Termination Orders(98)

But it didn’t come. There were gunshots, and before she knew it, Vinson looked up and retreated toward the chopper, shooting back at an unknown target. She lay there languishing as the firefight raged around her. She was enveloped in a whirlwind as the chopper took off. Her blond hair whipped across her face. The miasma of death was setting in now, and everything seemed distant. The shooting continued as the rotors slowly faded into the distance. Then there was silence.

Her eyes flicked upward, and through the haze she saw Cobra standing over her in the twilight. The world was far away now, as if she was underwater and sinking deeper. Not yet, she thought. One more thing. It took all her willpower to move her trembling hand into the secret pocket in her pants and to drag out with her weak fingers the small object. She closed her palm around it. Then she forced her laboring lungs to say one last word, in a weak wheeze.

“Andr . . .”

The name of her brother died on her lips, and the world went dark.





Morgan knelt over T’s lifeless body as Conley approached and asked, “Is there any chance you saw who was on that helicopter?”

Morgan shook his head distractedly. He was looking at her face, contorted with pain. Her beautiful sky-blue eyes still retained their wild intensity, even in death. He shut them gently and looked at her in the quickly fading light. As much as he could never forgive her for what she had done, their enmity seemed not to matter as much now that she was dead. Instead, he felt a strange camaraderie with her, as if she hadn’t been hunting him, but rather, as if it was still that first night at the ball; as if she hadn’t been told a lie and had lived her life without bitterness and had had no score to settle with him; as if they had remained friends to the end, and resentment had not turned her into a cynical, amoral, rogue agent. In silence he honored her as the friend she once was and the great warrior that she had been to the end. He took her hand in his one last time and was surprised to find that there was something nested in it.

He gently pried apart her fingers and found a small, featureless black metallic chip. He held it up to Conley. “You know what this is?” Conley shook his head. Whatever it was, it might be important. Morgan slipped it into his pocket.

“Lowry,” Morgan said. “Lowry, come in.” He got no response.

“I guess we’re out of range,” said Conley. “Come on. Let’s get back.”

They walked briskly back up the dark road and got into the GTO.

“What now?” asked Conley.

“We regroup,” said Morgan, starting the engine and rolling out. “T may be dead, but Nickerson isn’t. There’s still a mole in the CIA. They’re still arming Afghan insurgents.”

“Cobra,” Conley cut in softly.

Morgan continued. “. . . and for all we know, they’re going to try to kill Senator McKay again, and I’m betting they’re going to go for the quick and dirty kill this time.”

“Cobra,” Conley repeated, “Morgan. Maybe it’s time for us to cut our losses and leave. Take Jenny and Alex and get out of the country. Find a nice, quiet place to retire.”

“And what? Let them get away with it?”

“They already have, Morgan. The Agency wants to kill us. Nobody else is going to believe our word. There’s just two of us against all of them.”

“Then we keep fighting, Conley. We keep coming at them until we win.”

“Or until we die, Morgan? Is that it?”

Morgan didn’t answer because their discussion was cut short. Three squad cars turned onto the street they were on, tires squealing and lights flashing.

“Shit!” Morgan downshifted to second gear, and with a twist of the wheel the car turned a complete 180, rubber burning on asphalt. They tore off in the opposite direction, away from the approaching squad cars. Almost immediately, four more turned onto the street ahead of them. Morgan tromped the gas pedal.

“Cobra, what are you doing?” Conley exclaimed.

“We’re going to get past them!”

The cars ahead massed rapidly, blocking the road ahead. Morgan accelerated.

“Cobra!”

“We’ll plow through if we have to. We can make it!”

“No, Cobra, we can’t!”

“We can make it through!”

“Cobra! We can’t! Let it go!”

Gritting his teeth, Morgan pulled the hand brake and stopped the car with a controlled spin. The cars that had been chasing them closed in a circle around them. At least a dozen policemen scrambled out and took cover behind their cars, guns aimed at Morgan and Conley.

“Get out of the vehicle with your hands up!”

They were completely surrounded. There was nothing to do but surrender.