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  Three shots rang out, and Hammett leapt from the cab to the top of the trailer, sighting a white city bus that was heading toward them.

  Parkour time.

  Hammett put on a burst of speed, trying to judge where the bus would be when she made her leap, knowing it was going to be tight, flinging herself into the air as bullets tore past, sailing into open air with the street four meters below her, and landing on the roof of the bus as it passed.

  Hammett stuck the landing, but the bus’s speed knocked her sideways, and she began to tumble toward the edge. She splayed out her arms and legs, stopping the roll but not the momentum, and skidded on her chest until she reached the side, her head peeking over just before she stopped.

  Hammett watched the road whiz past for a moment, caught her breath, and then inched away from the edge. She turned back around to look for Forsyth and Ludlum, and spotted them climbing into the semi. Hammett frowned, watching as Forsyth started the truck. Apparently she’d found the keys.

  Hammett got onto her knees, sighting ahead. Open road, no traffic lights for a few blocks. She looked back at her sisters, and the semi was now in pursuit. Ludlum, gun in hand, crawled out of the cab skylight.

  She needed to get off the bus.

  “Hey!” Hammett banged on the roof, hoping to get the driver’s attention. At the rear, she began to crawl toward the front, slapping the aluminum roof as she went. She had no idea if the bus driver could hear her, but she kept her center of gravity low in case he did and hit the brakes.

  Another pop of a gunshot, and a round buried itself in the side of the bus. The semi roared up alongside.

  As she’d done with Clancy, Hammett put herself in her adversaries’ minds. They would get close and try to shoot her. If that didn’t work, their next move would be to stop the bus, either by pulling in front of it, killing the driver, or blowing the tires. They’d expect Hammett to try to jump off the bus when it slowed down, or get inside.

  What wouldn’t they expect?

  They wouldn’t expect Hammett, outnumbered and outgunned, to attack.

  Springing up from a crouch, Hammett ran across the roof of the bus and jumped, launching herself face-first at the oncoming semi, arms outstretched Superman-style, sailing over the gap between the two vehicles. Ludlum frantically emptied her magazine, wide-eyed with obvious surprise, her shots failing to connect. Hammett sailed over Ludlum, hitting the trailer on her chest. Hammett bounced, feeling the wound in her shoulder tear open, rolling right off the other side but managing to grab onto the upper side rail with one hand.

  As she hung there on the side of the semi-trailer, the street beneath her blurring past at forty miles an hour, the adrenaline kicking so hard she felt her heart would burst, Hammett had a brief, terrible moment of self-reflection.

  She didn’t wonder what led her to this point. She didn’t regret all the horrifying, unjustifiable things she’d done. She didn’t wish it all had gone differently. Instead, as she hung there, she had a single, overpowering urge.

  She wanted to set the entire fucking world on fire.

  Except for the puppies and kitties.

  Gritting her teeth, she forced all the pain, all the anger and hatred and fury, into pulling herself back up onto the trailer.

  Ludlum stood over her aiming the Glock at her midsection, ready to pull the trigger, but Hammett didn’t care. If Ludlum shot her, it would only piss her off even more.

  The truck began to slow down, edging for the side of the street. Hammett clenched her fists, stood, and faced her sister.

  “Don’t move! Hands up!”

  Hammett put her hands up—holding her fists in front of her, ready to box the shit out of this identical bitch.

  Incredibly, Ludlum didn’t shoot. Instead, she holstered the gun inside her jacket and spread her palms out. An odd move, considering Hammett was going to rip off her face and feed it to her. She’d heard of a serial killer who made people eat their own faces, and the rage she felt warranted something that extreme.

  “Easy, Hammett.” Ludlum took a step back. “We don’t have to do this.”

  “Yes,” Hammett said. “We do.”

  In Hammett’s adult years, she couldn’t recall ever being scared. She’d been surprised before (it happened often in this biz), worried (once when she’d taken a shih tzu who’d eaten a whole bag of Halloween chocolate to a vet), and resigned to death (the by-product of several enhanced interrogations). But Hammett gave up fear when she gave up playing with dolls. So it was odd to see fear on Ludlum’s face, a face that looked exactly like her own.

  “Pussy,” Hammett snarled.

  Then she attacked.

  Ludlum was excellent. She blocked the first salvo of punches and kicks, and even managed to send a few back.

  But Hammett was better than excellent. The Instructor had told Hammett that, pound for pound, she was the second best mixed martial arts combatant he’d ever taught, including men in her weight class. She kept attacking until Ludlum had no choice but to cover up, and then Hammett pummeled the woman down to her knees.

  Sometime during the fight the truck had parked, and Forsyth appeared on the trailer top.

  She also looked scared.

  “Control your fear,” Hammett said, quoting The Instructor. “If you don’t, you’ll die.” Then Hammett added a bit of her own wisdom. “But it doesn’t matter. You’re going to die anyway.”

  Forsyth held her ground, adopting a kung fu stance, Shandong praying mantis style.

  Hammett didn’t bother with styles. She just walked up and beat the holy hell out of her. Hitting and kicking and striking until Forsyth fell to her knees.

  “We can work together,” Forsyth said, her face already beginning to swell up like Rocky Balboa’s at the end of the first movie.

  Hammett gripped her hair, pulling her head back to expose her neck. Then she raised her fist to shatter her windpipe.

  Suddenly, Ludlum was on her back. And she’d cinched the neck lock, squeezing her biceps to cut off the flow of blood to Hammett’s brain.

  Hammett spun, but Ludlum clung on. Hammett’s vision became narrower, darker, as her consciousness seeped away, and her last thought was these women better kill her because there would be hell to pay if they didn’t.

  “Learn to tell the difference between friends and enemies,” The Instructor said. “And understand that friends can become enemies, and enemies can become friends.”

  Hammett woke up with her wrists zip-tied behind her and her legs lashed together with—of all things—jumper cables.

  She was being lowered into the semi cab, and as she began to struggle her oppressors dropped her into the sleeping compartment and onto the mattress. Hammett continued to thrash, trying to get out of her bonds, and then one of her sisters was sitting on her.

  “Easy. We want to talk.”

  Hammett went limp. “So talk.”

  “You’re our sister.”

  “Or your clone. I wouldn’t put it past our government.”

  It was broken-nosed Forsyth talking, her voice sounding a bit nasal, as if she had a cold. “Either way, we have a connection. We shouldn’t be fighting. I learned that when I met Ludlum.”

  “We’ve all had the same training,” Ludlum said. “We’ve all been through the same shit. And now we’re being exploited.”

  “Think of the money we could make if we went freelance,” said Forsyth.

  “I don’t need money,” Hammett said.

  “Money or not, do you like being Uncle Sam’s bitch? At his constant beck and call, doing whatever he orders us to do?”

  Hammett did not. But she kept silent.

  “Before I met Ludlum,” Forsyth said, “I felt like I’d been running on automatic pilot. I did what I was trained to do, and what I was told to do. But things have changed a lot. You’ve heard how misery loves company? Being exceptional also loves company.”

  “We were two before,” Ludlum said. “With you, we’re three.”

  “Four,
” Hammett said, figuring she could play these cards until she was dealt a better hand. “There’s another one of us named Clancy. She tried to kill me in San Diego.”

  “Another identical sister?”

  “Yeah.”

  And Clancy, like Ludlum and Forsyth, had apparently bought into this sisterhood bullshit. Genuinely bought into it.

  “Where is she?”

  “Still in Cali,” Hammett said, straight-faced. “Recovering from the beating I gave her.”

  “But you didn’t kill her.”

  “No.”

  “So you feel it, too.”

  Hammett didn’t feel anything. But she recognized a potential asset when it appeared before her.

  “Sure I feel it,” Hammett lied. “Now untie me.”

  Forsyth and Ludlum exchanged a glance. And then—incredibly—they untied her.

  Ludlum climbed off, sitting next to her, and Hammett felt like this had become some bizarre teenage slumber party. What was next? Pillow fights and talking about boys they crushed on?

  Then Hammett felt a gun press into her side. Apparently there were still some trust issues to overcome.

  “Can you contact Clancy?”

  “Yes. Do you really have my apartment rigged with C-4?”

  “ Why does it matter?”

  “Do you two really want to be free of Isaac and Hydra?”

  They nodded as one.

  “I can find The Instructor. He can tell us where Isaac is. But I need to get into my apartment.”

  “Call Clancy,” Forsyth said, holding out a cell phone. “If she answers, we’ll believe you.”

  Hammett glanced at the phone, then glanced at the gun in her side, and immediately realized what she had to do.

  “The best defense is a good offense,” The Instructor said. “People can’t defend themselves when they’re dead.”

  Hammett recovered a computer hard drive from her safe house in Buckhead—without blowing up.

  Written on the HDD was the end result of a blunt force attack on the databases of the NCIC, DoD, CIA, SSA, and NSA. A year ago, while in a vulnerable state and realizing that someday she might need to seek out The Instructor—perhaps to enlist his help, or perhaps to kill him—Hammett had worked for dozens of hours with a police sketch artist, and the best facial reconstruction software, to recreate his face in portrait and profile. Then she used a recognition program to manually scan millions of pictures on various government websites, in order to get a match.

  The Instructor had done a good job to hide his tracks, but no one can hide completely. Hammett had known she’d found him, but had never looked at the information. This was a safeguard; if interrogated, she truly had no information about The Instructor. But now that she needed to contact him to find Isaac, she was willing to forsake plausible deniability and initiate contact.

  But, coincidentally, she didn’t have to. Because the moment Hammett walked into her apartment, the phone rang.

  Then again, She knew damn well it wasn’t a coincidence at all.

  “You know who this is,” The Instructor said when she picked up the phone. “I take it you know about the others like you.”

  “I’ve met three. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “That decision was above my pay grade.”

  “Are there others?

  “Seven of you, total.”

  Seven. Just like the seven-headed hydra from ancient Greece.

  “Are we sisters?”

  The Instructor chuckled, also out of character for him. “Yes. Did you think you were clones?”

  Hammett had heard about a secret government program that involved cloning, but she let the subject drop.

  “I also met an operative named Heath.”

  “I sent him to help you. He says you repaid him by almost bashing his skull in.”

  “I did more than that,” Hammett said, recalling their lovemaking.

  “He didn’t seem to be complaining. So you know, I tried to call off Isaac. But my political influence isn’t what it once was. However, I have a plan to get that influence back.”

  Here we go. The real reason for his call.

  “Let me guess. I’m you’re plan.”

  “You no longer work for Isaac. You work for me.”

  “Maybe I don’t want to work for anybody.”

  “If that’s the case, this will be the last time we ever speak, and I wish you a long and happy life.”

  It was so incongruous to anything he’d ever said before, Hammett found herself at a loss for words.

  “I can’t do anything until I find Isaac,” she said, after finding her voice.

  “I know. And I’m willing to give him to you.”

  “But there’s a price.”

  “There’s always a price. But this one you shouldn’t mind. You eliminate Isaac, and then work for me. And I give you something you’ve always wanted.”

  She made a face. “What’s that? A house with a white picket fence, two point five kids, a dog, and a husband who works at a brokerage firm?”

  “I know you hate the world. It’s what makes you the best operative I ever trained. How about global annihilation?”

  “I’m listening.”

  “I have a plan, Hammett. A plan to change the course of the United States, and ultimately, all of civilization. It won’t be an easy task. Millions will have to die first.”

  Hammett didn’t need to hear more. He had her at millions will have to die.

  “I’m in.”

  “This won’t be an easy one, Hammett. Isaac is a hard target. He lives in a fortress, armed guards and attack dogs, the latest in security. Plus he just assigned himself a new bodyguard. Her name is Follett. She’s also your sister.”

  “Is she good?”

  “Very good.”

  “Does she know she’s protecting Isaac?”

  “I don’t believe so. As far as I know, Isaac hasn’t revealed himself to anyone.”

  “So… who is Isaac?”

  “Someone you’ve heard of. That’s why his death has to appear to be from natural causes. You can’t go in all guns blazing, because there would be consequences. No foul play. No interrogation.”

  “How about he just disappears?”

  “Trust me. You don’t want the Secret Service following the trail back to you.”

  “Why would they be involved?”

  “Because Isaac is the senior senator from Illinois, and the Democratic majority leader. Samuel Burling.”

  “A chain is as strong as its weakest link,” The Instructor said. “A good team has no weak links.”

  Seventy-six hours later, Hammett sat at the kitchenette, pouring over the blueprints to Burling’s mansion while Clancy—broken finger in a splint—snipped away at Hammett’s hair with the skill of a master stylist.

  The four Hydra sisters were in Ludlum’s safe house, an apartment in the Illinois city of Aurora. Ludlum and Forsyth were on the sofa, surveillance photos spread across the coffee table before them. They’d spent the last two days getting intel on Burling’s residence in nearby Naperville, and had gotten some long lens shots of his property from various angles, along with recent satellite photos, and Secret Service and guard details and routines. Clancy had also hacked into the database of the company that had installed Burling’s burglar alarm and security system.

  “He’s got cameras everywhere except the bathrooms,” Forsyth said. “Paranoid little bastard.”

  “Then we hit him in the bathroom,” Hammett said. “Did we get the coke?”

  “Meeting a dealer tonight,” Ludlum answered.

  “Kill him when it’s done. No loose ends,” Hammett told her. “How about the wand, cameras, and earpieces?”

  “Also tonight,” Forsyth said. “Burling’s security detail routinely scans for radio transmissions, but these will run on an encrypted WiFi network, through a laptop. But even with boosters, the range is limited. You’ll need to be on the grounds.”

  “That’s my problem,”
Hammett said. “I’ll deal with it.”

  “Burling has two armed men on premises. One guarding his room. One at the gatehouse. Two roaming. Plus Burling has a dog. Pit bull. Maimed an electrician visiting the house last year. Burling’s people covered it up, paid the guy off so the media didn’t find out. It’s a killer, Hammett.”

  “That’s my problem,” Hammett repeated. “I’ll deal with it.”

  But that wasn’t her only problem. Hammett glanced at the counter, at the picture of her sister Follett, her hair cut into a Louise Brooks-style 1920s bob, complete with bangs and side curls, taken yesterday while reconnoitering the estate. According to The Instructor, Follett was the only student who scored higher than Hammett in hand-to-hand combat. Also according to The Instructor, Follett was to be recruited, not killed.

  That wouldn’t be easy. But Hammett had been tinkering around with an electronic device that could help get her close, and if she refused to be persuaded Hammett would also be bringing a Taser X26.

  The only thing left for them to do was finish the haircuts, get the drugs and gear, and steal a cab.

  “The guards switch at two A.M.,” Hammett said. “That’s when we’ll hit him.”

  She turned her head to look at Forsyth, and felt the pinch of Clancy’s scissors as they poked her ear. Hammett met Clancy’s eyes, watched them widen.

  She saw fear. And she liked it.

  For the past three days, Hammett had been watching her sisters bond. A trend that would likely continue once Follett joined them. And although Hammett joined the conversation occasionally, she mostly felt like a visitor at a zoo, watching strange animals interact behind a thick wall of Plexiglas.

  These women had her training, and were very good at what they did. But Hammett viewed their need for camaraderie and acceptance as something odd, something foreign. She didn’t feel a part of their clique.

  Seeing the fear in Clancy, Hammett understood why.

  Hammett wasn’t their equal.

  Hammett was their superior.

  As Machiavelli said, it is easier to rule with fear than love.