THE BOYS FINISHED securing the bomb vest to Cassie, retrieved their guns, and stood back. Kasanov left his chair and moved to look each one in the eye, nodding at them as if he were a general inspecting his troops. “Well done. Don’t forget to kennel the dogs before you activate the motion detectors. You know what needs to be done.”
The boys moved behind Cassie and out of sight. Kasanov turned his attention to the other children who sat on the floor behind the dais. While he’d addressed the guards, the older woman, Natasha, had brought out a pitcher and began serving drinks to the children. They ranged in age from eight or nine to their teens. As they accepted their paper cups of what looked like orange juice, Kasanov moved behind them, stroking their hair, kissing them on the head, and whispering something to each as they drank. It seemed like some kind of bizarre bedtime ritual.
With the showroom spotlights aimed down on him, glinting from his gray hair like a halo, the whole affair took on a surreal quality. As if he’d hypnotized the children. They beamed up at him and drank, each placing an empty cup on the floor in front of them.
At first Cassie didn’t realize what she was witnessing. When she did, it was with a sick feeling that roiled through her stomach. “Stop,” she shouted, keeping the rest of her body frozen in place. “Don’t drink that.”
Kasanov caught her eye and shook his head in disapproval. He’d come to the end of the row of children, the last, the youngest, sitting in his lap as she finished her cup of juice. He gently moved her to the floor and returned to his seat.
He pulled out a small remote, the kind that could start a car. “It’s active now, Dr. Hart. Any movement and it will explode, taking all of us. But if you do nothing, they will all die anyway. How frustrating it must be for you. The doctor who never gives up on her patients, who chases after any lost cause no matter the danger to herself, and here you are, forced to sit and watch these innocent children die.”
“This has nothing to do with Rosa or any treasure,” Cassie said, trying to reason with Kasanov. Drake would be here soon, was all she could think. “Why are you doing this? And to your own family?”
Kasanov stretched his legs out and crossed them at the ankle as if he didn’t have a care in the world. “First of all, they aren’t my family. Merely random strays Natasha collected and taught some basic street skills to. Useful, but disposable.”
Cassie glanced past him to see if the children responded to his declaration, but they all had their eyes half-closed, slouching or lying across the floor in a stupor. Whatever he’d given them, it acted too quickly to be cyanide, the poison of choice among cult leaders like Jim Jones. Maybe a benzodiazepam or barbituate?
“Second,” Kasanov continued, “this has everything to do with your grandmother and her treasure. Do you know how she killed my father?”
His voice grew shrill, despite his relaxed posture. Unsure of how to respond and not wanting to agitate him further, Cassie merely shook her head.
“She knew that treasure was my father’s only chance to save his wife and unborn child. But Rosa didn’t care. She tricked him; let him and the Nazis he was working with follow her deep into the catacombs below Paris. They thought she was leading them to the gold, but instead she led them into a trap. They reached a dead end and she blew up the cavern, thousands of tons of rock came down on top of them.”
He leaned forward, both elbows on his knees, his voice dropping as if he whispered a prayer. “Imagine how they died. Crushed under the weight, broken and bloody, slowly suffocating as the air went out, or drowning in their own blood. I want you to picture that, Dr. Hart. Because that’s exactly how you will die here, tonight.”
Kneeling and holding her position for so long beneath the weight of the bomb had her entire body aching, ready to collapse. She just had to stay strong long enough for Drake to get here.
Then Kasanov surprised her. He leaned back and said, “I really thought Drake would have figured it out sooner.”
Cassie frowned at that, trying hard not to move. “You want him to come here?”
“Of course. I want him to suffer as I have. Knowing that you were the cause of all this death and destruction. They can see us clearly through the showroom window—it’s why I chose this place. They’ll call for SWAT and the bomb squad, whoever. Drake will be forced to watch. I’ll wait until the first wave of officers comes in, trips the motion detectors. Or if their SWAT team snipers kill me, then this,” he raised his fist with the detonator, “will set the bomb off as soon as my grip loosens.”
“A dead man’s switch.”
“Exactly.” He beamed at her as if she were a slow student who had finally gotten an answer correct. “I didn’t come here tonight to learn about a treasure. I came here tonight to die. With you, Dr. Hart.”