Drake breathed a laugh. “Always surprising me. Perfect, Margot. I’ll find him, we can put a team together. I’ll take you back to Abuelo and Red, or to your brother, and—”

“No.” She covered his hand with hers. When had it become such an easy move, such a comfortable one? When had his fingers begun to feel as familiar to her as her own?

He frowned at her. “Don’t insist on coming, mi alma. Please don’t.”

“It isn’t that. It’s that he must know how you’ll respond. He must know you won’t come alone. We must think differently. We must act differently.”

His brows were still gathered over the knot in his nose. But his breath eased out. “We should listen to my mother. She always said never to neglect our prayers.”

Margot would have liked his mother. She nodded and let her eyes fall closed.

Her spirit still felt a bit raw. The ache of her own mother’s absence was no less there. But that waterfall of His voice still filled her. She sought the words to match the numbers in her mind. I’m sorry, Lord God, for shutting you out. I’m sorry for saying no when you asked me to pray. And I thank you, I thank you so much for preserving him anyway. For bringing him here, so that he could help me to see my own heart. And that it’s all right to have one.

Her fingers tightened around his. Help us now, Lord God, as only you can. Help us to find the move in this game Dieter Regnitz has set up that will turn the momentum in our favor. That will save Dot. Help us to get her back to Red. Help us, most of all, Father, to find the path that will bring you the most glory. Ten, one hundred, one thousand, ten thousand . . .

Her words ran dry, but her spirit didn’t, and the powers of ten multiplied beautifully in her mind for another long moment, a new zero marching into line each time. A perfect circle. Without beginning. Without end. Eternal, like the One who had come before.

Then all the zeros scattered away like autumn leaves in a windstorm, and only the one remained. It folded, folded again. And one of those stray zeroes settled back into place. 40.

Her eyes sprang open. Not a number the Lord had ever spoken to her before. But it had only one meaning in her mind. She looked to Drake and said the number aloud.

He was pushing to his feet. “The OB?”

“Room 40.”

Together they hurried back into the night.

32

The munitions factory had shut down for the evening. Das Gespenst had watched the workers go, laughing together in twos and threes, not seeming to give any thought to the fact that they’d spent their day producing bullets, shells, and explosives that would continue killing off the generation.