Adnan opened a cargo hatch, strapped the two bags into the space, and closed the hatch again. Dust started swirling around, and the rotor began to pick up speed. He jumped into the helicopter, buckled himself in, and gave the pilot a thumbs-up. He pulled on his headphones and lowered the microphone.
“Okay, let’s go.”
The pilot slowly increased the blades’ speed and pulled the lever. As the chopper lifted and began to move forward, Adnan glanced at his watch. Seven minutes to go.
“Here are the coordinates,” he said, handing a slip of paper to the pilot. The pilot keyed them into the control panel.
“Okay—that’s almost back to where we came from,” the pilot said, a puzzled look on his face.
Adnan sighed. “Yeah, I know. It’s outside the village we came from, but that’s where we’re going.”
“Copy that.”
The pilot adjusted the course, and Adnan looked out at the horizon. So much had changed recently. Sometimes, he didn’t even recognize himself. When he was little, he’d been a quiet boy who did well at school and thought football was the best thing there was. He’d always had a rebellious side, but everyone who met him perceived him as well-behaved and kind.
But Adnan had noticed that he didn’t react like other children when something happened. If any other boy got into a fight, it often ended in tears. But the few times Adnan had gotten into fights, he reacted by growing so angry that his vision turned black, and he became utterly distant. A couple of times, he’d knocked the other kid unconscious just fighting over some trifling thing. But even when his opponent was on the ground, he hadn’t stopped. His classmates had needed to drag him away from the other boy, and Adnan knew that if they hadn’t, he would have killed him.
He’d always been different that way. Something inside him didn’t react the way other people did. That feeling had grown stronger throughout his childhood, and by the time he turned twenty, he was a young man so filled with darkness that he was on the verge of exploding.
As he had entered his teens, Adnan had changed markedly from his innocent young years. He had slipped more and more into the path of crime. He met guys who recruited him into a gang, and there, his dark urges had been given free rein. He had soon made a name for himself, and in just a couple of years, he had risen through the ranks. But when the others in the gang either dropped off, quit, or died, Adnan continued to rent out his now-well-known services. He’d become the ultimate weapon—an assassin who killed for money.
The pilot nodded out through the windshield. “You sure about this? Don’t you think the police are waiting for you back there?”
Adnan took a deep breath and noticed that he barely cared. “It doesn’t matter now,” he said. “Going back isn’t something they’ll be expecting.”
“That’s true, I suppose.”
“And even if they were to expect it, there’s nothing they can do about it.”
The pilot stared at Adnan. “If you say so.”
Adnan let his eyes glide over the horizon. The golden sun had dipped below it now, bathing the surroundings in gold and shadows. The fading light revealed deep valleys and ravines as the helicopter continued across the barren Spanish landscape.
He was one more step closer to revenge for his wife and child. That was all that mattered. Revenge.
***
It was never too late for love. Hugo looked at Lita where she was standing by the window. Her long, dark, curly hair fell on her shoulders. She was astonishingly beautiful. The golden morning sun beamed across her skin and accentuated the sharp contours of her body. He shivered. He’d be lucky to meet her—not only because she was gorgeous, but because she was everything you’d want a partner in life to be.
When they’d first met, Hugo had been in a bad place. He was unwell, both physically and mentally. But Lita had been like a balm to him; she’d healed him and gotten him on the right keel. What he had been missing for so long, she’d given him. Security, stability, a home. And in return, he’d given her what she needed: excitement, passion. In this way, they complemented each other, and that was their strength.
But something inside Hugo bubbled up sometimes and pressed him to take unnecessary risks. It was nothing he could control, and no matter how he tried to push it away, it didn’t always work. This had given rise to some friction in their relationship.
He set his coffee cup on the dining room table. “Can’t you say something?” he asked.
Lita shrugged. Painful seconds passed. He tried again.
“Lita, come on. You know what kind of job I have. Do we need to have this discussion every time?”
She spun around, and her eyes flashed. “What do you mean, ‘what kind of job you have’? This isn’t your job, is it? We were out taking a walk, and because you hear something, your first thought is that it’s a mission you should complete. And yeah, I know who you are. I’ve known that for a long time. But I was hoping that when Elektra and I were with you here that you would be able to relax for once.”
Hugo got up and took a few steps toward her. She held out her hand to stop him.
“No, not now. It’s not fair. You still do exactly what you want. No matter what I say and think.”
He stopped. “Now you’re being unfair. Of course I listen to you.”
Lita pursed her lips. Hugo could see how angry she was; she didn’t normally react like this. He’d gone on assignments before, and most times, she’d reluctantly accepted it. This time, she was acting differently.
“No, you don’t listen. And maybe it was okay earlier, but not anymore. Not now that we have Elektra. If you’re going to sporadically disappear and be away for days or weeks, what am I supposed to tell her? How are we going to raise a family like that? What if we have more children?”
Hugo swallowed. It was a subject he’d avoided overthinking because when he did, he couldn’t see a good way out. It was hard to balance a career like his with family life. But his problem was that he didn’t want to give up either of them—his job or his family.
“Lita, can’t we try to find a solution to this? You and Elektra mean everything to me.”
Lita bit her lip, and a tear found its way down her cheek. She shook her head. “No, not this time. It’s not something we can just come up with when we’re standing here arguing. I don’t know if I can do this, Hugo.”
He shrugged but said nothing.
“I don’t know what to do,” she said. “But I can’t continue like this. I can’t be afraid every time the phone rings while you’re out on a mission that might keep you away for two days or two weeks.” She paused. “Or not knowing if you’re coming home alive or dead. What kind of life is that?”
A jolt went through Hugo’s stomach. “Wait a minute,” he said. “My work at Novus allows us to live the life that we do. It pays for the apartment, for us, for Elektra.”
She shook her head, and another tear ran down her cheek. “But, Hugo, I don’t know if I want this life anymore.”
Hugo felt an abyss open between them. He wanted to say something intelligent and clever, but he couldn’t think of anything. For the life of him, he couldn’t figure out what to say to make everything go back to normal.
“Lita, please,” was all he could manage.
She stomped her foot on the floor. “No!”
From her bedroom, Elektra started crying. Lita’s eyes were dark.
“I don’t know if I want to, Hugo.”
She stormed out of the kitchen and left him standing there. Hugo sighed and walked to the window where Lita had been standing. Her scent was still there. He looked out on the street below and saw a couple of old ladies walking down the cobbled street. A moped engine buzzed somewhere in the distance. Hugo’s gaze glided over the horizon, where the snow-capped mountains surrounding the village gleamed in the sun’s rays.
He knew he should go after her. He knew he should do it, but something held back. He wanted to say something, but at the same time, he wanted her to say someth
ing. He clenched his teeth together. He shouldn’t do it. He glanced at the cabinet on the opposite wall. He really shouldn’t. Not now. Hugo stood for a few minutes and looked out at the horizon again, and he heard Lita go to Elektra and close the door.
He turned around and faced the cupboard. He opened it, opened a box inside it, and took out a communications radio. It was calibrated to the frequencies of the Spanish police. For pleasure, he used to follow local police communications while he was on assignment. It was something he did automatically. He turned it on now, and it crackled. Hugo adjusted the frequency until he heard the voices loud and clear.
A man’s voice came through: “What do you mean?”
A female voice, fast and robust: “Air traffic control is reporting to us that a helicopter has been flying north for the last hour.”
“It must be him!” the man replied. “The Spaniard!”
Hugo’s eyes widened as he listened.
The female voice said, “I don’t know anything about any passengers. All I know is that it matches where you are and where the helicopter flew from.”
“And where is it now?” “Pedro, you won’t believe me. But it looks like he’s on his way back to you.”
Hugo became a granite statue. The Spaniard was on the way back? Why would he come back to a place where he murdered people and then fled?
Sánchez: “Here? Are you saying he’s on his way back here?”
“Yes—at least, close to where you are. According to the air traffic controller, it looks like the helicopter is headed slightly to the west of you. Possibly targeting one of the villages up in the mountains. It’s still in the air. We’ll continue to report its course.”
Sánchez’s voice was excited. “Good, good—make sure to give me running updates on where it looks like it’s going to land. I’ll activate our team and tell them to be ready.”
The female voice didn’t hesitate. “Copy that.”
Hugo turned the volume down to zero. He bit his lip. He knew he shouldn’t do it, but at the same time, he knew he’d regret it for the rest of his life if he didn’t. If there was the slightest possibility of taking on the Spaniard, the most legendary assassin in thirty years, he couldn’t skip that chance.
He turned to the hall and saw the closed door to Elektra’s room. He clenched his jaw, considered for a minute, and then rolled his shoulders. This was who he was. The issues with Lita would have to wait. He entered their bedroom, opened the closet, and pulled out a duffel bag that was tucked away in the back. Then he walked out into the hallway and put his hand on the door of Elektra’s bedroom. Both of the people he loved most in the whole world were behind that door. He carefully removed his hand and left the apartment.
***
There was no time like the present, but Balthazar Vimpel still didn’t know if he’d done enough. He’d done everything in his power. When their colleague had died, Balthazar had immediately understood what was going on. Something inside him made the connection directly to the man who called himself Adnan. There was something in his voice that convinced Balthazar that the man was serious. He frowned, and a drop of sweat slid down his back.
He cringed, and the hairs on his arms stood up. Could he do more? He wasn’t sure. The whole situation had slipped out of his hands a long time ago. He pushed back the office chair, rose, and started pacing the extravagant office. The thick carpet dampened his steps as the luxurious bookshelves looked down on him from two of the walls. Three Chesterfield armchairs framed a marble-top table.
But there were no windows. Lamps and spotlights gave the room its illumination. Balthazar walked around the armchairs a couple of times, his thoughts swirling. There must be something else he could do. It couldn’t end like this. Not his long, shining career.
For the past five years, he’d been a giant in his field of experimental cancer treatment. Balthazar and his team had invented several groundbreaking technologies that were now put to practical use in cancer treatment. He grimaced. It was ironic that his expertise could lead to his downfall. He wouldn’t have thought it possible. By the time he’d perfected the treatment, it had been examined for years to be sure it was ready for human testing. And he’d been sure it would succeed—otherwise, he would never have pushed on. And at first, the human trials had gone well. Then it had become his undoing.
There had been a special committee that decided which patients would have access to this highly advanced form of medical treatment. They’d been contacted by a hospital that had a patient, a young girl who was seriously ill with an aggressive form of cancer.
The hospital had already tried all the treatments they had access to, but nothing had worked. In the end, they had turned to Balthazar as their last hope. After much discussion, Balthazar had accepted the girl into the patient group, but he’d made a mistake. The girl had responded to the treatment at first, and hope had been ignited. But just a few weeks later, her health had taken a turn for the worse, and the little girl had died. Balthazar had been devastated. He’d done everything possible to make this treatment effective, but it hadn’t succeeded.
He shivered as he checked the clock—a little after six. It was going to be a long day.
There was a knock on the door.
“Come in,” he said wearily.
The door flew open, and a girl ran in. “Dad!”
Balthazar’s face burst into a big smile. “Sky! Well, there you are. I was hoping you’d wake up soon.”
The girl’s bright, curly hair bounced as she ran up to her father and hugged him. “Why?” she asked.
He looked at her and grinned. “I just missed you, that’s all.”
Sky gave him another hug. “I’m here now,” she said. “What are you doing?”
Balthazar patted a chair for her to sit down next to him, and they sat. “I’m thinking about what fun things we can do today,” he replied.
Sky laughed. “What if we go home?”
He wrinkled his forehead and shook his head. “Not yet,” he said. “We have to stay here a little while longer.”
“But why?” Sky’s face twisted into a scowl. “It’s so boring here. I’ve played all the games here a hundred times. I can’t even go out, and I can’t call my friends, and . . .”
Balthazar raised his hand. “I know, my darling. It’s tough, I understand, but there’s something we must do before we can go home. Just a few more days. I promise.”
Sky jumped up from the chair. “Really? You promise? Just a few more days?”
Balthazar hated to see his daughter sad, so he bit his lip and said a silent prayer that it would be true. “Yeah, sweetie. Just a few more days. Then we’ll go home.”
Sky threw herself around his neck and hugged him. “Thank you, Dad, thank you!”
Before he could say anything else, Sky jumped down and ran away, shouting, “Mom, Mom! You want to know what Dad said?”
Balthazar sighed. Why had he said that? A few more days? He hoped to God that would be enough. He got up and started pacing again. Ten minutes later, he heard steps outside the door and knew who it was. The door opened, and Laura came in. He froze and forced himself to face her gaze. She stood with her arms folded in front of her and her lips pressed together.
“What did you tell her?”
He looked away. “About what?”
“Don’t act innocent. What did you say to Sky? Did you tell her we’re going home in a couple of days?”
He hesitated. “Yes,” he said.
She stepped closer to him, and her eyes flashed. “And that maniac who’s after us? What about him? Has he been caught?”
“No, not yet,” Balthazar replied in a small voice.
A vein pulsed in Laura’s forehead. “How dare you? How dare you tell our daughter that we’re going home when the maniac after us is still at large?”
In the end, it was just too much for him. He exploded. “I don’t know, okay? I just want her to have a good time and for you to be okay, but I don’t know what else to do
! I can’t take it anymore down here. We have to get our lives back!”
Laura stared at him. A few seconds passed. “Okay, okay,” she said. “I understand, and I’m on your side, but you can’t say things like that to our daughter without you and I talking about it first.”
He pulled his hand over his face and took a deep breath. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”
Laura walked up to Balthazar and took his hand. She caressed it. “We’re going to get through this together,” she mumbled. “Together, we can do anything. Okay?”
He met her gaze, and warmth rose within him. “Yes, together we can do it. You and me.”
5
Reinhard Argento got up and walked away from his desk. It had been an intense morning. He’d been on the phone for hours trying to deal with the damage from the Spaniard’s attack.
He reached overhead and heard his back creak. He wasn’t a youth anymore; his hair had become more gray than black in the last six months, and the fine wrinkles along his eyes were getting deeper every year. But Argento took it with equanimity. It was the test of time—it was inevitable. He did what he could to stay in shape, eat right, and exercise. Now, barely fifty years old, he felt pretty good.
His phone rang, and he answered it. “Argento.”
A voice with a thick accent spoke on the other end, “Argento, it’s Miguel. I need to know what we’re going to do now. The house is roped off, and we can’t get in.”
Argento bit the insides of his cheeks. He needed more information—that was his profession. As head of security at Cabello Medico, he handled the safety of its employees. But more important than their safety was the information, the research results that were the very heart of a medical device company like theirs. Research data could take more than ten years to collect before results were realized, and costs could run up to several billion dollars before they saw any income. It was a gigantic gamble, but it was one that Cabello Medico had been making for almost four decades—and they played their cards well. The company had grown year after year and currently employed over twenty thousand people.
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