focus on his mission, his life’s work, playing out at this very moment. But he could not help but look across the room, gaze at his beautiful daughter, and consider whether to take her out of here and administer antibiotics to her right now.
He was a realist, so for the good of his mission, he knew he absolutely should not. For one, once he gave them to her he’d have to sequester her from the rest of the hostages so she didn’t alert everyone. And that meant he’d have to take one of his too-few mercenaries here to guard her in some other part of the castle. It also meant when he and his team slipped out of here, he’d have to bring her along, and the thought of making their getaway with a noncompliant, resourceful, and clever enemy—he had no question but that she was now, and would forever be, his enemy—left him feeling frustrated.
For ten minutes he thought about nothing else, but ultimately he told himself Zoya had put herself in this position by siding with the Americans, he didn’t have the manpower to spare in dealing with her, and she could not know that the bacteria had been released on the crowd, or she would undermine the entire operation.
Yes, for the good of this operation, Zoya would have to die. It brought a thick mist over his eyes when he made the decision, but once he did make it, he was resolute through his profound sadness.
* * *
• • •
Zoya had the head count of combatants in the room solidified now. There were fourteen, plus Fox and her father and Hines. She’d seen another six or so men leave in pairs, presumably to search the interior of the castle for anyone they’d missed by locking down the great hall.
Now she had to find a way out of here.
She looked to her father. He looked right back at her; he appeared sad, sadder than she ever remembered seeing him.
He was thinking about her; this she knew for certain.
Zoya realized that his remaining softness for her, what little left existed, was her way out of here. The gunmen working for her father in this room would be reluctant to shoot her if she made a run for it, and her father would be reluctant to give them the okay, at least for a moment.
She looked across the room towards the center double doors. These were not locked, but they were guarded by two men with submachine guns on their chests. Making her way around the tables would have taken too long; this she knew by tracking the route she’d have to run. But there was a faster way to the doors. She looked over each table between herself and her goal, and then she moved her hands slightly on the table, covering up a small, thin steak knife. This she slipped under the cuff of her track top, and the elastic there held it firmly in place against her forearm, with the handle across the palm of her hand.
She took a breath to prepare herself and looked back over to her father, and then her heart sank.
He was standing from his chair now, his eyes on her. There was no doubt in her mind he’d seen her take the knife and likely figured out exactly what she was going to do.
Which meant she had to do it now.
Zoya leapt up and onto the big round table, raced across it over dirty dishes and crashing wineglasses, vaulted over the people sitting on the far side, and landed on the floor. She was up onto the second table an instant later, her legs kicking between those seated there.
Screams and shouts erupted from the men and women at the banquet.
Back on the floor now, she vaulted over a seated lady from the Canadian intelligence services and took another two steps across this table, then landed on the floor a third time.
Behind her she heard her father shout into the microphone on the stage.
“Kill her!”
The last table she ran around instead of over, knowing her surprise had been lost and her pattern had been established, but she was lightning fast, and the two men at the door had just got their weapons pointed towards her as she executed a diving forward roll. Gunfire cracked, but the rounds had gone above her, and she snapped back up in front of the men, stabbing one through the throat as she used her momentum to crash