand. You’re not Vanessa, I know you’re not, but I heard her voice.”

Carrie turned on the recorder. Vanessa’s voice sounded. “Hello, Matthew. Won’t you come in and talk to me?”

He stood quietly, holding his arm, staring at Mike, then Carrie, and the pain was making him weave where he stood.

“That was really smart. A recording,” and he hugged his arm tighter against him, then, amazingly, he began to laugh.

“You tricked me good, didn’t you? She really is dead, isn’t she? What, this is her dying message?”

“Oh no,” Nicholas said from behind him. “She was happy to record this for us. She only wished she could be here to speak to you in person.”

Mike said, “She recorded more for you, Spenser, if you would like to hear it.” And she pressed the button.

69

KING TO G1

Vanessa’s voice, weak but steady: “Matthew, you need to tell them everything, where you planted the bomb in Yorktown, where Darius is, what he plans.

“He wasn’t ever who you believed he was, Matthew. We believe now that Iran and Hezbollah hired him, the very people you hate. He’s been using you. They’ve been using you.

“Please cooperate with Drummond and Caine. They’ll make sure you’re treated fairly.”

Vanessa’s voice stopped. The only sound in the room was Matthew’s hoarse breathing.

Mike kept her Glock trained on him as she took a step toward him. “Vanessa told you the truth, Mr. Spenser. We will treat you fairly, but you must help us, you must tell us where Darius is. Did you know his real name is Zahir Damari? He’s an assassin, not a comrade in arms. He used you, simple as that. Does he intend to kill the vice president? Or the president? Did he manage to get one of your bombs to Tehran?”

Matthew began to laugh again, and Mike edged a little closer, her weapon steady.

Matthew looked from Nicholas in the doorway, to the three agents crowded in behind him, to the woman who shot him, to the woman with the red hair. The pain in his arm and hand was immense, thudding and pounding, making him want to scream, but he didn’t. When he spoke, his voice was steady, firm. “Darius, or Damari, whatever, I don’t care, what he’s going to do is just, it’s righteous, no matter his motives. You’re lying about Iran and Hezbollah, Darius was English, and like me, he understood loss and pain. As for the bombs, he doesn’t have any.” He stopped cold, then slowly shook his head.

So Damari had stolen one.

Spenser looked from her to Nicholas and down at Carrie. “You people don’t understand. Vanessa never understood. I know there isn’t a single person in this world who thinks clearly when it comes to the terrorists. They aren’t one country, one group, they’re an entire section of the world stuck in the Middle Ages, and their sole purpose is to kill us. Our current administration believes we can work with them, show them how we respect their beliefs, their religions, regardless of their sects.

“We’re told we should be tolerant, we should excuse what they do to women, do to anyone who disagrees with them, and then, if we do, we’re assured they’ll stop hating us and wanting to kill us. What a joke that is.

“Our own president wants to placate them, appease them, give them endless concessions, drop sanctions, let them come and go as they please. And the minute we agree to do these things, they will smile at the peace table and drink a toast to peace with us, then parade in and slit our throats, chop off our heads, burn us to death.

“They hate us, they hate everything we stand for. We are a pestilence to them, nothing more.

“They must be stopped, to be shown once and for all that we will stand up for ourselves, that we will not let them murder us. I’m taking the first step. I’m killing that idiot who would hand us over to the terrorists on a silver platter.” His voice rose to a yell. “No more appeasement!”

He smiled at each of them in turn, a triumphant smile, one that scared Mike to her toes. His hand came away from his wounded arm. He was holding a cell phone.

He paused only a brief instant, then, “I’m the beginning!”

He pressed a button on the cell phone an instant before Mike pulled the trigger.

Spenser went down hard. The phone spun away out of his hand, hit the floor, and rolled out into the hall.

Everyone dove for cover, bracing for the explosion.

It didn’t happen.

Nicholas was out the door, scooped up the phone, and began to frantically search. Mike stood at his elbow, leaving Carrie to see to Spenser.

“No bomb,” Carrie called out.

“Nicholas, what’s on there?”

“I don’t know yet. It has to be some sort of trigger. There’s a countdown going. We better clear out of here in case he dropped something in a trash can on his way in.”

The agent who’d spoken to them over their comms, shouted, “I didn’t see him put anything anywhere. He walked in, didn’t stop, didn’t toss anything. He never took his hands out of his pocket except to pull out the knife, so I think we’re okay.”

A huge relief, Mike thought, since clearing an ICU would be a nightmare.

Nicholas pulled out his laptop, set it on the counter. “I’m going to plug it in, see if I can override the program.”

The phone was an Android and he had a cord for it in his bag. It didn’t look like it could do much, yet the countdown was still going on.