Authors: Jeff Abbott
‘August told me when I talked with him at The Last Minute.’
‘It’s flattering to be on his radar screen. I must have a file at the CIA now. How exciting. What percentage of the world
has a file there? Minuscule. I feel special.’ She inspected her nails again. ‘Should I friend August on Facebook?’
‘He wants me to hand you over to them so you can tell them what you know about Novem Soles and who you work for. They are
intensely interested in you.’
‘I am interested in August. In what he can find out. In how good he is. And in who will try and kill him when he finds out
more about Novem Soles.’
‘You still think there are people working for Novem Soles inside the CIA.’
‘It’s a given.’ She watched the football player; he’d made
friends with two blondes who looked like they’d missed the turn to the Playboy mansion. ‘If August is good at his job, likely
he will die. If he is bad, he will retire and get a nice gold watch because he was never a threat to anyone.’
‘Do you know if there’s a mole?’
‘Of course not. And I am hurt you think I would keep such juicy gossip quiet. Plus, if I knew, I would sell his name to the
CIA. I adore free markets.’
‘You told me when we met that you’d seen the tapes of when the Company interrogated me,’ I said. ‘You have your own mole inside.’
Again the sideways glance. ‘Well, I didn’t find the tapes on YouTube, Sam. If you must know I stole them off the server.’
‘You stole data off a CIA server.’ I didn’t want to know more.
‘I am making you nervous,’ Mila said. ‘I’ll go upstairs and wait for our friend to arrive. I’ll keep an eye on the cameras.’
I watched her go up the stairs at the back of the bar.
Anna Tremaine was coming.
The crowd had filled out, the bartenders moving in a constant blur of service. The music pulsed. I scanned the crowd, looking
for anyone suspicious who might be here backing Anna. But maybe she didn’t need or want security. Maybe this would be easy.
She didn’t know she was coming onto my turf. For me, the bar was both public and private. So many potential witnesses around
would tie her hands but I could get her upstairs and then I’d have the truth.
But I felt haunted by the person who’d been watching me do the parkour run. Maybe the driver had just been curious. Maybe
it was nothing more. Maybe I hadn’t made a mistake.
What would you do to get your son back?
It was the simplest question in the world, with the simplest answer. But if I made the wrong move, I could easily end up dead,
or in prison, or with Daniel no safer than he was now.
Right now, somewhere, a husband and a wife were holding my child, calling him their own. Did they even know he was stolen?
Did they care? Did they love him as much as I did, though I’d never even held him?
Here she came.
Anna Tremaine. I recognized her from the video in the French clinic. She was a tall woman, with wide shoulders and the bearing
of an athlete. Graceful. Men noticed her as she walked through the crowd; you could see gazes flickering to her as she moved.
She was dressed in black fitted jeans and a colorful shirt and an aquamarine and silver choker covered her ivory throat. She
was coming, though not from the front door but from the back, where the restrooms were. Maybe she’d slipped in a back entrance.
She looked about thirty, raven-dark hair, a hard, cold face that was beautiful in technical proportions, but not because of
warmth or kindness.
I stayed perfectly still as she sat down across from me. I didn’t stand.
This was the woman who’d stolen my child. All I wanted to do was to fling the table aside and close my hands around that bejeweled
throat and force her to tell me where Daniel was. That time would come. Now I had to prime the trap.
‘Mr Derwatt?’
‘Yes, hello. Ms Tremaine?’
‘Yes.’
‘Your drink.’ I gestured at the martini she’d asked to have ready as a sign. It sat, a bit warm, three olives. She could choke
on them as soon as I made her tell me where Daniel was.
‘That was only for an identifier. A bottle of Amstel Light, and please tell the waiter to open it at the table.’
Very cautious. She didn’t want to risk a drug being slipped into her drink. I waved over a waiter, repeated the order. I kept
my voice steady. This was a business meeting and she was treating it like a potential trap. Which it was, of course.
‘Your wife isn’t here?’ Her voice was soft. I suppose you think a woman who steals and peddles babies would sound like the
creaking crone from a fairy tale. She sounded educated. A French accent, but very slight, as though she spent most of her
time conversing in English.
‘My wife is considerably nervous about this arrangement. She’s upstairs. She wants to continue to pursue conventional adoption
but … ’ I shrugged. I felt sweat trickle down my spine, dampen my armpits. I didn’t get this nervous in a fight. Then my mind
shut clear and I knew what I would have to do. This was worse than crossing a minefield. But she was here in my bar, my home
ground, and she wasn’t leaving without telling me where my son was.
The waiter returned with her bottle of Amstel. He opened it for her at the table, she thanked him, he left, and then she took
a long sip. ‘Your wife isn’t upstairs. Your wife, technically your ex-wife, is in a CIA-run hospital in Bethesda, Maryland,
in a coma from which she is unlikely ever to recover. She’s your ex not because you are an asshole who divorced a critically
ill wife but because she’s a traitor who saved your life and then tried to kill you when you came after her. She picked the
wrong side and she paid the price.’
I kept my gaze locked on hers. Well. Anna Tremaine was no fool.
‘Your name isn’t Frank Derwatt, it’s Sam Capra.’ She took a
dainty sip of beer. ‘You enjoy playing monkey in empty buildings when you’re not creating trouble for us.’
Fine. Who needs masks? ‘Where’s my son, Anna?’
‘See, I know more about you than you do about me. Anna’s not my real name.’
‘Where’s my son?’ I leaned forward. I could produce the Browning under my jacket in one second. I didn’t care if I set off
a panic in The Canyon. She was going to tell me.
‘An hour ago, a friend of mine left a half-pound of C-4 explosive in the ladies’ room.’ Her smile went coy. She uttered her
threat in the same tone as you might say
I love what you’ve done with the place
. ‘The trigger is under my control. You raise a hand against me and this bar burns, with everyone in it.’ She glanced at the
partiers, the light pulsing in time to the music, laughing, drinking, oblivious. ‘I can’t say they’d be a real loss. These
people are nothing, they serve no purpose.’
‘Unlike selling children.’ I battled the rage rising in my chest. The rage was like a strange heat. I had killed before, for
the first time a few weeks earlier, and in normal circumstances it wasn’t ever anything you wanted to do again. But her. I
could kill her.
She smiled, the cat’s smile at the mouse wriggling under its paw. ‘I sell happiness, Mr Capra. I give desperate parents exactly
what they want.’
‘Where is my son?’
‘You keep asking like I’m actually going to tell you.’ She took another swig of her beer, scooted a bit closer in her chair
like she had a cute story or a joke to tell me as we sat enjoying our evening in the primo bar. ‘I won’t tell you where your
son is. I will tell you how you can get him back.’
‘How?’
‘I want you to kill a man for me.’ She enunciated each word carefully, as though I were impaired.
When I didn’t respond, she said, ‘It’s not like you haven’t killed before.’
‘Not in cold blood.’
‘Will it make it easier to swallow if I assure you he deserves it?’
‘Who?’
‘My employer has a traitor. We want him dead.’ She smiled. ‘We have your son, so I think what we want is what you want.’
‘Kill him yourself.’
‘He’s not under our control at the moment. I think you are particularly placed to be able to find him and reach him. You kill
him for us and we’ll give you back your son, alive and unharmed.’
‘And I should believe you
why
?’
‘Why? If we wanted you and your son dead, you would both be dead.’ She smiled, tasted her beer again. ‘Because you have no
choice, Sam. That seems to me to be common sense. You must do as we say. We own you.’ She leaned back a little. ‘Your child
is cute. He favors you in the eyes, he has his mother’s mouth.’
‘You sold him.’
‘So you were told. But we didn’t. We kept Daniel close, in case he was useful to us. I think it was a smart move.’
‘You want me to kill a man.’ My mind felt clouded. There must be something very special about this man. He must be hard to
kill, or hard to reach, or hard to find.
‘And failure, as they say, is not an option. If you don’t kill him maybe we won’t kill Daniel – you will never know – but
we won’t sell him to a sweet and kind family. There are all sorts of unappealing people … who will buy a baby.’
I wanted to fling the heavy table into her face. But I bottled
the rage. Stuffed it down. Not the time. But I was going to make those words taste like ash in her mouth.
‘Uh, uh,’ Anna said. ‘Anger is destructive. Here is what happens now. Nod if you understand me – I’ve grown tired of your
voice.’
Slowly I nodded.
‘Your target will be in New York tomorrow. You’ll have a partner in your hunt; a woman who’s a wizard at finding people who
don’t want to be found, she’s gifted. And motivated, just like you.’ Anna gave a smug laugh, she sounded like a bird chirping.
‘So. Get to New York, find him and kill him.’
‘I need a guarantee that you will give me Daniel.’
She pulled a photo from her jacket and slid it across the table to me.
I knew it was Daniel. I knew it just like a soldier long separated from his child, by distance and normality, gets a picture
and can see both himself and his wife in the baby’s face. He was wrapped in a blue blanket, green eyes looking up at the camera,
not a smile on his face but he wasn’t crying, intrigued with the contraption above his head that was taking his picture. One
arm reaching up, his mouth a toothless curl, cheeks full and fat. He looked good. He looked loved. Thin, blond hair crowned
his head, like mine when I was a baby before it darkened, like his mother’s.
I gritted my teeth.
‘Now. When you’ve killed the target, and Daniel is returned to you, we are done. You don’t keep coming after us. You don’t
help the CIA or the FBI or anyone else in pursuing us. You retire from the grand game. Go be a good daddy.’
‘I want the protocol for the exchange.’
‘When the target is dead, you will phone a number that I give
you. When we have confirmed that you’ve completed your side of the bargain, then the child will be left, with a note with
your contact information, at a church. A DNA test will confirm that the child is yours. Simple.’
‘No. You’re asking me to trust you far too much.’
‘You do not have a choice, Sam.’
‘If I can’t kill or find the target?’
She made a slow little wave with her hand. ‘Then I guess you’ll have that picture of him as your only memory. Would you like
to keep it? Put it under your pillow?’
‘If you hurt or sell my son, I’ll kill you.’
‘Shut up. Do you really think you should threaten me right now? He could get by with nine toes as easily as ten.’
My mind went blank, in the way not of shock but of the way of calculation. I didn’t believe in a truce, not now. They were
not going to threaten my child and go unpunished. But I didn’t let the decision show on my face.
‘So. Who is this target you want dead?’
She slid another photo from her jacket to me. ‘Him. His name is Jin Ming. At least that’s the name he used. I think it’s an
assumed name.’
I studied the face. I recognized him, although I’d only seen him for a few moments. ‘I think you’ve made a serious mistake.’
‘You want me to kill a dead man.’ I shook my head.
‘I hope you’re better at killing someone than finding a pulse. He’s not dead.’
I hadn’t had but a moment to look at him, he’d been sadly caught in the crossfire between Piet and his thugs and August’s
CIA team and he looked dead enough to me. But I was running from the CIA then, and desperate to get Piet, the one surviving
smuggler out of harm’s way, where I could put him to use – Piet had been my sole link to Edward, the kidnapper of my wife
and my son. So I’d made a mistake. ‘Who exactly is this Jin Ming?’
‘A graduate student from Hong Kong attending the Delft University of Technology, focusing on computer sciences.’
‘And he’s a threat to you. He’s just a geek, a kid.’
‘His age is irrelevant. You’re going to find him and kill him before he surrenders to the CIA. You have two days.’
Jin Ming had walked in with August and the rest of the CIA team. If he wanted to turn against Novem Soles, would he turn to
August? Perhaps this was why Anna was eager to use me. I could get close to August, and therefore close to Jin Ming.
‘Why hasn’t he surrendered to them already?’ I asked.
‘I don’t know. He set up a meeting with the CIA in two days. In New York. So get there and kill him.’
‘He has the goods on you. Poor, poor you.’
‘And we have the goods on you, Sam. Your child.’
I shut up.
‘Kill him before that meeting so it never happens and he never passes on whatever information he has. You do that, you get
your son back. You don’t, your son is gone forever.’ She slid an iPhone to me. ‘This is yours. You do not tell anyone what
you are doing. Anyone.’
Between her threat of a bomb in the club and my son, she had me pinned. I hate being pinned. Really, really hate it.
‘I’m going to leave now.’ She held up the remote control, another iPhone, with a call number selected. ‘You do not follow
me. If you do, I call the cell phone attached to the C-4 and we have bits and pieces of drunken dancers landing in the parking
lot. The signal has a five-mile range.’ She kept her thumb right above the number. One tap and we were all done.