Kurst will not get away. Franks pushed harder. A new demon stepped in front of him, hissing, but Franks clotheslined it to the ground without even slowing. He approached the Swiss position. There was a pistol lying next to the outstretched hand of a dead man, so Franks snatched it up as he ran through the blast door. He caught sight of the truck as it reached the top of the ramp and cranked off a few futile shots from the Sig 226 before the truck was out of sight. Franks ran after them.

By the time he entered the hangar, the truck was outside and moving fast across the airfield. An Air Force C-17 had landed and its loading ramp was down. If Kurst flew out, in a normal situation Franks could just request a shoot-down or forced landing, but right now Franks was the fugitive, and Kurst was using Stricken’s extremely high level authorizations. If Franks could convince the military to act, by then Kurst could potentially escape, and if they could reverse-engineer that growth tank . . .

Escape is not an option.

Franks was breathing hard. He had a bullet hole in one lung. This would not do. The MCB command vehicle had a 40mm belt-fed grenade launcher, but it was on fire and there was no sign of Archer or the other techies. Franks looked around for a better option.

Gutterres had left his Ducati right inside the entrance, and the Vatican’s Hunter had left the keys in it. The motorcycle was an extremely powerful machine . . . Franks approved.

* * *

Heather and Earl were in an angled shaft. It wasn’t very long, and the exit was covered in bushes. The vault door at their back was warm from the fire on the other side. She didn’t know if that explosion had killed the other Nemesis monster, but it at least had to hurt.

Heather leaned against the dirt wall and caught her breath. Blood was running down the huge cut on her cheek and from a dozen puncture wounds in her arms. Earl put his arm around her and pulled her in close. “Are you okay?”

She smiled. “I will be. What’re you doing here?”

“I came to save you.” He kissed her on the forehead.

“How’d you know?”

“I tailed Franks. I promised him I wouldn’t, which is why I’m in disguise. How do I look?”

“Like a Fed.”

“Me looking like a Fed.” Earl laughed. “If that ain’t proof of my feelings toward you, I don’t know what is. Then I tracked your scent. I’m surprised you didn’t know I was here.”

She began to explain about still recovering from the poison, but then thought screw it, and she kissed him hard. She’d been wanting to do that for a long time. After several seconds they broke apart. “We’ve got a lot of catching up to do.”