Free Girl Takes Up Her Sword by Jacques Antoine Page B

Koreans?”
    Michael remained impassive, but Walker sensed a red rage coming from Andie and Emily at the mention of the kidnapping. The maternal fire smelled like burnt flesh, as if Andie would rend her enemies with her teeth. But the other sentiments, the ones in Emily’s heart, they were subtler, more complex. Fierce, violent, certainly, but also exultation, as well as an unexpected sympathy. She had not merely endured the catastrophe. She had triumphed. And forgiven? A paradoxical combination, it made no sense to him.
    “I have my little secrets, just as you have yours.”
    In the end, Michael agreed to give Meacham’s scheme further consideration, even though both men knew he would not change his mind.
    ~~~~~~~
    “He’s got nerve, I’ll give him that,” Meacham said, as they rolled down the driveway.
    They could just see Michael’s son, playing with a couple of smaller children by a pond at the bottom of the hill. The puzzle of George’s daughter preoccupied Walker. To be so open, to let him see so much of her heart, it seemed foolhardy. An opponent could exploit it. As confounding as that may have been, the brightness of the light, the fire he felt in her skin, the apparition of the sword, all these were troubling in their own way.
    “So, David, can you handle her?”
    “Do you mean, can I kill her? Yes. But that would be a mistake.”
    “Let me worry about the mistakes. If it comes down to it, we need her dead before we can let anyone else take her alive.”
    “What a waste that would be.”
    “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you react to anyone like this before. You tripped over your own feet, like a lovesick schoolboy. What exactly did you see in her?”
    The old man seemed to forget who she is. George’s daughter. “Does he expect me to forget it, too?” Walker thought. “He may be a distant cousin, but I still feel the connection. She’s family. He wants to know what I saw in her?” Walker turned to face him.
    “Fire.”
    “What the hell’s that supposed to mean.”
    “You asked what I saw. People are strong or weak because of what’s in their hearts. That’s what’s in her heart.”
    “But in terms of her skills, her training...”
    “She’s good. You saw the tournament videos. I’m better. But a real fight isn’t about skills. It’s about heart. And her heart is made of fire.”
    “But you can handle her, right?”
    “It would be a shame to waste that kind of intensity.”
    “Well, we’re gonna have to do something about Cardano,” Meacham finally said, unable to hide his exasperation. “We may have to storm his compound.”
    “His security won’t be much of an obstacle, judging from what we saw today. But last time you tried that, he managed to slip through your fingers. What makes you think he won’t get away again?”
    “He’s very crafty, always has been. Unless you can think of another way to get the girl and her mother, we may not have a choice.”
    “What did she mean about George being missing? Do you know anything about that?”
    “We know they scattered last fall, before the initial attack’” Meacham said. “We weren’t able to track any of them. If I had to guess, I’d say he’s either on an errand for Michael, or Burzynski’s killed him. This business with the Koreans must have gotten pretty hairy. Anything could have happened over there.”
    Walker hardly found this story satisfying, but he had no better notion of how Cardano got his son back. Sure, there were rumors of a genetics program, and some sort of deal between Burzynski, the Chinese and the Koreans. But that was all conjecture, and it came wrapped in the old man’s fantasy about genetic experiments. It all sounded too neatly packaged.
    “There was no sign of Connie,” he said to change the subject.
    “She’s your protegé. If she’s been turned, who’s she working for now? What does Burzynski have to offer her? Or Cardano for that matter?”
    “I thought she was killed in the