you have something in mind?”
Stikes’s cold gaze turned toward the door through which Nina and Eddie had exited. “As a matter of fact, I do.”
It wasn’t until they were back at their apartment in New York, away from anyone who might report what was said to Warden or his people, that Eddie finally felt free to unleash what had been bottled up inside him for the past hours. “Have you gone fucking mad?” he erupted at Nina the moment the door was closed. “What the hell are you doing, going along with them?”
“Eddie—”
“You know you can’t trust ’em, especially not Stikes!”
“Eddie—”
“And it’s because of them that Mac’s dead! They hired Kit, he was working for them—and now Stikes is too!”
“Eddie—”
“This is what you call us sticking together, no matter what? I can’t fucking believe that you’d even—”
“Eddie!” She grabbed his arms, getting right in his face. “Of course I don’t trust him! I said all that because I needed to buy some extra time.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah!”
“Oh.” His shoulders slumped. “I feel like a bit of an arse now.”
She smiled and briefly kissed him. “I’ll let you feel the whole of one when we go to bed. But no, I don’t trust Warden or this Group of his any more than you do.”
“So you wanted to buy more time, okay. But for what? Warden’s going to want an answer pretty soon—and there’s still Glas to worry about.”
Nina paced across the room. “We need to find out the truth about the statues—and, more important, the meteorite. What it can really do, how it does it—and how dangerous it might be. Not secondhand, like the Kallikrates text, or whatever Warden says about it. I’m sure Glas would have his own opinion too. No, we need to go to the source.”
“Where’s that?” Eddie asked.
She stopped and faced him. “Atlantis.”
TWENTY-TWO
The Gulf of Cadiz
The North Atlantic in November is an inhospitable place. Even though the weather on this day was not particularly bad, there was still enough of a swell to cause the research vessel Gant to pitch unsettlingly beneath the wet-slate sky. The helicopter’s landing on the pad at the ship’s stern was bumpy, to say the least.
“Welcome aboard!” called Matt Trulli, waving as Nina and Eddie hurried through the drizzle to meet him. “Great to see you both. Been up to anything exciting?”
“You could say that,” Nina replied with a pained smile. “You know, the usual.”
“Ah, right,” Matt said knowingly. “So what got destroyed this time?”
Eddie started to count items on his fingers. “A skyscraper, a helicopter, a secret US base …”
“Jesus, mate, I was kidding!” He shook Eddie’s hand firmly. “Seriously, though, I’m glad to see you again. I knew you were innocent.”
“Thanks,” said Eddie, smiling. “Would be nice if that were the end of it, but nope, we’ve still got problems.”
“Which is why we’re here,” said Nina. “Can we go inside?”
“Sure.” Matt brought them through a hatch into the ship’s interior, then headed down a passage. “Should warn you, Hayter’s about as happy as you’d expect that you were coming.”
“How’s progress been on the excavations?”
“Pretty good, I’d say. He can give you the details, but the biggest problem’s been that there’s a fairly huge piece of wreckage from the Evenor right on top of where you want to look. Too big to lift, even for Sharkdozer; we’ve had to cut it up. Most of it’s been moved now, though.”
“Good. I saw when we came in to land that the subs are on the ship—why aren’t they working?”
The Australian grinned. “ ’Cause I knew you were coming! Figured you’d want to work the arses off them, so I brought them back up top to recharge.”
“You know me so well,” Nina replied with a grin of her own.
They went into a large compartment overlooking the foredeck, where the archaeological expedition’s two submersibles were suspended from their cranes. Waiting for them was Lewis Hayter. As Matt had implied, his thin face was not exactly brimming with joy at his boss’s arrival. “Oh, Nina,” he said sullenly. “You’re here.”
She decided to try to make the best of the situation. “Hello, Lewis. I caught up with the daily reports on the flight over—it looks like you’ve made excellent progress. Thank you.”
He nodded, a little off balance from the praise. “We’re doing the best we can. It’s cutting things fine, though—even if the weather holds, the Gant will still have to return to port in five days at the most. I don’t think we’ll be able to do any further