Or, possibly, were there things she didn’t even know she’d done?
But none of that mattered. The bottom line was they had living animals gestating inside the surrogate hosts. From here on out, all they had to do was study the growth patterns and adjust the genome accordingly. Success was a given; the only variable was time.
Claus continued the autopsy, slicing open the stomach. The contents spilled onto the dissection tray.
Neither man said a word.
The mystery of the missing embryos lay on the wax tray in front of them. Rhumkorrf stared at the tiny, half-digested bones. He could clearly make out bits of a skull.
The ancestors were eating each other inside the womb.
NOVEMBER 16: THE RUSSIAN REPORT
Implantation +7 Days
PAUL FISCHER STARED at the sealed envelope on his desk. He was almost afraid to open it. If it didn’t contain information that would help him, he had few options left.
Other than the contents of the envelope, his only real lead had been uncovered by Interpol. The agency had discovered a shoestring connection between Genada and a U.K. company called F. N. Wallace, Inc., that had purchased parts from a scrapped C-5 Galaxy. That discovery made the pieces fall into place for Paul; a plane that large could move the entire Rhumkorrf experiment anywhere in the world. But knowing Genada had a C-5 only helped if the plane was out in the open, or if it flew again. Paul knew Colding would make sure neither of those things happened.
No, Paul’s best chance now was to find Galina Poriskova.
And that was why he was scared to open the report that sat in front of him. It could be the key to Poriskova’s whereabouts. An actual Russian lieutenant, escorted by two MPs, had hand-delivered it just minutes earlier. The Russian had actually asked for Paul’s ID and carefully examined it before asking Paul to sign for the report. Galina’s involvement could be enough to convince Switzerland, the Caymans and China to freeze Genada’s assets. If Paul couldn’t make that happen, there was no way to flush out Colding.
Paul couldn’t put it off any longer. He opened the sealed envelope, finding two manila folders inside: one thick, one thin. The thick one was on top, so he started with that. It contained page after page of financial records, records that seemed to confirm Galina had been living a lavish lifestyle all across Russia and Eastern Europe. After the financial records, though, came something far more interesting. It seemed that when Russian investigators followed up on the plane tickets and hotel stays purchased in Galina’s name, they discovered that more often than not, no one showed up. At times, a tall blonde did purchase big-ticket items like art and jewelry—but Galina was a five-foot-four brunette. Bottom line? Galina hadn’t been seen in Russia or anywhere else since shortly after her meeting with Paul two years ago.
Which meant the second report could contain only one thing.
Paul opened it. If the words on the four pages chilled him, the photos damn near froze him cold.
He picked up his phone and hit the extension for his assistant.
“Yes sir?”
“Get me Longworth, please. Immediately.”
“Yes sir.”
Paul hung up and waited for the callback. The second report changed everything. As gruesome as it was, it provided the leverage he desperately needed. If the C-5 lead panned out, he could combine it with this and make his case for freezing Genada’s accounts worldwide. But that would take time. And with Genada’s mole inside the U.S. governmental system, Danté might still stay one step ahead.
Unless Paul found a way to make sure the mole couldn’t find anything at all.
He looked at the Russian report. Not at the contents, but at the report itself, at the folder. Paper. A courier. That’s what he needed, not emails, databases and phone calls… nothing electronic.
The phone rang.
“This is Colonel Fischer.”
“What do you have for me, Paul,” Longworth said. “You find them yet?”
“I have an interesting lead. If you approve, I’d like to try something different. We have to catch them off guard if we’re going to gain the momentum, go on the attack.”
“I like the sound of that,” Longworth said. “What do you have in mind?”
“I’d rather not say at the moment, sir. I’ll have a courier deliver you a memo.”
“A courier? Just email me.”
“No,” Paul said. “I can’t.”
Longworth paused for a second. “I see. Good, Colonel. Send your memo. And while you’re at it, send memos to anyone else you need help from. I’ll make a call and ensure you have as many couriers as you need.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Paul hung up and did some mental math. To do this right would take three days, maybe four. If it went well, he’d soon be making another visit to a Genada facility.
And this time, he’d find much more than an empty building.
NOVEMBER 17: A WALK ON THE BEACH
Implantation +8 Days
COLDING AND SARA walked along Rapleje Bay. Snow, stones and sand crunched under their feet. The bay’s two tongues of land on either side made for a mile-long, water-filled U that pointed northeast toward the unending expanse of Lake Superior. Stars sparkled like diamond chips on a blanket of black velvet.
He had to get some personal time, even if it was only an hour or so. Jian had recovered from her panic attack. Not all the way, but some—she was still twitchy, eyes always darting to corners. She was hallucinating again, even though she denied it. Colding had told Rhumkorrf to up her meds a little bit more.
Rapleje Bay was ten miles away from the mansion, from the hangar… from the lab. Sara had borrowed Clayton’s crazy Bv206, the Nuge, so they could get away from everyone for a little bit. It was all getting to be too much: the fetus biting the camera, Jian going off the deep end, Danté’s evasiveness, Fischer out there hunting for them. But it was all worth it… wasn’t it? Saving millions of lives, sparing people the pain his wife had gone through—didn’t that end justify the means? A week ago, he would have said yes. He wasn’t so sure anymore.
A stiff wind blew from the northeast, rippling the nylon of his black Otto Lodge parka. He was ice-cold. Sara seemed perfectly comfortable in only jeans, a sweatshirt and a windbreaker.
“You must be part penguin,” Colding said. “I know you were born around these parts and all, but it’s freezing out here.”
“Technically, thirty-two degrees is freezing. It’s at least forty-five out here. Like spring, really.”
Colding smiled and shook his head, wondering how she might handle a sweltering summer day in Atlanta.
“Besides,” Sara said, “you better soak up this heat wave while you can. On an island like this you can bet it’s below freezing every day from December to February.”
Colding shuddered at the thought. “That’s horrifying. I had enough of that at Baffin Island.”
“Oh come on, Peej. This place is beautiful. This is where the jet set from the fifties came to relax, and you’re being paid to be here. Do you know what a resort like this would cost you a night?”
“We’re in the middle of nowhere. I wouldn’t pay a dime.”
Sara rolled her eyes. “That’s you, Peej, last of the tightwad romantics.”
Colding stopped and looked at Sara. Her short blond hair flopped in the stiff breeze. She had a beauty he’d never seen in another woman, including, he realized, in Clarissa. Even when Sara squinted her eyelids against the stiff wind, he found himself admiring her laugh lines.