Read Online Biowar by Stephen Coonts - Free Book Online Page A

than scientists.
    The Russian foreign service agents were veteran holdovers from the days their spy agency was known as the KGB. Lia put her hand to her face as she went through the door, nearly bowling over a bleary-eyed American tourist who was carrying a baby in a backpack. Dean, meanwhile, had given up on the taxi line and was waiting for an elevator to the basement level, where he could take the shuttle to London.
    Lia circled through the large shop area, trying to avoid giving the airport security cameras a good shot at her face. Sylvia Reynolds had followed Dean to the elevator; Lia saw her get in the car with him.
    “He know she’s following him?” Lia asked.
    “We didn’t tell him.”
    “Why the hell not?”
    “He’ll be more natural if he doesn’t have to act natural.”
    Typical Art Room logic, thought Lia.
    She went down the stairway, coming out as Dean walked through the hallway into the shuttle tunnel. Tickets were sold at a machine on the wall, but as she approached it, Rockman warned her that the train was arriving. Lia veered toward the tunnel, deciding she’d have to buy it on board.
    The train came in just as she reached the platform. She slipped into the last car, holding her carry-on luggage and watching through the glass as Reynolds found a seat in the next car up. She couldn’t see Dean, but Rockman told her he was in the next car as well. The com system blanked as the train started; it was supposed to provide complete coverage to a depth equal to two basement levels, but there was a gap between supposed-to and reality.
    Lia took out her handheld and clicked on the transmission detector mode; there were no signals being sent in her car. She had started to get up to check the next car when Rockman came back on the line.
    “I’m going up to the next car,” she told him.
    “Sylvia may recognize you,” he said. “Hang back.”
    “She’ll see me sooner or later. Did you figure out who she’s working for?”
    “It’s not really a big deal at this point.”
    “You don’t think she’s his contact?”
    Obviously the idea hadn’t occurred to them, because there was a long pause. Telach came back on the line.
    “We may be able to psych it out on this end without announcing that you’re there,” she said. “There’s no reason to think she’s involved. The contact will come at the conference.”
    “Why?”
    “Because we haven’t answered the E-mails; we just registered him as Kegan’s last-minute replacement.”
    “Like she wouldn’t have accessed the information already?”
    “Lia, she’s working for the Brits. Just stay in the background for now, all right?”
    “Suit yourself.”
    Lia reached into her large bag and pulled out a tourist guide. The book contained eight pages of detailed maps of the area and hotel they’d be working; while she had the same information on her handheld, there was a certain quaintness to using the guidebook. It also saved on the battery.
    In a few moments they were outside of the airport tunnel, hurtling toward London. And then, not....
    The train slammed on its brakes, and Lia, caught by surprise, found herself flying into the Plexiglas liner of the luggage compartment.

    Dean braced himself as the brakes slammed on, warned by a change in the sound of the train’s wheels—a benefit of having grown up in a town where trains ran through regularly.
    “Trouble,” he whispered to his runner.
    Dean was sitting next to an emergency exit and eyed the bottom of the glass as the train screeched to a halt.
    “We’re with you,” said Rockman in his ear. “There’s a woman following you named Sylvia Reynolds. Brown sweater, brunette hair, about forty. She’s with the Brits but we’re not sure why she’s trailing you. She’s in your car.”
    Dean adjusted his glasses, clicking the small tab at the back near his left ear. The tab opened a video feed in the lower portion of the glass; another click and the screen displayed a view from a