“I am the royal family’s chef, and today I can use every hand I can get.” She looked at her watch. “We don’t have much time. The mise en place is already well underway and, as always, we are going to be extremely pressed for time.”
She waved to the waiter and he signaled back that Eloisa did not need to pay for her breakfast. Hellen and Cloutard were still confused. Eloisa had already stood up and was preparing to leave. Cloutard had to smile, because although Eloisa was now standing, she was at eye level with him—she stood no higher than four-foot-six.
“Well, what are you waiting for? Do you want a special invitation? I’m slipping you in as catering staff. For the next few hours, you will help me. And I hope you’re not complete nincompoops!” Hellen and Cloutard both looked at her in horrified surprise. “Once the dinner is running nicely, you can do whatever you want.”
Eloisa was already stalking along Avenida el Cid toward the Alcázar. Hellen and Cloutard had to move fast to catch up with her.
“How is it possible for someone with such short legs to walk so fast?” Cloutard asked, panting. Eloisa was setting a very good pace.
“You’ll help in the kitchen,” Eloisa said to Hellen. “And you look like a waiter. I’ll need you in the banquet hall.”
Affronted, Cloutard glared at the little dictator, but he dared not contradict her. They walked through the staff entrance and were inside the medieval walls of the Alcázar.
41
An office in a secret prison complex, New Mexico, USA
Shelley could not get the images out of her head: pictures of her son, Dylan, bound and gagged, staring despairingly into the camera, his eyes red from crying. No matter what she tried, the images were burned into her mind.
She would do anything to get him back. Anything.
So she had not hesitated for a second when she read the accompanying letter. She’d fallen headlong into the Englishman’s trap and revealed her greatest weakness to him. She’d served up her son on a silver platter. But she’d make up for it. She had to fight back her tears and pull herself together more than ever before just to make sure no one noticed, but she would meet every single one of the Englishman’s demands. She would do what he wanted, and she would be able to hold her son in her arms again.
She’d been sitting in the office for several minutes, waiting, marking time until she finally summoned up the courage. One more deep breath and she was ready. She stood up. She reached for her handbag and took one final look at the photographs. A moment later, summoning her strength, she left the office. She locked the door with her ID card and made her way along the corridor. She was one of the first to arrive at work that morning, and the office wing was still deathly quiet. Every step she took sounded like an rifle shot. She kept picturing someone coming around a corner any second and discovering what she was up to.
But she knew it was just her mind playing tricks. She could do this. Shelley was the warden’s assistant and her ID gave he access to every part of the office, without exception. If she was smart, no one would ask any questions, no one would notice what she’d done. She would get the Englishman what he wanted.
And she would save her son’s life.
42
Newton Ferrers, fifty miles east of the Genesis Program
Tom’s arm was hurting like hell when he woke up. The small case lay on the floor beside the bed, still cuffed to his wrist. It took less than a second for Tom to remember where he was and everything that had happened. It all came flooding back: Sienna, the Kahle, the police, the bridge. His head was pounding. He rubbed his face, sat up, and looked around the hut. No phone, no computer, no Internet, just an old TV in one corner—he’d fallen through a hole in time and landed back in the good old days. At least the place had a shower, and he found some clothes that would probably fit. His own were crusted with dried blood.
A shooting pain in his left arm made him wince and forced him back onto the bed. He grimaced as he rubbed the chafed, raw wound on his wrist. He had to get the damned cuff off. Like a bird with a broken wing, he grasped the case by its handle and stood up. He searched the entire hut but found nothing. No saw, no bolt cutters. A paperclip was all he could find that might do the job, so he set to work with that. Contrary to what the film industry tells us, handcuff locks are not easy to pick. It felt like forever before he finally got it open. Lucky for me it’s not an official police cuff, he thought. Probably something from a sex shop. Tom turned on the TV in the corner, then jumped under the shower.
His mind turned to Sienna. Had she made it? Tom’s conscience was bothering him. It had taken a while, but just when she’d started to trust him, she’d been all but torn from life. Tom put his destructive thoughts aside. He climbed out of the narrow shower stall when the hot water ran out, dried himself, and pulled on the clothes he’d found: a pair of jeans and a strange t-shirt featuring the logo of some small-time heavy metal band. Beggars can’t be choosers, he thought. He turned on the TV and the local news caught his attention. He turned up the sound.
“Leading today’s news, a grisly incident at the Genesis Program in Cornwall yesterday evening. Popular with locals and tourists alike, the botanical park was the scene of a terrible crime. An unknown man”—an identikit image, which fortunately looked nothing like Tom, flashed on the screen—“forced his way into the complex at around six p.m. local time and murdered the head of the research institute, Dr. Emanuel Orlov, and a security guard. The man then took botanist Dr. Sienna Wilson hostage as he fled the scene. Dr. Wilson died late last night of serious injuries sustained during the incident. The fugitive also shot two local police officers who tried to stop him. Both officers died instantly. Whether the man stole anything from the laboratory is not known at this time.” Tom hurled the remote control across the room and sank onto the bed in disbelief. Sienna was dead.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” her murmured to himself. “Next time, no more hesitation. Next time, asshole, you die,” he said aloud. There was an interview with the hippie guy, then a report about the tragic journey to Central America during which Dr. Wilson’s colleagues had perished. The usual “reward for any information leading to . . . etc.” followed. Tom stood up and switched the TV off.
He had to get the case to his CIA contact as soon as possible, then make sure the real murderer was brought to justice.
He pulled on a baseball cap and his expression clouded over: the baseball cap reminded him of Sienna and her miserable attempt at going undercover to retrieve the substance she’d developed. Then Tom grabbed the case, slipped a pocketknife he found in a drawer into his pocket, threw the windbreaker hanging in the closet over his shoulder, and left the hut.
He followed a narrow path back down to the water, where he’d left the motorboat at anchor the evening before. But his plan to take the boat along the coast to Newhaven to avoid possible roadblocks was a non-starter. A police launch was bobbing alongside the motorboat, and one of the officers was just calling through his discovery on the radio. Cops are fast here, he thought. And I thought yesterday was bad . . . He turned back and disappeared into the woods, following a walking path called Passage Road toward the southeast. In five minutes, he reached the end of the little patch of woods and was back in civilization.
He needed to find wheels, fast. Something fast, maneuverable and inconspicuous. Then his eyes fastened on something: a Ducati Scrambler 1100 Sport Pro. A beauty of a motorcycle. Okay, the Ducati was far from inconspicuous—two out of three would have to do. It stood in the small front yard of a house. He looked around, but there was no one in sight. He ducked beneath the arching gateway and looked the motorcycle over. To his surprise, the key was still in the ignition. He smiled. Every biker, at least once in their life, had done that. It was one of the main reasons bikes went missing. Hot-wiring a modern motorcycle was actually next to impossible. He strapped the case to the pillion seat with his belt. To avoid immediately alerting the owner to the theft, he rolled the Ducati out onto the street before firing it up
.
43
Kitchen at the Alcázar of Seville, Spain
The large kitchen during a banquet lay somewhere between a war zone and a Black Friday sale. People swarmed everywhere, hurrying back and forth with knives and other implements, shouting to each other, working feverishly on a thousand different things at once. Deadlines had to be met. Everyone depended on everyone else. They were simultaneously a team and lone warriors, all ultimately under the command of a sergeant who had to keep track of everything and everyone. In this kitchen, Eloisa Arebalo, the chef de cuisine, was that sergeant. Her voice rose above the countless sous-chefs, sauciers, junior cooks and dishwashers, and everything ran like a well-oiled machine.
Hellen and Cloutard had spent the last several hours helping out wherever they could. Cloutard was wearing a waiter’s livery and had helped with the mise en place in the banquet hall, folding napkins, setting out cutlery, distributing bread baskets, draping vases, and lining up countless glasses in neat rows. Hellen had been put to work as a kitchen assistant and, with about twenty others, was busy setting up all of the ingredients, herbs, spices, and utensils in the optimal order for the cooks. Cloutard, the perpetual gourmet, was familiar with these kinds of gastronomic processes, but Hellen was deeply impressed when she caught a glimpse of the countless checklists with which Eloisa worked.
“I thought the exhibition I curated at the Museum of Fine Arts was complicated, but that was nothing compared to this,” she sighed, sweat pouring down her face. She had spotted Cloutard amidst the confusion and had left her post to join him, and they both stood and watched the organized chaos for a moment, impressed. But Eloisa had seen them and stalked grimly in their direction.
“We’re going to get chewed out for standing around,” Hellen said, glancing at the time. The gala dinner would start soon, and they could focus on the real reason they were there: to find the map of El Dorado.
“Change of plan,” Eloisa said, and she looked Cloutard up and down. “It has not escaped my attention that, as a waiter, you are not completely ignorant. One of my men has just injured his ankle and is out of commission.” Cloutard and Hellen looked at each other, both knowing what was coming. Eloisa pointed at Hellen. “You I can do without. You can go and do whatever you like. But you,” she said, whacking the flat of her hand so hard against Cloutard’s chest that he had to take a step back, “will serve in the banquet hall. The whole thing is planned from start to finish. If I am one man down, nothing works anymore.”
“But I can’t—” Cloutard began, but Eloisa cut him off.
“No discussion. You help, or I blow your cover.”
Eloisa glared at them, and both Hellen and Cloutard knew she meant exactly what she said.
“Well, then. I did work as a waiter in my youth,” said Cloutard, and immediately put on a supercilious servant’s face. “Let me see your carte du jour.” Unbidden, he picked up one of the checklists that laid out the evening’s menu. He began to recite as if he were reading for the role of King Lear.
Salmorejo andaluz
Lobster medallions with shrimp and a spinach-lobster sauce
Périgord truffles à la Savarin
Toulousian quails à la Souvarov
Beef Wellington in a red wine sauce
Potatoes with red pepper and sel de mer
Strasbourg foie gras supreme à la francaise
Rhine wine jelly with mandarin
Lemon tart with mango-passion fruit ragout and Cornish clotted cream
“Your menu is a little all over the place, don’t you think? I know you are only a Spaniard, so I am willing to overlook an occasional culinary faux pas, but are you sure you want to serve the foie gras after the beef Wellington? That will confuse the palate mightily ahead of the Rhine wine jelly.”
He took a second sheet of paper, this one listing the wines for the evening, and his eyes widened. “Mon Dieu! And who chose the wines? The Pingus 2004 with the beef Wellington is already dubious, but a Spanish white wine with the quail?” he shook his head and screwed up his face as if he’d bitten into a lemon. “A Domaine Baron Thenard Montrachet Grand Cru chardonnay is the only acceptable wine to have with Toulousian quail.”
Hellen looked first at Cloutard and then at Eloisa, whose pulse was probably just topping two hundred just then.
“You insufferable frog! Shut your mouth this instant and start serving the aperitif, or I’ll personally call the Palace Guard and you’ll both be in prison before you can say Français vaniteux!”
Cloutard looked as if he were about to reply, but thought better of it.
“By the way,” Eloisa said. “Australian white wine is far superior to French.”
Cloutard sniffed indignantly, but he turned to the trays of vermouth glasses and joined the line of waiters. Hellen saw that as her cue to leave. She grabbed a tray as well, but hers held plates of snacks—a little camouflage, at least—and she left the kitchen. Eloisa had already explained how to get to the royal apartments on the top floor, and had told her where she could expect to find guards posted. There were only two that she would need to get past. With everyone gathered for the banquet, the palace was completely deserted.
44
CIA safe house, London
The ride to London passed without incident—no roadblocks, no increased police activity. When he reached the London suburb of Bermondsey, not far from the Tower Bridge, he parked the motorcycle between a tree and a trash container at 17 Ambrose Street. His grandfather, a Jimmy Stewart fan, would have been delighted at the address. According to Tom’s briefing, the CIA safe house was above the barber shop. Tom’s intuition kicked in, however, and he made an spur-of-the-moment decision.
He trotted up the outside stairway to the first floor and rang the bell. The fish and chips smell rising from the Elite Fish Bar next door was mouthwatering. The unobtrusive security camera above the white door swung its electronic eye toward Tom, and a tinny voice spoke through the intercom.
“What’s the password?”
“The blue hummingbird with pink feathers flew over the cuckoo’s nest.” Tom rolled his eyes as he spoke the silly security phrase out loud.
A moment later, the door buzzed and Tom pulled it open. Before he was even two steps into the entryway, he heard laughter ring out. A man in his mid-forties, still chuckling, came out of the office and shook Tom’s hand happily.
“Sorry. We do that to all the new contacts. Come on in. I’m Jack and the guy back there’s Anthony. We spend hours thinking up stupid passwords. There’s not a great deal to do here most of the time. You’re the highlight of the month.”
In one corner stood a bank of high-tech surveillance and computer equipment, in the other an old sofa where Anthony was sitting. Empty pizza boxes and beer cans littered a small side table. “Call of Duty” had just been paused on the sixty-inch TV. The exciting life of a CIA agent, Tom thought ironically as he shook Anthony’s hand.
“Nice to meet you,” Anthony said.
Tom looked around and went to the window.
“So you’ve got something for us?” Jack asked.
Tom pushed the curtain a little to one side and peeked out. “This isn’t quite what I expected,” said Tom, turning back to Jack.
“We hear that a lot. Thank you, Hollywood.”
“I don’t have it on me.” He’d hidden the case outside before he went into the safe house. “It’s been a rough twenty-four hours. I figured it’s better to play it safe. Okay?” Jack nodded. “Have you got a phone for me? Mine’s dead.”
“Sure thing,” Jack said. He crossed to a steel cabinet, took out a white box, and handed it to Tom. “Fully charged and the PIN’s in the lid.”
Tom took the phone out, switched it on, and slipped it into his pocket. “Thanks,” he said, and he glanced out the window again.
“Don’t keep us in suspense,” Anthony said. “What was so important that you had to shoot the shit out of a research center to get it?”
“It’s close by. A
nd I didn’t shoot the shit out of anything,” Tom said absently. His attention was on the brown delivery van that had just pulled up across the street. “Grenade launcher!” he screamed, as the side door of the van slid open and Tom recognized the Kahle. Tom turned from the window and ran toward the exit on the opposite side of the apartment, but he didn’t get very far. The shock wave from the explosion tore him off his feet and sent him flying into the steel cabinet. Part of the ceiling fell in, and for a brief moment Tom lost consciousness.
45
An office in a secret prison facility, New Mexico
Shelley had worked with Terrance Zane for years, but the man was still an enigma to her. And though she had been inside his office countless times, she still felt uneasy every time she went in. She’d heard what Zane had done just recently with that black woman they were holding. He’d hit her, apparently, then humiliated her. He sent her out of his office naked, exposing her not only to the eyes of the guards but also of the other prisoners. And in a prison of this kind, that did not bode well at all.
“What is it, Shelley?”
His voice, and indeed his whole demeanor, made Shelley shudder every time. Zane looked up at her intently from behind his Victorian-style desk.
Don’t get nervous now, she chided herself.
“HR sent the papers for the new guards. I’ve gone through everything with them. You just need to sign.”
Warden Zane slowly reached for his spectacle case and removed a pair of vintage-looking reading glasses with an amber frame, the color matching the grain of the desk perfectly. Shelley wondered for a moment what it would be like to be married to such a pedantic perfectionist, before deciding she didn’t want to know.
The Golden Path (A Tom Wagner Adventure Book 4) Page 13
