It wasn’t long before she heard voices—male voices. She recognized Luther’s, then Albin’s raised in answer. She slid along the wall, pressing her body against it, making herself all but invisible. She inched her way to the edge of the open doorway. She could see only a narrow slice of the chamber. Neither man was visible, but she heard their voices as clearly as if she were standing beside them.

She had never been given any reason to believe a word Luther had said to her, and seeing how he had bundled her uncle into an ambulance outside the Bethesda Institute of Mary Immaculate had given her every reason to distrust him. She had been curious about his interest in her, about what he was in to. He was NSA, he’d shown her his ID, but this facility wasn’t NSA. After being given the tour, she was sure it wasn’t anything the feds knew of, let alone had built. And then there was the sign of the chimera she had glimpsed tattooed on the inside of his left wrist. No, Luther was into something so far underground even the NSA was unaware of it, just as they were unaware of the sigil, of the chimera. That was one reason this place was safe from prying eyes and inquisitive noses. Luther and the rest of them could do whatever they wanted here without fear of rebuke or reprisal.

“… Lindstrom gone,” Luther was saying, “the entire project falls apart.”

“You know that’s not true,” Albin said in a resonant baritone. “As Hartwell has pointed out numerous times there’s another direction to go in.”

“Events have overrun us,” Luther said. “We lack the time to—”

“What events? What aren’t you telling us? And what the hell happened to you?”

“A bullet jumped up and bit me,” Luther snapped.

“As events overran you?”

The silence buzzed like a defective light fixture.

Albin cleared his throat. “Here’s the bottom line, Luther. We’re not shutting down Mobius just because your pet researcher is dead.”

“As I told you, we have no choice.” Luther’s voice continued on its knife-edge. “At this late date, we’re not going to go searching in the private sector for—”

“I agree, but there’s another road we can take.”

“I don’t follow you,” Luther said.

“I have summoned Preach.”

Within the terrible silence that now enveloped not only the chamber in which the two men stood, but the corridor outside, Lucy felt her legs begin to tremble, turn weak, and betray her. She felt herself kneeling on the stone, her mouth half-open, her eyes glazed over in inescapable memory.