“I feared the worst about you,” Ana said, sitting on the edge of his bed. “How do you feel?”
“Mostly just tired from the medication they keep pumping into me.”
Pitt eyed his heavily bandaged left leg. “How soon before you can dance again?”
“The doctors tell me I shou
ld make a complete recovery, but I can expect a few weeks of therapy. My femur got nicked up, but I’m bolted back together, with a leg full of titanium.”
Ana squeezed his hand. “I am so glad you are all right.”
“What happened on the salvage ship after I went for a swim?” he asked.
Ana relayed her escape from the salvage ship with the HEU and her fortunate encounter with the NUMA men.
He looked to Pitt and Giordino. “You two seem to have a nose for rescue.”
“Trouble smells us out all too often,” Pitt joked.
“Did the ship get away?”
“Unfortunately,” Ana said.
“We’ll find her sooner or later.”
“We’re searching,” Ana said. “Now, tell us what happened to you after you fell in the moon pool.”
“There’s not much to tell. I swam to the surface and clung to a mooring ball until a passing fishing boat spotted me. Good thing they found me when they did. The doctors say I wouldn’t have lasted much longer.”
An overweight nurse with slate gray eyes entered the room holding an intravenous bag and gave the visitors a petulant gaze. “It’s a bit late for visitors.”
“We’ll leave you to your care,” Pitt said to Ralin. Then he turned to Ana. “Are you going to return to the ship with us?”
Ana caught a fond look in Ralin’s eyes and pointed to a stuffed chair in the corner of the room. “I think I’ll stay with Petar tonight. I have to travel to Sofia in the morning to make my reports, so I’ll just leave from here.”
The NUMA men said their good-byes, promising to check on both agents the next time they were ashore. Exiting the hospital just after midnight, they found no taxis, so opted to walk back to the ship.
“They make a nice couple,” Giordino said.
“It would seem they’re on the verge of figuring that out.”
“I hope they don’t become targets for the gang that stole the HEU.”
“Someone won’t be happy,” Pitt said, “but they’re probably smart enough not to pick a fight with Europol.”
The bustling town had grown silent as they walked its narrow streets. They skipped the temptation to visit one of the smoky pubs still open along their route and hiked to the waterfront.
The commercial dock was dark and quiet as they stepped across its diesel-soaked timbers. Approaching the Macedonia’s berth, both men tensed, then stopped in their tracks. In front of them, the black harbor waters lapped gently against an empty dock.
The Macedonia was gone.
21
Heavy raindrops splattered against the window of the high corner office in the headquarters building of the Main Intelligence Directorate. A blanket of gray obscured the normally expansive vista across the Khoroshyovsky District of Moscow.
The GRU’s foreign intelligence field director, Maxim Federov, was oblivious to the weather as he sat at his desk, silently studying a crinkled document. The spymaster was equally unmindful of a slight, bespectacled man who sat nervously in front of him. Federov looked up only when a knock rattled against his office door and a third man entered.
Tall, with an athlete’s build and a soldier’s posture, he crossed the room with an air of confidence. His short blond hair framed a well-tanned face and striking blue eyes. Federov grimaced at the man’s beige Yves St. Laurent suit, yellow tie, and Italian loafers.