Page 161 of Bonded in Death

When she’d wrapped up, Roarke brought her bacon and eggs tucked between toasted bread. “You can eat in the van if necessary, but eat. Do this for me.”

“Okay, okay.” She grabbed a helmet, tucked it under her arm, then took a bite. “God, God, that’s good. We’ll get there before sunup. Another advantage. Put on the jacket with the Thin Shield, grab a helmet. Do that for me.”

He put on his jacket, took a helmet as he looked toward The Twelve. And Summerset.

“You’ll know when we have him.”

“And when we do,” Eve added, “get some sleep. It’ll be at least a couple of hours before I bring him into Interview, probably closer to four.There are things to work out, so get some sleep. Someone will contact you when it’s time to come into Central.”

“Will you,” Summerset asked, “get any sleep?”

“Depends on the things to work out.”

When they sat alone, Ivanna put a hand over Summerset’s. “She’s outlined a very good plan. And yes, even very good plans can go astray. We’ll trust this one won’t.”

“More usually I learn what she’s faced down—or they have—when I deal with the blood on her clothes. It’s different, and difficult, to know from the beginning.”

“And different, and difficult for us, even at this point in our lives,” Marjorie said, “to be the ones sitting and waiting.”

“There’s very fine equipment in the lab here.” Cyril looked from face to face. “It’s possible, with a bit of this and more of that, I could hook into the mobile equipment. We can’t be there, but we could see as it happens.”

“What are we waiting for?”

As Marjorie rose, the others rose with her.

The drive didn’t take long. When they parked out of the gate’s camera range, Roarke got to work.

“The trick is to shut down the camera without alerting the system. And it’s an excellent system.”

“You’d know,” Eve said.

“I would, and it has layers to foil someone doing precisely what I’m doing. Can’t just backdoor work-around it,” he said, more to the other e-geeks. “And no drilling the tunnel, no sliding down the pole. It’s a peel, you see, skin by skin, all while doing the cloning.”

“I’m seeing it.” McNab hunkered closer.

“Are you going to inchworm it?” Callendar asked.

“I am.”

“Well, shit, watch that trip wire.”

Roarke nodded at Feeney. “No worries. I have it.” He’d designed it, after all.

“And son of a bitch.” Feeney shook his head. “They’re down. The system reads green, but they’re down.”

“For sixty minutes, and not a second more.”

Eve set her wrist unit to sixty minutes while he melted through the gate locks.

“Exterior house cams.”

“I’ve got the locks,” Feeney said, and his hound-dog eyes gleamed. “Yeah, I see it, I got it. Couple minutes.”

“McNab, get me a read on how many and where in the house.”

“On that. No shields there. Guess he didn’t figure anyone would get this far. Two heat sources, and you can see, Dallas, just where you figured. Both horizontal. No movement.”

“Then we’re moving. We’re go,” Eve ordered. “On foot, comms open, all teams, go.”

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