More important, however, were her numerous visits to Eastern Bloc.
Who had she typically come with? Justina thought, her mind muddled by whatever drug she’d been given.
“Lower the towel,” the tattooed woman said in a distinctive alto voice. After a moment, Señora Moreno removed the towel from her face, at which time the woman nodded and spoke rapid, indecipherable Catalan to the man. Then the woman turned to Justina, narrowing her eyes.
“Where have I seen you before?” she asked, switching to Spanish.
Justina made sure to look puzzled yet indignant when she shrugged.
“Is she from Lloret?” the woman asked the man.
“Don’t know where she lives. I think she’s Polish.”
“I know I’ve seen her before.”
“Have you been to Lloret?” the man asked Justina.
“No,” Justina answered with a sneer.
The woman walked to Justina, touching her forehead, running her fingers back through her hair, making a humming sound as she said, “She’s really beautiful.”
“D’acord,” the man replied, pressing himself behind the woman, licking the back of her neck, leaving a slick trail.
The woman turned and they kissed again, their tongues entwining like impassioned asps. After the moment passed, he gestured to Señora Moreno’s wound. “Can you manage?”
The woman moved next to Señora and viewed the incision. “It may not be pretty.” From the bag she removed a bottle, a small syringe, a small pair of scissors and a plastic container with what appeared to be needles and surgical suture.
After preparing a needle, she touched Señora Moreno’s shoulder. “You’ll be glad to know that I’m going to numb your face.” She injected Señora Moreno’s face in four locations, setting the needle aside and resuming her necking with her beau.
Several minutes later, needle in hand, she went to work.
* * *
More than a half hour after departing the cabin, the posse, led by the dogs, followed the upper lake to its river source. After continuing on, they crossed at a foot bridge, the hounds picking up the scent on the other side. They knew the prisoner and the prison’s captain had to be close. On the far side of the river, soaked from slogging through a bog, the posse rushed to the south, each man satisfied that the hounds seemed to be growing excited as the scent grew more powerful.
But, to everyone’s surprise, the scent halted around a jutting headland. There they found an older gentleman on a stump, placidly fishing with an improvised pole. In one hand was a flask—it contained Swedish vodka. He took a swig and lowered his fishing pole.
“You folks looking for a man and a woman?” he asked in his oddly-accented Catalan.
When the handler quieted the hounds, the Manresan police chief stepped forward. “Yes. Did you see them?”
“Sure did. Just know I’m well-oiled this afternoon. And unless I was seeing things, I’m pretty sure they went in right here and started swimming.” He pointed straight out over the water.
It took ten minutes to find the clothing that had been sunk by the heavy stones.
Sven was arrested on the spot, but the posse was nearly an hour behind Gage and Angelines.
They would not catch up.
* * *
Fortunately, there had been no epic chase on the river. Gage had navigated by Garmin, never really having to rely on it since the river’s path was obvious and marked. But after some time, when the available fuel was well below half a tank, he began to see markers denoting a major confluence.
When he zoomed out on the Garmin, the confluence was distinct—the Llobregat River loomed just ahead. This was good, meaning they were now forty kilometers away from where they’d ditched the car. But the bad news was the controlled locks on the Llobregat as the river descended toward the Mediterranean. According to Señora Moreno’s man Sven, once the rivers converged, Gage and Angelines would need to find other transport since the first locks were only a few kilometers downstream—and operated by workers from the government. Those workers could easily be on the lookout for two fugitives.
As they floated into a town at the confluence, Angelines turned to Gage. “This is Ripoll.”
“Do you know it?”
“Not really. It’s about like Berga. Just another hill town.”
“We’ve got to trade this boat for some other type of ride, and we need to do it very quietly.” Gage pulled the throttle back, checking the current as the boat idled. Although close to the confluence, the current was still mild. Not knowing the depth near the shore, he tilted the prop up, keeping it submerged just enough for thrust. He reversed a few times, easing the boat to the shore, a slight thud announcing their impact.
Gage leapt from the front, holding the bow while he found two steel stakes under the bow hatch. When he turned, he saw an older woman on her knees, peering at him from behind a clump of yellow meadow buttercup. She was on a knee-pad, a small shovel in her hand. Wearing a straw hat held down by a filmy kerchief, Gage could see a smile on her kindly face.
“Hola!” he said cheerily, just any recreational boater happy to have a day off. Continuing in his American-accented Spanish, he said, “My girlfriend and I are hungry and looking for a bite. Is it okay if we leave our boat here for a bit?”
“But of course,” the woman replied, standing. When Angelines babied herself from the boat, wincing from the impact, the woman’s face clouded as she gestured to the bandage. “You seem to be in a bit of pain.”
Angelines smiled and dismissed it. “I cut myself earlier—just a surface wound.”
“So, you’re from around here?” the older woman asked in Catalan upon hearing Angelines’ accent.
“Sí, sóc de Barcelona.”
Seeming unfazed by their presence, the woman resumed her position on the kneepad and continued her weeding. “Please, leave the boat as long as you like.”
Gage leapt from the boat, carrying the cardboard box before making the line fast. “We’ll be an hour or two, madam,” Gage said, backing away. Under his breath he said, “Now we’ve just got to hope she doesn’t go inside and turn on the television.”
“Where are we going?”
“No clue,” he said, looking both directions as they reached the narrow road in front of the woman’s cottage.
“Esperi!” the woman called out after them.
“No,” Gage groaned. “You talk to her since she’s speaking Catalan.”
Angelines turned, cupping her hand to her ear. “Sí, senyora?”
“If you’re looking for a meal with a good view, you should go to the Restaurante Panorámico…it’s just south of town, on the right. An easy walk from here.”
“Thank you!” Angelines called out, while Gage grumbled from the continued attention.
“And make sure you sit on the back patio where you can look at the towering mountains and watch the parasailers and parachutists,” the woman continued. “It’s a well-kept secret among the locals.”
Gage asked for a translation and received it. His grin grew from fake to genuine as he waved his thanks.
When the restaurant was in sight, he moved to the side of the road and lowered the cardboard box to the flowery weeds.
“What are you doing?”
“Sven mentioned something earlier.” Gage tore the box open, finding a letter on top. He read it, his hand absently rubbing his sweaty hair.
“My God,” he breathed.
“What?”
Taking loud breaths, Gage lifted the sheaf of greenish paper from the top of the box. Underneath the thick sheaf were stacks of euros. He thumbed the sheaf several times, shaking his head.
“What are those?”
He handed her the top sheet of linen paper.
“Bearer bonds?” she asked, holding the paper close to her face.
“Along with the money I was paid, Señora Moreno has left me nearly seventeen-million dollars in these bonds.”
“Why?”
�
��She said they didn’t know if I would even show up today. But in case I did, she left these for me to negotiate with, if necessary.”
“Whose bonds are they?”
“Hers.”
“Señora Moreno’s?”
Taking the bond back from Angelines, Gage nodded.
“She’s that wealthy?”
“Apparently so.”
He handed her the note, explaining as she read.
“So they went to Redon,” Angelines said, “pretending to have access to Ernesto Navarro’s money.”
“As I told you earlier, last night I called Justina but I could only speak for a minute.” He put everything back into the box, looking up at Angelines. “And based on what I told her, she had no idea I was escaping. So, she told Señora Moreno about my instructions that she go to the U.S. Consulate. Señora Moreno said that was not a good plan and, instead, they hatched a plan to go and entrap Cortez Redon.”
“Using these bearer bonds.”
“Correct, acting like they’d found Navarro’s fortune. Señora Moreno wrote that she took one with her to use as proof. Since I asked Justina to leave the money and the pistol, they thought maybe I was somehow coming to retrieve it, hence her leaving the rest of the bearer bonds.”
Angelines shook her head. “But that plan is reckless. What if you’d sent me, or a guard, or Los Leones for the money?”
“That’s why she left the bonds, and the money, with her armed men.” Tugging on his bottom lip, Gage said, “The plan’s not all that bad. But it’s dangerous.”
Gage removed Sven’s phone and battery from his pocket, mating them and waiting for the power to come on. He held down the first speed dial, listening to the rings followed by Señora Moreno’s voicemail message.
“Damn!”
“No answer?”
He shook his head and stared at the phone. “I assume this phone belonged to that man called Sven.”
“Yeah?”
“I’m debating whether or not to disconnect the battery. My training tells me to leave it disconnected.”
She shrugged.
“But instinct tells me to keep it on.”
“Instinct,” Angelines said.
“C’mon,” he said, dropping the still-operating mobile phone into the cardboard box.
Bruised and battered, the fugitive couple headed south.
* * *
When they reached the Restaurante Panorámico, a rustic establishment constructed from what appeared to be local timber, Angelines waited for their order in an vacant corner. In the meantime, Gage hiked across the rolling meadow behind the restaurant. Across the meadow, about a kilometer away, was a small metal hangar and short asphalt airstrip, both nestled at the base of a rocky peak. As he closed in on the hangar, he watched several parasailers, so much more common in Europe, soaring gracefully, using the updrafts created by the rapidly warming day and the arching towers of rock. Added to the updrafts caused by radiational heating, Gage mused, was the upward air effect when gusts of wind were forced to move up and over the mountain. With a light breeze at the mountain’s southern face, Gage assumed that today was the perfect day for soaring.
He also heard the droning of an aircraft somewhere high above, most likely the jump plane. Gage shielded his eyes, hearing the pitch change as he walked. The aircraft had just turned on what’s known as “jump run”, the slow pass when the jumpers exit. He spotted the plane’s T-silhouette high above. The airplane was a single engine, but Gage could tell no more from his position approximately 10,000 feet below. Rather than strain his eyes, he kept walking.
When he reached the hangar, receiving a few polite nods, he saw the normal goings on one would expect to see at a skydiving center. Even though this dropzone was smaller than Raeford—it seemed like years ago when Gage met Hunter there—there were still a number of similarities.
On the grass, staked down near the hangar, were several blue packing mats. An instructor stood on one of the mats, speaking Spanish, teaching several students the “flat pack” with what appeared to be a large student canopy. Behind her were diagrams of the proper skydiving “arch,” a basic body technique that makes a jumper fall face to earth.
With a flash of melancholy, Gage recalled his first free-fall instructions two decades before, his Alabaman green beret instructor spitting tobacco juice as he yelled, “Just aim your dick for the dirt!”
Long time.
While Gage was looking for an unoccupied “up-jumper,” meaning a non-student, to ask a few questions, he heard the familiar rip-popping of parachutes opening in the skies above. Thankful for Sven’s sunglasses, Gage looked up to see four parachutes, spread apart but at roughly the same altitude, open and flying quickly. They’d opened at what Gage estimated to be between 2,000 and 2,500 feet above ground level, indicating the foursome were experienced jumpers. Added to that fact was the rapid forward speed of each of the canopies. He could tell the chutes were zero-porosity, and small, meaning they didn’t bleed air and truly acted as a wing. The fact that the canopies were small in relation to the body and gear they supported denoted them as high-performance, allowing the operator of the parachute to generate high forward speed. While more dangerous, the landing result was often breathtaking and, to some skydivers, as great a rush as the freefall itself.
Gage watched the canopies setting up like F-16s preparing for high speed landings.
The first canopy, marked by the familiar Performance Design logo, a Stiletto, turned sharply from its blazing fast downwind leg, swinging the parachutist face-to-ground at several hundred feet. This was by design and was a method known as “swooping,” something only experienced jumpers should attempt. Like an aircraft racing straight toward the ground, the parachutist applied pressure to the steering toggles, generating lift. Then, as pretty as Gage had ever seen, the parachutist leveled out with the ground, moving at least fifty miles per hour, lifting his legs to prevent further drag. The effect was breathtaking, and allowed the jumper to “turf surf” nearly the length of a football field.
Each of the other jumpers followed suit, with the last one misjudging things slightly, but recovering enough to wind up in a harmless low-speed tumble on the ground. This generated good-natured laughter from his fellow jumpers while the parachutist, after brushing himself off, took a self-deprecating bow. Something about the tumble reminded Gage of his old Army buddy, Chuck. Chuck was a natural skydiver when it came to relative work—maneuvers while free-falling—but had never been known for his pretty landings.
As the quartet removed their helmets, Gage realized two of the jumpers were women. While the first one daisy-chained her lines, he walked over and asked who the owner of the skydiving center was.
The woman, with an open and friendly face, tilted her head upon hearing his accent. Then, with her gloved hand, she pointed up and made a circling motion. “You’re looking for Arturo, he’s also the pilot. His aircraft isn’t a turbine—it takes him a while to get down so he doesn’t over-cool the engine.”
“Are you a pilot?” Gage asked.
“Student pilot,” she said. “You’re a jumper?”
“I am.”
“Novice?” she asked, switching to English.
“Not a novice, but not exactly current either.”
“How many jumps do you have?” she asked, gathering her chute in her arms.
“I haven’t kept a strict count in a long time, but probably five, six…maybe seven thousand.”
Her eyes went wide. He was being truthful and, while large, such a high number certainly isn’t unheard of. In the U.S., especially at large drop-zones like Raeford, a person can find dozens, maybe hundreds, of skydivers with over seven thousand jumps. But in Spain, where jumping is far more expensive, and tougher to accumulate with a small piston aircraft, it would take a skydiver decades to accumulate such a total. Plus, most of Gage’s jumps were military, often coming during training when they would make ten to twelve practice jumps in a day.
“What’s
in the box?” the woman asked.
“Ah…just some of my old gear.”
They chatted a bit more before they saw the single-engine airplane, a Cessna 182, turn in on a short final. Arturo landed on the asphalt airstrip expertly, flaring at the last moment, resulting in a very short landing roll. When he killed the engine in the grass, a small pickup truck with a large fuel drum on the bed drove to the aircraft. Gage watched as Arturo exited.
“Do you know Arturo well?” he asked the woman.
The woman was shading her eyes, waving and smiling. “I’ll say,” she replied with obvious affection. “I’ve dated him for eight years.”
Arturo returned her wave, crossing the wide field.
“He wasn’t military, was he?” Gage asked.
She turned to Gage. “How did you know?”
“This is a skydiving center. I’d have put the odds at one-in-three.”
As he approached, Arturo spoke Spanish to his girlfriend at such a rapid rate Gage couldn’t keep up. Arturo hitched his thumb back to his aircraft and was saying something about the exit door and its latch. Then he asked her about her jump.
“We almost flushed and only got five stinking points,” she said, shaking her head in disgust. “I wasn’t very focused.” Quickly brightening, she motioned to Gage. “Arturo, this is our guest, but I didn’t get his name.”
“Hola, amigo,” Arturo said with a genuine smile, removing his sunglasses and tucking them into his shirt pocket. He was a few inches shorter than Gage, but probably the same age. His hair was black and streaked with gray, bushy with natural curls. His well-tanned face was notable due to its deep, natural lines and affable dimples. The man had keen, light brown eyes and shook Gage’s hand firmly. Gage instantly liked him.
“I’m Greg,” Gage said.
“And he has about seven thousand jumps,” the woman said proudly.
“Somewhere in that range,” Gage corrected. “And many were hop-and-pops. Nothing to get excited over.”
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