The Diamond Dust on Dragonfly Wings: A Jeffry Claxton Mystery Novel

by Michael Yudov

  “I will, Therese. I promise.”

  “À bientôt!”

  She leaned across the corner of the table and kissed me on the cheek so softly I had to concentrate to feel her lips. Then she stood and walked quickly from the room.

  As she did, my mind started to clear. By the time, she was on her way up the stairs to pack, I was already thinking of my flight to Bahrain. If I remembered correctly, there was a Pan-Am flight out of Paris three times a week, just under two hours from now if today was one of the days, that went all the way to Mauritius. With a stopover in Bahrain, and The Seychelles. The Bahrain leg was almost eight hours, that meant that before nightfall I could be checked in at the Bahrain Sheraton. By tomorrow I would be on a Saudia Airlines flight to Jeddah. After that I would drive up into the mountains, and Taif itself. I checked my watch, and went to check the flight days, and get my things prepared.

  ~

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  A

  s I was finishing up, there was a quiet knock on the door. I was still trying to sort out the gear that I wanted when I got to Venezuela, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to be taking it into the Kingdom. George would be riding with Therese and Ted in a chartered jet to get back to Toronto, and forward to Venezuela after that. A charter wasn’t the safest place for this gear.

  I’d have to get Evie to care for it during the trip out to the Bahamas, and collect it with all of the other gear when we got it into Brazil. Exactly how that was going to go down, I’d work out on the flight to Bahrain. In the meantime, it should be safe on Ronnie’s jet. Casey and Littlefox would be taking a commercial flight, and traveling light, so it wasn’t as if there was much in the way of choices.

  All of this and more was going through my mind as I called out.

  “Who?”

  Instead of an answer, the knock was repeated. Again, softly. Someone wanted a word, and they didn’t want it with everyone in the house apparently, just me.

  As I walked over to the door, I could feel the tension starting to build inside. Nothing about this trip had been normal so far, and I didn’t see where that was going to change just yet. When I opened the door a few inches to see who was there, Evie’s face was staring back at me. She gave me a withering look like I was so silly that I didn’t just know it was her or something. Women. You gotta love ‘em. She slipped inside, quickly shutting the door behind her.

  What it was going to be now, I had no idea, but from the look she’d given me I suspected that Evie thought that she wasn’t through giving me a hard time today. I thought otherwise, but I held my tongue until she’d stated her purpose.

  “I need to have ten minutes with you Jeffry. It’s important.”

  “I don’t have ten minutes. I’m giving a last-minute briefing before I leave, though, in about fifteen minutes. Can it wait until then?”

  “No, it can’t. It’s got to be now.”

  “It’s got to be now, why?”

  “Because this is a conspiracy we’re fighting, right? They’re more people involved in this affair on all fronts than any one of us ever imagined at the start, right?”

  “Yes, but…”

  “’But’, nothing. It’s true. Those are the facts. I’m not guessing at this stage. We’ve left over half a dozen dead in our wake so far. So far. It ain’t over yet, either, brother. And that count could just as easily be ten. It all depends on how many were in that chase car. If it was full… then ten is more like it.

  And out of everyone here, I seem to be the only one who has an inkling of what’s to come. Besides you, I mean. It’s going to get a lot worse before it gets any better, isn’t it? We’ve had a pretty easy time of it so far. We’ve had the law on our side, badges and contacts, weapons and money, our own plane, full communications gear, we’ve managed to get our hands on the suits as well, it just hasn’t been that hard, has it?”

  I thought about what she was saying and I realized where she was going with this. Maybe. I’d have to let her speak and then I’d see. She’d earned that much from me. I went along, even though her idea of what was ‘hard’ and what wasn’t was different from mine.

  “Okay, whatever.”

  “Yes, I know it’s been hard for you. It’s a completely different thing to be so good at something that you always come out on top, and having to do that thing when you don’t want to. And when ‘that thing’ involves the taking of human life. I realize that Jeffry, and I don’t want to belittle what you’ve accomplished so far. Especially in spite of having to watch the backs of a band of pencil-pushing theorists while you were doing it.”

  I started to protest, albeit weakly, but she could see it coming from my body language, and she cut me off before I got started.

  “I know that you now consider us as a ‘team’, and that you have respect for Ronnie and I. You wouldn’t slag us off if you were tortured to, I’m sure. That’s not the point I’m trying to make here.

  That analysis was fairly accurate when we started out, with the exception of myself and Casey. We have done some field work before, and I’ve had to pull the trigger before, too. Only once, but once is all it takes to find out what it’s like. It doesn’t get easier with a rising count. In fact, I find it’s just the opposite, it gets worse. For me, anyway.

  I figure that you’re the same. You do it, and you do it very well, but you don’t like to, and you never will. For you it’s just part of the ‘mission’, and whatever it takes is what you do. I understand that about you.”

  Now I was getting fidgety. I checked my watch again.

  “Evie, you’ve got six out of ten left, and then I’m gone. Make your point or help me pack.”

  She took a deep breath and let it out in a slow whooshing noise, with her lips pursed. This was obviously tough for her. I pushed again, this time with a softer voice.

  “Evie, just ‘out’ with it. It’s me you’re talking to. Make your case.”

  “I’m sorry Jeffry. It’s hard for me to say this, that’s all, but it needs saying. I’ve been with Ronnie now for almost eight years. I know her inside and out. I’m loyal to her, and for good reason. But.”

  Here it came. I waited.

  “She’s not ready to take the Bahamas job solo. She’ll get cut down if Enrico’s grey men show up. Or, even worse, if Enrico shows up. I can’t take that risk, and neither can you. I know that one of your main mandates was to protect Ronnie’s back. You can’t do that from another part of the world. You’re not talking a lot about your trip to the middle east, but can’t it wait until we do the Bahamas together? She needs you, Jeffry. I need you. I have the heart for it, I just don’t know if I have the skill for it if it starts to go down hard.

  The opposition is tough here, and… well the bottom line is that if they know that we’re coming, then—it’s all on their ground. Every advantage that can be had. Truthfully, the only thing we have is surprise, and you. If we take both of those away, then we stand between the devil and the deep blue sea.”

  I was getting the distinct impression that she wanted me in the Bahamas on this trip. What was more intriguing was her belief that the element of surprise was no longer going to be in our favour, no matter what we did. That was important. Why? I forgot all about the ten minute limit.

  “How come you feel that we don’t have the ability to surprise the quarry anymore?”

  “I’m beginning to think that we never did surprise him.”

  “Carry on.”

  “Ah… I don’t think we can say with absolute certainty that all of the members of our team are loyal at this point.”

  She got it out in one rush, and it was apparent that it had been hard for her to say, which meant that she’d agonized over this before coming to me with it.

  There was an honest-to-goodness ‘pregnant pause’. Now I had to hear why, so I repeated myself.

  “Carry on.”

  “We found that one of our data researchers was turned, and we didn’t think that was possible. You found one of the Speci
al Operatives attached to the Canadian Embassy in the Zurich office was turned. That was unthinkable. You turned him back, and then he was promptly killed for it. Nastily.

  What if there are others and we don’t know yet? What if someone on this very team was turned? What if it was just another someone back at the home office, even?”

  Now we were getting into blue-water sailing. What if? Out on the ocean, out of sight of land, anything can happen. Sometimes it even does.

  There you are, minding your own business, sailing along in your nice sailboat, maybe only hours out of port, with the sun shining and a clear radarscope for the next thousand miles in every direction. Your wife is in the galley with your son, rustling up a lunch for everyone. Next stop, St. Thomas, or maybe St. Kitts. Life is good. You glance over your shoulder because your five-year-old daughter is yelling for you to ‘look daddy look!’, and five hundred yards off the stern you see a wall of water sixty feet high rushing at you at five or ten times your top speed. Your boat is a thirty-foot sailing ketch, built for blue-water sailing, but this isn’t sailing, this is your worst nightmare. The boat won’t stand up to this thing, and you know it without even thinking.

  You look to the sky, and it’s as clear and as blue as forever, as far as the eye can see in all directions, except the direction of the wave, because now it’s closing on you real fast, and it cuts off your entire view in that direction. It’s as huge as a tidal wave, and it might as well be a tsunami for all you can do about it, but it’s just a ‘rogue wave’. A freak of nature. Maybe it came from the Cape down at the horn of Africa. Who knows? Shit happens.

  You don’t even have time to scream out a goodbye before it’s all over, and after it passes, the sea is clear and calm again, but your boat is gone. You’re gone, your family’s gone, your hopes and dreams and fears are all gone, and the sun shines down on the happy tropical sea. Fifteen minutes east of your position the wave hits an underwater trench, deep, with a high lip on the far side. The force of the wave is broken down to a manageable size in the twinkling of an eye. Too late for you though, of course. Life.

  I knew about life a little. It hurt sometimes, and it always kicked at you. The trick was to know when to take one step sideways. However, you could get to that point, you got there, then you listened when life whispered in your ear, ‘I’m coming now’. And maybe you got to hold onto it, ride it out. Maybe.

  I spoke my case clearly, because I could see that Evie was in a state of distress.

  “Let’s take this one point at a time. Firstly, we haven’t had any contact with the home office since the initial discovery of the leak, and the follow-up. That was intentional, for just the reason you postulate. Two, when we did contact them, no aspect of our operation was discussed. Because of that very reason, trust. How can it hurt us if someone at the home office is on the wrong side when they don’t even know where we are or what we’re doing?”

  Evie flinched, almost as if someone had slapped her. She started talking, but it was almost as if she were talking to herself, not me.

  “I don’t want to, but I have to. …Jeffry, if you screw up my relationship with Ronnie over this…”

  “Just–tell me.”

  “Ronnie has been calling the office regularly to check in and get any updated information that we may have come up with since the last call. It’s because you came up with so much and she felt that she had to get the inside scoop in order to keep up with you.

  It still hasn’t happened, and the quality of information coming out of the office these days isn’t what it should be. Maybe that’s because Ronnie’s in the field, not the office, but… I don’t know.

  I don’t trust anyone back at the office anymore. Not until we’ve gotten back and had a chance to do some housecleaning.”

  I was floored. Ronnie had kept her business to herself in the middle of all of this? What else was going on that I didn’t know about? I tried to stay focused, and keep my mind sharp, but the betrayal was hard. It was tempered somewhat by Evie coming to tell me, finally, because she at least saw the danger.

  She’d heard the whisper, ‘I’m coming’, and she’d taken one step sideways. But she’d waited before she moved. Was it enough?

  “Has anyone else on the team been in contact with the home office while we were on the road?”

  “I don’t know if they did or didn’t. That’s part of the problem. I know that Littlefox is A-1 loyal. I know that Casey is a great guy. I know that Wilson has been with Ronnie the longest, and his loyalty is supposedly fierce. I don’t know him well, though. He keeps himself to himself.

  What I don’t know is if any of them made calls that weren’t authorized by Ronnie. For whatever reason. I do know that Wilson has been the one who kept Ronnie up-to-date part of the time we were on the road. How many times he called the office, and who he spoke to… I just can’t say.

  I think that we have an eye on us and I don’t know whose it is. I can feel it, and it’s not the guys we’re hunting.

  I don’t know for sure that anything I’m saying is relevant. I’m also afraid that it’s just me. Maybe I’m becoming paranoid, who the hell knows.”

  She finally wound down, and stood there looking at me. Waiting for me to solve it all for her.

  “Is this why you were so mad after Therese and I became, well, so… casual?”

  She kept looking right into my eyes, trying to read the answer there to her own unspoken questions.

  “It’s part of it.”

  “I see.”

  We stood there in the middle of the room, and I thought for a minute or two.

  “Pick one person on the team that you know in your heart that you trust. Don’t think, just answer.”

  “Loretta Littlefox.”

  She opened her mouth and spoke the name as I was finishing the order. Perfect. I’d have to trust her instincts now, but I thought they were pretty good to start with, so it wasn’t too big a gamble.

  “Bring her here within the next two minutes.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  She was out the door and gone. I turned back to the task of packing and separating the gear for the trip. I should have just stood there and waited. One minute later the door opened and Evie slipped in, followed by Littlefox. Evie looked tense, and at the same time ashamed. She’d have to learn that shame was only for the ones who didn’t listen when life whispered to you. Even then, it was mostly posthumous.

  Littlefox looked confused, wondering what was going on and all. I checked my watch again. Okay, ten more minutes, then I was out of here.

  “Both of you, please, sit down for a minute.”

  I motioned to the bed, but Littlefox looked around for chairs, of which there was only the one, next to the wardrobe. A high-backed wooden chair, not the most comfortable choice, and piled up with gear right now. That left them no option but to sit on the bed, so they did.

  I cleared the chair for myself. While I was moving the chair closer to the bed so that we could talk in conspiratorial tones, Evie started rapidly scanning the room. With a look of panic on her face.

  “Jeffry.”

  “Yes?”

  She pulled a small notepad out of her back pocket and pulled an integrated pen from a small plastic pocket, the kind of thing you find in the dollar-store, or in your mail as a promotional item. It came in handy for her today. She quickly finished it and thrust the pad in my direction. I took it as she got up and left the room.

  On it was hastily scribbled—Forgot to sweep for bugs, be right back!—so I handed it to Littlefox, and made a silent shushing motion. Then I spoke.

  “Just a minute while I finish packing this bag. So, how are you liking Paris so far, have you got a boyfriend here in town? In the Service, you can be like a sailor you know, a guy in every port, all that…”

  Blah, blah, blah, I kept that up while I opened and closed a few zippers, puttering, while Evie got her sensors and bug killers.

  That must have been where she went, and she wasn’t wo
rried about what we had been going to say, that could have been stopped, it was what she had said, earlier, that was scaring her. If what she believed to be true, were true, then the bastard that had ‘turned’ would certainly bug my room, as well as other key areas of the house. Maybe every room in the place. And what had been said would be putting them on notice that it was almost over. A dangerous moment.

  I wasn’t going to go off the deep end just yet, but if this proved out, it was going to be a tougher day than I had anticipated.

  Once the suspicion had been voiced, in this game there was only one way to go. One direction only. Resolution without doubts.

  If you were clean you wouldn’t sweat. But if you were dirty, well it could get messy indeed. When the microscope swiveled to your position, all would be revealed. When you ‘turn’, you leave a trail, and you change as a person. That can be detected. The closer it gets to the unveiling of your dirty secret, the easier it gets to see it hiding there in the dark.

  People in the field did not take kindly to betrayal, since it usually meant your life. The repercussions were just as deadly from the flip-side.

  Littlefox was sitting patiently, looking a bit confused, but she was quick, and she watched me talking to myself without so much as a peep.

  She was ready to go out by the look of her, maybe to do some ‘honeymoon shopping’. What was I thinking, of course, it was honeymoon shopping. Even I’d be out picking up a few things.

  She was wearing a dark blue jacket and skirt combo, with a white blouse and blue silk scarf. It was nice, but not overdone, kind of classy. At six foot tall, the skirt was a showstopper, because naturally she had legs that went all the way to heaven. If you were a ‘leg man’, whatever the hell that was supposed to mean.

  I never did get it. All that guy stuff about being a ‘leg man’, or a ‘butt man’, or all of the other ways that men had to describe themselves and their taste in women.

  I guess I didn’t get it because I never was that way myself. I looked into the eyes, the ‘windows of the soul’, when I was interested. That’s where you got to see a little of what was on the inside, where true beauty resides.