by Bob Mayer
Neeley frowned. “Good question. Why would Nero do that?”
“I don’t know yet,” Hannah said, “but before this is over, I think we need to find out.” She nodded. “Let’s do lunch.”
Neeley agreed to a quick lunch but had to add: "I wonder what's at that address?"
Hannah pulled Gant's message from her waistband, the only place she could stick it during her frantic search for a pocket. "By the way, I know what you did."
"What do you mean?"
"Don't be coy, Neeley. It's not a good look for you. I know that you set me up to dig through my clothes so that man would think I had a gun. What if he'd shot me?"
"With the silencer and the locked breach I knew he had to work the slide to chamber a second round. I knew I'd have time. I threw the rock to screw up his aim on the first shot."
Hannah pushed her fading blond hair away from her face, careful not to disturb the stinging slice there. "Well, I think that's a little presumptuous. What if you'd been wrong or he hadn't been distracted?"
"You'd be dead." Neeley started the car and leaned back to check traffic. Neeley pulled the small car smoothly into the heavy traffic. "I want to go to that address before we leave. If we're lucky, we have a few hours before they find us and we can't stay in public places forever. Eventually the public goes home. We need to be in the air before nightfall."
"Neeley," Hannah said, "if we only have a few hours, don't you think we should leave France now? Getting that tape is our only chance, not running off on some goose-chase, no pun intended."
Neeley remained silent and Hannah knew it was hopeless. Hannah also had a very good idea what was at that address and she was surprised Neeley didn’t. But she kept her peace, not wanting to ruin the upcoming meal. The lunch traffic was so chaotic that Hannah soon forgot her complex thoughts and concentrated on learning and using the obscene gestures directed toward them by the irritated French drivers.
***************
The pungent odor of flowers made Racine want to gag. His nose had always been sensitive and what others found sweet he found cloying and vaguely frightening.
He hated parks and this one was the worst. Fucking traffic getting here was a nightmare and it seemed that once again he had lost the bitches. He was definitely grateful that he wouldn't have to contact Nero with more bad news. This time he knew where the women were going thanks to his directional mike and their big mouths.
Racine was chewing on a piece of French bread, a long, thin baguette. A small piece of the crusty loaf fell to the ground. Racine snarled as a squirrel darted across the grassy expanse and poked at the bread. These park squirrels were pretty daring and it only scampered off when Racine's foot swooshed the air alongside its quivering tail.
He looked around and caught a few looks of disdain. A good time for a tower and a sniper rifle. He was muttering as he tossed the remaining bread into the lake. Let the rodent work for it.
As he sauntered off, he tried to steady his anger with two thoughts: Nero didn't know he was in Strasbourg and the two bitches were having their last day. Screw the tape. Nero needed another tape like Congress needed another asshole. Fucker probably had the entire 20th Century on tape or that dotted paper he was always running his fingers over. Besides, this was personal now. Racine had only to think of Kansas City and his guts would twist until he thought he could kill with just the pure energy of his hate.
Racine's car was on the other side of the park but he was in no hurry. His directional mike had picked up the women's conversation clearly. Going to lunch, he thought. Maybe they'd do a little shopping again. Women. Never would a woman be a true professional.
He worked his way through the park, backtracking the women, and discovered the body of the man they'd killed. Racine stared at the corpse. He’d never seen him before, but that didn’t rule out the Cellar employing him.
He checked the body and noticed the close range death shot. Had to be Neeley. The matted brains from the knock on the head he gave to the blond. A bloody mess she was. Bash in some guy's brains and want to eat. That was sick for a civilian. Yes, Racine decided, as he continued to his car, that woman was very sick for a civilian. He couldn't wait to kill her.
CHAPTER 26
Lunch was pretty much symbolic as neither woman could muster up much of an appetite. Neeley toyed with the fruit tart on her plate and tried to get past all that had happened in the park.
“Who do you think the man was?” she asked Hannah.
“I don’t know,” Hannah admitted, her thoughts elsewhere.
“If he was from the Cellar why didn’t they stop us in Atlanta? Or have someone waiting when we got off the plane?”
“Good questions,” Hannah said. “I need more data before I can give you an answer.”
“’More data’?”
“More information,” Hannah said. “We’re behind on the old information curve here.”
“’Information curve’?”
Hannah stared at Neeley. "Do you have a problem with me? I’m doing the best I can.”
Neeley backtracked. "I'm sorry. Let's not get into anything right now or right here.”
"No, Neeley, I've listened to your story and while parts of it horrify and even anger me, it is not what I see in front of me now. And I don’t know for sure what you see in me but I don’t think you know enough. Everything in your past put you in a place where you chose to save my life. So it couldn’t have been all bad."
Neeley put her napkin on the table. "We need to go."
"No." The retort was harsh enough that Neeley dropped obediently back onto her chair.
Hannah's voice was cold. "I have a story to tell, too. One I've never told before because my first foster parents warned me that no good could come from anyone knowing my past. They were simple, ignorant people who didn't know any better, but I was an obedient child who became an obedient adult.
"In the past few days I've realized my entire life has been dominated by only one desire: I wanted no shit in my life. That was important to me because as a young child, shit was all there was. Well, given the fact that we just killed some man over a piece of paper, I would say I now have plenty of shit in my life, so the old rules don't apply anymore."
Hannah's words were coming out steady and the tone brooked no interruption. "My parents didn't die in a simple car crash even though I've told the lie so often that it seems more real to me than the truth.
"I was six the night my parents died. My mother woke me up to go the sheriff's office to pick up my father. He was drunk as usual and he had been arrested in a bar fight. My only real memory of her is the smell of her cream and the varying hue of her bruises. I guess she was pretty hopeless. She had no one but my father.
"That night I sat in the backseat in my cotton nightie and asked him what had happened. He reached back and slapped me so hard my head hit the side window. Then he passed out and my mother started the drive home.
"We drove for a long time, much longer than it should have taken. She talked, but my head hurt and I didn't understand a lot of what she said. I finally fell asleep and I don't know what happened to my mother's mind then. When I awoke, it was to a huge thundering noise and a glaring light.
"I sat up and shouted for my Momma and she turned and grabbed my hand and held me. The noise was so loud I couldn't hear her at first and then she shouted 'Forgive me' and her hand was torn out of mine.”
Neeley was perfectly still listening to Hannah’s quiet voice. The noise of the restaurant had faded to a distant murmur.
"That was all I remembered,” Hannah continued. "In the hospital everyone whispered dreadful accident and what a miracle for such a small child to survive. But I knew my mother was waiting for the train and the only accident was that the car had sheared in half rather than crumpling into a pile of jagged metal. I was barely injured. My parents were destroyed."
Neeley stared at Hannah, not quite wanting to believe her but knowing it was true. "Oh my God, Hannah. Why didn't yo
u tell me this before?"
"Because now you'll understand the end of the story. Nothing from that night, the train, the hospital, nothing was as bad as months later when I tried to explain to my first foster mother what had happened. The look on her face when I told her of my mother's holding me in that car was terrible. That was the worst.
"I swore that no one would ever look on me with such appalled pity again. But we both know that was an empty promise."
“Why would I know that?"
Hannah signaled the waiter for the check. "Because you've been motivated by pity since you first discovered what a sham my marriage and my life were and how screwed I was that John had left me in the hole he did."
Neeley held up a hand in protest. "I never meant that. I think you've been incredibly strong and I wouldn't have made it without your help. I don't pity you."
Hannah put a fistful of francs on the table with the careless American gesture that signals your money means nothing to me. "I didn't say you pitied me. I said you were motivated by pity. The pity is for you. Really it's for the you in that airport holding a bomb and knowing Jean-Philippe didn't give a shit about you."
Hannah wasn’t done. “I learned some things over the years from those women you listened to at the golf course-- my bitch brigade. I bet you ten-to-one your Jean-Philippe could hand you that bomb and kiss you good-bye because he had someone else ready and waiting to take your place. That’s the way men are.”
Neeley's hands were clenching into fists and she dropped them into her lap as if they were untrustworthy and could at any moment cause her acute embarrassment. "Why did you tell me your story now?"
Hannah pushed her friend into the beautiful spring afternoon. "Because I know betrayal too. But I know something you don't. Sometimes betrayal is the only love left. Remember that."
CHAPTER 27
Strasbourg was an amazing city, fascinating enough to cause some of bad emotions of recent events to fade as the two women drove through it. Neeley was reminded again and again of its magnificence as she and Hannah searched for the Rue d'Adelshoffen. It was in a part of the city, Schiltigheim, she was not familiar with, being far north of the suburb where she and Jean-Philippe had lived before they moved to Berlin. After they left the restaurant, she had driven down a street just a few blocks from the Parc Orangerie. She passed the large apartment where she had spent so many wonderful summers bathed in her grandparents' adoration. Neeley had been devastated by their deaths, but at least they had not lived long enough to watch her destroy her life with Jean-Philippe.
Hannah consulted the map and groaned hopelessly at the maze of canals and bridges that made up the city. Finally she gave up and assumed the air of tourist. She took in the old center of the city with admiration. The towering cathedral and the four hundred year old houses met with her approval as did the endless blooming flowers hanging from every window and adorning every pot.
She thought of the austere Kansas countryside that had been her birthright, the endless miles of nothing and wondered about Neeley even more.
"How could you grow up here and become caught up with Jean-Philippe?"
"Remember, I only spent summers here until I graduated high school. The rest of the time, I was caught in the happy bosom of my family in the Bronx."
Hannah craned her neck to catch a glimpse of the Kammerzell House built in 1467, one of the oldest houses in Europe. The narrow streets were clogged with traffic and pedestrians so their progress was slowed considerably.
"Tell me about your mother."
Neeley momentarily gave up maneuvering the small car through even smaller breaks in the traffic. She leaned back and thought about an answer. "My mother lived her entire life waiting for my father to have a good mood. Eventually she got tired of waiting and she tried to make him have one. She pretty much became an extension of him, a parasite to his emotion. Mostly I just remember a lot of tension and manipulation. It was like something was always about to happen, but never did. My mother just wanted him to be happy no matter what."
Hannah whistled. "Polar opposite of my mom, eh? I find it fascinating how different people are. Look at us: nothing in common, yet look how great we get along."
Neeley saw an opening for one of the small canal bridges and went for it. "We have to get along great. The same people are trying to kill us."
"Well, yeah, that may be what brought us together but you have to admit our personalities mesh well. You could have dumped me along the way, tossed me to the wind so to speak, but you've stayed with me and protected me."
"Oh, my God, not this again. Hannah, your personality would mesh with anyone's. You're the universal donor of relationships, but hey, I'm not complaining."
"Neeley, do you have any idea where you're going, or better yet, why we're going there?" Hannah was watching her partner closely.
"I'm just following the note. It was from Gant, so I know it's important. Gant obviously wanted me to go there. I just don't know why. Maybe it’s the mysterious third piece that Racine thought I had."
“The third piece,” Hannah mused. “You said Gant wrote it was the ‘why’ in his note?”
“Yes.”
“What do you think that means given we have the what—the pipeline deal; and the who—Senator Collins and Bin Laden?”
“I don’t know,” Neeley admitted.
“I think the why takes this whole thing to another level,” Hannah said.
“What level is that?” It was indicative of the new nature of their relationship that Neeley’s question was straightforward.
“That the who and the what is only the tip of the iceberg,” Hannah said. “The why is the bulk that’s hidden from sight right now.”
“Well let’s not be the Titanic,” Neeley muttered as she pulled the car to the curb in front of an ultra-modern office building. The building appeared out of place amid the ancient city, but Neeley had to admire its clean, elegant lines as being aesthetically pleasing.
A small sign on the door front advertised the building as the offices of Doctor Bernard Wiss and if Neeley's French was a match for the complicated medical lexicon, then Doctor Wiss was a straightener of teeth; the proverbial orthodontist. The two women entered the lobby and approached the receptionist area, which was empty of customers.
"Are there any other practitioners in this building in addition to Doctor Wiss?" Neeley's French was not as succinct as she would have liked.
The young woman looked up from her computer screen and shook her head in the negative.
"May we see Doctor Wiss then?"
The girl, whose plump breast proclaimed 'Gaby' on a plastic smile of a nametag shook her head. "It is our day to do paperwork. The doctor does not see patients today."
"I need to see the doctor." Neeley and Hannah's perfectly straight teeth seemed to belie any medical emergency.
"I am sorry but--"
Neeley finally gave up on the respectful strategy and reached across the perky red and white counter to grab a handful of Gaby's shirt.
Hannah noticed that Neeley's French sounded much better when it contained the element of threat. "Get the doctor, now!"
Gaby was evidently not paid enough to serve as bouncer because she quickly used the phone to do as she was told.
Hannah was worried about their presence in the office. It certainly didn't look like the kind of place Gant would send Neeley. Maybe it was a mistake, maybe the address was wrong or there had been some move or change that Gant didn't anticipate. All Hannah knew was that Neeley was acting stranger than normal. Her aggressive behavior with the receptionist was to be noted as well at the loaded pistol in her jacket pocket. Ultimately, Hannah hoped she was wrong about why they were here.
The door to the inner office opened abruptly and a very handsome man appeared. He looked at the receptionist with some irritation and it was obvious that his French was about the sudden interruption. Gaby merely shrugged her shoulders and pointed at the two troublemakers.
Later, Hanna
h would remember that the irritated orthodontist appeared to swoon. Just like in one of those British costume dramas. Except it looked ridiculous happening to a man over six feet in a white smock.
Hannah wasn’t surprised by the change in Neeley. She quite literally energized, as if she had grabbed a live wire and popped it in her ear. The roots of her hair crackled with an energy that seemed to bolt right through to her toes. Her hand was fumbling for the gun she’d taken from the man in the park and that was what dragged Hannah's attention from Doctor Wiss.
"What are you doing?" Hannah's voice was louder than a whisper.
Doctor Wiss swiftly turned and slammed the door behind him. Neeley was already after him.
Hannah was right behind her. "Jean-Philippe, oui?"
Neeley had the doorknob in her hand, ready to blow it off the door if there were resistance. There wasn't and she and Hannah were chasing the white-coated figure down a hallway.
Neeley was cursing under her breath. Hannah was more fascinated with Neeley's demeanor then the sudden appearance of Jean-Philippe, which she had suspected would be the case.
So much for cold and calculating. At the moment Neeley looked like the model for female rage. Neeley reached the door at the end of the hallway as it shut in her face. She didn't even pause. She slammed her foot into it and the jam splintered. And then the three were in a small room cluttered with clay impressions of heads and crooked teeth and piles of wicked looking metal appliances.
Jean-Philippe's voice was magical and lilting. Hannah had no idea what he was saying, but the tone and hand gestures seemed to be saying, 'please don't kill me.'
Neeley's answer was rapid-fire and caustic, so much so that Hannah waited for the red stain to form somewhere on the white-coated chest.
Hannah was sorely regretting taking Spanish in high school when Neeley abruptly switched to English. It seemed that her level of anger had forced her frontal lobe to revert to its native tongue. Jean-Philippe followed suit with that marvelous French accent that sounded so sexy. Hannah looked at this man who had so affected her friend's life and could well imagine how things had happened. Hannah stared at his blatant good looks and thought she might have carried a bomb for him too when she was 19.
