The History Thief: Ten Days Lost (The Sterling Novels)

by Joseph Nagle

  The door leading to the second floor was close enough to touch.

  He reached out for the handle.

  He fell.

  His knees crashed to the floor, but he couldn’t feel the pain that should be there. His body had gone numb from the lack of oxygen. The ceiling above spun viciously. He closed his eyes, hoping for some control.

  With a grunt, he threw himself onto his side and then pushed himself off of the floor with as much strength as he could muster.

  He half-crawled, half-walked to the door of the safe house.

  It was nondescript and no different than any other room in the hotel, but it was his. It was an agreement with hotel’s owner—a permanent thank-you for having saved the man’s life.

  At the door of his room, he fumbled for the card key. It dropped to the floor. He dared not attempt to pick it up, knowing that, had he tried, his fast-fleeing strength wouldn’t have allowed him to stand once more. Instead, he shoved a heavy shoulder into the door where it met the frame and fell painfully into the room in a shatter of splinters.

  He tried to stand, but fell.

  Reverting to childhood, he crawled.

  Across the room, he dragged himself until he was in front of a sink cabinet.

  He opened it and rummaged through its contents, not caring about the mess he was making.

  The kit was there. He tried to open it, but his hands felt heavy and thick; he fumbled and dropped the kit. Trying once more, he put the kit on his lap and held it firmly with an elbow. He was able to open it. In it was a thick syringe of epinephrine. Putting the plastic-covered needle into his mouth, he yanked off the covering that protected the needle.

  Its gauge was heavy, and its length was long. Needle was not the right word; it was really a long, sharp hose.

  Its size and length were necessary for its destination. The needle must be plunged through muscle, fat, and cartilage, directly into the heart.

  Michael’s central nervous system was shutting down; he knew it. Time was not his ally. The needle in his hand was his only hope for survival. It was a fight-or-flight hormone that had helped him so many times in the past, but never in this manner.

  He couldn’t waste another moment; he raised the hypodermic with his last ounce of strength. An intracardiac injection is a difficult technique for a physician to administer, much less a patient to himself.

  It was the only way.

  Michael braced his back against the wall and raised the needle. He squeezed the syringe as hard as he could in his hand. His aim had to be true; violently he slammed the thick-gauged needle into his chest and just to the left of his breastplate.

  The shock of the long, razor-sharp syringe being buried into his heart forced his head to slam backward into the wall and his jaw to clench tightly shut. His arms dropped to his side. He was unable to move them.

  First, he gurgled awkwardly, then his breathing slowed.

  Rolling his eyes downward, Michael cast a glance at the end of the syringe: the plunger was fully out of the body of the syringe.

  He hadn’t been able to depress the plunger. No epinephrine had been injected into his heart.

  Trying to raise his arms, Michael was only met with fear. He couldn’t move them. The signal sent from his brain to his arms to move was either not sent or could not be received. The best he could do was to wiggle slightly the tips of one hand’s fingers.

  His breathing had slowed even more. Narcosis was here, and death was only moments behind.

  He thought of Sonia.

  He thought of the day they had met.

  He thought of her laughing.

  He thought of their child not yet conceived.

  He smiled, albeit his body at death only allowed it to be an uneven one; then a resolute sadness overcame him.

  She was missing.

  He would never see her again; never touch her.

  It was over.

  He was over.

  The room of the safe house faded black around him. As his vision failed, he watched as the darkness began to move from the edges of his field of view until it collapsed into the center. He wanted to close his eyes, but didn’t have the strength to do it.

  In the moments before death, he was blind.

  In the center of the black, a bright, white light appeared and painfully defenestrated through a small hole in its center. Michael wanted to squint, but his body’s strength was gone, even for the slightest of needs.

  In the middle of the light, a man stood.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  INTERROGATION ROOM

  4A CIA HQ, LANGLEY

  Lou sat alone in the windowless room; he knew the camera was trained on him, but he didn’t look up at it. He felt uneasily calm being on the other side of the table.

  This surprised him.

  His arm had been casted, and he felt no pain. The fentanyl that had been given to him for the pain was a miracle—thirty-minute heroin, as it has been called.

  He liked it. It was the only thing that felt good at the moment.

  The door to the room opened; Lou was not surprised at who came through.

  “Hey, Chief, I wondered when you might stop by,” said Lou in a nonchalant manner.

  The section chief stood between Lou and the room’s sole camera, but didn’t speak. Instead, he put his right hand in front of his thigh and began a series of slight taps with each of his five fingers.

  Lou watched.

  The section chief stopped drumming his thigh.

  Lou looked at the chief for a moment and then, with his good, non-casted hand, tapped his own thigh.

  The section chief nodded slightly, and then spoke out loud. “Lou, I stopped by to see how you are doing.”

  “Fine, Chief, never better,” Lou responded.

  “Lou, I am going to ask you this once. I was tracking the Doc when he went off the grid—right before his encounter with you. Lou, do you know where he is?”

  Lou sighed in the way a trapped man should and replied, “Chief, it’s like I said: I was tracking him, too, but he attacked me.” Lou nodded at his broken arm. “As you can see, his attack was better than my counter. No, Chief. No, I do not know where he is.”

  “Then how is it you knew to go to our asset at USGS?!” the section chief shouted back.

  Lou growled in return, “Just blind luck; it was the only asset with supplies near his escape. It was either there or nowhere. I went and waited. He showed up five minutes later.”

  During their brief conversation, both men continued to tap their respective thighs. If any of this had been caught on the camera, it would have appeared normal, nervous habits or natural gesturing.

  The taps were nothing natural.

  Their verbal conversation was short, benign, and revealed nothing. However, their conversation being tapped atop their thighs was the exact opposite.

  Out loud, the section chief said, “Okay, Lou, you just hang in there; we’ll get to the bottom of this. If it’s like you say, then you have nothing to worry about. For your sake, however, I hope you had nothing to do with the Doc disappearing from the grid. Treason isn’t taken kindly amid these walls.”

  Quietly, however, the section chief tapped out a completely different message: They have someone on the inside of Langley. Watch your back. They sent the Doc to find him. He has less than forty-eight hours to live.

  Lou tapped back: Let’s hope he makes it.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  THE RESURRECTION

  SOLAR DO CASTELO

  The small light was gone; everything was black. There was no sound, no feeling—no nothing.

  This was death.

  Michael heard a voice call out to him.

  It was masculine. He spoke his name, not his real name, but the name he was called. It came in the form of a question.

  Doc?

  Michael wanted to answer, but had no response to give. He wasn’t even sure what he had heard. Again came the voice; this time it was louder and clearer:

/>   Doc!

  Then he touched him.

  York ran across the room to the slumped CIA officer and shouted at Michael once more, shaking him: “Doc, Doc! Can you hear me?”

  There was no response.

  York fell to his knees in front of Michael and, his Special Forces training taking over, instantly evaluated the fallen man. A needle was embedded to the base of its syringe, deep into his heart. York put two fingers on Michael’s carotid artery and watched for the rise and fall of Michael’s chest: he felt no beat and detected no breathing. Repositioning his first two fingers, he tried again, this time pushing deeper into the side of Michael’s neck. It was nearly nonexistent, but he thought he felt something. And then he lost it.

  York pulled open one of Michael’s eyelids. The white of Michael’s eyes surprised him. His eyes had rolled upward and deep into their sockets.

  I am dead.

  It was the only thought in Michael’s mind now.

  Then a white-hot light exploded in front of him; it made him scream.

  York reeled backward, nearly falling over as Michael’s scream erupted from out of nowhere.

  “Hold on, Doc,” a shocked York yelled back, as he reached over to yank out the syringe.

  Michael would later realize that the flashing bit of light caused by his eyelids being peeled open saved him. His hand shot up, aided by the last bit of adrenaline his own body could manufacture, adrenaline that flushed through him when York had pulled open his eyelids. It was enough to give him the shot of energy needed to stop York.

  He grabbed York by the hand and feebly said, “Do not…take…it…out.”

  York was silent; he didn’t know what to say or do.

  Michael mumbled, but nothing coherent spilled out from his lips. His eyes were shut again. His hand fell away, limp and heavy, hanging at his side.

  His murmurs continued.

  York leaned closer. “What are you trying to say?”

  “In…ject.”

  Michael’s command was weak, and York wasn’t sure he had heard him correctly, but he would get no second opportunity: Michael was gone. His heart stopped, and his chest no longer rose in any palpable rhythm.

  He was dead.

  York acted fast; he pushed the plunger, sending the epinephrine directly into Michael’s heart.

  Nothing happened.

  York pulled out the needle; a slight trickle of blood followed.

  Michael was slumped to the right; his back was still planted against the wall.

  The moments ticked by slowly.

  York sat down, unsure of what to do next. He was exhausted from the past twenty-four hours. He had gone from Afghanistan to Iran to India; now he was in Portugal. The man that he needed to make things right was dead.

  His mind was blank; for the first time since this madness began, York felt weak. Unable to support the weight of his own head, it lowered until his chin touched his chest. He felt defeated; he felt lost.

  “Why the long face, kid? Someone die?”

  Michael’s voice was weak and scratchy. The words came out rough, even painful.

  He had risen.

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  PATIENCE IS A VIRTUE

  BETWEEN TWO CASTLES

  LISBON, PORTUGAL

  The lawn that surrounded Castelo de São Jorge was alive with numerous units from the Polícia de Segurança Pública (PSP)—the local police.

  Distinctive white Volkswagens with alternating white and blue stripes were parked in a manner that set up a perimeter around the castle. Their blue lights spun atop the cars, making it quite clear to onlookers to stay back. PSP officers were everywhere. They looked omnipotent in their dark blue uniforms, replete with heavy Glock 19s holstered at their sides. A few carried the ominous Heckler & Koch MP5 with telescoping stocks.

  As was typical with every policeman around the world, none smiled.

  But Charney didn’t need to be any closer than he was. He had seen and heard enough. It wasn’t difficult to find Dr. Sterling; the carnage the deputy director of the National Clandestine Services had created did the work for him.

  Charney did not know what had caused the officer to drive in such an impetuous and haphazard manner, but whatever it had been, it had nearly killed him.

  Listening intently to whichever officer was closest, Charney heard as they spoke of a man, an American, who had incapacitated two men at a nearby hospital, then stolen a car and left a five-kilometer-long path of damaged cars, downed poles, and this destroyed lawn.

  The American had been running.

  There could be only one conclusion: he was being chased, or, thought Charney, he was hurt. Charney knew that a trained man didn’t act like this—so careless—unless it had been necessary. He would have to be careful with this one.

  Charney raised his hand to his mouth and inhaled deeply on his cigarette, and then exhaled slowly without having removed the cigarette from his lips. He took one more drag. Having seen enough, he flicked the cigarette to the ground and watched it burn in the grass. Leaning against the tree, he scanned across the lawn and past the still-smoldering Peugeot smashed against a tree.

  There wasn’t much to see beyond the destroyed car; through the narrow rows of trees, he saw a small hotel. Solar do Castelo.

  Charney smiled.

  Next to the hotel was a sidewalk café. Circumambulating the expanse of lawn and trees between the two castles, he casually strolled until he was at the café’s outdoor patio. Taking a seat, he crossed his legs and signaled for an espresso, lit another cigarette, and then sat back.

  Sitting out in the open, he didn’t need to blend. He had the advantage.

  Dr. Michael Sterling didn’t know what he looked like.

  Patiently, he waited.

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  SHOTS OF ESPRESSO, ONE

  TO THE NOSE CASTELO

  COFFEE HOUSE

  The two men, one a Green Beret, the other a former Airborne Ranger, accomplished Special Operations officer with the CIA, and the current deputy director of the NCS, sat dejected on the dusty wood floor of the small hotel room. Sprawled about were splinters of wood from the broken door, bottles of counter and window cleaner, rags, dish detergent, and those other things typically found stored in an under-the-sink cupboard.

  York was motionless, and Michael was thankful.

  Eyeing the open door and the mess, York stood and closed it into its frame. He struggled a bit to make it fit as best as he could.

  Turning to Michael, he asked, “What the hell is going on, sir; why did you have a syringe shoved into your chest?”

  “Doc,” replied Michael. “Call me Doc.”

  Michael groaned as his faculties slowly returned. His head still spun a bit, and the horizon of the floor’s edge rocked slightly. He closed his eyes in an attempt to get his balance. Opening them, the light-green walls with horizontal, dark-brown stripes helped the nausea return.

  Ignoring York’s question, he ordered, “Go to the freezer; give me what’s inside.” He hoped it would help.

  York was a soldier, trained to follow orders. Instinctively and without question he went to the freezer, opened it, and eyed its lone content, but didn’t reach his hand in to get it.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me—are you serious?” asked York instead.

  “Just give me the fucking bottle, kid!”

  York reached into the small icebox; his hand scraped roughly against the growth of thick frost that lined its interior and pulled out the frosted bottle of White Wolf vodka. It was three-quarters full and clear as spring water, but that didn’t change the truth: it was some of the cheapest vodka one could find.

  Kneeling at Michael’s side, he handed it over and asked, “You really think this is the best time for a drink?”

  Michael was sweating, and his hair was matted unevenly across his scalp. His face had gone from an opaque white to a deep crimson as his body worked feverishly to cleanse itself of both the injected adrenaline and the
drug.

  But that didn’t stop his ire.

  “Kid, I don’t see tits on your chest, or my mama’s growl across your face. You’re not my wife, and you certainly ain’t my mother—give me the fucking bottle!”

  York wanted to tell Michael to go plug his sunshine-less hole with the bottle, but, instead, he obediently handed it over.

  Michael didn’t move and further commanded, “Pop the cork, kid.”

  York did.

  His arm was still limp as he grabbed the vodka, and the weight of the liquid forced both hand and bottle to smash against the floor. But Michael didn’t lose his grip. A small geyser of vodka shot up and splattered against the floor. The frozen bottle, firmly cupped in the palm of his hand, felt good. The cold permeated the meat of his palm and worked up his forearm. It radiated upward like little slices of heaven.

  With a little effort, he put the bottle to his lips and took a deep swallow, but he had no palpable reaction to the alcohol that burned down his throat. He then rubbed the cold bottle across his forehead.

  The warmth from the vodka fell into his stomach and cascaded outward, while the cold bottle fought the burning in his head; he felt instantly better.

  Handing the bottle over to York, he said, “Here, have some, kid. It’s been a bitch of a day.”

  York didn’t take the bottle, dismissing it.

  Michael sighed and said, “Look, kid, sorry for being such an ass, but in my defense, I am having a rather shitty day: I have been blamed for the murder of who was to be the country’s next president, my house was shot up, I have been in two near-death car accidents, I am being chased by my own team, forced on some centuries-old scavenger hunt, attacked by an ogre-sized, over-confident, genius rugby player, injected with the drug used to put Fido, Rover, and Fluffy to sleep, and, if it couldn’t possibly get any worse, the bad guys shot a small device into my femoral artery, which is clamped against its wall like some fucking parasite, and, according to my steroid-abusing, rocket-scientist, rugby buddy, it will most likely detonate in,” Michael looked at his watch. “About thirty hours. And,” Michael paused, “they have my wife!”