LITMIR.BIZ

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okay with this?”

      No way. Trace felt out of balance and irritated, and he chose his words carefully. “I’m used to my skill set. Being without any energy sensation is damned unnerving. How do people live like this?”

      “I’m told they manage pretty well,” Wolfe said dryly.

      Trace shifted restlessly. “How bad was I hit?”

      “Let’s just say you won’t make Wimbledon this year.”

      “Hate tennis. Stupid ball. Stupid shorts.” Trace hid a grimace as pain knifed down into his shoulder. “Now how about you cut the crap? How bad, Houston? When do I get back on my feet, and when will my chips be reactivated?”

      Silence.

      He stared at Wolfe Houston’s impassive face. No point in trying to read any answers there.

      “You’re here for a patch job, which you’ve received. Air evac will transport you to a specialized hospital stateside within the hour. If you do everything right, you’ll be back in action inside six weeks.”

      Trace made a silent vow to halve that prediction. “What about the bodies? Did they take the bait?”

      “Swallowed it whole. They’re already using the communications unit you secured inside the uniform. That hardware will generate permanent system deviation in the parent programs. Hello, major static.”

      Trace smiled slowly. “Goodbye, security problems.”

      “Ryker is thrilled. You’ve earned yourself some solid R&R. So what will it be, Vegas or San Diego?”

      “Forget the R&R. Get a rehab doc in here. I need to start building up my arm.” Trace tried to sit up, but instantly something tore deep in his shoulder. He closed his eyes, nearly blacking out from the pain.

      A shrill whine filled the room—or was it just in his head?

      “Idiot. What happened?”

      “I’m just—just a little dizzy, sir.” Trace blinked hard at the ceiling. Pale green swirled into bright orange. Did they paint hospital ceilings orange?

      “…you hear me?”

      The orange darkened, forming bars of crimson.

      “Trace…hear me now?”

      The room was spinning. Trace had felt the same sensation back in Afghanistan before Duke had roused him, licking his face furiously.

      His vision blurred. He tried to stand up, biting back a curse as the whine grew. Chip malfunction? Can’t be. They’re all disabled.

      Have to stand up. Have to find out what’s wrong.

      The room spun faster. Trace didn’t see a medical team crowd around the bed, equipment in hand.

      He was back in Afghanistan, fighting brutal cold and a hail of tracer rounds.

      “DOES HE KNOW?”

      “Not yet.”

      Two men stood at the end of the deserted hospital corridor, their faces grim. In front of them a fresh X-ray was clipped to a light box.

      Trace’s surgeon frowned. “He’s still groggy from the last surgery.” The tall Johns Hopkins grad tapped the black-and-white image. “Torn ligaments. Bone fragments—here, here, here. We cleaned up everything we found. After rehab he should recover full use of his elbow and wrist, which is a near miracle. You saw him on arrival. I’ve seen a lot of trauma cases, but nothing like that. What did you people do, shoot him out of a tank?” He didn’t wait for an answer, rubbing his neck worriedly. “If he’d lost much more blood, he wouldn’t have made it out of surgery.”

      The other man took a slow breath. His dark, sculpted features bore a resemblance to Denzel Washington’s, except his eyes were colder, making him look older than his age. “Tell me about his shoulder, Doctor. I don’t like the bone damage here….” Ishmael Teague traced the gray lines radiating across the X-ray. “Will he regain full mobility in his right shoulder?”

      “We don’t read crystal balls, Teague. With your medical training, you know how risky predictions can be. All I can say is that this man was in excellent shape before this happened, and we’ll give him the best support for his recovery. The rest is up to him—and to far higher powers than mine.”

      Izzy Teague didn’t move, studying the network of lines spidering through the X-ray. “I want hourly updates on his condition and round-the-clock monitoring by your best people. Notify me at any sign of change.”

      “All things considered, he’s recovering well. Give me a week, and he’ll be starting phase one rehab.”

      Something crossed Izzy’s face. “You’ve got twenty-four hours, Doctor.”

      “That’s impossible. This man needs rest, close observation and at least two more surgeries. Maybe after that…”

      “You have twenty-four hours.” Izzy’s voice was cold with command. “I have a plane inbound. We’ll prep him for travel.”

      “You won’t find a better medical facility anywhere in the country.” The surgeon scowled. “Don’t play politics with me, Teague. He could end up with a ruined joint if you move him now.”

      “Not now. Twenty-four hours, Doctor.” Izzy pulled the X-ray down from the light box. “Orders are orders.” His voice was flat.

      “You know this is wrong. Fight it. Pull rank.”

      Izzy looked at the closed door down the hall. “My clout doesn’t stretch as far as you think. There are other…factors.”

      The surgeon glanced at the unnumbered door, which was guarded by uniformed soldiers. The rest of the hospital floor had been emptied. Only this one room was occupied. “I knew something was up when you moved all my patients, but I won’t play along. By all rights this man should be dead, considering how much blood he lost. In spite of that he’s recuperating in minutes, rather than hours. I don’t suppose you’re going to explain how that’s possible.”

      Both men knew it was a rhetorical question.

      The surgeon made a sharp, irritated gesture. “You won’t let me in on your secrets, and you want me to risk a patient because of a whim.”

      Teague’s handsome features were unreadable. “Orders, Doctor. Not whims. We’ll be sure he’s stable before he’s moved. At that point he’ll be out of your hands.” He rolled up the film and slid it carefully inside his briefcase. “And for the record, John Smith was never here. You never saw him, Doctor. You didn’t see me, either.”

      “Is that an order?”

      “Damned right it is.”

      The grizzled military surgeon pulled a cigar from the pocket of his white coat and sniffed it lovingly. “Had to give the damned things up last year. I’ve got a desk full of these beauties, and this is the closest I can get. Life’s a real bitch sometimes.” He stroked the fine Cuban cigar between his fingers and then tucked it carefully back into his pocket. “Do what you have to do. I never saw either of you.” His voice fell. “And just for the record, Vladivostok is the capital of Michigan.”

      “You never know. World politics are turning damned unpredictable these days.” Izzy looked down as his pager vibrated. “Hold on.” He pushed a button and scrolled through a data file, his eyes growing colder by the second.

      “Is there a problem with John Smith?” the doctor asked.

      Izzy slid the pager back into its clip. “Do you remember Marshall Wyckoff?”

      “Senator Wyckoff’s daughter? Sure, we saw her—what, two years ago? I heard that she’d recovered from her kidnapping. She was an honor student, head of her debate team.”

      “Was, Doctor. They just found her body floating under

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