Read Online The Hades Factor by Robert Ludlum; Gayle Lynds - Free Book Online Page A

them on one at a time. He had hoped they would.

The bolder padded around the mansion's right side, between it and the gazebo. That was a break for Smith. As the man continued on, Smith crept toward him from behind. He stepped on a twig. It was a soft snap, but loud enough to alert the attacker. Smith's heart seemed to stop. The man whirled around, pistol rising to fire.

Smith acted instantly. A single powerful right fist to the throat paralyzed the vocal cords, a sweeping arc of right leg smashed a size-twelve shoe to the side of the man's head, and he dropped quietly.

Smith slid back into the gazebo.

One... two minutes.

The more cautious of the pair materialized in a patch of moonlight between the gazebo and the fallen man. He had had the sense to circle his partner out of sight. But that was where his imagination ended, and he hurried to kneel over the fallen man.

“Jerry? Jesus, what---” Smith's appropriated Beretta smashed across the back of the bent head.

Smith dragged both unconscious men into the gazebo. Crouched over them, he panted as he listened to the night. The only distinctive sound was of a distant car heading south. With relief, he left the gazebo and loped through the shadows of houses and trees back the way he had come. As he neared the intersection where he had been attacked, he slowed and listened again. The only noise was what sounded like the same car driving in the opposite direction, this time north.

On elbows and knees, a pistol in each hand, he crawled to within a front yard of the intersection. The sprinkling of parked cars on either side had not changed, and his Triumph still waited at the curb where he had left it to go to the aid of the fake victim. No one was in sight.

There was no way the six-wheeler truck could have found him first on Wisconsin Avenue and then here. No one had that kind of luck. Yet the truck, the car, and the “drunk” had created a diversion, intending his death.

They had to have known exactly where he was.

He waited as the moon went down. The night grew darker, a large owl hunted through the trees, and the distant car continued to drive south, then north, then south again, slowly making its way closer to the intersection.

Satisfied that no one was lurking there, Smith jumped up and ran to his Triumph. He took a small flashlight from the glove compartment and slid under the car's rear. And there it was. No imagination, no originality. The bright funnel of his flashlight revealed a transmitter no larger than his thumbnail attached to the car's undercarriage by a powerful mini-magnet. The tracking device's reader was probably in the truck or with the short, heavy leader.

He flicked off the flashlight, slipped it into his pocket, and removed the tracking device. He admired the creativity that had manufactured such delicate engineering. As he crawled out from under the Triumph, he noticed the car he had been monitoring was almost at the intersection. He knelt beside the Triumph, watching. The car was moving slowly as the driver pitched newspapers from his rolled-down window onto the lawns and driveways of the neighborhood.

The driver made a U-turn.

Smith stood up and whistled. As the car slowed in the intersection, he ran toward the open window. “Can I buy a paper from you?”

“Yeah, sure. I've got some extras.”

Smith reached into his pocket for change. He dropped a coin, bent to pick it up, and with a cool smile he stuck the microtransmitter to the car's undercarriage.

Straightening, he took the newspaper and nodded. “Thanks. I appreciate it.”'

The car drove on, and Smith jumped into the Triumph. He peeled away, hoping his trick would occupy his assailants long enough for him to reach Sophia. But if these attacks where part of what Bill Griffin had warned him would happen, they knew who he was and where to find, him. And where to find Sophia.

__________

4:07 A.M.

Fort Detrick, Maryland

The report from the Prince Leopold Institute of Tropical