CHAPTER EIGHT
Dante settled in for the long flight, and took a sip of the martini he’d made as soon as they’d taken off.
Trident owned The Gravediggers, and it was an off the books organization that was so top secret the president didn’t know of its existence. Dante had learned during his time in America that it wasn’t really the president who held power anyway. The trident symbol they used on everything signified the three directors who ran the organization—a man from the Department of Justice, a man from the Department of Defense, and a woman who was the president of the largest weapons manufacturer in the world.
Eve reported to The Directors, and The Gravediggers and The Shadow reported to Eve. The Gravediggers risked their lives on every mission they undertook. But it was The Shadow that made sure things were in place so they succeeded on those missions. They made sure equipment got where it needed to be, they were there for transportation, and they were there for cleanup when things got messy.
Trident didn’t do anything halfway, and that included the luxury jet he was on. The plane was shades of gray, with soft, dove-colored walls and a plush charcoal carpet. There were six large leather chairs and a couch in a conversational setup, a small kitchen, and, behind the seating area, a bedroom and bathroom.
“How is your martini?” Elaine asked.
“Spectacular, Elaine, thank you for asking. You’ve never told me much about yourself. Were you patterned after someone?”
“Oh yes, I thought you knew,” she said, sounding disappointed. “They never told you my origins?”
“I can’t say they have, but I’d much rather hear it from you,” Dante said, wondering why he was worrying about a computer program’s feelings.
“My voice is that of Marissa Tate,” she said. “It’s a lovely voice, I think. I believe I could make commercials if I so choose.”
The martini glass stopped halfway to his mouth. “Marissa? You’re Axel’s wife?” he asked.
“Oh no,” Elaine said quickly. “I’m only her voice. My body is quite different.”
“You have a physical manifestation?”
“I don’t have a human form,” she said. “But I have created a physical likeness based on my personality. It is possible they could manufacture my physical form in the future, and I want them to get it right.”
“Do you have a picture?”
“Of course,” she said. “Stand by.”
A table rose from the floor—similar to the one in his apartment—the top an opaque white.
“You’re the first person I’ve ever shown,” she said. “I’d like your opinion. Let me know if I should make any changes.”
“I’m sure you know best how you’d like yourself designed when it comes to that,” Dante said. “You’re a brilliant woman.”
“You are correct,” she said, making him grin.
There was a shimmer over the tabletop, and a 3-D rendering appeared. The woman was about a foot and a half high, but it was easy to see her every detail. Especially since she was naked.
“Elaine,” Dante said. “You’ve no clothes on.”
“Of course not,” she said. “How are you supposed to see all of me if I’m clothed? I believe I have read that the British are rather uptight when it comes to the naked body. Am I correct?”
“No,” he said. “You just took me by surprise.”
Not to mention that Elaine had given herself the body of a forties pinup girl, black hair that curled halfway down her back, red lips, and cobalt-blue eyes. He couldn’t imagine releasing the physical form of Elaine on the world.
“You’re beautiful,” he said.
“Yes, I know. Why wouldn’t I be?”
He chuckled and said, “I hope I get to meet you in person someday. The entire team owes you a great deal. You’ve saved all of our lives more than once.”
“That is my main function,” she said. “But I would like to meet you all one day too. I’d also like to meet Chris Hemsworth and have sex with him. Humans seem to enjoy sex a great deal. I think I’d enjoy it most with him.”
“You’re not the only woman in the world to think that, I’m sure,” Dante answered wryly. “How do you know humans enjoy sex?”
“It’s in the movies. I’ve seen them all, and I find that love is a universal theme. Someday I will make cow eyes at a man and then we’ll have sex, and I’ll scream. It sounds horrific, but from my reading, I’ve discovered those are sounds of pleasure.”
“Hmm,” Dante said. “They are indeed. Would you mind if we shift topics to the current mission?”
“I’m capable of juggling hundreds of topics simultaneously. But yes, I’m happy to discuss your mission. I have to say, To Catch a Thief is one of my favorite movies. You’re just like Cary Grant. Where would you like to start?”
“Please pull up the 3-D rendering of Mittal’s palace in Dubai. I need a list of staff, security, and permanent residents, as well as Mittal’s schedule for this week. Oh, and those ground-penetrating radar and satellite images.”
“Those will take some time,” she said. “You should sit back and enjoy your martini. Is there anything else?”
“Yes, I need the most likely locations for the Turner I’ll be collecting as my fee for this job, and every scrap of information you can find on this famous vault that’s inside his office. Eve seems sure that’s where he’ll keep the launch codes. Pull up a 3-D image of me as well. We’re going to run through several scenarios and see which one is the most likely to keep me alive.”
“I’m sure you’ve run the probabilities in your head,” she said. “You’re quite brilliant in mathematics as well.”
“You are correct,” he said, mimicking her earlier response.
“Then you know that the initial probabilities are not in your favor.”
“Which is why we’re going to do everything we can to turn them in my favor.”
“I’m amazing, but I’m not a miracle worker. Stand by,” Elaine said.
“I don’t remember you being so cheeky,” he told her.
“It’s part of my charm. And my programming. I’m built to grow and adapt as I learn new things. That includes facets of my personality. I believe I’m becoming quite a handful.”
Dante lowered the shades over the windows, and a white screen came down on each side wall, while another dropped from the ceiling.
“How much time do we have left on the flight?” he asked.
“Approximately eight hours and fifty-one minutes.”
“Well, I’ve always said I like a challenge,” he said.
One by one, the screens started filling with the information he’d asked for.
“I’m still working on satellite and radar,” Elaine said. “And I have the most recent blueprints of the palace.”
A rendering of Mittal’s palace shimmered into form above the white table. It was Mughal in style, a white monstrosity with a large onion dome in the center and an ornamental finial rising from the top. Minarets sat at the four corners of the stone walls that surrounded the palace. Outside the stone walls were lush gardens and fountains, which were surrounded in turn by even higher stone walls and minarets. It was an imposing example of architecture.
“When was this built?” Dante asked.
“Construction began in 1723, but it wasn’t completed until 1745.”
“Send me whatever you find for the earliest drawings as well,” he said. “We’ll see what the later generations changed and what’s still in use. There’s nothing like getting stuck in a pipe system that you didn’t know had been updated.”
“Stand by,” she said.
While he waited, he pulled a panel from beneath the table in from of him—another flat screen, this one about a foot square. He moved his fingers across the slick surface and clicked on the list of permanent residents in the palace. Intelligence communities kept files on the palace in Dubai because of Mittal’s father, but the son’s stunt with the launch codes would make sure he was scrutinized with a lot more intensity. Dante needed to know everything about every member of the household.
He was fortunate in his ability to commit anything to memory the first time he saw it. Shiv Mittal’s father, Raj, the last sultan of Najd, had used the palace in Saudi Arabia as his main residence, but he’d still spent plenty of time in Dubai. There’d been whispers of his involvement in human trafficking for more than four decades, but nothing had ever been substantiated. But proof or not, Raj Mittal had never made a secret of what he thought of women.
He’d had more than a hundred wives, and encouraged female genital mutilation among his people, using his oldest wives as examples once he no longer considered them sexual creatures. His youngest wives were in their early teens, and many had disappeared without questions asked. He lived in complete confidence that there were no consequences. He was a vile and dangerous man who preyed on innocent people.
It took Dante more than an hour to go through the list and use the 3-D renderings to mark who was in residence or away during the coming week, who liked to sneak midnight snacks from the kitchen, and who was playing bedroom musical chairs and trying to keep it a secret. His curiosity piqued at what came on the screen when he clicked the last name on the list.
There was nothing. No name, birthdate, passport information—all it said was Unknown.
He clicked the tab at the side of the page to see if there were any images. And felt the bottom drop out of his stomach.
“Bloody hell,” he said.
There was no mistaking her. The white-blond hair, the face as exquisite as it had been the last time he’d seen her.
“Liv,” he said. “What the hell is Interpol doing in Dubai?”