“Not the rats,” Larkin repeated, “not the rats,” as though it was a mantra with which he could alter Jane’s intentions in much the way that a nanomachine control mechanism worked its will on the brain of one possessed.
Jane turned from the table, the bottle of water in her hand, and regarded her captive. He pulled against his bonds with such determination, straining upward with arms and legs, that it almost seemed as if he might, by sheer will, levitate and ascend out of the susurrant lantern light into the gloom overhead.
She said, “The only bottle spiked with appetite stimulant was the one you drank from. The other three are just water.”
In the lantern glow, his khaki eyes shone almost yellow, like the eyes of some feral cat. “Then you never intended…”
She put the bottle on the table. “The rats? No. But you needed to believe I would.”
From the handbag, she removed a pair of scissors. She went to him, aware that his relief stiffened into wariness at the sight of those blades.
The cutting edges were sharp, but she had to work the jaws of the scissors to saw through the stubborn zip-tie and release his left arm.
A sob of gratitude escaped Larkin as Jane dropped the scissors in his lap and said, “Free yourself.”
She stood by the table, watching him as he cut the tie that bound his left arm and then went to work on those that secured his ankles to the chair.
He gave no thought to attacking her with the scissors, but dropped them on the floor and rose shakily to his feet. He appeared cramped and fatigued, as if he had been bound much longer than was in fact the case.
Nevertheless, she drew the Colt .45 and held it at her side.
“You promised me a way out of this, a path to a life,” he said in a tone of condemnation, as if he served now as the voice of her conscience.
“You don’t need me for that. You already have a path prepared, Randy.”
“What’re you talking about?”
From an inner sport-coat pocket, Jane withdrew a passport. “A life as Ormond Heimdall.”
He reached into his suit coat, as if he could not believe the passport she held was the one he’d been carrying.
“Do you keep this with you all the time?” she wondered. “Every day, everywhere you go? Do you sleep with it close at hand? How long have you been so worried that things were going to fall apart?”
He reached for his wallet, found it missing.
“Of course I searched you before binding you to the chair. Ten C-notes in your wallet in addition to smaller bills. Your own credit cards plus, in a separate compartment, an American Express card in the name of Ormond Heimdall, which probably has a very high limit.”