"The Amber Room? Nazis? Großen Sterbens?" Baxter frowned. "What's this all about?"
"Just listen for now," Graham said. "I'll fill in the details later."
"Großen Sterbens is a type of bacteria," I told Beverly. "It was supposedly preserved millions of years ago in amber. That amber was later used to build the Amber Room."
"What's so special about it?" she asked.
"The Nazis thought it caused the Great Dying. In other words, this stuff could be responsible for the worst extermination event in all of known history."
Her face paled.
"The details are sketchy," I continued. "But it looks like they wanted to create a cure for the Great Dying and then spread the bacteria across the world. Only the inoculated few would survive it. Sort of like a system reset for Mother Nature."
She exhaled sharply. "So, that's it. That's what Raven was after."
"Who's Raven?" I asked.
"Raven is a former colleague." She sighed. "Long before I got into the military, I was searching for something personal. Every time I thought I'd found it, it turned out to be a dead end. Eventually, I discovered it was concealed within a mysterious ODESSA stronghold named Werwolfsschanze. That's how I popped up on Jack Chase's radar screen."
I remembered Chase, remembered him well. He'd once served as the CEO of ShadowFire. A few weeks ago, he'd hired me to find a lost subway car buried deep within Manhattan's maze of underground tunnels. He'd paired me up with Beverly and everything went to hell. In a matter of days, I was fighting Chase deep under the streets of Manhattan, next to a raging underground river. I'd survived.
He hadn't.
"As you know, Jack was looking for a separate ODESSA facility," she continued. "But he figured there was some overlap between our goals. So, he recruited me. I made for a good asset. I was already in the military so I was a natural fit for his company. Plus, I spoke German."
"You speak German?"
She nodded. "Jack told me locating ODESSA's Manhattan facility would help me find Werwolfsschanze. And I've got to give him credit. He might've been using me. But he was right."
"Where does Raven fit into the picture?"
"I met Raven long before I hooked up with ShadowFire. He was looking for Werwolfsschanze too. He knew it was in Antarctica but had no clue where to find it. We agreed to team up. I never told anyone about him, not even Jack."
I sensed there was more to the story. "The two of you had a falling out right? That's why you didn't bring him here."
"At first, I thought we were after the same thing," she said. "But the more I got to know him, the more I realized I wanted nothing to do with him. So, I decided to cut him loose. When we found those gold bars, I instantly realized he could use them to find Werwolfsschanze. That's why I hid them."
"That doesn't make sense," I said. "If you were worried about him locating the gold bars, you wouldn't have left one behind."
She avoided my gaze. "That wasn't intentional."
My jaw dropped. "What about the inventories? The shipping logs? The correspondence?"
"Truthfully, I didn't plan on leaving any evidence behind. I was going to clear out the entire room. But you and that blonde girl — Diane — showed up first." She shrugged. "Something came over me. I etched a quick message onto one of the bars and tossed it back into the room. Then I hid in the shadows with the rest of the gold. I kept waiting for you to notice me. But you never did."
"So, the gold bar wasn't intentional?" Shock surged through my system. "You didn't want me to follow you?"
"Like I said, I'm here for personal reasons." She hobbled toward the door. "Speaking of which, I'm leaving. You can come with me or you can stay here. It's your choice."
She hadn't left a trail out of guilt or a deep-seated desire to see me again. Instead, I was an afterthought. The realization burned me up inside. At the same time, the fact that she'd left a trail at all had to mean something.
I cleared my throat. "Do you even know how to get there?"
She turned around.
"We found a book," I continued. "It's got a map of the area. You're going to need it."
"I know how to find it. Jeff and I were almost there when that lunatic started shooting at us." She shook her head. "I already told you this."
"You did?"
"Yeah," she said slowly. "Right after you brought me up here. You laid me on the mattress. We were talking."
"I didn't carry you up here. That was Aaron Jenner."
Her features froze. "Who?"
"Aaron Jenner."
"What does he look like?"
"Mid-thirties. Tall. Black hair. Oh and he's got these scars—”
"Where are they?"
"Across his neck."
"Oh my God." She clapped her hand over her mouth. "He's here. Raven's here."
"Aaron is Raven?"
Suddenly, everything made sense. Jenner had searched Antarctica for years. Eventually, he'd discovered the gas chamber. He'd even found the collapsed colony of tardigrades. But he couldn't find Werwolfsschanze. He'd recruited Holly and Rupert to study the dead tardigrades. Most likely, he'd been using their research in an attempt to reconstruct the deadly bacteria.
"He must be wealthy," Graham said.
"Outrageously wealthy," Beverly replied. "Raven — I mean Aaron — is one of the world's foremost mercenaries. He gets paid millions to do all sorts of shadowy things."
Graham looked at me. "We can't let him get the Amber Room."
I set my jaw. "We won't."
"You can't stop him by yourselves." Beverly said. "Get me a gun. And gather up as many weapons as you can find. We're going to need them."
"He's alone," I said. "How dangerous can he be?"
"Extremely dangerous," she retorted. "In fact, I'd say he's one of the most dangerous men on the entire planet."
Chapter 77
Aaron Jenner felt the rumble in his toes. It surged up his legs. Jolts of electricity stabbed at his thighs. His muscles started to jerk spasmodically. He leaned forward, doing his best to quell the involuntary movements. "I'm sorry about your husband."
"Thank you." Holly cleared her throat. "May I ask you a question?"
"Go ahead."
"What the hell are we doing?"
Her mild expletive sent a small shock cascading through his brain. She seemed too innocent, too nice to be using such language. He had to remind himself it was all a carefully constructed facade. Holly considered herself a good person. She even put up a respectable front. But deep down, she possessed a murderous instinct. "I hired you to reconstruct the bacteria that killed those tardigrades. Unfortunately, your efforts have yet to bear fruit."
"Wait just a second—”
"It's not your fault." His legs shook harder. His arms groaned as he applied pressure to his thighs. "It was a difficult assignment. Maybe even impossible."
Her face softened just a tad.
"It turns out there might be another option. As you've probably guessed by now, the bacteria's source is in this region. I've been looking for it for a long time. Now, I've finally got a solid lead on it."
"What's the big deal about this bacteria anyway? I've spent years studying its dead spores. But my knowledge is entirely structural. I know next to nothing about how a living sample would behave."
Jenner wasn't about to tell her the truth. Holly had convinced herself the people she'd killed weren't really dead. But there was no way she'd help unleash a monstrous epidemic on the world.
"All you need to know is that it's worth a lot to me," he replied. "You're one of the only people in the world who knows the Großen Sterbens bacteria actually exists. And since you've studied it the most, you're the obvious choice to extract it from its source. I need you to study it, help it reproduce. If you can do that for me, I'll fully fund your cryonics research for as long as it takes. Together, we'll revive Rupert and your dad."