When You Can't Stop (Harper McDaniel Book 2)

by James W. Hall

  When the staff was gone and the door shut, Albion lowered the privacy shade across the glass.

  “I want a word with Naff, Ms. Bixel. You set the weights on the bar. I’ll start with a hundred pounds. I want to work on my pectorals first.”

  She nodded but kept her eyes fixed on Naff.

  “Adrian,” Albion said. “I wanted to remind you about that pickup at the airport I told you about yesterday.”

  “Yes, sir. I have Graham heading out in an hour.”

  “Graham?”

  “He’s one of our best. Big, tough, and a good driver.”

  “No, not Graham. I want you to do it yourself.”

  “Me? An airport pickup?”

  “Do you consider such a task beneath you?”

  “Well, if that’s what you want, but I do have a staff meeting at one.”

  “This is not just any airline passenger. This is a dignitary. Horst Schneider. You probably recognize the name.”

  “Can’t say I do.”

  “Olympic coach? Does that help?”

  “Not really.”

  Albion sniffed at Adrian’s ignorance.

  “Horst was the German national trainer in track and field for a dozen years. His teams won countless medals, dozens of gold.”

  “Impressive,” Adrian said, though he wasn’t particularly impressed.

  “Coach Schneider has agreed to become my personal trainer.”

  “Really? Replace Bixel?”

  “I believe I’ve moved beyond Bixel’s capabilities. I’m setting my goals ever higher.”

  “The Olympics?”

  Albion studied Naff’s expression.

  “You think this is amusing, Adrian? Worthy of mockery?”

  “I think you should have the coach you want. I’ll be happy to pick up Mr. Schneider. It will be my honor.”

  Across the room, Bixel was watching them, her head tilted in their direction to eavesdrop.

  Adrian smoothed a hand across his mouth to erase any hint of a smile. In the few years that Adrian had known the man, Albion had been working constantly to remedy his deficiencies in manliness. Handguns had been his obsession last year, now weight training. In the last few months, his runty physique had bulked up a fraction, adding maybe a few pounds of new muscle, but the man’s frame was simply too slight to carry any serious brawn. His paunch had retreated and he stood a bit straighter, but beyond that, Adrian could see little evidence the new regimen was working.

  “You know Ms. Bixel’s eldest daughter, Gerda. Am I right?”

  “I met her once,” Adrian said.

  “The man you’re picking up at the airport, Mr. Schneider, was Gerda’s Olympic coach. He helped mold her into the superior athletic specimen she is today.”

  Specimen was exactly the word Adrian would have used for Gerda. Pin her to a museum wall, labeled ATHLETICUS FREAKOID.

  “Listen to me, Adrian. I’ve given you a second chance. Don’t let it slip away.”

  “I’m not following you.”

  “You know exactly what I mean.”

  “No, sir. I’m sorry, but I don’t.”

  In the months since Albion’s shooting spree and his subsequent court case, he had not discussed with Adrian the events of that day or the days that followed. They’d kept a cool, businesslike distance, which was fine by Naff. He had no desire to be Albion’s buddy again or his manhood adviser.

  “Truly,” Albion said. “After the way you betrayed me, you should be grateful you still have a position. Don’t pretend otherwise. Last year when I most needed your backing, you were nowhere to be found.”

  “You mean the court case?”

  “I mean all of it.”

  “I believe I testified on your behalf. Gave several depositions.”

  “Yes, and what did you say? You equivocated. You quibbled over my right to defend myself against life-threatening conditions.”

  “In my opinion, no one was threatening your life,” Adrian said.

  “There it is again. Until this very day, you’re determined to test my patience.”

  “I don’t mean to do that, sir.”

  “You broke my heart, Adrian. I thought the two of us were friends. My god, how idiotic I must have seemed to you, but I really believed we’d formed a deep, personal alliance. We had a bond, or so I thought.”

  “I’m sorry I disappointed you.”

  “No, you’re not. You’d do all the same things again exactly in the same way. Don’t pretend otherwise.”

  He was right, of course. But Adrian tried to keep the fact out of his expression. Bowing his head briefly and trying for a penitent grimace.

  “I’m sorry you feel that way. I’ll do what I can to restore your confidence.”

  But Albion wanted to get in one more lick.

  “I trusted you, Adrian. I put my faith in you, believed you were the right man to guide the security apparatus of our organization while others doubted my judgment.” He flicked a glance toward Bixel.

  Adrian waited. Bixel was taking her sweet time adding ten-pound weights to the bar on the bench press.

  “Go to the airport,” he said. “Pick up Coach Schneider.”

  “Yes, sir. Happy to do it.”

  Lester Albion lay on the weight bench, extended his arms, gripped the cold steel bar, and lifted the weight from the hooks. Brought it slowly down to his chest, drew in a breath, then pushed it back to full extension. Down and up again, down and up. Expelling breath with each lift.

  Larissa Bixel stood over him, at the ready.

  When he reached ten, he settled the bar back in the hooks, lay still for a count of ten, then sat up. His chest muscles engorged, arms and shoulders flushed with blood.

  “Any ill effects from the transfusion?”

  Albion drew a deep breath.

  “I feel fine. Quite good, actually.”

  “I’m pleased to hear it.”

  Albion sat up on the bench. He ran a hand over his pectorals. Cupped them, squeezed lightly as if he were feeling a tingle of pleasure at the engorgement.

  “You’re sure you’re not offended that I’m bringing in Coach Schneider?”

  “Of course not,” Bixel said. “Shall I add more weight?”

  “Yes, let’s go up five pounds.”

  “That’s a big step.”

  Albion lay back on the bench as Bixel began adding the silver disks.

  “You know, of course, Ms. Bixel, I’m quite taken by your daughter.”

  Bixel added the final disk to the bar and tightened the locks.

  “Oh yes,” she said. “You are not the first to fall under her enchantment. For the right man, Gerda will be quite a catch.”

  Albion took a large swallow of air and spoke in a sigh.

  “Tell me the truth, Bixel, and I want complete honesty.”

  “And you shall have it.”

  He drew another deep breath and steeled himself.

  “In your opinion, am I man enough for Gerda?”

  Stretched out on the weight bench, Albion looked up at her, his lips parted, his hazel eyes beseeching her for the answer he wanted to hear.

  Larissa Bixel said, “Perhaps I should add ten more pounds. What do you think? Are you up to it?”

  ELEVEN

  Andalucía, Spain

  “I told Nick to rent the Mercedes, at least go with the 3 series Beamer, but no, he’s a frugal boy, had to take the Fiat, barely room for a couple of starving goats, much less three full-size Americanos.”

  Sal turned in his seat and looked at Harper, flicking his eyes toward Nick in the driver’s seat. Prompting her. Do something, say something, break the ice.

  Nick kept his eyes on the road, his face a mask of detachment. In the rearview mirror, Harper studied Nick’s dark, unflinching eyes.

  He hadn’t responded to Harper’s greeting. Once she was inside, the door shut, he’d pulled away from the curb in front of the dojo and wound through the alleyways, following Harper’s directions out to the highway, A
-4. Sulking or fuming, she couldn’t tell. She’d never seen her brother like this.

  Adopted from a Russian orphanage at eight years old, Nick had been a frail and bashful child when he arrived at his new home in Miami. For the next few years, Harper became his protector against the schoolyard bullies who targeted him because of his Russian accent, his girlish lashes, his slender build.

  While their mom, Deena, globe-trotted and their dad stayed late at work, Harper had prepared their meals, read him bedtime stories, snuggled with Nick as he drifted off to sleep. She’d played every role. Sister, mother, mentor.

  To stand up to Nick’s tormenters, together they devoted themselves to martial arts classes, moving up the ranks year by year until Nick mastered the fighting skills to hold his own, and his coltish body finished filling out, leaving him a formidable young man, sleek and strong and just over six feet in height. The bullies drifted away and turned on easier marks.

  Over the years, the bond between brother and sister never faltered. Never a harsh word between them. Harper, his guardian, his advocate, his confidant, sharing his struggles with adolescent love affairs and his secret longings, soothing his nightmares and his memories of the hardships he’d endured in the orphanage. She’d taught him to ride a bike, fly a kite. She’d bandaged his scuffed knees.

  With the car locked in stony silence, Nick steered them through the frenetic freeway traffic, gliding from lane to lane with effortless dexterity. In half an hour, the traffic thinned and the roadway rose onto a ridge that overlooked the central plain of Andalucía. Coppery fields of grain and grassy, cattle-grazing land, olive groves and grape vineyards. They passed through the city of Carmona, where Roman ruins were scattered along the hillside visible through the trees, highway signs pointing the way to Córdoba and the fertile lands beyond.

  Thirty minutes of rigid, unnatural silence.

  “Jesus,” Sal said. “Would you two please make up? I’m an old man. The tension in this car, it could give a guy a myocardial heart attack, you two would never forgive yourselves, your old granddad pushed over the edge by brooding youngsters.”

  When Nick didn’t respond, Harper leaned forward and said, “I’m sorry, Nick. It was cruel to disappear like that. Not stay in touch.”

  “Why’d you do it?” Nick’s voice was nearly inaudible. His lips barely moved, eyes fixed on the road ahead.

  Harper was trying to frame her response when Sal piped up.

  “I’ll tell you what Lavonne said. Harper was trying to protect us, Nicky. Keep us in the dark because she thought the situation was too risky, the shit she’s into now. Personally, I find that severely discourteous, considering the above-and-beyond help we gave her last winter. The risks we took, you and me, Nicky.

  “So is Lavonne right, Harper? You were trying to protect us, didn’t think we were up to the job, this strong resourceful young man, and your old granddad, one foot in the grave already, I could die, who’d even care?”

  “It’s my fight,” she said. “It’s not fair to drag you two into it again.”

  Sal swiveled in his seat, gave her his full attention.

  “Lavonne says this olive-oil thing, it’s how you’re trying to get to Albion.”

  Harper nodded.

  “From what I’ve seen, the guy’s untouchable. That corporation of his, it’s a fortress, and the fucking Swiss courts, they’re not going to help you bring him down.”

  “Nobody’s untouchable.”

  “So what is it, butt your head against a multinational conglomerate, like what, the rest of your life? Your mission forever? Give up your career in photography, be a one-woman vigilante?”

  “Nobody said I was giving up anything.”

  “Hey, believe me, I get it, the revenge thing is potent stuff. You come down with a bad case, it keeps you running in high gear for years. I know firsthand. And sure, the shitty way you lost Ross and Leo, that sweet beautiful kid, yeah, that was as bad as it gets, like losing a major organ. But you can’t spend the rest of your time on earth getting even with some goddamn corporation.”

  “Can’t I?”

  Sal shut his eyes, shook his head. Getting nowhere.

  She said, “Anyway, I’m not going after the corporation, just Albion.”

  “It’ll be thugs coming for you, not Albion.”

  “I know that, Sal. I’m ready for them.”

  “Are you?” Sal said. “’Cause thugs, they’re bowling pins—knock ’em down, new ones pop back up before your ball rolls back to you.”

  “I’ll see about that.”

  “Don’t you ever just want to go home, live a normal life?”

  Harper looked out the side window at the golden countryside.

  “My home was burned down.”

  “That was your house. I’m talking about Miami, place you were born, grew up, went to school, got married, had a baby boy. Where your brother and your granddad still roost. That place. Your home.”

  “All that’s over.”

  “So now you live on the road? A nonstop string of hotel rooms? That’s what you’re looking forward to?”

  “What do you want from me, Sal? I’m supposed to go back to Miami and do what? Come over to your condo every Sunday, grill burgers and listen to you reminisce about the good old mafia days?”

  Sal shut his lips hard, looked to the side as if he’d been slapped.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “That was stupid.”

  Sal managed a quiet smile of forgiveness.

  “No need to apologize. From where I’m standing, yeah, grilling and reminiscing wouldn’t be bad. A lot I don’t know about my granddaughter. Someday I’d like to catch up.”

  “Maybe someday, Sal, but not anytime soon.”

  “I want you to be happy is all. Just you being happy. That room back there, place you were living, it was a depressing shithole. You’ve gotten stronger, sure. Muscles and all that. But I can take one look at you, see you’re not happy. Not a bit happy.”

  “Happy isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”

  “Yeah, yeah, it isn’t everything. But what you’re doing now, you’re bitter. On a revenge binge. Burning up inside. That to me is not a healthy way to be. That’s the kind of poison, you keep sipping long enough, I don’t know anybody can survive a steady diet of that.”

  “You’re a therapist now?”

  Sal smiled to himself, his eyes swimming out of focus.

  She drew a deep breath. He was right, of course. Right about all of it. But none of it mattered. She couldn’t stop, couldn’t give up until this was finished. Till Albion was finished.

  “About this woman who’s following you . . .” Nick said.

  “Name’s Gerda Bixel,” said Sal.

  Nick shot a look at Harper in the rearview.

  “What about her?” she said.

  “So they’ve been watching you, the Albion people.”

  “Apparently, yes. I should’ve spotted her, but I didn’t.”

  “What did Gerda see? What could she have learned, all that time tailing you?”

  “Not much,” Harper said. “I shopped for food, stayed in the hotel mainly.”

  “You went to that library,” Sal said. “Every day at one o’clock, stayed all afternoon.”

  “Yes.”

  “Doing what?” Nick said.

  “Researching the olive-oil business, looking for an angle, some way to get to Albion.”

  “And did you find anything?”

  Harper sighed and looked out her window at the rolling hills. With every response she was allowing them deeper into her mission.

  Nick said, “Where are we going? Where are you taking us?”

  “Somebody I need to meet, somebody that could be helpful.”

  Nick asked who this person was, watching her in the mirror.

  Harper shook her head, not yet.

  Sal said, “Your library research, did it turn up anything?”

  “I know there’s a lot of money being made in phony extra-vi
rgin olive oil. Italian mob’s involved.”

  “Mafia guys love olive oil,” Sal said. “It’s how Corleone got his start, remember, used the business as a front for all the criminal shit he was into.”

  Nick glanced over at Sal. “You know that’s fiction, right? A novel, a movie.”

  “I know what I know,” Sal said.

  Nick spoke over his shoulder: “Is Albion making counterfeit oil?”

  “I don’t know. That’s what I intend to find out.”

  “Seems like small potatoes,” Sal said. “A million here, million there.”

  “Unless there’s more at stake than money.”

  “You got something in mind?”

  Harper shrugged. “Not yet.”

  Nick’s shoulders stiffened. His eyes clicked to the rearview.

  “Don’t anybody turn around,” he said. “But two cars back I believe there’s a baby-blue Peugeot on our tail.”

  Sal slanted his head to the right and peered into the outside mirror.

  “Well, well,” Sal said. “Looks like Gerda, and she’s got company. Somebody riding shotgun.”

  Nick held Harper’s eyes in the mirror.

  “Your call, Harper. Tell me what you want to do.”

  TWELVE

  Andalucía, Spain

  A damn chicken was loose in the rear seat, and Gerda, her hands tight on the steering wheel, could do nothing about it. The chicken was flapping around, turning crazy circles on the grandmother’s lap. In the rearview mirror, Gerda saw the grandmother was still alive, chest rising and falling, but her face was white and her eyes had rolled back. Either a stroke or she’d passed out. Couldn’t take the excitement.

  Holding her place two cars back, Gerda watched as the white Fiat slid into the fast lane and began to speed up. Inevitable. They’d spotted her and were making a run.

  In the passenger seat beside Gerda, the gray-haired woman was dead. It had taken three chops to her throat to stop her screaming. Rail thin, the woman was in her fifties. Looked like the daughter of the granny in the back. Gray Hair wasn’t wearing her seat belt, so each time Gerda adjusted the wheel, the woman rocked against the passenger window or tilted far to her left, about to topple onto Gerda.