by Gene Riehl
She was up in an instant, her eyes searching for the Beretta, but she heard the knob turning on Kwon Jong’s door before she had a chance to start for the pistol. She grabbed for her shoulder bag on the floor instead, managed to pull out her knife just as the door swung open and the second bodyguard stepped into the doorway. Sung Kim brought the stiletto up hard. The point of the blade struck just below his sternum and traveled from there directly into his heart. He frowned for an instant before falling. Sung Kim stepped up close, left the knife in him as she caught his body and pushed it back into the room.
She had to hurry now. She hadn’t made enough noise to bring anyone out into the hall, but that didn’t mean one of the guests hadn’t called hotel security. Or that Kwon himself hadn’t loaded up a shotgun and was now lying in wait for her inside the suite.
She darted back into the hallway and scooped up the Beretta before returning to the doorway. Holding the weapon with two hands, she stepped through. The living room of the suite was deserted. She glanced at the couch and chairs, at the computer work station near the glass doors out to the balcony, then to her right. Through the open door she saw a bedroom. She crept through the door and swept the room with the Beretta. It was empty. She retreated through the door and stepped across the living room to the closed door on the left side of the suite. She paused outside the door for an instant, then turned the knob and burst through.
Kwon Jong sat upright on the king-size bed. He was wearing a white hotel bathrobe and holding a small revolver. His hands trembled as he tried to train the weapon on her. Sung Kim swung the Beretta into place and fired. The silenced pistol coughed quietly. Kwon’s round face was expressionless, as a crimson-black hole appeared in the center of his forehead.
ONE
WASHINGTON, D.C.
THE PRESENT
In her rented Lincoln Navigator, the massive black SUV that allowed her to see over traffic, it wasn’t difficult for Sung Kim to follow Lyman Davidson from his three-story house in Kalorama Heights to the O’Bannon Gallery on Thomas Jefferson Street in Georgetown.
She watched him leave his silver Mercedes coupe with the gallery’s parking valet, before she tailed the valet half a block down the street to the pay lot the O’Bannon was using for the opening of the Bourney exhibit. Satisfied the Mercedes would be there when she returned, Sung Kim drove up to M Street, turned right, and parked in the first lot she came to. She switched off the engine and sat for a moment, uneasy with the nagging sensation that something wasn’t right.
The steady beat of her pulse was too slow, for one thing, and her breathing was far too regular. Had she been doing this too long? After eight years, had her work become too routine? She forced herself to picture what Pyongyang would do if she botched this job. The images made her shudder, but they did the trick. Now her palms were moist, her breathing quicker and shallower, as she slipped out of the SUV, grabbed her canvas book bag, and started back toward the Mercedes.
The overcast sky had brought some serious humidity, and she was sweating by the time she got to the rear of the valet lot. She stood for a moment on the narrow sidewalk, under the canopy of a dogwood still heavy with summer foliage, waiting for her chance. In her sleeveless gray Georgetown University sweatshirt, blue jeans, and Reeboks—with her shoulder-length blond wig tied back in a ponytail—she looked exactly like the all-American girl she’d been trained to become. Like Gidget, Sung Kim couldn’t help thinking. Like the girl in the old movies she and her parents used to watch in Pyongyang. The thought of her dead parents still brought an ache to the back of her throat and made her even more anxious to get to the work that would continue to avenge them.
As she watched the parking lot, the same dark-haired valet who’d delivered Davidson’s car pulled in with a white Mazda sedan. When he sprinted back toward the gallery, she hurried to the Mercedes. She dropped to the ground behind the right front tire and pulled her book bag with her as she slid underneath and went to work. Three minutes later she was finished. She listened as one of the valets brought another car, and waited until the running footsteps receded before zipping out from under the Mercedes and hustling back toward M Street.
At her Navigator, Sung Kim opened the heavy rear door, climbed in, and closed it behind her. The black tint on the windows made it impossible for anyone to see in. She sat on the carpeted floor and wriggled out of her jeans before pulling the sweatshirt over her head. In her black panties and bra, she reached for her makeup kit, a leather-covered carryall that opened like a fisherman’s tackle box. Now she had to risk turning on a light. She toggled a switch in the lid to illuminate the built-in mirror. Tugging at her blond wig, Sung Kim pulled it away from the custom-made skullcap covering her real hair. She blinked at her image in the mirror. No matter how often she did this, the sight of herself completely bald never failed to startle her.
Next she grabbed a new applicator pad and a round container of L’Oréal True Match No. 6, the darkest shade she could risk without calling attention to herself. She used the makeup on her face and neck, then lightly on her arms. For her eyes she applied black mascara on the lashes, black eyebrow pencil to darken her brows, and a thin streak of liner to make her eyes look bigger. She used a crimson shade of volumizing lipstick with an added collagen complex that thickened her lips and changed the entire look of her face.
From the bottom of the makeup kit, she brought out a single strand of pearls and fastened it around her neck. Back into the kit, she retrieved her panty hose and a pair of open-toed Isaac Mizrahi pumps with three-inch heels, half price at Nordie’s the same day she’d bought the dress.
Sung Kim had to work a little harder as she slithered into the panty hose, before slipping her shoes on and rising into a kneeling position. She reached for the garment bag hanging on the hook over the window to her right, withdrew the dress she’d bought for the mission: a killer black sheath that accentuated the length and shape of her legs. She pulled the dress over her skullcapped head, tugged it down until the hem settled into place a few inches above her knees.
Careful not to damage her panty hose, she knee-walked to the front passenger seat and picked up the jet-black wig she’d chosen for tonight. She slid into the seat, where she used the mirror in the back of the sun visor to put on the wig, making sure the double-sided tape on her skullcap kept it in place. From a midsize white leather purse lying on the console between the seats she pulled a brush, then used it to smooth the short straight black hair that extended to her jaw line, as well as the razor-edged bangs that extended down her forehead.
Back into the purse, she grabbed her contact lens case. Using the mirror, she put the lenses on her eyes, then stared in the mirror to check on how she’d done. She saw that Gidget had disappeared. In her place was Sarah Freed, a dark-eyed woman as beautiful as an Egyptian princess. As beautiful as a princess on her way to meet the pharoah.
A few minutes later—her Navigator safely in the hands of a parking valet—Sung Kim stepped through the double doors of the O’Bannon Gallery and looked around the narrow room until she saw Lyman Davidson. According to Thomas Franklin, the lean and immaculately suited multimillionaire with shaggy dark hair and suggestive brown eyes was a leg man. In her high heels and above-the-knee sheath, she would give him exactly what he wanted to see.
She ignored him to stroll among the thirty or so people in the room, pausing to pluck a glass of Chardonnay from the tray of a passing waiter before moving to the wall farthest from where she saw Davidson inspecting one of the larger of the Bourneys. She pretended to study the painting in front of her, shifting her weight from hip to hip, sensing his eyes on her. She turned suddenly and saw that she’d been right. He started to smile, but she swung back to the painting. Davidson was a sophisticated man. To be blatant with him would be a mistake.
Half a minute later she crossed the room. Those movie-star eyes were still watching her, Sung Kim noticed, so she tossed her hair just enough to make it swirl, and caught him staring again. This time she wa
s the one who smiled as she made her way toward the painting he was examining. A moment later she was standing next to him, giving him a chance to smell the woodsy fragrance of her Paloma Picasso perfume before she leaned in to take a closer look at the small white card next to the picture.
Museum, the painting was titled. Under the title was the name Hanson Bourney, and the year 2001. The picture—about two feet by three feet—showed a young woman sitting on a bench in the center of a room, the walls of which were covered with paintings. Beyond the woman were shadowy figures of people staring into the room in which she sat. Sung Kim shifted her weight until one bare shoulder was touching Davidson’s arm. He turned to her.
“So what do you think?” he said. “Does Bourney have a future?”
“Not with this one. It’s too derivative.” She looked at him. “He should have spent less time studying Hopper and more learning how to do his own work.”
“Ouch.” Davidson paused. “But couldn’t you say the same thing about Hopper himself? He was hardly original either … Few painters are. Last time I checked, he didn’t have a patent on urban realism.”
“I’m not talking about the realism. I’m talking about what Hopper called the ‘decay,’ the destruction of perception by painting a picture of it.”
Suddenly Davidson was looking at her differently. His heavy-lidded eyes stopped glancing at her boobs and stayed fixed on her face.
“Hopper’s way of dealing with the decay,” she continued, “was to add story elements to make up for it.” She turned to the picture. “At first glance the woman seems to be enjoying the museum. Then we notice the figures behind her, staring in at her, and we see that to them she’s just another part of the exhibit. Hopper did the same thing in 1927 with Automat. A woman at a table drinking a cup of coffee, a window in the background. It becomes clear that she’s just as packaged at her table in front of the window as the food behind the little windows of the automat. But the decay of first-hand perception is neutralized by our interest in Hopper’s story … the woman’s story.” Sung Kim glanced at Davidson. “It’s a good technique to emulate, but it’s still a rip-off.”
Davidson looked at the painting again, then at Sung Kim. “I know the Hopper you’re talking about. I think you may be right.” He smiled. “You talk like a teacher, or a collector.”
“Close. I was married to a collector.”
He smiled again, his brown eyes on her brown contacts. “I’m a collector myself.”
“That’s a shame.” She added just a trace of teasing in her voice. “One art collector per lifetime is my motto.”
“But we can still be friends, I hope.”
“I don’t know about that.” She shook her head playfully. “I already have quite a few.”
He grinned. “You’re not making this easy for me.”
“You don’t look like the kind of man who needs much help.”
“I didn’t think so either, but I have the feeling I could use some now.” He looked toward the door, then back at her. “Tell you what. Let me buy you a drink. We can walk down the street and still make it back here to catch the rest of the exhibit.”
“Ordinarily, I’d love to do that … but not tonight.”
He frowned. “I caught you looking in my direction. A couple of times. Did I read that the wrong way?”
“Not at all. It’s just that I came here straight from the office, and I’m exhausted. The only thing I want to do is look around and go home.”
He nodded. “I can certainly relate to that … but if you change your mind, I’ll be around for another hour.”
Sung Kim smiled. “You’ll be the first to know,” she said, then turned and walked away.
But Davidson didn’t wait an hour.
Thirty-two minutes after she’d walked away from him, Sung Kim saw him heading out the door.
She followed him as far as the gallery’s front window, where she watched him give the valet his ticket. The young man sprinted off toward the parking lot as she moved closer to the double front doors. Five minutes passed. The second of the two valets went for a car and was back with it in two minutes. Now Davidson was looking at his watch and beginning to pace. Another three minutes went by before Davidson’s valet came running back. Sung Kim stepped through the doors as the young man pulled up, out of breath.
“Sorry, sir,” he told Davidson, “but I can’t start your car.”
“Impossible,” Davidson said. “Damned thing’s brand-new.”
“Gotta be the battery, but I’ve never seen one so dead. I couldn’t even get a sound. No clicking, no grinding, nothing.”
Davidson looked around, saw Sung Kim and shook his head. “Hundred and ten grand for a car and it won’t even start.”
Sung Kim handed her ticket to the valet, who ran off into the darkness.
“Where do you live?” she asked Davidson.
“Not far. Kalorama Heights. I’ll grab a cab and take care of my car tomorrow.”
“Kalorama? I’m going that way myself. I’d be happy to drop you off.”
His eyes brightened. “Thank God for dead batteries.”
She smiled. “Be careful what you pray for.”
There was a moment of silence, the two of them looking at each other, before Sung Kim’s Navigator pulled up. She walked around the car and gave the valet a five-dollar bill. He held the door open while she slid behind the wheel. By the time she got there, Lyman Davidson was already in the passenger seat.
Half an hour later they pulled up in front of Davidson’s house, a three-story Federal-style brick mansion just off Massachusetts Avenue in Kalorama Heights, with a balcony over the front door and creamy white woodwork around the windows.
“Won’t you come in for a drink, Sarah?” he asked. “It’s the least I can do to reward you for your kindness.”
She shook her head. “It’s kind of you to offer, but I’ve had a long day. Perhaps another time.”
“What if I confess I have an ulterior motive? You know a lot about art. I buy a lot of it. I’d really like to know what you think of my latest purchase.”
Sung Kim smiled. “You want to show me your etchings?”
He used his index finger to make an X across his chest. “No etchings, I promise. And no ham-fisted passes either, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
She reached out and touched his hand. “I’m not trying to be rude, but I really am exhausted.”
He glanced toward his house, then looked at her again. “Well, if I can’t thank you with a drink, or lure you inside with my new paintings, I guess I’ll just say good night.”
Sung Kim held out her hand. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Lyman,” she said. “Perhaps we’ll run into one another again.”
His smile was forced. “I suppose it could happen.”
He opened the door and got out, closed it, and started up the brick walkway toward the house. Sung Kim let him get a full twenty feet away before she zipped down the passenger window.
“Lyman,” she called. “Hold on a second.”
TWO
After their second Courvoisier, Sung Kim decided he was ready.
“Okay,” she told him, as they sat together in upholstered chairs across from his unlit fireplace in the living room. “Let’s go see what you bought.”
Davidson nodded, then held up his nearly empty glass. “Let’s refresh these first. We can take them along.”
Sung Kim smiled. “I never say no to Courvoisier.”
He reached for the bottle on the small round table between the chairs and refilled their glasses. She uncrossed her legs so that her dress rode up her thighs, then rose from the chair, glass in one hand and white purse in the other. Davidson took his eyes off her legs and looked at the purse.
“You can leave that here,” he said. “The house is locked up tight … and my housekeeper has been with me for twenty years.”
Sung Kim shook her head. “A lady doesn’t go anywhere without her purse, Lyman, surely you know
that.” She paused. “I would have thought your housekeeper would greet you when you come home.” As good a way as any to verify what Sung Kim had been told, that it was the housekeeper’s night off.
“We have a deal. She doesn’t bug me for a big-screen TV, and I let her watch her favorite nighttime shows in peace.”
Sung Kim nodded, but he hadn’t really answered her question. She reached out and took his arm. Davidson turned and led the way out of the living room, then to his left down a wide corridor. They passed two open doorways on the right. Sitting rooms, with expensive furnishings and mostly-red Persian carpets. Davidson stopped at the next open doorway, this one on their left. He went through and she followed him into a library with a fifteen-foot ceiling and book-filled shelves lining two of the walls. The other two walls were filled with paintings. Sung Kim’s eyes ranged across the collection—many landscapes—and nodded her approval. The man knew how to collect.
Davidson led her past leather couches and chairs to the library’s back wall. On the gleaming maple floor, leaning against the wall, stood three oil paintings.
