Free The Gemini Deception by Kim Baldwin, Xenia Alexiou Page A

individuals were lowered down the shaft with a wire. They had shot the Secret Service agents through the roof of the elevator, with the help of devices attached to their heads. She assumed they were some kind of infrared or other high-tech gadgets that helped them see their targets through the elevator ceiling, like she’d seen in spy movies.
    Seconds later, she was lowered down the shaft herself in a harness and came face-to-face with the gagged and bound president of the U.S. going up. They were wearing identical clothes. The masked woman who was waiting in the elevator positioned Ryden on the floor and gave her the president’s wedding ring to put on. Ryden thought she would lose her lunch at the sight of dead men scattered on the floor. No one had said anything about people being killed. After tossing Thomas’s purse beside Ryden, the masked woman shoved the bodies of two of the dead agents over her and disappeared back through the hole in the ceiling.
    The time elapsed between the start of the attack and when the elevator began moving again, this time with Ryden in it, was only about a minute. Had the Secret Service agents not been wired, no one would have known something was wrong.
    Ryden heard the panicked shouts and screams as the elevator slowed, then stopped. She closed her eyes and crossed her fingers. Please give me the strength to do this. The rustling of people on the other side of the door told her the show was about to begin. She opened her eyes and began to struggle as it slid open.
    A voice shouted, “Clear!” and the bodies of the dead agents were being lifted off her. Soon after, another voice shouted, “She’s alive! The president’s alive!”

Chapter Six
     
    Bibbona, Italy
    Next day, February 25
     
    Harper Kennedy lifted her glass of red wine in a toast. “See you on the other side, buddy.” She rested the shovel against a tree by the grave and took a sip, swallowing hard as she realized another decade had gone by. Angelo had been her second companion since she’d moved to Italy, but he was not the first dog to bear that name.
    Harper had inherited the vineyard she loved, together with her first dog, from Pepo, short for Giuseppe. Pepo couldn’t imagine the vineyard or his life without his Weimaraner. He’d started the winery in 1953, when Angelo the first was just a pup. Pepo came to love that adopted stray so much he’d labeled the wine after him: Il Grigio Angelo , The Gray Angel.
    When she had first come to Italy on assignment with the EOO thirteen years earlier, Harper had never imagined she’d find not only a home but also a job she loved. She’d run into Pepo, already nearly eighty, at the local village café. They had started out talking about every Italian’s favorite topic and one Harper could relate to—politics—but the chat soon turned more personal. Ordinarily, Harper hated polite conversation and never volunteered much, but she surprised herself by opening up to Pepo about her hopes and dreams. She told him about her love for the country and how she never wanted to leave but had to find a job. It took but a few hours for them to become friends, and soon Harper moved into a small cottage he’d built next to his farmhouse. His only request was that she help out around his vineyard.
    Before long, she couldn’t fathom her life away from Tuscany or grapes. The work thrilled her and gave her a satisfaction nothing and no one ever had. When Pepo passed away and left her his sixty acres, she relished the challenge of making it her own and within five years had taken the vineyard to another level. She’d found investors who believed in her vision and the wine, and with the funds she expanded the vineyard and improved the earth, flavor, bottles, and label. She poured money into marketing and distribution, and soon she had taken Pepo’s popular local wine and turned it into an internationally renowned label now going for almost one hundred euros a bottle.
    The Bibbona region,