The Lance

CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

The Visitor watched his target walk to the front door of her Georgetown Brownstone. The woman paused in the mullioned yellow light from the antique coach lamps set on either side of the door. She fumbled with her keys and went inside. It was after eleven. The night was cold, the warmth of the day a memory. On the deserted, tree-lined street, all the post-dinner strollers had gone home to the safety of their beds.

The Visitor drove his car down the block. He turned off his lights and pulled into the service alley behind the buildings. He parked. He got out of his car and slipped to the rear of the target's home. He opened a gate in the fence and became another shadow blending into the tall bushes in back of the house.

The scent of wet leaves and the coming of winter filled the night air.

Lights came on in the second story, where the Visitor knew the bedroom was located. He pictured the interior of the house in his mind's eye, the location of the alarm box. He went through how things would happen and repeated the mental exercise. When he felt ready, he moved to the back door, opened it in seconds and slipped inside. He had only a minute to disable the alarms.

A red light blinked steadily on the alarm box. On. Off. On. Off. He took out a small electric tool and unscrewed the cover on the box. He took a device from his pocket and clipped leads onto the terminals. The blinking red light turned green. The Visitor started for the stairs.

Upstairs, Elizabeth had changed into her robe. She was sitting at her dressing table brushing her hair. Her holstered Glock was on the table in front of her, in the midst of an assortment of bottles and containers. After the events of the last days it was always in reach. She looked in the mirror, at the purple bruises around her eyes, her damaged face. She sighed and set the brush down.

Elizabeth tried to take a deep breath and coughed. She picked up the latest lab reports from Johns Hopkins.

Lymphangioleiomyomatosis. She couldn't even pronounce the damn thing. The doctors called it LAM for short. It was rare, so rare she was one of only five hundred some cases diagnosed in the US. It affected only women. It was going to kill her.

For a long time she and her doctor had thought it was a case of nasty chronic bronchitis. Finally, her doctor ordered an MRI and they had discovered the truth. There wasn't any real treatment. She'd already been through heavy antibiotics, but they hadn't done anything except destroy her digestion. Then hormonal therapy, but that hadn't worked either. Then an experimental regimen of something called Rapamycin. Now she was on another experimental drug. Something new, they said. It might work, they said. It might not. It left her with a dry mouth and occasional dizziness. It was too soon to know if it would do the job.

Her lungs were filling up with tissue that shouldn't be there. She was tired all the time, now, although she didn't think the others had noticed yet. She had a powerful inhaler, a bronco-dilator for when she couldn't catch her breath, but she didn't like to use it. Acupuncture brought temporary relief, but it was difficult to find time for visits to the cheerful Chinese doctor. In any event, it wasn't a cure.

At this rate she'd be dead in two years. If the new regimen didn't work, the only possible alternative was a full lung transplant. Elizabeth wasn't holding her breath on that one.

That bizarre thought made her laugh. She bent over the table in a fit of coughing, her hand resting on the Glock.

A movement in the mirror that shouldn't have been there. She half turned and stared into the barrel of a silenced automatic, held by a tall figure standing in the doorway. The man was dressed in dark clothing, his face bland and unremarkable, the face of an assassin. The hand with the pistol was unwavering.

"Please do not move." His voice was soft, neutral, a hint of an accent.

She stopped turning. "What do you want?"

She knew what he wanted — to kill her. The hard black grip of her holstered pistol was cold under her hand. The assassin had come in while she was in front of the mirror. He couldn't have seen the Glock lying in the midst of the bottles and jars on the makeup table surface.

Elizabeth knew there was little time. She would have only one chance. She closed her finger around the trigger. Had she chambered a round?

"To help you," the man said. He moved closer.

Elizabeth spun the Glock around with a swift, fluid motion and pulled the trigger as the intruder fired. She heard the soft sound of the silencer and felt the bullet strike her skull, a sharp, hammering pain that knocked her backwards off the low stool where she'd been sitting.

The Glock bucked in her hand as she tumbled to the floor and she smelled the leather of the holster burning. The assassin staggered backwards as she fired again, then again. His pistol clattered onto the floor and he fell back into the hall. She could see his feet sticking through the doorway. As she slipped into unconsciousness Elizabeth saw that one of the soles of his black, shiny shoes was almost worn through.