At the top, as she’d feared, she found the trapdoor stuck tightly shut. But, after some diligent chipping and digging with the scissors, she felt it begin to give.
And so did the ladder.
She gave a squawk of panic and one final desperate shove with the points of the scissors. The trapdoor toppled over, away from the opening. She managed to grab hold of the frame with both hands and hoist herself over the edge, just as the ladder gave way under her feet and fell into the chamber below.
Half sobbing, half laughing, Lucia hauled herself onto the floor of the cistern Corbett had shown her just…How long had it been? Two days ago? Three? She’d lost track. And of the hours, as well. She understood, now, why she hadn’t been able to see daylight through the crack in the trapdoor. She hadn’t seen it, because there wasn’t any. Days were short this close to winter solstice. While she had been working her way up the chimney shaft, night had fallen.
She rolled onto her back and lay still for a few minutes, resting. Looking up at the stars. More stars than she’d ever seen, except maybe for those long-ago camping trips in the High Sierras. She thought she’d never seen stars so beautiful, and she thought of Corbett, and the skylight above his bed, and his words:
“Having come much too near to losing the privilege forever, I do like to be able to see the stars.”
Now, she understood.
In the quiet suburban neighborhood that surrounded the hospital complex, a taxicab rolled slowly and almost silently through wet streets that reflected the displays of Christmas lights in a cheery kaleidoscope of reds and greens. Few other cars were out and about, and those splashed briskly past on their holiday errands, paying no attention to the cruising cab.
On its third pass down a deserted side street a block or so from the well-lit hospital parking areas, Corbett leaned forward to speak to the taxi driver.
“Mon ami, je vous quitte ici. Merci, et pardon pour le dérangement.”
The driver, who had been well paid already, protested volubly that it had been no trouble, and he would be more than happy to drop the gentleman someplace more hospitable. Corbett clapped him on the shoulder and pressed another wad of euros into his waiting hand. The driver gave an elaborate shrug and pulled to the curbside. Corbett opened the street-side door and stepped out into the steady drizzle. The driver muttered, “Bonne chance, monsieur,” and drove away.
When the taxi’s taillights had winked out around the far corner, Corbett turned up the collar of his coat, put his hands in the pockets, hunched his shoulders and began to walk toward the car that was parked on the street a short distance away. It was an unremarkable car, dark in color, small, German-made, though not recently. Droplets of rain shimmered on the hood and on all the windows, making it impossible to see who was inside.
As Corbett approached the driver’s side of the car, deep in his right coat pocket, his fingers flexed and tightened around the butt of a Walther P38.
He drew level with the window and it slid silently down. From the darkness inside came a voice with a familiar Australian accent.
“About time you showed up,” Adam Sinclair said. “I was beginning to lose faith in you, mate.”
Lucia stood in the ruins of the medieval castle, looking down on the rooftops of the village below. It couldn’t be too late, she decided, since the streets and many of the houses were still showing lights.
That was the good news.
The bad news was, her plan to go knocking on doors until she found someone with a telephone she could borrow was probably not the best idea. By this time, Kati and Josef would have spread the word that she was missing. In a town so small, it was a sure bet everyone would have received the news by now.
Still, what other choice did she have? The night was clear and growing colder. She’d freeze to death if she didn’t get down off this mountaintop and into someplace warm, and soon.
After studying the straight, snowy drop straight down to the village, she turned reluctantly to the winding path-the longer, but infinitely safer way down the hill. And vowed, as soon as possible after all this was over, to ask Corbett-assuming he was still speaking to her-to teach her to ski.
“Had no choice, Laz. We were being hacked. I had to shut down in a hurry.” Adam stared straight ahead at the spangled windshield. His profile was grim.
“How far did they get?” Corbett asked in a flat voice.
“Far enough. I terminated all the ops we still had running, called in our agents and told ’em to go underground until they hear from you.” In the dim light of the streetlamps, Adam’s grin flashed at him briefly. “’Course, they didn’t do any such thing. They’re all here, cocked and ready, just say the word. Didn’t have time to get word to you and Lucia, but I had an idea you’d be showing up here once you found out the whole system’d gone dark. I’ve been parked here since yesterday-well, in the neighborhood, anyway. Just in case.”
Corbett allowed himself a wry smile. “How did you know I’d find you?”
“Truth is, I didn’t. I’ve got our lads watching every way there is into that bloody hospital up there. Couldn’t risk it myself-our S.N.A.K.E. charmer knows me on sight.” He held up a cell phone. “I’m supposed to get a heads-up call if you show.”
Corbett stared narrow-eyed at the lighted medical complex just ahead. “She’s still there, then?”
“Hasn’t left the boy’s side since the shooting. She’s got a bed in his room. So they tell me.”
Corbett nodded, and after a moment felt Adam turn to look at him. “So. What’s the plan?” Once again he waved the cell phone. “We’re ready to move. Just say the word.”
He’d had plenty of time to think about it, on the flight from Salzburg and on the taxi ride into the city. He knew what he had to do. What he didn’t know was how much he dared tell Adam. How far he could trust him. He couldn’t afford to guess wrong. Doubt sat in his stomach like a rock.
“Too late to do anything now,” he said. “Prison wing will be locked down-I’m assuming that’s where they’ve got him?” Adam nodded without speaking, watching him narrowly. “So since she’s not going anywhere tonight, my immediate plan is to find a bed and a shower and something to eat. Not necessarily in that order. Got any suggestions?”
Adam grinned and reached for the ignition key. “I’m way ahead of you, mate.” Then, with the engine idling and the heater beginning to cough out chilly air, he paused and asked casually, “How’s Lucia? Not too happy about being left behind, I guess.”
“No, not happy,” Corbett said with a dark smile. “But safe.” He paused, then added, “Or…she will be, if she stays where I put her.”
Adam gave a bark of laughter. “Good luck with that,” he said as he put the car in gear.
Please, God, Corbett prayed bleakly, let her stay where I put her. Please, let her obey me this once. If she just does it this one time, I’ll never ask her to do such a thing again, I swear. Assuming we have more of that-time.
Lucia wasn’t quite sure whether to be glad or sorry to find no one abroad in the village’s main street. At least she didn’t have to worry about meeting anyone. But, if anyone should happen to pass by or glance out a window, she was bound to look a little odd. Hard to pass for one of the village lasses with her dark skin and wild Gypsy curls, particularly out and about alone on a cold December evening wearing dirty ski pants, boots, gloves and cap, but no jacket.
Then there was the problem of how she was going to find a telephone. Knocking on the door of someone’s home seemed out of the question. But a gasthaus, perhaps…or a pub? She could explain that she’d had car trouble…a flat, maybe. Or run her car into a ditch. But, assuming someone didn’t immediately phone Kati and Josef, or the local authorities, what then? Even if she could find a phone, who would she call? What transportation service would likely be available in such an out-of-the-way place at this time of night?
Not for the first time, she wondered if she would finally have to give up, go creeping shamefaced back to t
he cottage and beg forgiveness of the kind and caring people Corbett had charged with keeping her here.
And you, Corbett, my love. Where are you now? Fighting your battle…alone?
He’d gone back to Paris knowing only that someone he trusted had betrayed him. What if he went to the wrong person for help? What if he decided to trust no one and tried to tackle his enemies alone?
I can’t quit now. I have to get to him. I can’t let him do this alone!
And once more, just when despair seemed imminent, she lifted her eyes…and beheld salvation.
This time salvation came in the form of a panel truck, parked outside what appeared to be a bistro. Although the driver was nowhere to be seen, the truck’s motor was running, feathery plumes of vapor waving from the exhaust pipe in a way that seemed almost friendly…hospitable, like the smoke from a cottage chimney in an otherwise deserted landscape. But what truly made it seem like a miracle to Lucia’s tired eyes, a chariot straight from heaven, was what was painted on the side. In familiar red-and-white script were two words understood in any language:
Coca-Cola.
Without stopping to dwell on the unbelievably good luck, or question whether she should, she tried the truck’s back door. She wasn’t even surprised to find it unlocked. She crawled inside, closed the door securely behind her, and finding just enough room between the boxes of bottles and cans of syrup, lay down on the floor of the truck with the sewing bag under her head for a pillow.
She didn’t mean to fall asleep. However, the next thing she knew she was being jolted awake by the clang of the truck’s metal doors. Stiff, sore and completely disoriented, she lifted her head and blinked owlishly at the gray daylight, while a strange male voice shouted exclamations and questions at her in Hungarian.
Thanks to his numerous trips to America to visit his brother in Cincinnati-as he later explained to her-the truck driver’s command of English was reasonably good. Thus, she was able to, firstly, convince him not to immediately summon the police, and secondly, discover that, yes, she was now on the outskirts of Budapest. Even better, not far from the airport.
So it was, that barely an hour after sunrise, thanks to a kind and America-friendly Coca-Cola delivery-truck driver and most of her small supply of euros, Lucia was walking into the main terminal at the Budapest airport. An hour or so after that, thanks to her Visa card, she was about to board the first flight of the day to Paris, dressed in a new pair of jeans, leather boots and a very cool-looking black leather jacket. And, just in case there was an international APB out on her, a yellow beret and dark glasses-also very cool.
She still had her sewing bag, although the inspectors at the security checkpoint had confiscated her scissors.
By midmorning Corbett Lazlo, wearing the coveralls and cloth cap of a member of the hospital’s janitorial staff and pushing a mop, was making his way slowly along the corridor just outside the maximum-security wing.
It was a quiet time in the wards and corridors, relatively speaking. The doctors had made their rounds, medications had been dispensed, breakfast trays served and cleared away. It was too early for lunch and visitors were limited to members of a patient’s immediate family. Most of the traffic Corbett encountered now consisted of patients, scheduled for various tests, procedures and therapies, being trundled off to labs and operating rooms.
It was not by chance that Corbett was in that particular place at that particular time.
Earlier that morning, by means of a focused flirtation with one of the nurses just going off her shift, and some promises he didn’t intend to keep, he’d learned that there’d been quite a bit of interest, not to mention gossip, about the very good-looking young man in the jail wing, recovering from a gunshot wound and injury to the spine. It was said he’d attempted to assassinate someone famous. Speculation as to who that famous person might be ranged from Michael Jackson to the French president’s mistress. Of much greater interest to Corbett, however, was the information that this young man was scheduled to receive his first physical-therapy session this morning at ten o’clock.
He was still some distance from the double sets of reinforced doors leading to the prison wing when a loud buzzer sounded. He paused to watch, leaning on his mop and wiping his face with a large handkerchief, while first one, then the other set of doors swung open to allow passage of a hospital bed carrying a sullen-looking young man encased in a full-body brace. The bed was pushed along by a very large French West-African orderly and accompanied by an armed uniformed police guard. Walking beside the bed, one hand placed solicitously on the young man’s shoulder, was a tall, slender woman with red-gold hair. None of these paid the slightest attention to the janitor as they passed.
Corbett waited until the caravan had turned the corner at the end of the hallway, then leaned the mop carefully against the wall, tucked the handkerchief into his back pocket and sauntered after the group.
During his early morning reconnaissance he’d noted and marked the presence of several suspiciously bulky individuals in and around the hospital he felt fairly certain were Cassandra DuMont’s thugs. He spotted two more now. He’d also identified three of his own agents manning their posts at strategic locations around the prison wing, but had not made himself known to them. He did not do so now, either, primarily because he didn’t feel like explaining why he was operating without his usual backup, any more than he wanted to explain to Adam why he was choosing to take on Cassandra and her crew alone.
Adam would figure it out, of course, once he realized the stakeout Corbett had assigned him was a red herring. By the time he did, Corbett sincerely hoped he would have everything figured out, as well.
Lucia was stuck in traffic. A pile-up on the rain-slick freeway during morning rush hour had been cleared, but by the time traffic was moving again it was already midmorning. She was also hungry. She’d considered whether to take time to eat something before leaving the airport, but a persistent sense of urgency, not to mention a shortage of euros, had convinced her to head for the car-rental counter instead. The coffee and biscuits she’d eaten on the plane were now a distant memory.
The map and directions to the French hospital supplied to her by the rental-car agency proved accurate, and once clear of the traffic slowdown she made good time. It was a few minutes past ten when she pulled into the hospital’s visitor parking area, only to find it full. With no time to waste driving around in circles, hoping to catch someone pulling out, she exited the lot with an angry screech of tires and, luckily, found a place to park on one of the side streets. Of course, the rear end of her rental car was partly blocking someone’s driveway, but, she told herself, that couldn’t be helped.
With the help of the car’s rearview mirror, she put on her new beret, tucked all her hair up inside and adjusted it to a jaunty angle. Then she put on her new sunglasses-notably unnecessary in the December overcast-and got out of the car, locked it and pocketed the key. She left the sewing bag behind, having first removed from it a blunt knitting needle, which she’d inserted into the lining of her jacket just inside the right sleeve.
She made her way briskly along the wet sidewalk toward the hospital’s main entrance, sparing only the briefest glance and a quick thank-you wave to the driver of the old black BMW who had stopped to let her cross the street.
At the wheel of the BMW, Adam Sinclair lifted one finger in acknowledgment of the wave, then turned his head to watch the woman jog up the hospital steps. He did this purely as a reflex, a natural male response to a tall, shapely woman with a confident and sexy walk.
An instant later the same car was screeching around a corner and into the hospital’s emergency loading zone. Swearing as only an Aussie can, Adam opened the car door and bolted for the sliding doors before the engine had stopped running.
In the physical-therapy waiting area, Cassandra DuMont sat leafing through a magazine with impatient, jerky movements. No one else was around, the orderly and police guard having disappeared down the hallway and into
one of the rooms in the large therapy complex with their patient and prisoner. And the woman didn’t bother to give the man in the janitor’s coveralls and cap a second glance-until he sat down in one of the chairs across from her.
She looked up, then, with hot, angry eyes poised, Corbett was sure, to demand the reason for such an intrusion.
And she froze.
“Hello, Cass,” he said quietly. He put out a hand when she started to rise, casting quick, furious looks around, searching for someone-one of her watchdogs, no doubt. “Don’t bother to call for help. I came alone. It’s just you and me. I only want to talk.”
She sank slowly back into the chair but didn’t relax. “We have nothing to talk about, Corbett Lazlo.” Her voice was cold, her eyes hard. “Nothing at all.”
“We have a son.”
Sparks flared in her eyes, and he saw for a moment the fiery young girl he’d known. “I have a son. He is no part of you and you are no part of him. And never will be.”
He only shrugged and asked softly, “How is he?”
“He will live-a cripple.” Cassandra’s voice was a bitter snarl. “You did this to him. Are you happy now?”
Corbett shook his head. “You kept his identity from me and from the world. You trained him to be a killer, then turned him loose on his own father. You bear the responsibility for what’s happened to him, Cass. You, and no one else.”
“You betrayed me!” She surged out of the chair, still gripping its arms as if to stop herself from lunging at his throat. “You made me betray my own father-my brother, my own family.”
“Yes, and now I know what it feels like,” Corbett said, watching her with narrowed eyes, every nerve in his body on alert. He forced a smile. “You’ve won, Cass. You’ve destroyed the agency I built, killed a number of my friends and sent the rest into hiding. And turned someone I trusted against me. So you’ve done everything you said you’d do, haven’t you? You’ve won. That’s what I came to tell you. And to make you a deal.”
She straightened to her full height and looked down at him with cold disdain. “What deal could you possibly offer that would interest me? As you say-I have won. You have nothing to deal with. Nothing.”
Lazlo’s Last Stand Page 18
