“Can we help you gentlemen?” he asked.

  The assembled audience turned as one, and two Secret Service agents started toward us.

  “Excuse me, sirs,” one of the agents said.

  “Mr. Secretary, you have to stop the countdown,” Fuller responded.

  “XO, what the hell do you think you’re doing?” a brigadier general asked as he got to his feet. I guessed it was Mark Hawkins, the base commander.

  “Stop the countdown?” Secretary Carver asked. “Now why would we want to do that?”

  “Because you’re about to hand all our military intelligence over to the Russians,” I replied.

  “And you are?” Carver asked.

  “My name isn’t important.”

  “That’s Jack Morgan,” a woman said.

  A murmur of disquiet rippled through the audience, and I scanned the room to find the speaker near the front. It was Ann Kavanagh.

  Minerva.

  Her words caused sensation among the crowd, who clearly recognized my name from news reports.

  “He’s wanted as a Russian spy and this is clearly an attempt by a hostile government to stop us deploying technology that will give America significant tactical advantage,” Kavanagh lied.

  “Take that man into custody,” Brigadier General Hawkins said.

  “I can’t allow that, sir,” Fuller replied.

  A squad of six Marines formed up and moved toward us, and they were joined by a couple more Secret Service agents.

  “What do we do, sir?” the sergeant asked Fuller.

  “Hold your ground,” Fuller replied.

  “What the hell has gotten into you, Fuller?” Brigadier General Hawkins asked.

  “You need to listen to this man, sir,” Fuller declared, pointing at me.

  “He’s a spy and a traitor,” Ann Kavanagh countered. “He should be in prison.”

  A four-star US Army general near Kavanagh stood up and barked an order. “Seize those men!”

  The Marine guards and Secret Service agents rushed us, and Fuller and the sergeant raised their weapons.

  “Back off!” Fuller yelled, forcing a standoff.

  Everyone froze, and there was a silent, nerve-racking moment of ice-cold tension.

  Only one person moved. Ann Kavanagh leaned over and spoke to a man in a dark suit. He had his back to me, but I recognized him nonetheless. I could tell who he was by the set of his shoulders. He turned to face me, and when our eyes locked, I felt a rush of anger. It was Veles, and he was posing as a member of Kavanagh’s entourage.

  I couldn’t help myself. I rushed forward instinctively, and found myself staring down the barrels of a number of weapons.

  “Stand down!” someone roared.

  “Drop your weapons,” Fuller shouted in reply.

  We were outgunned and outnumbered. It didn’t take a genius to see what would happen. The Marine squad moved in quickly, and disarmed Fuller and the sergeant, who surrendered their weapons reluctantly. I was manhandled by the Secret Service team, and the three of us were thrown face down onto the concrete floor.

  We’d tried to prevent a strategic catastrophe, and we’d failed.

  It was over.

  CHAPTER 109

  AS BLEAK AS things looked, I wasn’t prepared to give up.

  “Mr. Secretary, you’ve got to stop this!” I yelled. I glanced up at the countdown and saw it pass through one minute. “If my story doesn’t check out, you can restart the countdown.”

  Someone pressed my face into the floor.

  “Shut the hell up!” a voice commanded.

  It would take more than that to make me shut up. “This is our national security we’re talking about. Surely it’s worth checking out.”

  “Can we get these people out of here?” a voice shouted. I was pretty sure it was the four-star general who’d been sitting near Kavanagh. “And let’s get this machine online.”

  I felt strong hands lift me up, and I was frogmarched toward the blast door. Fuller and the sergeant were pushed ahead of me.

  “Hold on there,” Secretary Carver said. “Someone switch this thing off.”

  I glanced round and saw him gesture at the countdown.

  “The man’s right. One last check won’t hurt. And if he’s wrong, we just start it up again. No harm no foul. It’s not like anyone’s got anywhere more important to be.”

  There was a ripple of laughter, and the mood lightened, but I noticed two people who weren’t smiling: Ann Kavanagh and Veles.

  “Mr. Secretary—” the four-star general began.

  “Indulge me, general. Let’s hear what this Mr. Morgan has to say,” Carver cut him off.

  The blast door opened, and Corporal Ryan entered with Hector and Dinara.

  “More guests?” Secretary Carver remarked. “Why not? The more the merrier.”

  Another ripple of laughter ran through the audience, but it stopped when the first gunshots rang out.

  Six members of Ann Kavanagh’s entourage were on their feet, wielding handguns and shooting at the nearest Marine guards and Secret Service agents. Kavanagh ran behind the podium, while Veles leaped onto it, grabbed Carver and took him hostage.

  I watched in horror as the Russian assassin disappeared behind the large swirling Stars and Stripes. He followed Kavanagh, dragging the US Secretary of Defense with him.

  CHAPTER 110

  THE CROWD SCATTERED as the firefight intensified between members of Kavanagh’s entourage and the Marine guards and Secret Service agents. Screams filled the air, punctuated by semi-automatic gunfire. Jack and the two Marines with him were released and the men who’d been holding them captive joined the shootout.

  “Fuller!” Jack yelled. “With me!”

  He set off with Fuller in pursuit. The other Marine who was with them took a couple of paces, and was shot in the shoulder.

  “Help him,” Dinara said to Hector, who nodded and rushed to the fallen man’s side.

  Dinara ducked as she set off after Jack. He and Fuller ran round the seating area, behind the podium and down an access corridor that led away from the auditorium. They were chasing Kavanagh and Veles, who was being slowed by dragging a struggling man at gunpoint. A Secret Service agent was also chasing them. The agent was twenty or thirty paces ahead of Jack and Fuller, and Dinara was twenty paces behind them.

  “Stop!” the Secret Service agent yelled.

  Veles opened fire in reply, and hit the man in the leg. The agent went down as Kavanagh reached a security door. She opened it with a swipe card, and Veles unleashed a couple of wild shots, forcing Jack, Fuller and Dinara to take cover behind columns that lined the corridor walls.

  When Dinara broke cover, Kavanagh, Veles and the hostage were gone, the security door was closed, and Jack and Fuller were beside the fallen Secret Service agent.

  “Veles,” Dinara observed as she joined them.

  Jack nodded. “And Kavanagh. I think they’re going for the servers. Can they switch the system on from in there?”

  “I don’t know,” Fuller replied. “We can’t wait here to find out, but if someone doesn’t stay with this man, he’s going to bleed out.”

  The sound of gunfire crackled along the corridor, rising above a bed of screams and commotion.

  “I have to finish this,” Jack said.

  Fuller studied him for a moment, and then nodded. He handed Jack his sidearm. “Take this.”

  Jack rose, and Dinara made to follow.

  “No,” he said.

  “What do you mean, no?” Dinara replied haughtily. “You think I’m sitting this out after what they did to Leonid?”

  Jack thought for a moment, and quickly relented.

  “Here,” the wounded Secret Service agent said, and he handed Dinara his pistol.

  “You’ll need this.” Fuller gave Jack his swipe card, and then set about using his belt to tie a tourniquet around the injured agent’s leg.

  “Come on,” Jack said.

  He ran down the corridor; Dinara followed. She checked her pistol as they came to the security door.

  Jack paused, gave her a confirmatory nod, and she replied in kind. He swiped the key card and the pressure door unlocked with a clunk and a hiss. He pulled it open, and Dinara followed him inside.

  CHAPTER 111

  WE ENTERED A vast, super-chilled server farm. Rows of inactive servers ran back as far as I could see. They were stacked in floor-to-ceiling racks inside climate-controlled glass cabinets.

  The security door closed behind us, and thick mortise locks snapped into place and the pressure seal gasped as it inflated.

  None of the computers were on, and the thick door had muted the sound of the gun battle. Veles’ team must have used ceramic weapons to circumvent the base’s security measures.

  I looked at Dinara and could sense her anxiety. I felt it too, and the silence somehow made it worse.

  We crept through the huge room. Dinara checked the aisles running away to our left, and I kept my eyes on the ones going right. There was no sign of Veles, Kavanagh or Secretary Carver.

  We picked up our pace as we passed one deserted row after another. After another two dozen rows, the narrow alleyway seemed to open up a short distance ahead, and I signaled Dinara to slow. We crept forward, and I saw we’d reached a control station at the heart of the server farm. A thirty-foot-square space was broken only by a ten-foot bank of screens and computer terminals set in an onyx plinth.

  Ann Kavanagh stood at a computer in the center of the console, her back to us. I signaled Dinara to stay put, and inched into the control station.

  “Don’t bother, Mr. Morgan,” Kavanagh said without turning. “Veles isn’t here. He’s with the secretary. An insurance policy in case you try to be disruptive. I needed Secretary Carver’s biometrics to override the FORCE System’s security controls, but I don’t need him anymore, so his life is very much in your hands. Behave yourself and you both might live.”

  I was startled when every single server suddenly came to life. Thousands of operating lights illuminated, and the machines began to hum as one.

  “Step away,” I said.

  “Shoot me, and the secretary dies. Stop me and the secretary dies,” Kavanagh said. “I’ve worked far too long to let you interfere with what’s happening here, Mr. Morgan. In six minutes, the system will link with the Pentagon satellite network and it will go online.”

  She turned to face me, and I saw triumph writ large. “And you know what that means?”

  I didn’t dignify her gloating with a response.

  “We’ll be able to access every single American military and intelligence system. They put everything in here”—she gestured around the huge room—“thinking it would give them real-time strategic advantage. They thought it would make them stronger, but it is their biggest weakness.”

  “Karl Parker wanted me to stop you,” I said. “Doesn’t that tell you something?”

  “It tells me he was weak,” she replied.

  “He’d come to love America,” I countered.

  “He’d forgotten who he was,” Kavanagh declared. “I haven’t. And I never will.”

  I cast around, looking for Veles. He had to be nearby. Somewhere he could watch and listen. As I looked around the room, I realized Dinara was gone.

  CHAPTER 112

  DINARA CREPT AROUND the server racks. She didn’t have long, and her options were limited. She couldn’t clear her plan with Jack, and in truth it wasn’t much of a plan, but pressure had made her desperate.

  Once she reached the end of the row, she started jogging swiftly, moving silently between the racks. She kept looking right to see Jack and Kavanagh in a standoff. Passing up the rows made the scene flicker like a movie playing through an old projector, and Jack moved toward Kavanagh in jagged jump cuts. Dinara realized he couldn’t possibly see the pistol Kavanagh held behind her back.

  When Dinara was to Kavanagh’s rear, she ran along the row, flanked by high cabinets on either side. She gathered speed as she reached the last rack, and was sprinting by the time she burst into the open space. Kavanagh looked startled, and tried to bring the pistol up, but she wasn’t quick enough, and Dinara tackled her.

  They went down, and as Kavanagh tried to rise, Dinara smacked her with the pistol, and the Russian spy hit the floor, dazed.

  “Find Veles,” Dinara said. “I’ll make her deactivate the system.”

  “Now you’ve done it,” Kavanagh said in Russian. “The Secretary of Defense won’t be alive much longer. And neither will you.”

  “Then there’s no point playing nicely,” Dinara replied.

  She pressed her pistol into Kavanagh’s knee and pulled the trigger. The thunderous gunshot resounded around the room, and the older woman screamed. When her cries of agony had subsided, Dinara said, “Tell me how to deactivate the system or I’ll kill you by inches.”

  Dinara glanced at Jack, who had frozen. He seemed shocked and torn.

  A feeble cry came from their right.

  “Go!” Dinara yelled.

  Jack hesitated for a moment, and then started running.

  CHAPTER 113

  I SPRINTED TOWARD the noise I’d heard—a guttural cry. I came to the end of a row of servers and discovered an access aisle. I ran left and soon reached a service area full of giant power transformers, refrigeration compressors and communications boxes. Eli Carver stood in the center of the space. His hands were bound behind his back, and a length of cord was tied around his neck. The other end of the noose was attached to a hook, which was connected to a winch and gantry system used to move heavy gear around the facility.

  “Help,” Carver cried as he caught sight of me.

  I heard the hum of a motor and the rattle of a chain being wound. The winch coiled, dragging the hook up, and pulling the cord tight around Carver’s neck. His legs flailed and he made a horrible choking sound as he was hoisted into the air. He didn’t have long, and his eyes locked onto me, pleading.

  Every fiber of my being wanted to rush to his aid, but I knew it was a trap. I was meant to go to him, and once I reached his side, I’d be executed and he’d be left to die. I looked around the space, trying to figure out a way to save the man without dying in the process.

  Another gunshot echoed around the server farm, and it was swiftly followed by a woman’s screams. I prayed Dinara would keep Kavanagh alive until I returned.

  Secretary Carver looked at me with utter desperation as his face started to turn purple. I was running out of options and had to move now. I checked my pistol and then scanned my surroundings once more. There were two good vantage points that offered a clear line of fire. One was on top of a transformer unit that rose from the floor and stopped a few feet from the ceiling, and the other was a service gantry that ran behind a row of cooling vents. I could only keep my gun and eyes on one. I opted for the gantry, and stayed locked on it as I ran to the secretary.

  I felt a chill scrape its way down my spine, and thought I’d made the wrong choice, until I saw Veles step out from behind one of the vents. I emptied the clip at him, and he managed one reflex trigger pull as he tumbled backward off the gantry and fell to the floor behind a cooling unit.

  I turned and lifted the secretary by his feet to relieve the pressure on his throat. I searched for the remote unit that controlled the winch, but it was probably on the gantry where Veles had been hiding. I didn’t think Carver would survive long enough for me to reach it, but I saw a stepladder behind one of the transformers, and ran over to grab it. Carver flailed behind me, and I knew I had to be quick.

  I returned with the ladder, propped it open, and raced up the steps. There was a third gunshot in the distance, and more screams, but I ignored them as I climbed to the top of the ladder. I held the muzzle of the pistol against the taut cord that led up from Carver’s neck and pulled the trigger.

  The bullet ripped through the cord, and the Secretary of Defense tumbled like a sack of stones. I jumped off the ladder and raced to him.

  He was clawing at the noose, so I set down my pistol, and together we managed to pull the cord away from his throat.

  He gasped a hideous, rasping lungful of air. His eyes widened with terror, and he tried to say something. All that came out was a throaty cry, but I knew it was a warning, and managed to duck and roll just in time to avoid the slash of Veles’ blade.

  CHAPTER 114

  I ROSE TO face the Russian assassin, and saw his suit and shirt had been shredded by bullets to reveal the protective vest he wore next to his skin.

  He lunged at me with a ceramic black-handled blade, and I stepped aside and drove a fist into his face.

  My heart was racing and my body crackled with adrenaline. This man had killed so many people, including my friend. Karl Parker might have been a spy, but I was convinced he’d been trying to make good. He hadn’t deserved to die, and neither had Leonid Boykov, another good man. The memories of these two fallen victims spurred me on, and I stepped forward and kneed Veles in the gut.

  He lashed out with the blade, but I moved inside his swing, parried his forearm with my elbow, and hit him with an upper cut. As he staggered back, I delivered a devastating combination of jabs and crosses that sent him reeling. He held the blade in front of him, a defensive move, I thought, until I realized what it really was. I turned just in time, an instant before the blade shot from its handle, and instead of striking me in the neck, where he’d been aiming, Veles hit me in the shoulder.

  The ballistic knife, favored by Russian Special Forces, buried itself deep in the fleshy muscle, but I was so amped on adrenaline, I scarcely registered the pain.

  Veles reached behind him and produced another knife. He didn’t give me a moment to recover, but came at me like lightning. His left fist lashed out, and I ducked the punch, only to be confronted by the second knife darting toward my neck. I lurched back, but momentum carried me too far, and I stumbled. My feet hit each other, and Veles took advantage of my clumsy maneuver and kicked me in the chest. The blow winded me and sent me flying. I landed heavily on my back and didn’t even have time to roll before Veles leaped on me.