Her emotions threatened her mission; this she warned herself of as she watched the nose of the Cessna break out of the clouds and into sunshine over the Chesapeake Bay. She’d have to fight to keep those emotions in check. But as she evaluated herself right now, taking notice of how she felt, she realized her main reaction to what she had learned, that her father was alive, was telling.

She felt no elation. She felt no excitement. She felt no hopefulness.

No. She’d just learned her father was alive, and right now she found herself fighting against an overpowering sense of dread.

CHAPTER 21

FOUR MONTHS EARLIER

Janice Won moved to the United Kingdom, using the same name she used in Stockholm, and through David Mars and Terry Cassidy, she started a company, on paper, at least. Her firm, Biospherical Research Labs, specialized in laboratory research of infectious diseases, ostensibly under contract with the National Health Service. Mars purchased a real firm under Won’s offshore corporation name, then sold it for parts, although the firm retained all its licenses and contracts so it could purchase items without raising eyebrows.

Won spent the first couple of weeks in an office in Soho, London, not a laboratory, and here she drafted a list of items she needed and a list of requirements for a lab to grow and weaponize the Yersinia pestis bacteria she’d successfully taken from the lab in Sweden. She also read through résumés of lab assistants Mars had selected as suitable, trying to find one or two people to help her, although they would think they were working for the front company, and they would never see the weaponized version of the spores.

Won was busy, but she was frustrated at the pace of one element of her preparation. To date she had not been given the information she requested from her new employer. She didn’t yet know the size and scope of the attack David Mars had in mind, or the distribution of the intended victims. She didn’t know if she would be attacking a football stadium, a sprawling metropolis, or a single building with her spores.

She found it ridiculous that she was having to base her needs on wild guesses about her objective, but Mars took her requests and went to work finding her a laboratory without giving her any more information.

It only took him a few days before he met with her in Soho. “Your lab will be in a private building next to Edinburgh University in Scotland. There is an existing facility there, no longer in use. It was built for medical research, but with some work it can be turned into a suitable lab for you. I have contacts in the local police; you will be well protected there, just as long as you use good operational security and don’t ever let out what is going on.”

“I have been trained, Mr. Mars.”

“I know you have, Doctor. I’m sorry.”

“Why Scotland?”

Mars shrugged. “Why not? Quite lovely people up there. You’ll like it.”

* * *

• • •

Two weeks later Won was in her new facility, watching refrigeration technicians restoring the long-dormant coolers in the old laboratory to operational condition. The rest of the equipment she’d ordered had already been installed: the fermentation vats, the freezers, and the spinners. While the lab was smaller and simpler than where she’d worked in Sweden or in Russia or even in Iran, it was a lot more advanced than where she’d done most of her work in North Korea.

Her two assistants had begun working with her. One was a twenty-six-year-old British woman of Pakistani descent, a registered nurse who had worked extensively with infectious disease, and the other was a twenty-four-year-old female Portuguese laboratory tech in the UK looking for more lucrative work.

Won’s company, run by David Mars, paid them well, and Won worked them both hard.

As the refrigeration men left, David Mars and Roger Fox appeared in her lab, again showing her how personally invested they were in the attack that she would help prepare. Mars and Won stepped into her office off the lab floor while Fox looked around and Hines shadowed him.

Mars said, “I trust the laboratory meets your needs.”

“Very much so. The two assistants are . . . adequate, as well. My only question remains—”

“The target?”

“Yes. I know you won’t tell me specifically, but to determine the ideal recipe for the agent, to choose and construct the proper delivery vehicle, I must know something about where this is to happen. Is it a city block? A sports stadium? What’s the weather in this location? There are so many variables that must be accounted for before I can even begin work on this.”

Mars nodded, drummed his fingers on the table a moment, and then said, “The location is here, in the United Kingdom, which means you will have to prepare for any weather conditions save for extreme cold and extreme heat. The target is a building. Large, sturdy, well fortified and protected.”

“A building like a grocery store, or a building like a shopping center?”

Mars said, “A building like a shopping center.”

Won waited for something more, then said, “I assume there will be a narrow time window when this must take place.”

“You are correct in your assumption.”

“How much time do I have before the attack?”

“Ten weeks.”

Janice Won gasped. “That is not much.”

“You told me the spores will grow quickly.”

“It . . . it can be done. But why didn’t you approach me sooner?”

“Because . . .” He hesitated, and Won noticed an unease in the normally composed man in front of her. “Because I only became sufficiently motivated to enact this attack a few months ago. Believe me, I reached out for a virologist as soon as the idea came to me.”

Won recognized there was a clue here about this mysterious Englishman’s motivation, but she could not discern it. “I see. I hope you understand I will need more information as time draws even closer. Very soon, even.”

“I do understand,” Mars said. “I will feed you intelligence about the target, the defenses, everything, well in advance of the mission.”

Won wasn’t satisfied, but she went back to her work. She had much to do today to set up the perfect conditions here at the lab before she could take the small amount of spores she’d stolen from Sweden and cultivate and weaponize them, and she had no time to waste.

PRESENT DAY

A sleek corporate helicopter descended through the darkness towards a landing pad at a country estate an hour’s drive west of London.

The AgustaWestland AW109 had been purchased the year before for six million U.S. by an offshore business owned by David Mars but untraceable to him. It was a chic craft with a plush interior, a range of 600 miles, and a top speed of 177 miles per hour.