“Take him!” shouted Jax. Dropping to the floor in a roll, he pumped three rounds into the dude coming down the stairs.
He heard the crack-crack-crack of October’s Smith and Wesson. Looking over, he saw the guy in the Tyvek suit stumble backward.
October yelled, “Behind you!”
He swung around just as Carlos Rodriguez came charging through the doorway of a book-lined room at the front of the house. Jax fired both the Glock and his own Beretta at the same time. Slamming back against the wall, Rodriguez hung for a moment, then slid to the floor, leaving a bloody trail down the plaster.
Jax realized his ears were ringing. A blue haze filled the entry; the stench of burnt powder and spilled gasoline stung his nostrils. He waited, his heart pounding, his grip on the two sidearms tight. He heard the wind scuttling dry leaves across the gravel drive, the drip of gasoline from the cans dropped by the man on the stairs.
Jax pushed to his feet. The guy hanging upside down on the stairs was missing half his head. His Tyvek-suited buddy on the front porch was a red, pulpy mess. From the looks of things, October had landed at least half a dozen rounds in him.
“You hit him,” said Jax.
She was leaning against the entry wall, her breath coming hard and fast. “He was five feet away and I emptied the gun into him. I should hope I hit him.”
Walking over to Rodriguez, Jax hunkered down to lay two fingers against the guy’s carotid artery and felt nothing. “He’s dead.”
She said, “Good.” Swiping the sleeve of her sweater across her eyes, she paused in the doorway to the study. “Oh, no,” she whispered.
Jax went to stand beside her. Kline was sitting in a chair beside the empty hearth, his ankles and wrists duct taped, his eyes wide and sightless. A line of blood trickled down his chin. His daughter lay facedown on the rug beside him.
Crossing to her, Jax gently turned her over, then pushed up to grab October before she got any closer. “Don’t look,” he said, pulling her back toward the hallway. “You can’t help her. Did you touch anything?”
She thought about it. “The chef’s knife. And you touched the back doorknob.”
He turned toward the kitchen. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”
“I hope you’ve got something,” Jax told Matt as they headed back toward the beltway, “because we just ran out of luck.”
“Your idea to check out who might have accessed the Navy’s report on U-114 turned up something interesting: a colonel by the name of Sam Lee. He’s one of Boyd’s protégés—in fact, Boyd got him assigned to the CIA two years ago. He may be our mole.”
“Have you talked to him?”
“That would be difficult. He was found in Rock Creek Park about an hour ago. Dead.”
“Shit. Sounds like they’re cleaning up their loose ends. I hope this doesn’t mean the operation’s over.”
Matt let out a harsh sigh. “I stumbled across something else while I was digging around. Somehow or another, the U.S. government knew U-114 went down with a mysterious weapon called die Klinge von Solomon on board. That’s why they sent the Navy looking for it when the Brits authorized their Operation Deadlight Expedition. They thought the Sword of Solomon might be the German A-bomb, and they were afraid the publicity surrounding the plans to raise the old U-boats might give someone ideas.”
“But that doesn’t make sense,” said October when Jax relayed Matt’s information to her. “The U.S. government had all Kline’s nasties at Fort Detrick. They should have known what the Sword of Solomon was.”
“You’ve gotta remember they didn’t have computerized databases in those days. Kline knew DP3 used to be called the Sword of Solomon, but I doubt anyone else did. Why do you think they renamed all his nasty little bugs? Because they didn’t want anyone to know they were carrying on where the Nazis had left off. I’ve no doubt all the original records were destroyed decades ago. Even if they weren’t, you need to understand that the kind of guys playing with plagues up at Fort Detrick don’t regularly communicate with the guys down in Washington who worry about Nazi A-bombs and sunken subs. No one in Washington talks to anyone else, remember?” He paused for a moment, then reached for his phone again and hit Matt’s number on his speed dial.
“What now?” she said.
“I’ve got an idea.” To Matt, he said, “Did Boyd ever go to MIT?”
“Nope. He’s a West Point man.”
“Then I think we may have a lead to the guy who’s bankrolling this operation. Get onto the university and see if you can get a list of Kline’s former graduate students. We’re looking for a male with ties to Florida.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
“And Matt?”
“Yeah?”
“Hurry.”