Page 58 of Ground Truth

“Couldn’t sleep?” Gaspar asked, working the keys, checking the reference points on the images, seeking to confirm.

“Woke up. Searching for the toilet. Saw you in here,” Flint replied. Staring at the pulsing screen set off his headache again, but he couldn’t pull his gaze away from the images. “Looks exactly like Phillip Reed to me.”

“Maybe,” Gaspar said, still working, seeking, comparing, as Flint waited for an answer.

Finally, Gaspar pushed his chair back and stood to stretch out his bad right leg.

“Is it him?” Flint asked. “If Phillip Reed is alive, then Greta could be, too.”

“Can’t be sure. But if I were a betting man, I’d say yes,” Gaspar replied. “His name is Stephen Brand. He’s a doctor. A transplant surgeon, in fact.”

Flint deadpanned. “What a coincidence.”

“He’s within a couple of years of the right age. His background data looks reasonable, but it could have been falsified. It’ll take me a while to run it all down,” Gaspar said, headed back to the kitchen for more coffee.

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Chapter 29

Atabei

Despite his immense wealth, Ernst Hedinger enjoyed a long list of foibles. Among them was his almost pathological desire for privacy.

He rarely entertained, seldom allowed house guests, and never slept in a bed he didn’t own. As a younger man, he’d been required to stay overnight in hotels and private homes for business purposes, but that was many years ago.

Like many of his eccentricities, his desire for privacy required him to own and maintain several homes around the world. The Atabei villa was one of his favorites.

One wing of his mansion was reserved for exceptionally qualified patients at Brand’s hospital. Very few were offered the privilege and the current guest was the first in a long while.

The man who called himself John Smith was a high ranking official in the Chinese Communist Party. He would, some said, be General Secretary one day.

Exactly the kind of personal relationship Hedinger craved, even as he realized, in this instance, he’d allowed a scorpion into his home.

Smith was especially difficult in many respects. Which was why he had paid a large fortune for his donor heart. Smith, a man of exacting standards, required a personal interview of his Chinese heart donor prior to the procedure.

The donor was honored to meet the great man and answered all of his questions fully. Until Smith thanked him for his heart. Terrified and unwilling to die, the donor had tried to escape. Hedinger’s guards pursued and subdued the man. Brand kept him alive and well until it was time to remove his heart this morning.

Hedinger enjoyed breakfast while reading his morning reports. He perused the list, located Cade’s summary of special operations, and skimmed through his account of the helicopter incident quickly.

Hedinger read the summary twice, feeling his blood pressure rising to dangerous levels as he absorbed the words. He picked up the phone and dialed.

When Cade answered, Hedinger bellowed into the speaker. “What the hell happened?”

“Results were inconclusive.” To his credit, Cade didn’t make excuses. “The helicopter went down with both occupants still inside. The boat was also heavily damaged and our operatives compromised.”

“Dammit, man! Did you have eyes on the operation or not?” Hedinger demanded, barely controlling his rage.

The one thing Hedinger could not abide was incompetence. Cade had failed. Failure was never an option. Hedinger would terminate and replace him within the hour.

While Cade remained on the call, Hedinger dispatched the order electronically in disappearing text. This would be their final conversation.

“We have footage of the firefight. The bird was hit. It sank.” Cade paused. “We haven’t heard from our operatives for several hours. Both are presumed dead. No bodies recovered at this time.”

“Send me the video.”

“Already done. You have it now.”

Hedinger opened his laptop and punched a couple of keys to pull up the footage. He set the video to play and watched as the scene unfolded.

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