The Last Second

by Catherine Coulter

  “Yes, yes, I have the tapes ready.” He moved out of the camera’s view and a screen flickered to life.

  Norgate fast-forwarded through the six hours of footage to the moment Patel drifted away. “I know it’s hard to see everything, the cameras missed a portion of the event when they repositioned. It’s a full fifteen seconds of her spinning, then she resists the spin, turns, and comes back to the hand rungs.”

  “Okay. So how’d she do it?”

  “Remember, this was early on, things are tighter now, so we will never have this happen again. You can see she and Verlander get their lines crossed somehow, and she tries to get them untangled. The cables snap, and with the sudden pressure, the trailing line breaks. Somehow, she released the main safety line when she was doing that. Or maybe it yanked free, we don’t know. Her third failsafe was a jet pack—what’s known as Simplified Aid for EVA Rescue, or SAFER. It’s basically a life preserver for astronauts. According to her colleagues, she activated it and propelled herself in the right direction. It was a smart move, gutsy. If she’d activated when she was facing the wrong direction she could have shot herself farther away from the ISS and Verlander wouldn’t have been there to catch her. We couldn’t move the robotic arm to save her in time, either. It was a fluke, and we were lucky she made it back in one piece. We changed a few things on the suits and our procedures afterward to make sure it never happens again.”

  He chewed a lip, then said, “Watch where I point, okay?” Norgate rewound the video, hit play. “See here? The video should show the vapor from the SAFER. It’s nitrogen gas propulsion. There is none. But by the time anyone thought to check, the pack had been reset. We have no way to prove or disprove she actually used it. She claimed it didn’t work, that the—Numen, she calls them—pushed her back to the hand rungs. We’ve never told anyone that fact, Mr. Grace. I trust you will only use it if absolutely necessary.”

  Grace said, “Back up. So it’s possible she’s been telling the truth all this time?”

  “I’m supposed to say no, absolutely not.”

  “I see. Let’s hear what her fellow astronauts are saying.”

  Norgate hit play. Patel’s voice was clear on the tape.

  “How do you know my name?”

  Grace said, “She’s talking to someone, who’s she talking to?”

  “We don’t know. It wasn’t an appropriate response to anything anyone was saying to her. She’s wearing what we call a Snoopy cap, which allows for regular communication with the ISS and command. She wasn’t talking to us, responding to us, or otherwise in conversation with us.”

  Patel again: “I will tell them. Thank you for saving my life.”

  Norgate said, “Then she’s back on the hand grip. Verlander grabbed her, maneuvered her into the airlock. We hastened the depressurization, blew out Verlander’s eardrums doing it, but we got her back inside the station. Doc checked her over, we talked to her extensively. Or tried. She wasn’t making sense, but we assumed that was part of the—event.” He paused, face strained in recall. “It was a bad day.”

  “There’s an understatement. What was she saying?”

  “She was talking about ‘new men.’ We didn’t know until later she meant the Numen. Dictionary says Numen are a divine spirit. Knowing the stress this event caused, we chalked it up to her panicking, losing her breath, having a few moments of hypoxia which caused a hallucination, though she said she didn’t see anything, only felt their presence and heard the words.”

  “Did anyone talk to her fellow astronauts on the space station? What did they say about the incident?”

  “Sure, everyone was thoroughly debriefed. We take accidents seriously, Mr. Grace. When she came back in, she was talking crazy, so we made the decision to sedate her. When she woke up, she kept insisting there were beings outside the space station. An alien race who wanted to bring us peace. We did a full workup, of course, but it didn’t show anything. She couldn’t shake it. The decision was made to end her mission early, rotate her off the space station when the next round of astronauts came up. She had another few months on her tour, but by then—her actions were colored by this event. We had no choice but to bring her home.”

  “Who made that decision?”

  “Our flight psychiatrist, Dr. Rebecca Holloway. She worked closely with Nevaeh and all the team from the beginning of their mission two years earlier. You can’t talk to her, though. She’s deceased, drowned in her pool. She’d recently been through a divorce, so they looked at her husband, but found nothing. He was out of town. They ruled it an accidental drowning.

  “Anyway, once Nevaeh was back on Earth, Dr. Holloway spent a lot of time with her, then decided to ground her. Nevaeh didn’t take it well. She quit, and I didn’t hear from her for a year. She came back out of the blue asking to be assigned a new mission. When I told her she wasn’t ever going back to space she was devastated.”

  Grace said, “Just so you know, we think it’s very likely Dr. Holloway was murdered. We have a record of Dr. Patel and her bodyguard in Houston the week Holloway died. They were also in Idaho the same week. She left behind two bodies, one of which was the research scientist who worked at the Idaho Research Facility. Made it look like a murder-suicide.”

  “The Idaho Research Facility, they’re the ones who’ve been in the news this week for misplacing some plutonium?”

  “The very same.”

  Franklin said, “You think Nevaeh had something to do with all these deaths? That’s preposterous.”

  “Were you aware Dr. Claire Fontaine is also dead? She’s the psychiatrist Patel consulted a year after she was grounded, before she came and talked to you. Patel and her bodyguard were in New York the same time of Fontaine’s death. She, too, was ruled an accidental death, a slip in the shower. But we believe Patel murdered her.”

  Norgate was silent a moment. “I don’t know, really, but I do know Dr. Holloway was jealous of Patel, perhaps treated her unfairly, and that’s why Nevaeh went to New York to this other psychiatrist. She and Holloway spoke.”

  “Patel saw this as a betrayal and so she murdered her. Revenge. Makes sense.”

  Franklin rubbed a hand across his face. “I can’t accept it, I can’t—”

  “Considering the attack on Jean-Pierre Broussard and his ship a few days ago, I would have to say the pattern is evident. Did she ever feel you betrayed her, Dr. Norgate?”

  “No, not really.”

  Grace said, “If Patel is capable of stealing plutonium to have a nuke made, she is fully capable of murdering millions. She’s capable of murdering you as well.”

  Norgate looked devastated. “I haven’t talked to her in almost six years. But I’ll tell you this. If she’s been planning to set off a nuke, she’ll have thought through every permutation. She’s brilliant, scary brilliant. If she doesn’t have every tool at her disposal, then she’s fully capable of obtaining whatever she needs to make this happen.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

  T-MINUS 18 HOURS

  Nevaeh Patel’s Chateau

  Lyon, France

  Mike was relieved to see Broussard not only conscious again but also getting back some color. She asked the pink-cheeked French EMT whose name tag read D. LOUÇON, “How’s he doing?”

  In heavily accented English, Louçon said, “Well, I think. The bullet passed through below his collarbone, just here. It is most likely cracked, and I believe his lung to be impacted as well, though it has not fully collapsed. He will need surgery.”

  Mike nodded, said to Broussard, “You heard that? You’re going to be okay, only a bit of surgery. Are you up to talking to me, Jean-Pierre?”

  “Of course. What can I do, Mike?”

  “Tell me how you knew where to find the Flor de la Mar.”

  “Three years of intense study, and some natural supposition, I suppose. And luck.”

  “So no maps, nothing physical? Gut instinct?”

  He managed a weak smile. “I certainly consulted many old maps. An
d journals. The Flor de la Mar is one of the richest lost ships in history, as you already know. Many people have searched for it. I spent three years studying its possible whereabouts. Why do you want to know this now?”

  “Jean-Pierre, did it emit some sort of electrical charge that enabled you to locate it?”

  “No, but the Holy Grail did.”

  “You know from the moment you touched the stone? How?”

  “I just knew. And it did have a charge to it, I suppose one could call it electrical. But it was really something else entirely. I felt like the clock had turned back. I was young again, invincible, strong, ready to take on anything, and I felt a sense of rightness, of peace.” He thought back, remembered how his knee no longer ached. “It was as if all my blood rose to the surface in greeting, and the stone vibrated in response. I suppose the very best description is it was like holding a purring cat, so it definitely must have been giving off some sort of audible vibration. You’d have to have an extremely sensitive microphone to pick it up, though. I don’t know if anything exists so powerful that it could pick up the Grail’s heartbeat from afar.”

  “You speak of it as if it were alive, in some way.”

  “Oh, it is, not in the way you believe, not a human sort of alive, but when I held it, I felt like it was becoming part of me. You know only those who are selfless, those who are worthy, can claim the Grail. I know I am not worthy.” He looked at her closely, drew a breath. “Mike, I told the Grail I wasn’t worthy, I was only the messenger, but still it favored me. But the person to whom the Grail must truly belong is more than worthy, she’s pure, incandescent, a bright light.” His breath hitched.

  “Who is this person, Jean-Pierre?”

  “It’s my daughter, Emilie. She is dying. She has la sclérose latérale amyotrophique.”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t understand. What is that in English?”

  He said, “It is amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. It’s called ALS, Mike, a death sentence. Nothing can help. It can kill quickly, in months, or it can go years, like Stephen Hawking. When Emilie’s leg muscles became weak—we learned it is the most common symptom to begin ALS—she was diagnosed. I didn’t know what to do. I railed against fate. It was so unfair, why my daughter? Why Emilie, she is so honorable, kind, humble. She was studying medicine at the Sorbonne. She is only twenty-one.

  “All my wealth, all my resources, yet I could do nothing in the face of this unrelenting, merciless disease. I realized the Holy Grail was her only hope. I knew the Grail would call to her, welcome her, cure her. Make her immortal? I don’t know. From the day of her diagnosis, every waking hour, I studied and searched. And I found it.” He choked. “And now it’s gone again. Stolen. Mike, Emilie must have it, and soon. She is now bedridden, can barely raise her arms. Soon she won’t be able to feed herself, then she will not be able to breathe, and then she will die of suffocation.

  “Please, Mike, promise me you will find Patel—yes, I believe you now—there could be no other, it had to be her. She is behind the theft of the Grail and my attempted murder. And the deaths of some of my crew? Yes, she is responsible.” He swallowed. “And poor Devi. Please, you must get me back the Grail. For my daughter. For Emilie.”

  Mike closed her hand over his, squeezed. “I will do my best, Jean-Pierre. Both Nicholas and I will. Now think a moment: Do you believe it’s possible the Grail will give off some sort of vibrations to help us locate it?”

  Grant stepped into the room. “I felt something when you brought the stone out of the sphere, Jean-Pierre. I don’t know if it was a vibration, exactly, or a hum, it was incredibly subtle, could even have been mistaken for the running of the motors on the boat under sail, but I did feel something. When you put it back in its lead box, the vibrations stopped.”

  Mike said, “So if Patel takes it out of its box, it could be traced.”

  Broussard said, “Perhaps. Do you have any idea where she is?”

  Mike said, “We think she’s in Sri Lanka. Adam traced the sale of a massive telescope to a company called Aquarius, which we believe she owns. There is an undocumented observatory there. He’s nailing down the exact spot. Jean-Pierre, this took some years to build, and millions of dollars.”

  “So she’s stolen from me. And the rest?”

  “Possibly from terrorists. Now, we want to draw her out, verify exactly where she is. I’m thinking if we can let her know you’re alive, we can trace her. Your secretary—”

  “Yes, that is a good plan. No, better to use Alys, Nevaeh’s secretary. All we need to do is tell her I’m alive and Al-Asaad tried to blow up Galactus, and she’ll call Nevaeh immediately to tell her.”

  “And while they talk,” Grant said, “we will trace Dr. Patel’s location.”

  The EMT approached them. “I must take Mr. Broussard to the hospital now.”

  Mike touched Broussard lightly on the arm. “By the time you wake up from surgery, we will have stopped her. I swear I will try to find the Grail, sir. For Emilie.”

  “Thank you, Mike. I was a fool, didn’t oversee Nevaeh like I should have. And she betrayed me. Remember, she is very thorough, very smart. As for Kiera Byrne, I’ve heard rumors she’s as dangerous as Nevaeh is smart. She was trained in the IRA camps when she was young, so she knows explosives as well as small arms. My secretary, Claudette, can get you a profile so you can at least see what you’re dealing with.”

  “Thank you for the warning, and the offer. We’ll call her, have her send it to Nicholas’s phone. We will succeed, Jean-Pierre. We must.”

  When the EMTs wheeled Broussard away, Mike said to Grant, “We have to get Mills out of here. He suggested a body bag. It’s not a bad idea. The CIA has arranged for us to go to an airbase near here now. Are you with us?”

  Grant cursed, dashed his fingers through his hair. “I want to, Mike, but the fact is Fentriss would have my butt in a sling if I left Broussard’s side. Does he still need protection? I don’t know. That CIA idiot, Mills, said he was betrayed by his captain. Maybe this terrorist has others willing to try to kill him. So I must stick close to him.

  “Please stay in touch, and if you need anything, you let me know and I’ll do my best to help.” He gave her a quick hug. “Now, go find Patel and the Holy Grail. For Emilie.” He walked away after Broussard, said over his shoulder, “Hey, you might want to punch out Mills. The yahoo.”

  * * *

  Nicholas and Mike gave their statements to the Lyon police, gave them Pierre Menard’s name and number at Interpol, and promised to talk more as soon as they could return. The fact that they appeared to have saved Jean-Pierre Broussard from terrorists helped. The police guaranteed to guard Mr. Broussard from further possible attacks while he was in the hospital.

  It was easy enough to lift a body bag from the coroner’s truck, since the responders were distracted by the nine bodies Mike, Nicholas, and Grant had left scattered across Patel’s estate, these in addition to the dead team at Galactus. And easier still to carry Mills out into the backyard and put him in the back of the waiting SUV, summoned by the CIA—Carlton Grace. The driver, wearing wraparound black sunglasses, black jacket, white shirt, and tie, was behind the wheel, tapping his fingers impatiently. Mike gave him a look, then quickly called Claudette, who agreed to manage the calls between Alys and Patel. Adam set a trap on both their phones so he could monitor where they connected, hoping if Nicholas’s attempt with the satellite phone failed, they could at least try to have a generalized location for Patel.

  Mike and Nicholas shared a glance before getting into the SUV. Grant had given Nicholas his go-bag holding all his tactical equipment. Nicholas sat in the back, going through the bag, seeing what they had to work with.

  A voice came from behind the back seats. “Hey, someone want to get me out of here?”

  Mike looked over her shoulder at Nicholas, winked, called out, “Sorry, Vinny, several more police cars are right ahead of us, you’ll have to wait.”

  Muffled curses, and Nicholas smiled
at the clear road ahead. Then he turned his attention back to the go-bag.

  Mike asked, “Anything interesting in there? Striped undies, a photo of Kitsune?”

  Nicholas spread all the goodies out on the back seat: extra magazines, of which there were only three, two guns, a variety of medical goods, a Taser, and a high-intensity flashlight that could blind anyone approaching from up to twenty feet away.

  He laughed. “I’ve looked through it, no underwear at all and no photo of Kitsune. A few handy items, yes, but not nearly enough. We’ll have to load up. There’s no way we’re heading into the abyss after these two madwomen without more.”

  “I doubt Grant was thinking about how to stop a nuke and two crazy women when he packed for his cruise on The Griffon. Um, about the crazy women. Assuming Patel and Byrne are in Sri Lanka, how, exactly, can we make it there in time?”

  “I’m not worrying about it. Grace has to figure it out. I’m more worried about how we stop a nuke. I have to assume it’s on some sort of timer, if she’s trying to make it coincide with the lunar eclipse and the passing of the International Space Station. If I can narrow down their location, I could conceivably jam the signal, but I’ll have to be on-site to pull it off. Once I’m in the system, I’ll be able to see what sort of failsafes she has in the software.” He looked at his grandfather’s Breitling. “The eclipse is in sixteen hours.”

  “I spoke with Broussard about the Grail. It emits a signature I believe must be electrical in nature, so I’m thinking we need some sort of air-based sonar. If we can focus on its signature, we might find them quicker. Wherever the stone is, Nevaeh Patel won’t be far away.”

  “A good idea, though again, we’d have to be close, on-site, for it to work. What does the Grail have to do with setting off the EMP? Why else would she have gone to such lengths to steal the stone from Broussard’s yacht?”