He turned back, ready to return to the reception area and show this latest bitch what became of those who schemed against him. He pulled out his ceramic blade and thumbed it open.

Another thought struck him.

Maybe it made sense that Alisha had been brought here.

Perhaps it was a logistical—and logical—decision to take Alisha out of Cedars Medical and bring her somewhere more remote. Less chance of collateral damage if Rickard did come calling. Perhaps this facility had only recently closed down, and had been commandeered as a temporary safe house for the critically ill woman. That would explain the lack of patients and medical staff.

Feasible?

Not very, but Rickard wasn’t going to run away without first checking out his theory.

He gave the ward only a cursory inspection, then moved farther along the hall. A door led into a descending stairwell. He could detect the faint residue of cooking smells left over from a once bustling kitchen area. She wouldn’t be down there. Instead he went a little farther along the corridor and found another staircase, this one leading up to the third level. It would be unusual for a patient to be closeted away up there when there were so many rooms on the lower levels, which was exactly why he thought that was where Alisha was roomed. He went up the stairs, passing his knife to his left hand and drawing his gun in his right—the two-weapon style of Musashi.

The upper hall was dull under muted lighting. But at the far end he could see a door and around the jamb leaked brighter light. The obligatory armed guards were nowhere to be seen, which was peculiar. Perhaps they were inside.

He moved forward stealthily, ears straining to hear voices from within the room. He could make out the electronic blip . . . blip . . . blip of monitors and something else like a distant chorus of voices. As he progressed he heard music and realized that a radio or TV was playing in the room, the volume low.

He was walking into a bottleneck. The hall behind him had only one exit and that was the way he’d come up. A couple of doors on each side led into cupboards or maintenance rooms with blind walls formed from the sloping roof. Should anyone come up the stairs, his only recourse would be to go directly into the room and damn the consequences.

But that was okay by him.

His mantra still played in his head.

Moving right up to the door, he placed an ear to the wood. He thought he heard the shifting of a body on a bed but couldn’t be sure, as it could easily have been noise from the radio or TV program. He glanced behind him, checking that the hall was still empty. It was.