The Project 05 - The Tesla Secret

didn't have a vest. I'm in a hospital.
    She couldn't feel her hips. She couldn't move her legs.
    Probably drugs, pain killers. That's why I can't feel much. Why can't I move my legs?
    Her throat was dry. "Nick," she rasped.
    He came awake, startled. His eyes were bloodshot and rimmed with red.
    "Selena. You had me worried." His smile didn't quite come off.
    "Water," she said. "Please."
    He took a cup with a bending straw from a table by the bed and held it to her mouth.
    "Not too much."
    The water was like nectar. She swallowed and coughed.
    "Where am I?"
    "Bethesda. You needed an operation." He looked at her. "You've been out for five days."
    "Five days?"
    "You were hit bad. You went into shock. The doctors kept you sedated."
    "I can't feel my legs." She watched his face pale.
    Oh, shit, she thought. What's wrong?
    "It's the drugs," he said. He talked quickly. "You're loaded up with pain killers. You'll be feeling plenty in a day or so." He smiled.
    "How bad?"
    "How bad, what?"
    "How bad was I hit?"
    "You took one through the gut and out the back. It nicked the liver. It missed the hepatic artery, or we wouldn't be talking. You're going to have a couple of scars to compete with me."
    "What else? There's more, I can tell."
    He looked down at the floor, then back up at her. "The bullet nicked a vertebra on your spine. They had to operate to clean out the fragments. They got them all."
    "Nick, I can't feel my legs. Tell me I'm not paralyzed. Tell me."
    She felt panic hovering. Fear. If she couldn't walk, what would she do? How would she function? Her passion for life was built around action, athletics, movement. Movement. Something she'd always taken for granted, never thought about.
    "Your spinal cord wasn't hit, but it's bruised. That causes temporary paralysis."
    "Temporary? This will go away?"
    "Yes. They're optimistic." He paused. "For the short term, you can't walk. But it will heal. You have to believe that."
    "How long? How long until I find out if it's permanent?"
    "A month. Maybe less. As it heals, you'll get feeling back. You're in for some tough rehab, but it should all come back."
    "If it heals."
    "Yes."
    "You forgot the vests." As she said it, she wished she could take the words back.
    He looked down at the floor again.
    "Yes," he said. "Yes, I did."

CHAPTER FORTY- TWO

    Ronnie, Nick and Lamont met Korov at the airport terminal in Florence. From there they would drive southwest toward Pisa and Foxworth's villa on the Arno. Ronnie watched Korov coming toward them across the terminal floor. The Russian wore a brown jacket, dark brown pants and shoes, a white shirt open at the collar. The collar on his shirt had wide points. He carried a cheap blue airline bag.
    "Reminds me a lot of you," Ronnie said to Nick. "We could have used him, back in the day."
    "Back in the day, he was probably helping people shoot at us."
    "Yeah. Times change."
    Korov came up to them. "So. We are a team again." He shook hands all around. "It is good to see you. Selena is not with you?"
    Nick was tight lipped. "Hello, Arkady. Not this time. Let's get going."
    Korov looked a question at Ronnie. He made a slight don't ask gesture with his head. They followed Nick out to the parking lot and their rented Alfa.
    "I still say we should have got the Ferrari," Lamont said. "Always wanted to drive one of those."
    "We would have needed three of them."
    "Christ, Nick. Lighten up."
    They tossed their bags in the trunk and got in the car. Lamont followed signs out of the airport and got on the E76 toward Pisa. Nick and Korov sat in back. Nick opened a folder with satellite photos of the villa and a road map of the region. Outside, the peaceful countryside rolled past.
    Tuscany, one of the world's great destinations, the birthplace of the Italian Renaissance and some of the greatest art, literature, architecture and music in the world. It had been the home of the Medicis, of dukes and popes and kings. It was a land of good wine, good food, passion and beauty. It was also a land drenched in treachery and blood.
    "We stay on this road until Pisa." Nick traced the route on the map. "At Pisa we go south toward the coast. Foxworth's place is right on the Arno, here, upriver from where it empties into the Ligurian Sea." He handed the photographs to Korov.
    Korov studied the pictures. "Only one road in. Fortified. What's his security?"
    "Foxworth has a dozen guards. Most of them are concentrated up top. They've got Uzis. The way the villa is built in