by Ronie Kendig
“What?” Rutger’s mouth hung nearly slack.
“Because I had her killed—are you thwarting this project to pay me back?”
“I came to tell you he is rogue and—”
“I would be very disappointed, Rutger.” Ciro fisted a hand to his mouth. “You’ve been with me from the start. I hated what happened to your sister, but it was necessary. She would have destroyed everything. In fact, she did her best to ruin me and Netherwood.”
“This is not about Katrin!” Rutger spat, his German accent thickening.
“Good.” Ciro narrowed his eyes. “Because if I even think you defied me again, I will send you to meet her.”
THREE
STUTTGART, GERMANY
He had more problems than he’d thought, and that was saying something.
Rutger Hermanns stared at the vault, dumbstruck. While still on the Learjet returning from his visit with Veratti, he had received notification of a breach at his home. He could not have fathomed . . . this. More than a dozen emergency vehicles had already clogged the drive when his helicopter delivered him from the airport. He had rushed straight into his home and the daunting truth. Now he stood in the vault, hand over his mouth, disbelieving.
“Is anything missing, sir?”
Rutger glanced around the fire- and natural-disaster-proof room, with its feet-thick walls and triple-redundant security measures. Tried to form words as he took in the empty fireproof boxes, steel drawers strewn across the floor, a shattered Ming dynasty vase. . . .
“Sir?”
He twitched toward the Polizist, who watched him intently. “Are you blind?” he asked, incredulous, waving around the vault. “Everything! Everything is missing!”
“Of course.” The reply was anything but repentant.
Rutger shook his head, absorbing the fact that his life’s work had vanished in one breach. One very well-informed breach.
“Do you know who might have done this, Herr Hermanns?” the officer asked. “Any reason you can think of that someone would break into this room, which”—his dull eyes scoured the empty walls and shelves—“looks fairly impenetrable?”
“Clearly not,” Rutger growled, making a mental note to call the security company and demand a refund. “And yes, there are many who would want what was in this vault. Have you any idea the value of what was stolen?”
“No, I’m afraid I do not.” He seemed lazy, bored. Why had he not asked for a list? Something about his tone, the odd gleam in his gaze, warned of trouble. Was he on ArC’s payroll?
“What do you need from me? Information? A list, perhaps, of the stolen items? Would that not be helpful for you to do your job?”
The man smirked. “Of course, Herr Hermanns.”
“Then why have you not asked for one?” Rutger gulped his annoyance in one lumpy swallow. A list would make no difference in uncovering the true reason behind this invasion. If the purpose had been the Book of the Wars of the Lord, the thieves had met with failure, because—mercifully—that was on loan to a certain young man.
Still. So much gone. Mein Gott! The loss—the incalculable loss.
“I must sit. If you need anything, my staff can assist.” He left the vault, motioning to his butler. “Tea, please.” He removed himself to the parlor and slumped into a chair.
Was this Veratti’s doing? He had warned of repercussions. Rutger had gone to ArC to garner sympathy and turn their gazes away from himself when it came to blame for the failed attack against the children’s park. Such a heartless place for an attack—so many children! Though Rutger had argued against that venue, ArC insisted on it to gain public attention. Show people that those against the coalition would not survive.
He did not doubt that he, too, would soon be among the dead. Because just as ArC would not cease in their mission, neither would he. His conscience refused to let him turn a blind eye any longer. Not after Katrin and that cruel, bitter night when he’d found her in the clock shop, bloody and dying. The days afterward, trying to keep her alive. Then keeping others alive.
“You must save them, Rutger. They did not deserve what we have done to them, what she intends to do with them.”
“I cannot!” he whined. “They will kill me!”
“Then you condemn your soul.”
His little sister had never been bigger than that night. She had sacrificed herself to interrupt a project so large and nefarious that the left hand—one scientist—didn’t know what the right—another scientist—was doing. Katrin and her fiancé had put the puzzle pieces together too late, and yet too soon. Had she been smarter, a bit more sly . . .
“Bah!” Rutger grimaced at his own audacity. He who had waited years before finally taking action. Who cowered just yesterday before the man responsible. Granted, Netherwood, which spawned the Neiothen, had been the brainchild of someone else—Wilhelmina. He had not seen that coming either.
“You are getting old,” he murmured to himself.
Now who held the key, the book? Perhaps it was good he failed so miserably, with Leif stealing the panel paintings from under his nose. He had tried to pacify another and protect Leif from the meanings of the panels.
“Herr Hermanns, you know these men?” an officer asked.
Rutger glanced at the door. Who would be visiting at such a time? The estate was tucked away from civilization for a reason. But then he saw the two men, and relief speared him. “Ah yes. Danke.”
He noted the way the officer took too much interest in Andreas and Leif as they entered, both projecting the message to leave them alone. With an uncertain glance, the officer left the room.
Rutger huffed and leaned his head back, closing his eyes. “You had me worried.”
“What happened here?” Andreas demanded.
“The vault was raided.”
“By who?”
“Does it need to be asked?” Rutger pushed out of his chair, the old leather squawking in protest. He went to the serving bar and poured a glass of water. “I was with Veratti just last night.” Gulping, he felt the liquid sliding into his enraged gut. “He threatened me.”
Andreas gestured to Leif. “He knows about him?”
After another sip, Rutger returned to his high-backed chair and offered Leif the other. “So . . . you came.”
The young man had a vise-grip on what was happening inside him and gave no response.
Rutger placed his water on a small table next to his chair, then reclined and folded his hands as he considered the young man. “Had someone not entered my home and come for the book . . .” He smiled. Then laughed. Shook a finger at Andreas. “Had I listened to you, it would have been here—and now, pfft!” He fluttered his fingers like flapping wings. “But you have it.” He sharpened his focus on Leif. “Yes?”
“It’s safe.”
“You left it?” Rutger came out of his chair. “Have you any idea the—” The hard pale eyes challenging him registered. His anger bottomed out, and he lowered himself to the cushion again. “That was foolish.”
“I want answers and needed a bargaining chip. It’s why I’m here.” Leif shrugged. “Right? Or maybe you don’t have them either.”
“My boy, did I say that?”
Jaw tightening, Leif looked at Andreas, who parked himself on the coffee table facing them.
“We have scans of every page, and you have the paintings. Yes?” Rutger prodded.
Again, no answer.
Though he understood the hesitation, it also annoyed him. Already so much had been handed to Leif in the hopes he would be . . . more. More responsive. More aggressive. “Do you recall what I said when you were here with your Freundin?”
“That I was Neiothen, that I had to stop what was happening.”
“And yet you doubted.”
Irritation slashed the impassive façade.
“Your actions at the amusement park—”
“I had to protect my friends.”
“Friends.” Rutger grunted. “You could have protec
ted them by embracing what you are, what you were meant to be,” he said, a growl pulling him forward. When he saw the ridge between Leif’s eyebrows grow, he eased off. “When you doubt and fight it, that puts them at greater risk.”
“One of my friends is down, possibly killed by an ArC sniper.” Leif gave a cockeyed nod. “I wasn’t even activated yet. Then they all saw me freeze and act like I’d lost my mind when that code blasted through the speakers, destabilizing me.” He drew in several quick breaths. “Now my team thinks I’m a traitor.”
“You are a traitor!” Rutger barked around a laugh, motioning to their surroundings. “You sit in the home of a man embroiled in ArC’s sinister deeds. There will be no explanation or acceptable excuse. They will not understand, because they have not to this point, have they?”
Leif swallowed.
“They have doubted you, wondered about you, marveled at you. But accepted?” He flung a hand in the air. “Bah! You get more loyalty from a dog.”
Leif slowly rose, fists balled, nostrils flared. “If you aren’t going to help me—”
“Help you?” Rutger charged to his feet. “What do you think this is? A spa? A vacation?” He thumped the young man’s chest. “This isn’t about you, you petulant little pup!”
It had not seemed possible for Leif to appear more rabid, but Rutger had clearly been wrong.
“I do not want your toe-dipping efforts as you skirt the danger, play it safe. You came here. We did not force you. We face a vicious dragon with ten rows of razor-sharp horns and teeth!” Spittle flew as Rutger raged through the room. “And we are poking that dragon with a searing-hot poker. There is no ‘safe’!”
In his periphery, he noted Andreas closing the door. Oh yes. They had guests, did they not? Ah, well.
“Our days of playing it safe are long gone.” He smoothed a hand over his goatee, then lifted a finger to the lone hope of the Neiothen. “Let me tell you a story about a young woman who was not yet thirty and had a revolutionary mind. What she determined to do, no one could stop her from accomplishing. Knowing her grandmother endured a concentration camp, she vowed to make it possible for men to fight, to be unafraid when they took a stand and confronted evil. Because of her brilliance, decades later there were advances in science and research that were once thought impossible.
“Then along came one who had much greed and deviousness, who caught the vision behind the dreams of this young woman. Thrilled to see her dream come alive, the young woman never saw the truth of her benefactor or the wicked barbs that embedded into her and the other scientists, poisoning them and their work. Perverting it!” His shout rang off the high ceilings. “When this brilliant young woman finally discovered the truth, she again put her ingenious mind to work.” He tapped his temple and squinted. “She created a . . . response. A key! Because she knew that without an answer, there would be no end to how the wicked could corrupt and twist her brainchild.” He slowed, his chest heaving, aching from the memory. “Though she succeeded, it came at a price—her own life.”
Suddenly exhausted, Rutger returned to his chair, lifted his water, and took a sip.
“Real tale of woe.” Leif shrugged. “It have a point?”
Rutger tossed the contents of his glass at him.
Water splashed Leif’s face and shirt. He lunged upward.
Andreas leapt forward, shouldering between what would have been an expertly delivered punch and Rutger’s face. “Easy, easy,” he said, palms held out, ready to fight.
After several long, tense seconds, Leif stepped back.
Rutger had lost focus, his grief over Katrin fresh despite the years. Perhaps it was his failure rubbing that ache raw. “Veratti has long had me tethered, but I fear that rope is at its frayed ends. Very well. I will tell you what I know. Everything. What you do with that”—he could not help but snarl—“be on your head, your soul.”
FOUR
STUTTGART, GERMANY
“Start with The Hague.”
Those words directed Leif’s attention to Andreas, who seemed just as ready as he was to move past Rutger’s rage, which had come out of nowhere and made Leif reconsider his decision to step onto this dark path.
No, he wasn’t second-guessing. There’d been no choice. Nobody was hand-delivering answers, so he had to dig them out on his own, and this man, connected to the enemy pitted against Leif, knew where to start.
Hermanns sent a sharp glare toward his protégé. “You push my hand.”
“Sometimes it needs pushing,” Andreas said without regret.
A heavy pause lingered. “As explained when you were here with his sister,” Hermanns said, “Andreas was at The Hague to disrupt the chips implanted in the Neiothen. Including yours.”
Leif nodded, then caught himself. “Hold up.” He glanced between them. “If you disrupted the chip, why was I affected by that blast in Taipei?”
“That,” Rutger said with a long sigh, “is a question we want answered as well.”
Something about his expression unhinged what little confidence Leif had in these men. “So, what? You’re just going around blasting people’s heads with a frequency charge without knowing what it does or doesn’t do?” His heart thudded. “How do I know you didn’t just fry it?”
“It is possible,” Rutger conceded too easily, “that while we prevented the chip from igniting whatever training they hardwired into you, we did not completely undo the effectiveness of the implant itself.”
That sucker punch stole his breath. “So you’re telling me that at any minute, I could be their lapdog.”
“We’re telling you,” Andreas said with an edge to his voice, “that we didn’t design the implant, so the effectiveness of the resonance weapon is—at best—an educated guess. It has worked on all the others. A team has been working for years to counter the Netherwood project, but ArC is always at least one step ahead. As to why it was not one-hundred-percent effective with you . . .” He shrugged.
“What is there, what they know and are able to accomplish, will not change by us rambling about it,” Rutger muttered. “However, there is something we should discuss that you will not like.”
“I haven’t liked anything you’ve said yet.”
“You will like this less.” Rutger exhaled loudly. “Until a month ago, the only people who knew I had the book and where it was are in this room.” His eyes sparked with no small amount of accusation. “Who did you tell?”
Though Leif didn’t appreciate where this was going, he had to keep an open mind, because truth had a way of hiding behind assumptions. “Two people.” His gaze hit Andreas. “Iskra.” And then back to Rutger. “And Iliescu.”
“So one of them has betrayed you and, therefore, me.”
Andreas grunted. “Or both.”
Anger tightened Leif’s muscles, but he balled it up. He couldn’t afford to rule out anything at this stage of the game. “It’s possible.”
“But?”
“Both of them would come after me before they went after the book.”
Hermanns’ laugh barked through the private library. “If you believe that, you are a bigger fool than Andreas suggested.” He shook his head. “No, to them, that book and stopping the wars is far more important than finding you.”
There was only one person Leif could believe that about.
* * *
STERLING, VIRGINIA
In his luxury SUV, Dru Iliescu crammed into the early morning traffic, slogging east along Route 7. He accelerated, one vehicle behind and to the left of the Camaro, but kept his distance. His timing had to be perfect as he followed the sports car from the private school where children had been dropped off. Though the vehicle made no effort to lose him, Dru had a feeling he’d been spotted. As the light ahead turned red, he slid around a slow-moving minivan and dived back into his lane. He braked, coming to a stop alongside the Camaro. Keeping his gaze straight, he gauged his periphery and erased all doubt. He’d been seen.
Once the light turned g
reen, he gunned it and zipped over two lanes, then took the turn-off lane, exiting onto Loudoun County Parkway. At the light, he banked right, then made another right at the next intersection, noting the Camaro swing into his rearview. He navigated the trendy shopping center, heading to the parking structure, and parked on the top level. He cut his engine and stepped out as the Camaro rumbled to a stop next to him and cut its engine.
The door opened, and if Dru hadn’t known who he’d tailed, he could have easily mistaken this guy for Leif. Same blond hair and blue eyes, just a bit rougher around the edges and longer in the tooth.
“What’s wrong?” Canyon Metcalfe demanded as he came toward him, hands balled at his sides. “I mean, that’s what this is, right? Why you followed me to my kid’s school and tagged me on the road.” He jutted his jaw. “Whatever you wanted to tell me couldn’t be overheard. So here we are. Talk.”
How was Dru supposed to deliver this news? Instinct said he’d done everything he could, but he hadn’t seen this coming. Leif had been a ticking bomb for the last year, especially since Iskra Todorova barged into his life.
“Where is he?” Canyon asked.
“I don’t know,” Dru admitted with a sigh.
Stretching his jaw, Canyon shook his head. Then he nodded, as if ready to take on the challenge. “Give it to me.”
“They were on mission, dealing with a threat in Taiwan. We interdicted as necessary. ArC activated him, Canyon. The signal came over a loudspeaker. Someone on his team was injured, but the team exfil’d and returned to the safe house otherwise intact. Shortly after, Leif put one of his guys in a choke hold and fled.”
Canyon stared at him—hard. Almost as if waiting for Dru to tell him this was a joke. He scratched the side of his temple, then roughed a hand over his mouth. “You said you wouldn’t let this happen. And it did.” Anger writhed through his hardened resolve. “What’re you doing to get him back?”
Dru wanted to scoff. Wanted to bark that they both knew nobody could make Leif come back. But that wasn’t good enough. “His team is returning now and—”
