Waiting to hear from John was as tense a fifteen minutes as Ayala had ever experienced, and she had known more than her fair share. After fifteen minutes, she had assumed the worst, as planned, and pulled Neal from the bus.

They would eventually hear from the English Agent, and return from their aborted escape run, frazzled and more aware than ever of the fragility of their entire enterprise.

* * *

Meanwhile, as John gambled their scheme on the honor of one Agent, a thousand miles to the south another Agent was arriving at the assisted living facility, which Madeline’s mother called home. As she approached, Lana was receiving the AI’s reports of a lack of contact with Agent Shahim Al Khazar. The AI had not received any distress call or anything that might indicate there was an issue, but it had been nearly twenty-five minutes since Shahim had entered the building. The AI was not speculating, merely conveying facts. It was aware of nothing in the human’s arsenal that could harm the Agent, short of prolonged heavy weapons fire from a large team of highly trained soldiers, and it saw no reason to believe such a group was hiding in Neal’s basement.

Given that it was unlikely that Shahim could have found anything that could pose any threat to him without destroying the building itself, the delay was merely being noted as unusual, and the AIs were monitoring. Despite the AI’s pragmatism, Princess Lamati felt a surge of self-righteousness. They should have killed the other humans back in India. Now she was here, she would go in and find out where this Madeline Cavanagh was. Maybe Shahim was even now interrogating one of Madeline’s cohorts, and Lana could imagine nothing more satisfying than doing the same here. Without a hint of her malice showing on her beatific face, Lana parked her rental car and got out, strolling toward the front entrance of the Sunny Valley Assisted Living Apartments.

Across the parking lot, Madeline was watching as Lana got out of her car; she had only just arrived herself. She had seen so many photos. She had even had nightmares about these Agents, but it took a moment for her to reconcile those images with the beautiful young woman she was watching walk up to the entrance of the nursing home.

She fought a wave of panic welling up inside her. They were here for her, she thought. She should run. She should hide. She fought an instinctive desire to glance at the sky and the threat that loomed there. Instead Madeline sat there, staring at the Agent Madeline knew as Lana Wilson as she opened the door and went into the nursing home.