The Lazarus Protocol (Division Zero Special Ops #1)

Chapter 1

ONE

Frankfurt, Germany

It didn’t matter what her name was. It never did. The only thing that mattered was whether she got the job done.

In this expansive hallway on the west side of the Congress Center Messe Frankfurt, she weaved her way through the crowd, heels clacking on the tile floor.

Dark hair tied back in a bun. Glasses on her nose.

Her whole outfit was meant to blend in. Just a nondescript pencil skirt, blouse, and suit jacket with a nametag on the breast pocket that read DR. ELIZABETH SCHMIDT.

The only part of the ensemble that belonged to Stephanie-Jo Davis hung down from her throat—the necklace that had been her prized possession for years.

Snatches of German, Dutch, and French drifted past her as she made her way along the hallway, a wall of glass windows on one side.

A few small round tables occupied by conference attendees.

Steph spotted the man she was looking for fifty feet away.

Talking to another man, both of them sitting at one of the tables.

Easing over as if her feet hurt, she slid into a seat close enough she’d be able to overhear what they were saying.

She set her purse on the chair beside her, then fished out a cell phone and the little case with her earbuds.

Angling it in the right direction gave her enough of a signal she could pick up their conversation on the receiver.

The phone would transmit the audio in real time back to a room at Langley with a crowd of analysts who would translate the conversation if necessary.

They’d go over it and over it, ad nauseum, discussing what it meant.

Finally, a summary would be sent up the chain and land on the desk of someone who had far too many of those summaries on their desk, along with a whole lot of other duties to attend to.

Meanwhile, she was the one out here with no gun, making decisions on the fly.

They should’ve made her code name “Expendable.” But this was the deal she’d made. The one her father had made.

Richard Baxter, a British national with two PhDs, had thinning dark hair and a heavyset frame, his back almost completely to Steph. He leaned closer to speak to his colleague. “I’ve been asking everyone I can find. No one knows where he went.”

You and me both, mate.

The man across the table was Chinese but lived in Portugal and was one of the world’s leading experts in biomechanics. In fact, just yesterday Dr. Runchu Jian had given a speech on how the future of medicine would be led by advances in AI.

“Very strange.” Jian shook his head. “Someone else will have to give his keynote address tomorrow.”

Baxter shifted in his seat, then smoothed down his tie. “You don’t think we should—I don’t know—call the police or what? He could be in danger. Maybe he was kidnapped!”

Jian didn’t seem overly concerned by the idea. “I’m sure his wife would know. She’d have received a ransom if this was a kidnapping.”

More importantly, Steph would have heard about it.

If a kidnapping had occurred, one of their wiretaps on the missing man would’ve given them something.

Dr. Sebastian Warrington had a wife and two children who lived just outside of Reykjavik, not that he was there much.

Aside from them, the person he was closest to would be Steph.

“The police will find him.” Baxter nodded. “I’m certain they will.”

Jian sat back in his chair. “Warrington probably just ran off with a mistress. Now everyone is talking about it, thinking he might be in danger. It’s probably all a ploy to get attention for his ideas.”

“I’m really worried. Unless he shows up tomorrow to make a spectacle, I’ll still believe he really is in danger.” Baxter barely paused before he said, “When did you see him last?”

Jian shrugged. “Not since the conference in Edinburgh, I think. Certainly not recently.”

Steph had met with Sebastian twice in Edinburgh, trying to nudge him ever closer to turning into an asset for the CIA. After the conference, he’d stepped on a plane bound for Heathrow, where he should have changed to a flight that would take him home to Iceland. Instead, no one had seen him.

Baxter leaned forward a little more. “How did he seem in Edinburgh? Was he agitated at all, or was he distracted? I’m trying to find someone he spoke with.”

For a moment, Steph didn’t move. She kept staring at the screen of her phone, keeping herself from reacting to a line of questioning that sounded a lot like Baxter was a cop interviewing a witness.

Then she gathered her purse and stood, stumbling two steps later and almost colliding with Jian.

“I’m so-o sorry,” she said in British-accented English. “These heels.”

With her off hand, she angled the phone and snapped a photo of Richard Baxter.

“So sorry.” She straightened and sauntered away, leaving Baxter behind without letting him get a good look at her face.

Steph slipped the phone in her purse and made her way to the lobby, where far too many people stood in line for a caffeinated beverage.

Where are you, Sebastian?

She slowed to join the flow of people making their way toward the exit doors, where the sun shone on the glass building. The convention center probably gleamed in the light. Steph would get to experience it for a few moments as Dr. Elizabeth Schmidt, then she would be back in the shadows.

A white van screeched to a stop at the curb of the circular driveway. Between her and the vehicle were a number of people, and flags flying on a collection of tall masts.

The van door slid open, and two men in all black, wearing black masks, rolled a body out onto the ground.

Someone screamed.

The van door slid closed, and the vehicle sped away as quickly as it had come.

Steph picked up her pace to a run, clipping a woman as she passed. “Sorry.”

Pain thrummed through the outside of her arm, a stinging sensation she dismissed. What they’d done to Dr. Warrington was far worse than an insect bite. She sucked in a breath, catching her knees before her legs gave out beside the man she’d been trying to convert to a CIA asset.

Blood coated his lips and the front of his shirt. Both eyes were swollen completely shut, and several of his fingernails had been removed. The only identifying feature was the name badge from that Edinburgh conference clipped to his shirt pocket.

Steph turned away, and the world swam around her. Realizing something was very wrong with her, she managed to reach up and clasp the necklace she wore. Then she squeezed the buttons on the top and bottom of the vial-shaped device.

Noise buzzed in her ears.

She took a step, her limbs like leaden weights she had to drag along. A vehicle pulled in front of her, far too close. Not the van again. This was a silver car.

The back passenger-side door was opened from inside.

Steph tried to turn away when someone caught her, holding her up. A woman. She smelled like jasmine. No.

The open car door loomed in front of her.

No.