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The resolve cracked just a little.

Following her lead, Ian asked quietly, “Where’s the virus?”

He shook his head. “It is done. God is great and has answered my prayers.”

Crud. What did that mean? “I saw your lab, Dr. Abahdi. Read your notes. Most impressive. Engineering a virus like you did with the equipment you had available…that was world-classwork. But here’s the thing. My government needs to know where the virus went. And I’m afraid Uncle Sam isn’t going to take no for an answer.”

He shrugged. “Giving the Great Satan an answer at this point is meaningless.”

She glanced over at Ian, and his eyes were black with worry. Yup, he read this guy the same way she did. The virus had already been released.Mother of God.

Tamping down on her panic, she asked as calmly as she could manage, “I’m fascinated by your work. Can you tell me a little about it? Were you able to modify the incubation times along with combining spread vectors and lethality factors?”

Abahdi just looked at her. His pain was so deep, so crystallized, she could see it in every pore of his skin, every hair on his head.

She spoke solemnly. “I understand your rage. I accept it. I will not shake you from your course. You are bent on dying…and so you shall. But are you willing to sacrifice your daughter to have your revenge as well?”

Ian’s gaze snapped to her and then back to their prisoner, measuring, testing her assessment. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to see that this guy was totally committed to avenging his wife’s death. He had nothing else to live for. Exceptmaybethe daughter.

Abahdi pressed his lips more tightly together.

“Really?” Anger crept into Piper’s voice. “You’re going to throw away your own child’s life, too? My father might have been a crazy sonofabitch with extreme political beliefs, but he never would have sacrificed me and my brother. You’ll never see Salima again. We’ll raise her to hate you and everything you stood for with all her being.”

With every word, more fury infused Piper’s voice. “We’ll turn her into your worst nightmare, Yusef. Is that what you want foryour daughter? For her to know that your revenge was more important to you than herlife?”

By the end of her tirade, she was battering at Yusef emotionally, pouring out rage and grief at him she didn’t even know until then she had inside herself.

The man had the good grace to look at least a little taken aback. For a few seconds. But then that diamond-hard resolve glittered in his stare once more.

Rage literally poured off the man. It disturbed the air around him like heat devils in the desert. If she reached out with her hand, she would be able to touch it. Feel it. His fury was so palpable, it had taken on a life of its own. It writhed around Abahdi like a sycophantic serpent.

It was arguably one of the most frightening things she’d ever seen. Here was a man of intelligence and resolve, a man of action. And he was motivated by so much rage that murdering thousands or millions of innocent civilians was a shrugging matter to him.

She looked into his eyes for signs of the monster within him, for surely Satan himself had consumed this man’s soul. But instead of the Beast, she saw only a man. A self-satisfied man. She might even call that expression one of smug satisfaction. He was not a reasonable man. He was a fanatic. Lost to them. Furthermore, the man was convinced he’d already gotten his revenge.

Which made her blood run cold. What had he done? There was very little she would put past this man and his invisible cloak of rage.

Ian picked Yusef up by his shirt front and the man did not resist. It was almost as if he welcomed violence. Ian snarled from a range of about four inches, “Where is it, Yusef?”

“Go to hell, Yankee pig.”

Ian flung Abahdi back down into the chair. “I’m not going to give you the satisfaction of losing my temper and burying my fist in your face. You’re not worth it. But you’re done, Abahdi. It’s over.”

The Palestinian laughed. “Oh, no, American. You are wrong. It is just beginning. The wrath of God is coming for you. For all of you.” Abahdi’s laughter changed in pitch. Took on a maniacal quality as it turned into a cackle of encroaching madness. No doubt about it. He’d already turned the virus loose.

“Sir?” An FBI type appeared in the doorway. “Everything okay in here?”

“Take him. He’s yours,” Ian snapped. “This is positively Yusef Abahdi. Take his kid into custody, too. Use her as necessary to break this sonofabitch. Drug him or water board him or whatever you do to people like him to make him sing like a bird. Find out where the virus is.”

The FBI agent spoke into a microphone in the collar of his shirt, and faster than Piper could believe, a half-dozen FBI agents rushed into the room, cuffed the Scientist, and hauled him out.

A few moments later, the agent who’d been left with Salima passed by the open door, carrying the child down the hall wrapped in a blanket, still sleeping peacefully. God knew, that peace would be shattered when the little girl awoke. But at least she got one last night of sweet dreams before her life went the rest of the way to hell.

Ian got on his phone and made a quick report to his boss. He pocketed the device grimly. “HQ says to find the virus ASAP.”

She replied heavily, “I think the virus will announce itself soon enough.”

He nodded. “If we can give the government and health care system any kind of a head start on knowing where to mass their resources, lives will be saved.”