He was the only man other than Tom whom she implicitly trusted.
Reaching the southwest corner, Stella turned left, passing the two men, who had moved away from the monument to assume a blocking position at the entrance.
No doubt her two circuits had worn down their patience.
It was time.
She walked a dozen or so steps past a row of benches, then sat facing the park, laying the jacket and the firearm it hid on her lap.
Behind her, beyond the wrought-iron fence and the border of trees, was the point on Twenty-Third Street that was roughly halfway between Fifth and Madison.
The two men back by the southwest entrance held their position, and the two who had entered in the northeast corner by Madison had made their way to the southeast entrance, blocking it after the last of the civilians had left the park.
Like their partners to Stella’s left, this pair alternated between watching her and scanning the park and the streets surrounding it.
These men were dressed in either sweatshirts or short jackets, and the absence of longer coats was an indication that they, too, had likely left behind any long gun in favor of more concealable firearms, though that didn’t necessarily rule out the possibility that one or more of them was armed with some kind of submachine gun—an Uzi or MP5 or KRISS Vector with its shoulder stock in the folded position.
If things went as planned, these men wouldn’t even get the chance to reach for their weapons.
Of course, Stella knew that things seldom went the way they were supposed to go.
No plan ever survives first contact.
For a minute or so, nothing changed.
A mix of concerns raced through Stella’s mind.
First among them was the possibility that the Benefactor wouldn’t show, that he had simply sent his men to kill Esa or had recognized the trap and sent his men to kill whomever had come to bait him.
But wouldn’t his men have made their move by now?
Unless someone was in one of the vehicles parked along Twenty-Sixth Street—a sniper making use of the relative darkness there to conceal himself as he took his time to zero his target.
Her second concern was that she had made a mistake by pushing for this mission, that she was in over her head.
The first concern she could do nothing about, but the second was within her control.
She knew that doubt was the mistake, not her decision, not the unassailable conviction to do whatever it took to save Tom.
Just like he would do whatever it took to save her.
Stella remembered the first time they had left Shelter Island in that rowboat, Tom keeping them on a straight line as they crossed to the mainland despite a broken forearm.
A year and a half later, they had found themselves back on Shelter Island, and once again they had planned a similar late-night escape, only to change their minds at the last minute and commit to the world that Tom had tried so hard to avoid.
The world he didn’t want for either of them, and that she was in the heart of right now.
Her mind clear, her heart rate and breathing steady, Stella slipped her right hand under the jacket on her lap till she found the grip of the SIG.
Holding it, she waited.
Another minute passed before two men entered the park via the northwest corner.
Both were dressed in suits and wearing leather shoes that gleamed in the bright lights. Starting across the park, following one of the diagonal paths that crisscrossed its center, they headed straight for the solitary woman in the black sweater and jeans seated on the wrought-iron bench.
Stella knew by their bearing alone that this was the Benefactor and General Graves.
Cruel and entitled men carried themselves in a specific and unmistakable way.
Tucking her chin to her chest as if looking down at her feet, Stella was counting on the long bill of her cap to keep her face hidden for as long as possible.
The lowered bill, however, also prevented her from seeing the men, but she knew she would hear their footsteps on the stone path.
Once she did, she would be able to gauge their distance from her as they closed it.
As she listened, she caught something from the corner of her left eye.
A white van—or the roof of it, at least, appearing just over the top of the fence.
The vehicle, with a ladder mounted to its roof, was coming down Broadway, racing for the turn onto Twenty-Third.
The glimpse was only fleeting, the vehicle passing from her peripheral vision nearly as soon as she saw it, but this seconds-long distraction was enough for her to have missed the initial audible steps of the two men closing in.
By the time she shifted her focus back to them, their shoes were in her line of sight.
After a few more steps, both men stopped.
“Esa,” one of the men said.
Stella didn’t lift her head.
“Esa,” the man repeated.
There was a touch of German in his accent, but it was the authority in the man’s voice that caught Stella’s attention.
It carried the weight of a command, and she felt an instant desire to resist that authority.
“Look at me, Esa,” the Benefactor said.
Stella knew now which feet belonged to whom.
The Benefactor was the man on her left.
“Is she deaf?” the man on the right said.
“Esa, look at me,” the Benefactor barked.
Stella waited, keeping her grip on the SIG hidden beneath the windbreaker firm but relaxed.
A few more seconds at the most was all she had—all that she could give J. D.
If he was in position on the south side of Twenty-Third, then he was no more than two hundred feet behind her, and the clack of his suppressed SR-25 would cross that distance and reach her ears nearly instantly.
If he failed to get into position, or was in the only position available but couldn’t get a clear shot for some reason, then it was up to her.
From the corner of her eye she detected the two bodyguards to her left. Drawn by the unusual activity as well as the sound of their employer’s angry voice, they began walking in her direction.
A quick glance to her right revealed that the two men by that entrance had stopped scanning and were fixed on her.
Stella had only seconds to decide, so she started a countdown in her head.
Three.
No clacking sound.
Two.
Still no clacking sound.
One.
Time was up, and Stella made her move.
Sixty-One
Raising her head, Stella lifted her right hand off her lap just enough to turn the SIG so it was pointed at the man on the left.
Squaring the weapon with her body so that it was aligned with her target, she saw the Benefactor’s face, and he saw hers.
His look of annoyed disdain was replaced by angry confusion, the shift occurring in less than a second.
That was all the time Stella needed to make sure the pistol was centered on the torso of the powerful man standing ten feet away.
She put two nine-mil rounds into his center, and he staggered back but remained upright, his look of anger and confusion deepening.
The man beside him took a step to the side, flinging his suit jacket open as he reached for a pistol in a brown leather shoulder rig.
Stella raised the SIG, allowing the windbreaker to drop away and placing the weapon between her eye and the target.
She put two rounds into that man’s chest as well, but like the Benefactor had, he, too, merely staggered backward.
More than that, the impact of the rounds did not slow his effort to reach across his stomach for his firearm.
Stella’s eyes went to the two points in his suit where her rounds had struck the man, and the lack of blood made it clear to her that he was wearing a protective vest.
It was then that she glanced at the Benefactor and saw the same lack of blood where he had been
struck.
And he was reaching for a weapon as well.
Stella shifted her focus back to the second man—Graves—as he was fast-drawing his sidearm. Even at close range, and especially while under duress, shooting a handgun accurately was no easy thing.
All it took was an improper trigger technique or faulty grip to guarantee a clean miss, even at ten feet away.
And Stella now needed to pull off not one but two head shots, so inches counted more than ever.
Graves, his suppressed pistol in his hand, was maybe a second ahead of the Benefactor, who was still reaching to the small of his back for his weapon. If Stella fired at Graves, the Benefactor would have time to remove his weapon and fire on her, and if she fired on the Benefactor first, taking the time necessary for a clean head shot, then Graves, already bringing his weapon to bear on her, would easily take her out.
There really wasn’t a choice.
She had to kill the Benefactor.
Shifting her focus to him, she positioned the night sights of the SIG between her eyes and the man’s face, adding her left hand to her grip.
The Benefactor, his look of anger solidified into rage, had removed his weapon and was swinging his arm around.
It was a move he was not to complete.
Stella laid the pad of her right index finger on the trigger and, letting out a slight sigh, eased it back in a straight line.
Before she even felt the recoil, the hollow-point 9 mil had passed through the Benefactor’s right eye.
With no heavy bone or tissue to resist the bullet, its serrated tip failed to mushroom, so it lost little of its velocity as it sliced through his brain and pierced the back of his skull, exiting with a burst of blood and brain matter that formed a brief halo of red mist above his head.
The dead man had not yet hit the pavement when Graves fired at Stella, striking her directly in the sternum.
It felt to her like someone had taken a sledgehammer to her chest, knocking the air out of her lungs.
Stunned, she dropped her left hand but managed to hang on to her pistol with her right.
The agony was unbearable, the shock overwhelming, but she couldn’t give up.
She started raising the SIG, ready to unload it into Graves, but he had closed the distance between them fast, parrying her right hand away and pressing the still-hot muzzle of his Walther PPQ against her head.
Owing to the bruised sternum, she could barely register the burning sensation.
Graves paused to say, “Look at me, bitch.”
More out of defiance than compliance, Stella met his stare.
He pressed the muzzle even harder, and Stella closed her eyes.
Then, from behind her: clack.
She opened her eyes in time to see the general’s head fly backward violently, a cloud of red greater than the Benefactor’s halo bursting into the air behind him.
His feet came out from under him, and he dropped to a seated position before slumping to one side and falling the rest of the way to the ground.
Stella slid off the bench and landed on the pavement.
She couldn’t do more than that. Her voided lungs were aching, yet she was unable to draw in air.
She faced west and saw the two men rushing toward her, their weapons on her, but Hammerton’s men appeared directly behind them, each firing their suppressed pistols, putting two rounds into the backs of their heads.
The men from the east began firing at Hammerton’s men out in the open.
The first got off only two shots before a mist sprayed from his head as he, too, was felled by J. D. from his position in the van parked on Twenty-Third.
The last remaining man, his eyes fixed on Stella, had removed an Uzi from under his jacket and pulled back the bolt, but that was as far as he got.
Hammerton’s other two men brought him down with head shots, though Stella observed that through fading eyes.
On the hard pavement, with two dead men just feet away, she struggled to breathe.
The next thing she knew, she was being lifted.
She wondered if she were a child being carried in the arms of her father.
Maybe she was dreaming this. She couldn’t tell, though.
It took a moment for her to open her eyes and realize that she was in the cabin of the EC-135, flat on her back on the floor.
The lifting she had felt was the helicopter rising off the helipad.
She was breathing now, though she could fill her lungs only partially before a wave of pain nearly knocked the air out of her again.
She saw Hammerton’s face above her, J. D. beside him. Both men were kneeling.
Her sweater and Kevlar vest had been removed, and a blanket had been placed over her.
J. D. was prepping a syringe. He said to Stella, “It’s for the pain. Your sternum is cracked, and this will help you breathe. We’re taking you back to Shelter Island. We’ll be there before you know it.”
He pulled the blanket back, exposing her shoulder, then wiped the skin clean with an antiseptic swab and injected her with morphine.
She felt the warmth moving through her almost immediately.
J. D. covered her up again and moved back to his seat. Hammerton adjusted the blanket, like he was tucking in a daughter, and then did the same.
Stella looked at them for a bit before she realized that the four former SAS men were staring at her.
Seated in a row, their gear bags closed and stowed at their feet, they each had an open can of Guinness in hand.
They nodded at Stella, a clear gesture of recognition and respect, then one by one, raised their drinks in salute and collectively said, “Cheers, mate.”
Together they took long sips.
Then everyone in the cabin sat still and silent, to allow Stella to rest.
While she did, they would bring her back home.
The men remained quiet even after Stella had fallen asleep.
She dreamed of Tom.
PART SIX
Sixty-Two
The departures began three days later.
The first to leave were Hammerton and his SAS men, while Tom was still bedridden and passing in and out of consciousness, and Stella had only just started to move around.
Before leaving, Hammerton’s men gave Stella a business card with a phone number on it.
If she were ever in trouble—any kind of trouble anywhere in the world, she was told—all she had to do was call that number, and someone would be there to help within twenty-four hours.
This promise of aid and support was a long-standing code among all former SAS, and as far as Hammerton’s men were concerned, Stella was an honorary member of their brotherhood now.
One by one, the four men shook her hand and left the room, and finally only Stella and Hammerton remained.
They were quiet for a moment, and then Stella asked him where he was going.
“Home,” Hammerton said.
“How long since you’ve been there?”
“A long time.”
“Do you have family, John?”
He nodded. “A sister. It’ll be good to see her again.”
Stella smiled, but tears welled in her eyes. It took another moment before she could speak. “We owe you everything,” she said. The tears fell then, spilling down her face.
Hammerton took her hand, held it gently. “No debts between friends,” he said.
Stella embraced him. She didn’t let go till she was ready, which took a long time.
Grunn and Krista left a few days later, bound for Krista’s adoptive father’s farm in Northern Vermont.
Tom was able to sit up for short periods by then. Stella brought the two women into the study to say their goodbyes.
“You guys are welcome at the farm anytime,” Krista said. “It’s a big house, lots of rooms. We’ll always have one ready for you.”
Stella asked them if they had thought about what they were going to do.
Grunn said, “Sleep. After that, who kno
ws.”
Krista asked, “What about you guys?”
“We’re still figuring that out,” Stella answered.
But she said it with a smile, as though, at least for now, the fact that the future was finally theirs to choose mattered more than the actual future itself.
It was another week before Tom was able to get out of bed for more than a few minutes at a time.
Another week passed before he left the study and began spending his nights with Stella in the room they had occupied during their two previous stays.
As pleased as he was to be in that room again—to be beyond mere convalescence and on his way to full recovery—he grew eager to leave it after a few nights.
During bouts of sleeplessness caused by the termination of pain medication, Tom would plan their own departure—he and Stella leaving quietly and disappearing, just as they had done once before.
For the longest time, Tom had desired that—wanted nothing more—and he wasn’t about to settle for anything less.
On one particularly bad night, as Stella slept beside him, Tom got up and removed a pad of paper and pen from the drawer of his nightstand.
He had once, as a child, asked his father what their last name meant.
A sexton used to be an officer of the church, George Sexton had explained. He was the caretaker for church grounds. My grandfather told me that the word was derived from the Old French word sacristan, which means “sacred.” Part of a sexton’s duties was to dig graves, and eventually the word came to be used as the title of someone who is the caretaker of a cemetery. Someone who tends to the grounds, buries the dead, keeps a list of their names and where exactly they are interred.
Tom placed the notebook on his thigh. The night beyond his window was clear, so there was enough light for him to see by as he began to list the names of the dead—those who had died because of him.
The last name on that list belonged to the only person whose resting place he was currently aware of.
The woman interred illegally on the Cahill property, which, should she ever be discovered, would bring nothing but trouble to the family to whom everyone—not just Tom and Stella and the others, but also the entire citizenry of the country Charlie Cahill had loyally served—owed so much.
The Shadow Agent Page 35