“No, but you can go and ask Tanner if there’s a problem,” Lara said. “He hasn’t stuck his head out of the cockpit since we took off.”

He held up his hand. “I’m ahead of you. I called him from the galley. There’s no real problem, but he heard from Sorens, one of the men we left to keep an eye on what Volkov was doing. Anton is moving fast and asking lots of questions. They knew you left in a helicopter and they found the heliport we leased it from. It will take them longer to trace it to the private airport where we boarded this jet, but they’ll get there. We just have to hope they don’t do it before we get to Connecticut and can tuck the jet in a hangar.”

“How long will that be?”

“About eleven hours. But they’ll have to trace it first to Stockholm, and that will give us more time.” He added gently, “Tanner knows what he’s doing. He’s done it many times before, and he’s never lost an extraction. He won’t lose you, Lara.”

“Is she giving you a hard time?” Tanner was coming down the aisle toward them. “I thought she might. I’m surprised that she didn’t have you bounding into the cockpit to grill me.”

“I was planning on doing it myself,” she said. “You could have given me a report on what was happening. You should have known that I’d suspect something was off kilter when you were orchestrating a simple breakfast with such military precision.”

“Heaven forbid you just assume I’d tell you if there was anything really to worry about.” He paused. “Or that perhaps I had something else in mind.” He turned and headed for the back of the plane. “Come along. Let’s get this over. I want to make sure I haven’t screwed this up.”

“What?” She didn’t move. “Screwed what up?”

He looked over his shoulder. “I made you a promise, didn’t I?” He suddenly smiled teasingly. “Come and see if I kept it.”

She got to her feet. “I will.” She glanced at Maria. “I’ll be right back.”

“She can follow us if she likes.” Tanner was already halfway down the aisle. “Maybe she can protect me from your wrath if I didn’t do it right.” He stopped and gestured to the four seats opposite the galley opening. “But I did the best I could considering the time constraints.”

“What on earth are you talking—” She inhaled sharply as she looked down at the black rectangular object lying across the two seats in front of her. “A keyboard? You got me a keyboard?” She was looking dazedly down at the keys. She gingerly reached out and touched one of the keys. The sound, the beautiful sound…The feel of the key beneath her finger. The music waiting…