The Doll (28 page)

The drop was near Port Hercules, Monaco’s deep-water port, where many of the world’s largest private yachts home-berthed or visited. Where better to play with your pawns or taunt the governments of the world in a completely swollen ego sort of way—the fox walking blatantly into the chicken coop and daring the farmer to catch him—than to bring a highly visible trafficked woman into the country with the world’s lowest crime rate and largest police force per capita, in broad daylight, and then silently make off with her?

Munroe reached for her pocket and retrieved the stolen phone. Her course of action was set, but before continuing, she hoped for news out of Dallas that might mute the inner voices and allow her to plunge fully into the task at hand.

She powered on the screen and winced. Battery—if barely—but no signal. Hurting against the unknown, voices running dialogue inside her head, Munroe shut off the phone for good. Needed to hold things together just long enough to receive the final set of instructions that would take her to the client.

She returned to the driver’s seat. The engine’s turnover, loud in the relative silence, brought Neeva’s eyes open: a slow rolling out of sleep that had, by the time Munroe had gotten the vehicle halfway out of the parking spot, parsed quickly into full-blown panic. Neeva glanced from Munroe to the road, to the sidewalk, and to the road again, as if she’d spent hours planning an escape inside her head only to wake and find time and opportunity had flown. Still sleep stunned, the girl twisted and clawed at the door and the seat belt simultaneously, her body tensed to bolt and run.

Munroe snapped a hand on her arm. “Don’t,” she said. And then, when Neeva, wild-eyed, turned back to glare, to fight, Munroe tightened her grip and yanked her close. Through clenched teeth she said, “Don’t do it. I’ll find a way for you.”

Whether or not the words meant anything to Neeva, the girl yanked back hard, got her free hand on the door latch, and snagged the handle; the door inched open. Unable to control Neeva and move the car forward at the same time, Munroe opted for both hands on Neeva, and a second later, resorted to using her full body.

She let the clutch and brake go.

The car jumped forward just enough to tap the vehicle in front.

She leveraged her grip on Neeva into a pivot. Clamped her second hand on Neeva’s far shoulder, dragged a knee out from beneath the wheel, and punched Neeva’s pelvis with the cap, her own weight and size overpowering Neeva’s smaller frame, and still Neeva didn’t stop. In the space of seconds, the girl bucked, clawed, bit, and finally screamed, bloodcurdling and vicious.

Few pedestrians were on the street, but it would only take one; houses with open windows, patios with open doors, just one curious bystander and this was over. In a move vile enough someone
might die for it, Munroe leaned back and struck an open palm across Neeva’s face.

In the shock of the blow, Neeva, eyes wide and blinking, gaped and went mute. “Shut up,” Munroe hissed. “And stay put. I will find a way, okay?”

They entered Monaco at the principality’s northernmost border without anything to mark the crossing but a change in signs and a sudden tightness in building density.

The GPS led them south along the coast, down pristine streets bordered by trees and beautiful landscaping, streets slowly filling with morning traffic; past the beach area of Larvotto; past a mix of grand architecture and block-style residential buildings making up in height what they couldn’t grab in land; past innumerable CCTV cameras, toward the area of the Japanese Garden and specifically to an underground parking not far from their final destination.

It couldn’t have been easy for Lumani to send them down—even if he had the connections necessary to tap into surveillance cameras—not with nooks and pillars and cars with which to play hide-and-seek with his nerves. But in a city-state where square footage consumed fortunes, street parking was nearly impossible to come by, and accessing the garages was the only way to get rid of the car and move the delivery forward.

Munroe pulled into the entry lane, took a ticket, and the beam lifted. Continued downward into a subterranean world reclaimed from the sea, well lit, and not yet filled with the day’s haul of metal.

On cue, the phone beeped another alert.

She scanned the text, placed the phone in her lap, and took the vehicle past long rows of sporadically spaced cars, down another level, beyond many open spots, toward the areas farthest away from the choice parking that arriving drivers would fill first.

Cameras monitored the interior in the same way their counterparts did the streets above, and so Munroe continued at a crawl, searching out blind spots, and finally, as certain as she could be under the circumstances, pulled into a space next to a Pajero where at least the vehicle’s height would shield something.

Turned off the ignition. This was the end.

The final instructions required going on foot, out in the open, in public. Munroe left the parking ticket in the glove box and car keys in the visor, as instructed, and while Neeva sat staring, clearly waiting for some piece of advice or news, grabbed the backpack from the backseat, pulled the GPS off the dash, and shoved the machine inside. Paused long enough to glance over Neeva.

The ripped tights had been replaced on the road toward Genoa, and although Neeva’s eyes were puffy and she was developing dark circles beneath them, the makeup had been redone well enough that she looked presentable—stareworthy, but not in a beat-up domestic-abuse sort of way. Munroe reached for Neeva’s hair, and when the girl winced, she stopped.

Said, “May I?”

Neeva held still.

Munroe fluffed up the curls, untwisting several that had wrapped around one another. Other than that, the hair, like nylon doll hair, was still perfect, and for all of the attention the getup would attract, it also provided a distraction; human nature would have observers try to make sense of the costume before noticing the person wearing it.

“You look good,” Munroe said, and Neeva rolled her eyes.

Munroe reached low and popped the hood, felt beneath the seat for the lug wrench stowed so many hours ago, and left it on the floor between her feet. Then, deliberately and very slowly, so that she drew Neeva’s attention to her movements, she placed Lumani’s phone on the console, opened the driver’s door, and said, “Let’s go.”

She made it around to the other side before Neeva had stepped fully to the pavement, took Neeva’s hand, guided her away from the door, and shut it. With her arm around Neeva’s shoulders, Munroe
walked her several steps from the car and said, “We don’t have time to talk and I really need you to listen, okay? I am not one of
them
. I’m going to find a way to get us out of this mess, but you
have
to do what I say. Don’t try to run, because if you do, they will find you and I will be powerless to save you, you understand?”

“But what about your friend who will die?”

“That’s my problem,” Munroe said, her voice a whisper and speech running at hyperspeed, trying to cram into fifty seconds what should take much longer to say. “Right now we need to focus on staying alive. I can get us out of here, but only if you do what I tell you.”

Neeva’s head tipped down, just once.

“The sniper is out there somewhere watching us and we’re also being followed by the guy who hit you last night. I need to know where he is before we do anything. I’m going to give you the phone, my shoes, and the backpack. I need you to start walking when I hand them to you.”

Munroe turned Neeva, oriented her based on what she’d seen on the GPS prior to packing it up, faced her toward an exit. “In that direction is a stairwell. Take it up to ground level. The exit will open to a street that leads to a seawall. Follow the ocean—you’ll see a big hotel and a tunnel that runs under the hotel. Anytime the path splits, keep left and as close to the ocean as possible—always follow the ocean. Walk slow and keep going until I find you.”

“What if you don’t come?”

“Then I’m dead. Just walk. Don’t talk to anyone, don’t make eye contact, and if anyone recognizes you, pretend you’re a body double.”

Another head tip.

“And I am not kidding, Neeva, if you run, or try to get away from me, you’ll be doing me a favor by letting me wash my hands of you, but these men
will
capture you again. If you try to get help from someone else, people will die. You are not smarter than them. Not faster. Not stronger. I am your way to salvation. Understand?”

“Yes,” Neeva said, and Munroe, in one long, drawn-out movement, loosened her grip on the girl’s shoulders and turned her so that they were eye-to-eye. Searched her face, her expression, her body language, wanting and trying to read what went on behind the mask, and then let go of Neeva completely. Slipped off her shoes,
put them in the backpack, and handed it over. If after this the girl still chose to flee, she did so fully aware of the cost, and Munroe’s conscience was clear.

“If I haven’t found you within fifteen minutes,” Munroe said, “then you’re on your own.”

Neeva stared at Munroe’s socks and then up again at her face. “Thank you,” she said.

Munroe turned to the car, lifted the hood long enough to grab the rag she’d once used to wipe off engine fluids, and gently, quietly pressed the engine cover shut. Opened the driver’s door and pulled out the phone that was already ringing.

She pressed talk and, before Lumani had a chance to speak, said, “It was an accident, I won’t forget again.”

“You need to get moving,” he said, and because of what was missing in those five words a wave of relief washed over her. He didn’t have visual contact, had no idea what she’d just done, and Arben or some other thug would be there soon.

“We’re moving now,” Munroe said, then paused and with a lowered voice that bordered on conspiratorial said, “Valon, is there anything I need to know? I can connect the dots. Things aren’t what you’d planned. If there’s going to be a double cross, if you’re getting set up—if I’m getting set up—let me on your side, we can work this together.”

As had been typical of the man-boy so far, he waited a long while, but this time he didn’t hang up. “I can’t,” he said finally, “it’s not possible.”

So she ended the call.

Before Munroe shut the door for the final time, she reached to the floor and pulled out the wrench. Set it on the ground and turned to Neeva, who’d remained waiting and quiet. Munroe put the phone in Neeva’s hand and a finger to her own lips. Pointed to her eye and then the exit, and with a slight wave, motioned the girl off.

Neeva took a few hesitant steps, past an empty space, continued beyond the nearest parked car, and then turned as if begging for reassurance.

Munroe waved her on farther.

Neeva nodded and gave a mock salute: camaraderie—or Stockholm syndrome. Whatever went on inside that girl’s head was now completely beyond control, and with instinct rebelling against letting
her go, Munroe remained in place, watching the rear of the departing costume as Neeva sashayed in slow motion toward the other side of the garage and out of sight.

Munroe turned to the adjacent Pajero, and with the cold wash of assignment taking over, slid beneath, elbows to the ground, head angled beside a rear tire. Body poised and ready, she waited.

Arben arrived within the minute driving a black Passat, the first Munroe had seen of his ride, tires cruising slowly past, while his head, visible through the window, swept from side to side as if searching out the Opel. He braked. Reversed slightly and then pulled into the spot directly on the other side of his target.

Arben opened his door, and from where Munroe lay, she had only a line to his feet. If he’d been smart and on his game, if he’d believed half the things Kate Breeden would have told the Doll Maker, he would have leaned down to check beneath the chassis. At least then he might have had a fighting chance.

Instead, he stepped from his vehicle to the Opel, opened the driver’s door, and according to the sounds that followed, dropped the keys from the visor into his palm and presumably took the parking ticket as well. His pause was long enough to tuck them into a pocket or pouch, and then he shut the door and returned to his car.

Munroe slid out and in a crouch between the rear axles of the two vehicles, her body shielded by tires and trunk space, she stretched just high enough to observe him through the windows. He was in the driver’s seat on the phone, apparently on the receiving end of a one-sided conversation.

Palms to the concrete, runner on her mark, Munroe closed her eyes. Arben would follow on foot, but with Neeva moving slowly and the assumption that the two were together, he held back, allowing a small lead time. Cold fed into her hands, fueling the drive of the hunt. The voices that had for the last several hours played as backdrop to rage hushed in peaceful anticipation.

Arben’s door opened.

She picked up the lug wrench and rag.

His feet hit the concrete.

She moved to a crouch.

He stepped out of the car and turned his back.

She stood.

She came up behind him fast, and as if in response to instinct, or perhaps the rustle of her clothes or her feet on the ground, he began to turn.