I pulled open the door and we went in fast. The room was as we left it. Ghost ran straight to the desk that blocked the bathroom and his growls deepened. Something was pulling the wolf out from under the dog’s facade.

“Cover me,” I said as I grabbed the desk and hauled it out of the way. Lydia and Ghost moved to one side. I drew my gun and yanked the bathroom door open.

The soldiers we’d roughed up were where we had left them, except that they were dead. Their throats had been torn away and they lay in a lake of blood. The metal cuffs I’d used to secure the major were twisted out of shape as if someone had put them in a vise and applied a hell of a lot of leverage. Or an unnatural amount of physical strength.

And the major was gone.

Ghost snarled. Not at the dead men, but at the rear wall of the small cubicle. There were bloody handprints on the wood behind the toilet, and the back wall—actually my missing hidden door—stood ajar. I quieted Ghost with a gesture as I bent close to the opening. There was no sound, but a harsh, foul-smelling odor wafted out on a sluggish current of air. It wasn’t the stink of petroleum or the sewage smell of methane, and it wasn’t the garlic I’d swallowed. This was a stench that provoked the most primitive reactions in me so that in my head the Civilized Man cringed back, the Cop became aware and defensive, and the Warrior bared his teeth in fearful, vicious defiance.

It was the sick-sweet aroma of rotting meat.

The perfume of death.

Chapter One Hundred Eight

Chapter One Hundred Eight

Near Aghajari Oil Refinery

June 16, 5:54 a.m.

Violin tapped her earpiece. “Oracle.”

“Oracle welcomes you, Violin.”

“Patch me through to my mother.”

Lilith came on the line in a few seconds. “Where are you?”

“I’m a mile from the Aghajari refinery.”

“Good. The rest of the team is ten minutes out. Leave a trail of bread crumbs for them.”

Violin patted her pockets to make sure that she had plenty of transponders. They were small and designed to look like discarded cigarette butts. All she had to do was crush the filter to activate the battery. All Arklight field teams had trackers.

“And, daughter?” said Lilith.

“Yes?”

“Be smart.”

“You trained me well, Mother.”

“I’m not talking about the mission. I trust you in combat. But you know nothing at all about men.”

Violin hesitated. “What do you mean?”

“You’re not a good liar, my love. I saw how you looked at Captain Ledger, and how he looked at you. I did not live my entire life in a cell. Don’t let infatuation or any other feeling affect you. Not now, not tonight. Be the warrior you are.”

“Yes, Mother.”