I have him if I want him, she thought. A lonely widower mourning his wife — at just this moment I can harvest him as a well-trained swallow would, harvest him body and soul.
It was the right thing to do. It was what they would want her to do. And when she had done it, she would be no better than her father’s dockside whores.
McKenzie shook himself like a wet dog. “I need a drink.” He pushed himself away from the desk and fumbled open the minibar. “Do you want something?”
The opportunity had passed. She knew she should feel guilty for letting it slip by, but instead she shivered with relief. “No. Yes. A soda. No, a fruit drink.” “Rattled” is the word an American would use. I have lost my self-composure and must recover it.
He brandished a cold can of orange juice, mixed himself a gin and tonic. “You want ice with this?”
“No.” After pouring it into a glass, he passed it to her with a napkin. The spark was back in his eyes, and the wry smile on his lips. She’d lost him.
Sipping his drink, then sighing in satisfaction, he said, “Anyway, like I was saying, I’m on your side. At least for the here and now. The guy you have to watch out for is the one whose tail I was twisting at the Hilton, Johan Schmidt. He’s bad medicine, the worst I can name. He’s a merc, a pro, and he’ll have five hundred men or more behind him. You’ve got the most dangerous mercenary organization I can name on your case. As if that weren’t bad enough, you also have to worry about the civilian police, the FBI, and a whole bunch of alphabet-soup agencies. A lot of people want to take you down; I’m pretty much the only one who doesn’t.”
“I will escape them.” She would. And it was important that this McKenzie man know it.
“The government guys? Sure. There’s no doubt in my mind you can get past them. But Schmidt is a horse of a different color. Look, we don’t have anything like your country’s Spetsnaz in America. Heavily armed, highly trained special forces who do the dirty work both abroad and at home just aren’t the American way. So, the laws of supply and demand being what they are, private enterprise —”
Her temper ignited. She found herself sneering as her father would sneer. “This is your much vaunted free-market economy at work.”
McKenzie chuckled. “I guess. It all comes down to the same pig-stupid libertarian philosophy. Yeah, sure Johan Schmidt’s the personification of the free-market economy. He and his people are only in it for the money. Patriotism, duty, ordinary human decency — they’re irrelevant to that crowd. All they care about is cash on the barrelhead. The profit motive, my girl, is the most powerful motive there is. Once you understand that, you’ll understand how much danger you’re really in.”
True, Schmidt was to be feared. The very sight of him had frightened her. But his men were mere hooligans. They would be no challenge.
“Don’t make the mistake of believing that Schmidt’s gang are all brawn and no brains. His soldiers — the monkeys you saw with him an hour ago — aren’t particularly bright, although they are exceptionally well-schooled. His officers are a different story. One officer for every ten foot soldiers, they’re the best money can buy — smart, seasoned, and not easy to fool. I’m damned good, but as good as I am, I’d rather keep out of those guys’ way.”
He is back in control of this conversation. How did that happen?
McKenzie continued. “Which should be your objective if you decide to run. Look, I’m leaving here early tomorrow morning. They’ll be following me — or at least they’ll think they are. If you wait until after I’m gone, you should be able to get out of town unseen. After that…well, I don’t know what your best route is. Southwest, probably. More traffic that way, you’d be lost in the crowd. Yeah, the route over to Southern Arizona is your best bet. Phoenix, Tucson — big cities are always a good place to hide. Although the truth is you’d be safer if you stayed here until I get back.”
She glared at him, unable to decide what to say but knowing that she would never, never accept his advice.
“If you do run for it, get some decent clothes to replace that junk you insist on wearing.” Irina winced. “Stop at some upscale shop, and look for the St. John Sport label. Mary always was a knockout in their stuff, and it would look great on you. Schmidt’s people aren’t searching for a well-dressed posh kind of woman. If you’re wearing fancy clothes, you might slip by them. I doubt if you’ll find the right kind of store in this town. Maybe in Tucson or Phoenix or Sedona — one of the resort towns, anyway.”
Why is he helping me? He is up to something. There is a trick here.
“Okay, it’s getting late. We should go to bed — chastely to bed. Wearing our britches by the way, because Schmidt is quite capable of kicking down the door at three in the morning. But before we do, there’s something I want to ask you. Be patient. This will only take a few minutes.”
All she wanted was sleep. If she could put this day — the most hideous in her life — behind her, she could deal with this man and with whatever sly gambit he was about to attempt. Or has attempted, and I am too tired to notice. She shook her head, trying to clear her mind of its fatigue, and of all the chemistries of fear and flight that had bewildered it.
He withdrew a handful of photographs from his satchel. Some were black and white. Others were color. He spread them on top of the motel desk. Her cheeks flamed. Such was her outrage and such was her shock that she could feel the heat. How dare he? How dare he show me this?
“These snapshots were taken mostly up at Beloye More and over at Lake Ladozhskoye. This is your father, right? That’s you. Those are your brothers and your mother.”
She teetered on the brink. The precipice was high. The pit bottomless. The photos were too much, too much to be borne. This day — horrible, horrible — Dominik dying in a fog of blood, cars stolen where any man might see her, the expression on sad, sweet Mitch Conroy’s face, McKenzie finding her not once but twice, and the gloating obscenity of Schmidt’s henchmen….
She did not know how much more she could endure. Surely she could not endure the sight of these…of these…damnable photographs!
“So here you all are on holiday, and every holiday your father takes the family sailing. You must have been six or seven when this first one was taken. And in this last one, out in the Gulf of Finland I think, you look to be about seventeen.”
“Eighteen.” She could barely get the word out. Her throat was constricted. Choking memory rendered speech impossible. She felt her hands shake, knew that she burned with terrors best left unspoken, and wanted nothing — nothing! — more than to open her mouth and shriek.
“Same as every other spook shop in the world, the Agency just loves collecting snapshots of foreign military guys. So we’ve got this full photographic record of you growing up. Dozens of shots of you and your family on vacation. Usually you’re all out on the water. But the thing is…see here in every picture…the thing is that while everybody shares the boating chores, there’s one chore we never photographed you doing. I’m curious about that, Irina. I mean, I was just wondering —”
An explosion. A house condemned to demolition. Its walls crumble. Nothing is left but dust and rubble.
“Never!” she shouted, “never!” She would not cry. This man — no man — could make her do that. “Never once! Only my brothers! Not me! I was never allowed! He would never give me the chance to prove myself, and…” She swallowed hard, gulping back the pain.
“He never let you take the tiller, never let you steer.”
“I was a girl. I was not good enough.”
“That’s what he said.”
“Always. About everything. I was never good enough!”
“So you never really knew?”
“Knew what?”
“Whether he was right. Whether you’re good enough. You don’t know that.”
“I do know.”
“You only think you do.”
“No!”
“The truth is…” He stretched out his hand to comfort
her; she pushed it away. “…you never can be certain how good you are.”
She hated him. The power of the emotion staggered her. She began to speak — to shout, really, but stopped herself short.
She stopped because she could see it. It was in his eyes, a hint, not a flagrancy, the flickering ghost of unspoken knowledge.
He knew more, knew that secret thing, knew what her father had done, knew her humiliation, the shame she denied because if she admitted it she would scream and scream and scream.
It was written in his eyes. And it was written that he would never speak of what he knew, but keep it hidden inside of him, locked as deeply as it was locked within her.
For this she hated him most of all.
She slapped him. She slapped him as hard as she was able.
He merely looked at her sadly, as though she had somehow disappointed him.
Part Two
Charlie’s Love
De l’audace — encore de l’audace — toujours de l’audace.
— DANTON
5
Roadwork
Wednesday, July 22.
0545 Hours Central Time
Charlie pitched his voice loud to penetrate the closet in which Irina hid. “Good morning, Mitch!” he boomed as he flung open the hotel room door.
With two shopping bags and a greasy box of Krispy Kremes clutched to his chest, Mitch Conroy hobbled in. “Mornin’, Mr. McKenzie. Am I on time?”
“Five forty-five to the minute. Punctuality is the virtue of princes.” In grey slacks, white shirt, and a Sears sports coat, Mitch looked like a small-time businessman — a car dealer, an insurance broker, a shoe store manager. Charlie was confident Schmidt’s watchers hadn’t given the rodeo rider — walking slowly to conceal his limp — a second glance. “Is that breakfast I see? Why, bless you. And quit calling me ‘mister.’ My friends call me Charlie.”
“Yessir, I’ll try to remember to do that, Mr. McKenzie.” Wearing a puppy-dog grin, Mitch put his shopping bags on the floor, then perched on the edge of the bed.
Laughing at the cowboy’s sly wit, Charlie sat beside him. This was a good man, he told himself, one miscast in the risky role he’d volunteered to accept. More to assuage his conscience than anything else, he asked, “Look, son, are you sure you want this job?”
Mitch opened the donut box, revealing four cups of hot coffee and a dozen gloppy confections. He peeled a plastic lid off one of the coffees, then picked a sticky bun with hot pink icing. “Only work I seen in a long time.”
Charlie took a coffee for himself. He eyed the pastries, choosing the one that seemed least likely to trigger coronary thrombosis. “You’re going up against some pretty bad people, Mitch. They might rough you up some.”
“I been ridin’ rodeo since I was sixteen. I reckon anybody as whups up on me can’t do more than some horse already done twice.” He licked his fingers with relish and took another donut.
“Just so long as you know what you’re getting into.” Charlie passed a manila envelope to Mitch. “I’ve signed the BMW’s title over to you. The registration and all the paperwork are in here. Plus the twenty-five thousand cash I promised. When you get to Las Vegas, don’t blow it at the tables.”
“I ain’t no gambler. Most I’ll do is catch me a show and have a good steak dinner.”
“Smart man. Okay, now let’s go over the plan one last time.”
Mitch nodded. “Well, sir, like you told me, I bought me some khaki clothes same as yours. Also got built-up shoes to make me look taller. And I found a store out near the state college that sells makeup and wigs and such, so I got that stuff too. In a minute or so, I’m walkin’ into your bathroom, and when I come out I’m gonna look a mite like you — leastways at a distance. Then I’m headin’ downstairs with a satchel similar to yours, goin’ out the back door —”
“The BMW’s parked beneath a tree right by the fire exit. They’re watching it.”
“I’ll be limpin’ fast and keepin’ my head down. Then I’ll climb in that fancy vehicle of yours. Always did want me one of them German cars.” He smiled boyishly. “As the crow flies, we got ’bout six hundred miles between here and Vegas. If I take the long way around, I won’t get there ’til dark. Whereupon I drive up to the Mandalay Bay, throw my keys to the valet, and as soon as I go through the door, the wig and all goes into my satchel. Then I check in under my own name, and I stay there ’til I hear from you — or for three days, whichever comes first.”
“If you get pulled over — and it won’t be by the police — what do you do?”
“Tell the truth. Tell ’em everythin’. Even ’bout that pretty girl.”
Charlie looked warily at the donuts. Still hungry, he selected something slathered in chocolate and oozing whipped cream from the center. “Especially about that pretty girl. And make sure they know that I’m the one who paid you to drive a high-visibility BMW from here to Vegas. You’re not part of this, Mitch, you’re just a hired hand. If they understand that, they’ll probably let you off easy.”
Mitch drained his coffee. “Will do. And now…” He pulled a folded envelope from his slacks pocket. “…here’s the papers for the car I got you. Ain’t much of a car. Beat up old riceburner, actually. Most folks in this part of the world would sooner walk than be seen in a Jap car, so I got a right good price on it.”
“It’s not going any farther than the airport. By the way, I presume you had no problems chartering a private jet for me.”
“Nothin’ that wavin’ a big ol’ wad a hundred-dollar bills didn’t solve. They’s a-flyin’ in from Dallas. Be waitin’ for you at seven o’clock sharp.” He began to reach into his rear pocket. “Which reminds me, I got plenty of money left over from what you gave me yesterday.”
“Keep it.”
“Can’t do that. It’s close to two thousand dollars.”
“Put your damned wallet back in your damned pants. The money’s for you.”
Nodding, Mitch hefted the shopping bag containing his disguise and walked to the bathroom. Five minutes later, he was gone. Five minutes after that, Charlie followed.
When he returned to the room, Irina was sitting at the desk. She’d wolfed down three donuts and was working on her fourth. Charlie blackly observed that she’d polished off both remaining cups of coffee. He’d wanted a second cup for himself.
“No trouble?” she asked.
He pulled up a chair at the desk, peeked into the donut box, and decided that no power on earth could persuade him to eat another one of the things. “None. The night clerk is still on duty. He checked me out and went back to his nap.”
“Will Mitch…” Charlie noted the hesitancy in her voice. “…will he be all right?”
“Sure. Oh, they’ll be mad as hell, but that won’t change the fact that I skunked them into following the wrong man. If they stop him, I figure Mitch will walk away with no more than a bloody nose. No one’s got any reason to hurt him.”
“I hope you are correct, Charlie. He has a good heart.”
She’d stopped calling him Mr. McKenzie. Charlie rather liked that. Of course it’s only appropriate to be on a first-name basis after spending the night with me, and damn but I had trouble falling asleep….
“Charlie?”
Hell, is it showing? “What?”
“I feel badly about what I did to him. Do you feel badly about what you did to me?” Caught off guard, Charlie returned a poker-faced stare. “Showing me those photographs, taking advantage of a weakness, playing mind games — this is not so different from what I did to Mitch, I think.”
After a moment’s reflection, Charlie pursed his lips, “That’s good, Irina, in fact, it’s first-rate. If you make me feel guilty, then you’ll have the upper hand. Congratulations, you’ve scored a point.”
“You have not answered my question.”
“Two points. Now get ready to lose one. The answer is if you feel guilty, you’re in the wrong line of work. In this business, the only thing you�
��re entitled to is pride when you win and bitterness when you lose.”
“You still have not answered.”
Charlie chortled, although not happily. “Game, set, and match. Yeah, I do feel guilty. You were vulnerable. I took advantage of it. Even though it’s all part of the game, I feel like a louse. Now, are you satisfied?”
“Not really. I too feel guilty. Guilty in my heart.” She gave him a flat, emotionless look.
I loathe this job. I truly, truly do. He drew a deep breath, “If it’s any consolation to you, that confession makes you a better person than ninety-nine percent of the other guys.”
She refused to meet his eyes. “Now what? You will arrest me, and return your precious Whirlwind to its owners, I suppose?”
“Dead wrong. Make no mistake, Irina, if Whirlwind is critical to the national defense — and I suspect it is — I’m not letting you get it out of the country.” A small fire sparked in her eye. Good, Charlie thought, let’s see some spunk, girl. “On the other hand, I have no intention of bringing either it or you in until I know what it is. I’ve said this before, I’ll say it again: there’s more going on than meets the eye. They wouldn’t have brought me back from exile — and they sure as hell wouldn’t have hired Johan Schmidt — unless there’s a secret behind the secret. That second secret is the important one. If I can crack it, then I might just get what I want. If I do, if you help me, then maybe we can work something out between us.”
“I will make no deals with you, Charlie.”
No hesitation, nothing but resolution in her voice. Charlie would have been disappointed if there hadn’t been. The night before he’d mounted a full scale assault against the weakest place in her defenses. She’d fought back like a champ. The most he’d been able to accomplish was to plant a seed of self-doubt. That seed wouldn’t bloom until she started questioning her motives. And then, my dear, you belong to me. “Fair enough. Leave the deal-doing to me.” He glanced at his jeweled watch. “Look, I’m going to have to leave in a few minutes. I’d like to ask you some questions before I go.”
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