Deliver Us From Evil

by David Baldacci

  “Our people have always come through before.” She waited, sensing that he had more to say.

  “I want in on this on the ground,” he said suddenly, then paused, probably to study her reaction to these words. “Maybe you can nip over to the prof and talk to him?”

  Reggie slipped her pistol into its belt holster and wiped her hands off on a rag she drew from a workbench. “The plan’s still preliminary. There’s time for that.”

  “You know how Mallory thinks. He fancies you as always the first choice for the tip of the spear.”

  “You’ve had your share of mission leads, Whit,” she said firmly.

  “I did, before you came along. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not blaming you. You’re excellent, really brilliant at this stuff. And since it’s mostly old blokes we go after, having a lady in the lead makes sense for getting their guards down. But I’m not bad either. And the thing is, I didn’t sign on for this job to carry the bags all the time. I’d like to get me whacks in too.”

  She considered this for a few moments. “I’ll talk to the professor. Kuchin isn’t a nonagenarian Nazi who’ll get duped by a pretty face and a glimpse of thigh, now is he?”

  Whit grinned and moved closer, running his gaze over her. “Don’t sell yourself short, Reg. That stuff works for most men. Young and old.”

  She smiled and lightly smacked him on the cheek. “Thanks for the offer, but shove off.” Before he could take another step toward her, Reggie passed by him and set off back toward the mansion. She made only one other stop: the estate’s graveyard. It was situated a respectful distance from the main house, past a stand of birch and nearly surrounded by a hedge of stout English yew. The headstones were darkened by the passage of time, and it seemed even colder here, as though the corpses below could somehow extend their chilly influence to the surface.

  She stood in front of one grave and, as she usually did, read off the ancient marker.

  “Laura R. Campion, Born 1779, Died 1804. An angel sent on to Heaven.” She had no idea if she was related to Laura R. Campion, or whether the woman’s middle name was Regina. She’d only been twenty-five when she’d passed, not so unusual back then. Perhaps she’d perished in childbirth as so many women from those times did. On discovering this grave marker one morning while walking around the estate, she’d eagerly set out to find other Campions buried here. There were none, though other family names were repeated across the burial plots. She’d researched Laura R. Campion on the Internet and at the library but found nothing. Thomas Campion had been a poet born in the 1500s, and one of his best-known works had referred to a woman named Laura, but there was no connection that Reggie could see.

  Walking back to the house she thought of her family, at least the one she used to have. She was the only one left, that she knew of, anyway. Her family tree was a bit complicated. Because of that there was a hole in her chest through which nothing could pass. It was a total dead zone. Each time she tried to come to grips with what was motivating her to travel the world in pursuit of evil, the zone repelled her, never allowing her closure, never allowing her a free breath.

  After fetching her things from the house she began the drive back to London. More meetings at Harrowsfield would come. Intelligence and background briefs digested down to the smallest detail. A plan would finally evolve and they would refine it, attempting to massage out all possible errors. Then when preparations were complete she would travel to Provence and attempt to kill another monster. In that simple equation Regina Campion would have to find all the solace she was ever likely to possess.

  CHAPTER

  8

  SHAW WAS IN PARIS, just having finished an intense day of prep work. He changed into long shorts and a loose-fitting white T-shirt and went for a run along the Seine, passing the Jardin des Tuileries, the Orangerie Museum, and the Grand Palais. His feet pounded along the Avenue de New-York before he cut across a bridge, passed over the famous river that bisected Paris, and a few minutes later ran underneath the wide base of the Eiffel Tower. He slowed, jogging through the green space before picking up his pace again. Eventually he ended up in the Saint-Germain section of Paris, on the Left Bank where his small hotel was situated. He normally preferred the adjacent Latin Quarter while in the city, but Frank had made other arrangements.

  He showered, changed his clothes, and met Frank for dinner at a restaurant near the Orsay Museum. They sat in the rear corner of the outside eating area, which was cordoned off from the sidewalk by rectangular flower planters set on tall wrought iron stands. Before leaving Frank gave him a slip of paper.

  “What’s this?”

  “A phone number.”

  “For who?”

  “Just call it.”

  Frank wedged his hat down on his head and walked off. Shaw could see him pause at the doorway to light one of his favored small cigars before quickly disappearing into the mass of people threading their way along the crowded street.

  Shaw walked back to his hotel, trying to lift his spirits by absorbing the magic of one of the most enchanting cities on earth, but the effect was exactly the opposite. It was in a hospital in Paris, where he was fighting for his life after having his arm nearly hacked off by a neo-Nazi, that he’d learned of Anna’s death. It was shortly after he’d asked her to marry him, and she’d said yes. She was a gifted linguist and had actually said yes in multiple languages. Shaw had even gone to the little town in Germany where her parents lived to formally seek her father’s permission for his daughter’s hand in marriage.

  And then she was dead.

  Shaw’s path took him along the river. He crossed over to the island where Notre Dame Cathedral stood. It had been recently cleaned, centuries of grime scraped off with pressurized water. For some reason Shaw had preferred it dirty. He checked his watch. It was nearly nine and the church shut down at 6:45 on weekdays. Tourists still roamed around taking shots of the famed exterior and themselves in front of it. He was not a particularly religious man and he wasn’t sure why he was even here.

  For prayer? Well, he was out of luck. God apparently was closed for the night.

  Shaw walked back to his hotel, unlocked the door to his room, and sat at a small desk chair, pulling out the slip of paper. He picked up his cell phone and punched in the number.

  “Hello?”

  Shaw hadn’t heard that voice in months. Unprepared for it, his finger hit the disconnect button. Damn you, Frank. Shaw had thought the phone number had something to do with the current mission. But it hadn’t.

  That was Katie James’s voice.

  He lay back on the bed and stared at the pale blue ceiling.

  Their last day together had not worked out exactly as Shaw had wanted it to. Well, maybe it had, since at the crack of dawn he’d left the hotel in Zurich where they’d been staying, grabbed a shuttle to the airport, and took the next flight out; he didn’t really care where it was going. She’d woken up, gone down to breakfast to meet him, as they had planned, and probably become frantic when he didn’t show. She’d tried to call him, but he’d never called her back. He’d changed his number. He didn’t really know why he’d done all this. He’d never run from anything or anyone before. But he’d woken up in Switzerland on a chilly morning and just knew that he had to be alone.

  So I just ran.

  He stared at the slip of paper again. He should at least give her a chance to bitch at him for what he’d done. Yet an hour went by and he didn’t move.

  Then he sat up and punched in the number.

  “Hello, Shaw,” she said.

  “How did you know it was me?”

  “You called over an hour ago and then hung up.”

  “You couldn’t know that. I’ve got caller block.”

  “I still knew it was you.”

  “How? You don’t get other calls?”

  “Not on this phone. The only person I gave the number to was Frank so he could give it to you.”

  “Okay,” he said slowly. “So why didn’t you t
ry to call back? You just had to hit redial on my number.”

  “I figured I’d let you work it out. How have you been?”

  “Don’t you want to scream at me?”

  “Why, would that be productive?”

  That didn’t sound like the Katie James he knew. She was all emotion, wearing her heart on her sleeve and in her news stories. The lady was impulsive, something that Shaw both objected to and admired about her because it was so different from who he was. Or at least who he’d thought he was. As it turned out, around her he could be pretty spontaneous.

  Shaw got up and walked over to the window overlooking the cobblestone courtyard of the hotel as night fell solidly over Paris. “I’m okay. How have you been?”

  “Back doing freelance. I got some permanent job offers but none of them really interested me.”

  “Bunch of rags?”

  “New York Times. Der Spiegel in Germany, even Rolling Stone, real bottom dwellers.”

  “I thought you wanted to get back in the game.”

  “I guess I was wrong. How’s Frank?”

  “The same.”

  “So you’re back in your game, apparently.”

  “I guess so,” he mumbled.

  “Where are you?”

  “Working.”

  “I’m in San Fran for now. So when do you think you’ll get a break from work?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Not sure if you’ll survive the next job, or something else?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Well, if you ever want to talk you have my number.”

  “Katie?”

  “Yes?” Shaw could hear her breaths coming a little more quickly.

  “It was good to hear your voice.”

  “Take care of yourself. And remember, you don’t have to do everything Frank tells you to.”

  She clicked off and Shaw tossed the phone on the bed.

  CHAPTER

  9

  DOMINIC LOWERED his glass of beer and tapped Reggie on the arm.

  “I’m sorry, Dom, what were you saying?” she asked sheepishly.

  They were at a restaurant a few blocks from her London flat and her mind had drifted to other things while he’d been speaking.

  “That I knew Whit talked to you about what was coming up.”

  “He stopped me outside the shooting range. Did he tell you he was going to?”

  “I was actually the one who suggested he go to you.”

  “Why me? He could have gone directly to the professor.”

  “He and Whit don’t always get on.”

  Reggie frowned. “None of us get on all the time. It’s the nature of the beast.”

  She swallowed some tea and played with a biscuit on her plate. It was gray and drizzly outside, and a sharp wind smacked against the window, apparently trying to force its way inside. Across from them an ill-nourished fire sputtered in the soot-caked fireplace. Reggie knew if the weather stayed like this through the summer, half of London would become suicidal and the other half would seriously contemplate it. Ordinarily, a trip to warm, sunny Provence would be a godsend. Ordinarily.

  “You know he wanted a frontline place with Huber but the professor objected?”

  She leaned forward and lowered her voice. “That was Huber. Whit going in guns blazing wasn’t going to work in that situation. The old Nazi wanted boobs and ass, not a touchy Irishman with tats and a Glock.”

  Dominic raised an eyebrow. “Whit has tattoos?”

  Reggie sighed wearily. “Get on with it, Dom. I’m tired.”

  “But perhaps with Kuchin Whit can participate?”

  “I told Whit I’d talk to Mallory, and I will.” She eyed him over her cup. “What about you? What part do you want to play?”

  Dominic shrugged. “I’ve been reading up on the Holodomor ever since our first meeting. I really want to get this bastard.”

  “Just don’t let your emotions run away with you. That makes you lose your focus, and that’s where mistakes come in.”

  “How do you turn it off? How do you not feel?”

  She leaned still closer and her lovely eyes grew wide and her smile seductive. “I’ll tell you how. Every time Huber put his hand on my ass I pretended it was you, Dom, feeling me up. And that got me through it.” She tongued a piece of biscuit into her mouth.

  Dominic blinked and looked confused, his cheeks tinged red.

  Reggie laughed. “I’m just kidding. I’m taking Whit’s advice to lighten up more. Seriously, when he did that he wasn’t touching me, he was grabbing Barbara, his German bimbo. I had to play the role in order to take him down. One step at a time. It was just a role. That’s how I got through it. I get emotional and lose it, he walks. That’s the best motivation not to ever lose it. Because then they win.”

  Dominic swallowed the rest of his beer. “What was it like?”

  She stared dully at him. “What, when he had his bloody hand up my skirt?”

  “No, I meant when you, you know?”

  “I really didn’t think about it, to tell you the truth. I just did it.”

  “I’ve never had to do it yet. I was just wondering.”

  “When the time comes you’ll deal with it, Dom. Everyone does it differently, but you’ll finish the job. I have no doubt.”

  He was silent for a moment and then said in a low voice, “The other Nazi hunters turned them over to the police and they were tried in court. Why don’t we do it that way?”

  Reggie leaned forward and said in a near whisper, “Those are just the cases you read about in the newspapers. And do you really think there aren’t groups that turned the Germans directly over to the Israelis? And do you think the Jews gave them their day in court? And people are losing interest. The Americans have a division at their Justice Department devoted to the Nazis. Funding and personnel have been slashed because everyone believes the old Hitler lovers are mostly dead. As if the bloody Third Reich had a monopoly on evil. I’ve seen genocide in Africa, Asia, and Eastern Europe that would bugger the imagination. Evil has no geographic boundaries. Anyone who thinks otherwise is barmy.”

  After a few moments of silence Dominic changed subjects. “So how do you see the plan formulating?”

  She gave him a stern look. “In a way that I don’t want to discuss in a public place.”

  “Sorry. I’m heading out to Harrowsfield tonight.”

  Reggie relaxed. “So am I. The professor wants to start early. And the couple in the flat above mine are screwing their brains out every hour. All I hear is ‘Oh God, oh God, yes, do me!’ I turn my wireless up all the way, but it’s still driving me mad. Do you want to ride out together?”

  “No, I’ll take my motorbike.”

  “You mean your crotch rocket?” she said wryly.

  “What? Oh, you’ve been talking to Whit about more than missions.”

  “Pretty rainy to be doing the two-wheeler, isn’t it?”

  “I’ve got all-weather gear.” He added wistfully, “I like it better at Harrowsfield than I do my place in Richmond.”

  “I like it that I’ll be able to get a good night’s sleep.”

  “I’ll see you there then. I have to stop for some petrol first. Cheers.”

  As they got up to leave she put a hand on his shoulder. “Dom, when the moment comes all you need to focus on is that justice is finally being done. That’s all. And you’ll be fine. I promise.”

  CHAPTER

  10

  THE NEXT MORNING Reggie woke early. She sat up in her bedroom on the third floor of Harrowsfield and shivered. This part of the house was never heated. She looked out the window. The rain had passed and she thought she could actually see some sunlight breaking through the cloud