Page 70 of Sinner's Salvation

Everyone looked at each other, shaking their heads. Including the Homeland Security agents.

“Um, not that I’m aware of,” one of them said.

The others nodded in agreement.

“Why do you ask?”

“Look at his eyes,” Marek ordered. “His pupils are blown wide open.”

Ledger slumped to the floor, nearly taking the FBI agent holding him along for the ride.

“Someone get another team of paramedics up here,” Marek ordered.

The police detective who’d stayed behind made a phone call. “Paramedics are on their way,” he said.

Ledger mumbled a few words, tried to sit up, but failed, flopping over onto his back like a dead fish.

“Is this guy a diabetic or something?” Marek asked.

Two of the Homeland Security agents crouched down next to Ledger and tried to wake him up, but he didn’t respond or react.

The elevator dinged again and a new pair of paramedics stepped out. They assessed Ledger.

“What’s wrong with him?” Baz asked.

“Hard to say,” one paramedic said. “His heart rate is a little fast, but his blood pressure is low. His blood sugar is normal, too. We’ll have to do a tox-screen to figure it out.”

One of the Homeland Security agents cleared his throat. “He has been downing energy drinks, one after another since the fire at the military base.”

“How many?” the paramedic asked.

The agent shrugged. “I don’t know. I wasn’t keeping track, but at least six that I saw.”

The paramedic sighed. “Yeah, that would do it. We’ll have to watch him. He could have a heart attack or stroke.”

They strapped Ledger onto the gurney and rolled him out. All the Homeland Security agents wanted to go with Ledger, but the paramedics allowed only two to accompany him. One FBI agent and Homeland Security agent.

The others moved to wait by the elevator.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Marek asked them.

When they stopped to frown at him, he smiled. “I’m missing a man. Where is he?”

One of the agents stepped forward and shrugged. “I’m sorry sir, we don’t know. This whole situation has been chaos from the beginning.”

“Why don’t you tell usallwhat happened,” the lead FBI agent said.

When the Homeland Security agent hesitated, the FBI agent gave him a half grin. “No matter how you spin it, it’s going to sound bad. We all figured that out when the word vampire got thrown out there by your boss.”

“I have to admit,” Marek said, with a nod. “It got my attention, and not in a good way.”

“I can’t believe I’ll be using that word in a report,” the remaining NYPD detective said. “I’m gonna get laughed at by my whole department.”

The Homeland Security agent looked at his colleagues, then said. “Yeah, maybe you guys can help us understand what the hell happened, because it doesn’t make any sense to us either.”

It took him an hour to give a summary to the group, and another hour to attempt to answer follow-up questions.

“Ledger said he had a credible terrorist threat. He said he’d caught a dirty FBI agent and a Russian spy. He said he needed an interrogator who could get results fast,” Marek said. “I pulled one of my best men off an active surveillance mission and sent him here with no situation report because it was that time sensitive. Now you’re telling me, Ledger did all this because someone told him he could create for himself some vampire super-soldiers?”

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