“You could probably knock me down with a bullet,” he continued. “Put me out for the count long enough to take this. But before you do, there’s something you should know.
“In addition to the Seed, this little box also contains twenty grams of C4. Not a lot, I grant you, but then that’s the idea. When I closed it just now, I armed the trigger. Open it again, and it will blow up. If you shoot me and I drop it…” he shrugged. “It might not blow up. And I’m sure you could probably bring in someone to try to defuse it — he might even succeed. But it’s just as likely that, if you try to take it by force, I’ll open it and blow it to hell.
“So, were back to the easy way. Let Annie go, and I’ll give it to you, simple as that.”
Hauser cocked his head sideways and squinted with his good eye. “You’re bluffing. You wouldn’t destroy it. And I don’t think you’d part with it either.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Kismet said, without a trace of his earlier flippancy. “I never cared about any of this. Legendary relics, mythical powers — I only ever started looking for these things because I hoped it would lead me to you.”
He spread his hands. “And here we are. I want to be done with you, Hauser. If you aren’t going to tell me what you know, then leave me the hell alone.”
Hauser regarded him a moment longer, and then broke into a wolfish grin. “Mother will be so disappointed to hear that.”
Kismet’s confident expression slipped a little. Annie thought he looked like he’d been sucker-punched. In a low voice he said: “Whose mother?”
Hauser threw back his head and laughed. “Very well, I accept your terms.”
Throughout the conversation, Annie had kept waiting for Kismet to do something, pull a rabbit out of the hat, rescue her and keep the Seed out of Hauser’s hands. Now, she saw that he was serious; he was going to give Hauser and Prometheus exactly what they wanted, and he was going to do it in order to save her.
That was unacceptable.
“Nick, don’t.” She wasn’t sure anymore what she could say or do to stop him, but she had to try. “You can’t let them have this. They might hide it away, or they might do something much worse. Power like that…I don’t know what they’ll do with it, but you can’t give it to them, no matter what they do to me.”
Kismet offered a rueful smile, but Annie saw his gaze move slowly toward…her father? “It doesn’t matter, Annie. If it’s not the Seed, it will be something else. If it’s not Prometheus, then someone else. But I can do something good, right now. I can get you out of here, and that’s all that matters to me.”
He turned to Hauser. “Just let her go. I’ll put the Seed on the ground and walk away.”
“And your explosive device?”
“Like I said, you should be able to figure out how to bypass the trigger. I’d promise to send you the code to disarm it once Annie and I are safely out of here, but you probably wouldn’t believe me anyway.”
Hauser considered this a moment longer, then shook his head. “No. It’s a fake. Has to be.”
Kismet held the box up. “Elisabeth, do you think I’m lying?”
The actress gazed back at him, almost defiantly at first, but then softened. “No. Subtlety isn’t your style.”
He nodded. “Here’s how this can work. Elisabeth comes and gets the Seed from me. One touch, and she’ll know it’s the real deal. At the same time, Al walks Annie over to me.”
Hauser nodded his assent, and Elisabeth immediately strode across the courtyard, tucking her gun in her waistband as she moved. She reached Kismet a few seconds later and placed a tentative finger on the box.
“Oh.” Her eyes rolled back in undisguised ecstasy. She stood up a little straighter, as if playing to a hidden camera. “Yes, it’s real. I can feel the energy flowing into me.”
Higgins reached Annie’s side, but she resisted him. “Damn it, Nick. You can’t do this.”
“Come on, Annie girl,” Higgins urged. His voice was strained, like a piano string tuned so tight it was about to snap. “It’s going to be over soon.”
“Is that good enough for you, Hauser?” Kismet called, his fingers tight on the box, resisting Elisabeth’s stolid efforts to take it away. “Now, let her go.”
In the same way that Annie had believed, right up to that moment, that Kismet would play some unexpected wild card to save the day and keep the prize away from Prometheus, she expected Hauser to somehow play false at the end. She was wrong on both counts.
The one-eyed man relaxed his grip on her, and her father reached out to draw her into his embrace. She was too dumbfounded to even resist.
Kismet uncurled his fingers, and surrendered the Seed of the Tree of Life to Elisabeth Neuell.
She almost ran back toward Hauser, holding the box before her with equal parts fear and awe. Higgins, half-dragging Annie, had barely gotten a few steps away when Elisabeth raced past, holding the Seed out to Hauser.
That was when everything started to happen.
Higgins, with preternatural calm, reached out and snatched the pistol from Elisabeth’s waistband. She felt it, and started to turn, but her momentum had already brought her within reach of Hauser, who was unaware of what Higgins had done and too caught up in his imminent victory.
Hauser greedily snatched the box from Elisabeth and hugged it to his chest.
Higgins spun Annie toward Kismet and gave her a shove, propelling her across the courtyard, into his arms. Then, the old Gurkha raised the pistol and aimed it at Kismet.
The rest of the Prometheus security team had instantly come alert and brought their weapons up, but none of them could seem to decide where to aim.
Hauser suddenly gave a low cry and doubled over. Then, as he straightened, he reached up with his free hand and tore the eye patch away. He winced as light flooded into the restored orb, and covered it again with his hand. That was when he caught a glimpse of Higgins, aiming a gun at Kismet.
“Dad, no.” Annie's pleas seemed to fall on deaf ears, but she did not give up. “Just let us walk away.”
“Do what you have to do,” whispered Kismet, nodding to Higgins.
Hauser fixed both eyes on Kismet. He raised the box with the Seed and waved it triumphantly. “Game, set and match, Kismet.”
“What about the experiment?”
Hauser laughed. “There was only ever one rule to the experiment; do not interfere. Oh, I’ve wanted you dead so bad I can taste it, believe me. I had hoped you would die in that Iraqi hellhole, but someone—” He rolled his eyes — his perfect, unblemished blue eyes — and mouthed a single word: Mom. “Decided that I had interfered by blowing up your ride and leaving you stranded, so she pulled strings like you can’t imagine, to ‘balance the scales.’
“Her interference made it so much easier for me to take over.” He had lowered his voice to a barely audible mutter for the aside, but then spoke clearly again. “But rules are rules. I’m not going to tell Higgins to kill you. But I am certainly not going to stop him.”
Kismet nodded to his nemesis—brother? “Then I guess I'll see you in Hell.”
As if Kismet’s words were the signal he’d been waiting for, Higgins’ thumb extended up to pull back the hammer, cocking the pistol and readying it to fire.
Time seemed to freeze. Elisabeth, standing beside Hauser, clutched his arm as if he were a prize she’d finally won. The security team around the perimeter of the courtyard had lowered their weapons again, and were watching as if hypnotized. Hauser continued to stare across the plaza at Kismet, holding the box above his head, as if daring the heavens to take it away…
And in a heartbeat, they did.