She stood motionless, her heart banging against her ribs like a mad drum. The two soldiers approached her, their faces completely devoid of emotion. Lily looked at the youngest of the two men. He couldn’t have been much over twenty, and she found herself wondering if he had any idea what kind of man DeBruzkya was.
“Don’t do this,” she said.
Grimacing, the younger man took her arm while the other quickly and impersonally ran his hands over her body. Lily closed her eyes when he discovered the pistol strapped to her thigh. “General!”
But DeBruzkya was already at her side, his eyes amused and unnervingly cruel. “Ah, Lillian, you have many surprises in store for me, no?”
Because her heart was in her throat, Lily didn’t answer. Just stared at him, horrified by the realization that if he took her pistol, she would have no way to protect herself or Jack.
Never taking his eyes from hers, DeBruzkya yanked up her skirt. She tried to shift away when he ran his hand over her thigh, but the soldier holding her squeezed her arm painfully, and she stilled. The general’s fingers lingered inches from her panties, then quickly unholstered the tiny pistol. Smiling, he examined it and shoved it into the waistband of his slacks. “I’ll keep this for you,” he said, then to his men, “let’s go!”
The soldier holding her arm forced her toward the door. Lily clutched Jack tightly and tried hard not to think about what DeBruzkya had in store for them. More frightened than she’d ever been in her life, she pressed her face against the top of her son’s head and began to pray.
Robert had learned to trust his instincts over the years. As he made his way to the hospital, he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. He felt it as clearly as he felt the light rain on his face.
One block from the hospital, he ducked into the alley across the street and looked at the three-story structure, his eyes moving to the top floor, the third window over from the south side. His blood stalled in his veins when he saw the white length of curtain flapping in the breeze. It was a signal he’d discussed with Dr. Orloff. If there was a problem—any kind of problem—while Robert was at base camp, Dr. Orloff was to open that window and put out a white flag to warn him.
Blood zinging through his veins like a spray of bullets, Robert broke into a dead run, a hundred scenarios flashing through his mind. He tried to comfort himself with the knowledge that Lily and Jack were in the safe room in the basement, but he knew DeBruzkya was a master at getting information, at making people talk.
Ice pick jabs of pain flared in his thigh as he ran, but the fear clenching his chest dwarfed it. He sprinted down the street with the speed of an Olympian athlete, then took the crumbling steps of the hospital three at a time to the top. He didn’t think before bursting through the doors. He knew better than to enter a building without knowing who was inside. But it was emotion driving him now, not logic.
Pulling the revolver from the waistband of his jeans, he entered the lobby, found it eerily quiet. He heard someone crying, then spotted a young nurse sitting on the floor behind the desk. Next to her a man in a white lab coat lay on his back in a pool of blood.
Robert sprinted over to her, speaking in Rebelian. “What happened?”
She looked up at him with tear-filled eyes. “The soldiers came. Several people were shot. Please, help me. He’s been shot.”
“I’m a doctor.” Robert knelt, but knew immediately there was nothing he could do for this man. Setting his hand against the man’s throat, he felt for a pulse. When none came, he sat back on his heels and shook his head. “I’m very sorry, but he’s gone.”
Putting her face in her hands, the woman sobbed.
Robert put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed, outrage and anger burning through him. “Are the soldiers gone?”
“They left about ten minutes ago.”
“How many soldiers?”
“I don’t know. Fifteen or so. Maybe more.”
“Where’s Dr. Orloff?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did the soldiers take anyone with them?”
Her gaze snapped to his. “There was a woman and a child.”
Robert didn’t hear the rest of the sentence. He jumped up, felt the world rock beneath his feet as his worst nightmare became a reality. For several long seconds he stood there, breathing hard, trying to decide what to do next.
DeBruzkya had Lily and Jack. The woman he loved and his innocent son were in the hands of a madman.
And suddenly Robert knew what he had to do. He knew it would be the most dangerous mission of his life. Only he was no longer acting as an ARIES agent, but a man who would do anything to save his family.
Chapter 15