by Ben English
His long coat flapping, the killer fell backwards into the living room, his head rebounding from the floor even as he rolled to his feet. Color had come at last to his cheeks, and the look he threw his silent, still partner was as murderous as the one he turned on Bryce.
Jack Flynn—if that’s really who he was—smiled. Bryce realized he was having a hard time remembering to breathe. None of it made any sense.
They came together again, and this time Jack’s style seemed to match that of the other man; short, quick blows and less kicking. Bryce was growing dizzy. The shorter man grunted and fell away. He grimaced again, while Jack looked as if he would howl in exhilaration.
Another song began playing over the speakers. Bryce was going to throw up.
*
Jack was alive. The energy coursing through him was incredible; every cell in his body sang on the brink of explosion. The smaller man darted forward again, and Jack leaned into him, meeting his opponent’s strike with a blow to the inner wrist and an open hand to the center of the chest. He was smiling despite himself. In the Paris attic he hadn’t had much of a chance to see the shorter man move, but he bet in hand-to-hand, the killer would stick with the same moves Alonzo found matched his size, drawn from Thai boxing. A kick slipped through, only partially blocked, and Jack spun with it, completing a circle with a clenched backhand strike, which was blocked.
And that had given the smaller killer a chance to pull his knife, damn it. Jack pressed in, but his fierce, ink-eyed opponent scuttled back and flipped the knife open, rotating his hand in that graceful whirl of steel that Jack supposed caused Americans to associate the term butterfly with the small, deadly blade.
Now he was in real trouble. Jack backed away from the grinning man, snatching the towel from the table. The smaller man stayed back for a moment, then launched a kick that was immediately followed by a slash with the knife. Jack’s eyes never left that bright glint, as he twisted and wove his body around the attack. The kick ripped across the side of his stomach, negligible. He barely got the towel in front of the blade to twist it away, but his opponent was just slightly quicker, withdrawing the knife before it could be captured. Jack’s hand came up under the younger man’s chin, and he both heard and felt the click of teeth as his assailant’s head snapped back. Jack pushed off, the towel gone, and stumbled on the edge of a carpet, Bryce’s spilled water, and falling—
—into the dark library. Over his opponent’s shoulder, Bryce Westen and the bearded man watched. No chance that Mercedes would have a claymore on the wall in here, eh?
A knife fight always results in blood, no matter what Hollywood says. It’s just a matter of time, and the best you could hope for was to take it in the arm and do the other guy before you lost too much blood. Anything longer than a few seconds, and each combatant merely takes for granted the eventuality of getting cut, and badly. Jack had met professionals who could literally flay their opponents alive. The killer kept the knife in constant motion, making it as difficult to follow as it was to see when he was going to—
Jack barely blocked as the small man twisted in, and the thick leather sleeve of his coat was opened up from elbow to sleeve. He gripped the man’s arm with both hands, but before he could swing his opponent into the hard edge of a shelf the killer dropped the knife into his other hand and angled it at Jack’s eyes. Jack ducked and spun under the steel, finally connecting with a punch to the solar plexus, which missed—just!—the delicate bundle of nerves and aorta, and an open blow to the man’s kidney, which did not.
Doubled over sideways in the air, the assassin shrieked and stabbed blindly. Jack stepped into the opportunity and seized the other man’s wrist—but with the corresponding hand, leaving his entire side exposed, and the little man came in hard, striking and kicking, trying to free the knife, whirling like a razored tornado. Knees and feet and hands came in too fast, almost too fast to see, and Jack was falling back, hand still frozen around the clenched knife, other arm back to absorb his fall against the shelf, and his fingers brushed against the leaves of a book.
In that moment, as Jack sought any form of balance within himself that would allow survival, provide for instinct or luck to sustain him, his senses were uncommonly precise. A faint breath against the back of his neck and ears flowed from the open French doors. Moby’s Porcelain thinly saturated the air. It seemed they swam through sound. In the living room, the quiet, insanely curious Frenchman stood next to a gaping, gasping Bryce Westen. A book lay flat on the shelf, closed but not returned to the rank and file of its brethren. It slid under his weight, and he stumbled an inch or so with it. Another knee landed on his hip at the same time the knifeman rotated his wrist, curled and coiled it like a python, and the blade slipped free. Jack had no choice but to move with the knee blow, his eye tracking the hard edge of the knife as it raked back –
He spun and swept the book from the shelf, fitting it to his palm as he whirled into the path of the knife, bringing the hard spine of the book and all his strength behind it right up under the assassin’s ear.
Shock from the blow traveled back down Jack’s arm, but his opponent was already recovering. In that instant the knife wavered, Jack found his balance and kicked the assassin full in the head. The grimacing killer stayed conscious long enough to land in a tangle of arms and legs.
Using his foot, Jack tapped the man’s head to one side, then stomped hard on the hand with the knife. No reaction. He glanced at the book jacket before returning it to the shelf. The latest edition of one of those Women are from Venus books. Thank God for hardcover.
Another. The black-clad Frenchman had already tossed his gun aside as Jack stepped across the threshold, and stood with his hands near his face. Unchanged since the Paris attic, his smile bore the same weight of amusement and anticipation. Jack had no confidence that the Frenchman had given up his only weapon in the discarded gun; posture, stance, and sheer attitude convinced him the older man was capable of unleashing himself like a compressed steel spring.
Then again, what wasn’t an act? They measured each other for a few seconds.
“Thanks for that ticket,” Jack said quietly.
The bearded man inclined his head slightly. “I’m very glad you made it to the theater in time.” His eyes narrowed. “How is the second act coming along?”
Jack looked around quickly at the house. “A few surprises, but it’s getting better as it goes along. We’re here for the same thing?”
Bryce let out an explosive gasp that was almost a gibber. “You guys are completely nuts! Gone! Whu—What’s Mercedes got to do with you? You gonna—“
The Frenchman slapped him then, seized his collar at the same moment and yanked him close enough to strike a second time. Bryce’s eyes and face went slack, and the dark-clad Frenchman cast him into an overstuffed chair. A heartbeat later he offered the same hand to Jack.
“I am Roland Thiel.”
He took it, cautiously. The older man’s eyes were clear, grey, and they lingered on Jack after the handshake. Again, Jack felt an odd measure of almost fatherly amusement and—gratitude coming from him. The same sense of anticipation he’d shown in the attic across from Vincenzo’s. “You knew the restaurant in Paris was screened.”
“I knew it.” The Frenchman frisked Bryce, taking keys, watch, and billfold. “I was running out of options to get your attention. I could not contact you personally, as my time to myself is limited now, with my employer’s plans so far advanced.” He smiled. “We had difficulty enough tracking you through Paris; for an American you know the back streets of my city as well as I do. It was difficult enough keeping up, and no opportunity presented itself until the Italian’s.” He indicated his supine partner. “Krest and I are kept together night and day.”
“Because Raines doesn’t trust you?”
“If he did not trust me, I would be dead. I’ve been training the boy—”
“—to kill. To take your place in Raines’ organization.” Jack said it matter-of-fac
tly.
The Frenchman watched Jack carefully. “Krest needs very little instruction. I’ve been with Raines for less than a year. He’s unusual. Always sending us into the world, two by two.”
Jack stood and thought a minute. The music had run its course; the house was silent but for a bit of wind. The fog would shortly be gone.
“Why all this, then? Making yourself easy to find; the ticket to the movie. These aren’t the actions of a man looking to retire with a nice gold watch.”
The older man smiled. “Perhaps I thought it would be a nice final gesture. A salute to the pawns before I leave the Game.”
“That’s too easy.”
Another short pause. The Frenchman spoke, quietly. “Because a few years ago, you were a shade faster than I. Here. Help me clean this mess, won’t you?” He moved to one end of the couch and motioned for Jack to do the same. They righted it as he spoke.
“When my name was my own, I had a son. His mother never spoke of me to the boy, perhaps thinking – thinking he’d grow into someone other than his father. When he joined the French air force, it came near to breaking her.
“Remember the Kavir Desert, and the boy you pulled from a burning plane?”
Jack blinked. “That was years ago. You’re Bruno Thiel’s father?”
The older man regarded him a beat, then scooped up two pillows that had fallen. “The European Union is a wonderful thing for many people, but their peacekeepers are like so much early wine.” They moved quickly together about the house, straightening furniture and returning cushions more or less to their original positions.
“Thanks to my employer at the time, I became aware that his flight hadn’t returned to its base hours before AFP announced it. My employer became convinced he needed something in Esfahan.” Thiel crouched and picked up a few shreds of Jack’s sleeve. “I imagine I arrived at the crash site nearly three hours after you and your group had been there. You were easy to track. Your Farsi is not very good, you know.” He smiled grimly. “The Friends of the Desert—and Prince Asad—remember you well.”
The wind was beginning to pick up, winding the long curtains of the library around each other. “Why do you think you owe us anything for helping your son?” Jack asked.
The old man, Thiel, was about to speak, when a clacking hum sounded from the front of the house. “Mercedes,” Jack felt himself pale. Thiel shot him a questioning look.
“You know this woman?”
“It’s a long story.”
The old man pursed his lips. “Give me a hand with this mess.” He gestured at the supine Westen, and strode to where his companion lay, kicking another wicker chair into place.
The garage door was still clattering up; Jack snatched a few more papers and one of the disks from the neat fan on the table and scooped up Bryce. The old Frenchman was already at the louvered patio doors. Turning to fit Bryce through the door, Jack looked back into the warm interior, his thoughts scattering like motes before the sudden wind that ranged over the house.
At the edge of the yard, they paused. Jack gestured at the house with his free hand. “So what was this supposed to be?”
“Just what you think. A burglary that evolved into rape and murder.”
“Make it sensational, as freakish as possible to cover the removal of her father’s research material?”
Thiel nodded. “It’s a hard thing today to horde knowledge, but Raines is mostly successful. We missed one in San Francisco, and the two operators originally sent after this woman got lost in the mountains, but my employer has collected nearly everything he needs.”
“Needs for what?”
The other man plainly didn’t know. A light went on within the house. Jack wet his lips. “What were the other targets, the ones here in L.A.?”
“Three last night and the final about 30 minutes from now. A fuel physicist named Fenn.” Thiel gave him the address. “If you mean to stop them, it will not be as simple as this.” He indicated the house. “This was a soft target. Fenn knows much more, his paper and electronic files will be purged as well. They mean to interrogate him before the kill. He is the final, so there will be eight men, in two cars.” Thiel added a few other items of information, then grasped Jack’s arm. “Thank you for the life of my son.” He hesitated. “I am afraid that the next time we meet—”
“Will be the next time we meet,” Jack finished, and smiled. “That is what the Friends of the Desert said to me, when I fought them over water for Bruno.” Thiel squeezed Jack’s arm with undiminished power and walked away, his companion still as a sack of wheat over one shoulder.
Bryce grew twice as heavy in the ten seconds it took Jack to fish the Jeep keys from his pocket. With difficulty, Jack keyed the lock on the SUV and dropped Westen into the passenger seat. He couldn’t help but lean into the door as it closed, and winced. The wind was cold. He was beginning to feel the aches now, the strength-sapping bites of contusions and bruises. Thank God he hadn’t been cut during the sparring match in her house.
In Mercedes’ house. Of their own accord, his eyes traveled back up the streaming light toward her home, and another ache blossomed in his chest, totally at odds with the turbulent, sharp thoughts in his head. For all its expectancy, Jack cringed at the soft sting in his heart. Eyes on the house, senses straining for any sound of alarm, of discovery from within, he rounded the SUV and tried the handle. Searched pockets for the keys already in his hand. Forcefully jammed the key into the lock. It was already unlocked.
He couldn’t pull his eyes from the house. Jack shuddered. His mind was numb. He half turned toward the house, and the wall of the incoming weather system slid down the street in an avalanche of air. Thiel was gone. What was he going to do? What was Jack going to do? He couldn’t think of a single thing.
The wall of air combed over him, and orange- and pineapple-colored petals, torn from a bank of snapdragons, swirled around Jack, pulling him away. He brushed them aside. Someone moved past a window, the kitchen window, and Jack shoved himself across the street. He left the keys swinging in the Jeep’s door, and in half-a-dozen steps he was at the front gate. The impatient wind tugged at him, urging flight. Run, Jack, run.
*
Mercedes dropped her keys and baseball cap on the sideboard, then paused in the semi-darkness. Something odd about the house, something…She glanced at the alarm console near the door, trying to remember if she’d activated it before sailing off to rescue Sylfa. Probably. At this time of day, when the garage door closed the alarm automatically activated and the house was as tight as a vault, but even so, disquiet settled over her as she stepped across the threshold. Like she’d just interrupted a full-blown conversation.
The wind outside pushed against the window, blown petals and leaves tapping for her attention. Was that a shift of the house, or a step in the living room?
She held her breath, and listened.
Again, a palpable click, like some great, silent wheel had turned.
The music was over, that was it. When a playlist of music hung between songs, the wall speakers stayed on, making a barely-audible hiss. Mercedes sighed, then chuckled self-mockingly. As she moved through the dining room on her way to the kitchen, she saw the towel, and the puddle of water under it. The sheaves of papers on the table were scattered, but hadn’t she bumped the table with her hip, running back to change clothes?
A pair of her socks lay under the living room sofa. She’d fallen asleep reading there a few nights previous.
Mercedes took her time, walking from room to room, and finding nothing amiss. A lot more dust than she remembered, and more cobwebs than her mother would approve of. The old baseball bat leaned against the wall in the living room, but she often picked it up and practiced swinging when she worked through an idea for a job. Everything was normal in the house. Her house, her fortress.
The music would shuffle on its own. Mercedes went back to the kitchen and turned the burner on under a saucepan. All her ingredients were exactly as she’d
left them, everything perfectly in place.
And a man standing in her front yard.
Even as her hand shot to the cutting board for a knife Mercedes felt her face harden. Her senses opened up all the way, like a dilating lens. The phone was just to the left of the window, the intruder would be in plain sight, and she hit 911 without looking—
But what was she really seeing? Mercedes stabbed the knife into the wooden board and leaned forward, straining for a better look at the figure standing at the far edge of the lawn. Adrenaline roared down through her, the second hand on the wall clock became a distant, slowing sweep as the features of the man swam through the gusting wind, tossing shadows at her. He was big, in a collarless wool coat with dark leather sleeves, a letterman’s jacket, maybe, but the light was wrong. Vague outlines of a face and cheekbones, nothing of expression—
—a warm, velvety calm touched her then, a single point of calm, a brief island piercing her inner, angry sea. She suddenly felt no fear toward the hesitant figure on her lawn. Was he smiling? It was hard to tell; the lamps on the street stood on the other side of the rioting trees—
—Her floodlights! She took a step away from the window and slapped them on, but by the time she dashed back to the counter—one hand on the knife hilt, the other on the phone—he was nearly gone. As he passed the pool he dropped something small and bright into her fountain, then vaulted the brick wall. The wind seemed to loft him up and carry him into the singing night.
The police arrived twelve minutes later. She had to consciously put down the knife to undo the locks and open her front door for them. For forty-five minutes they questioned her and prowled the house within and without, finding nothing. While uniformed officers checked the grounds and tested her house alarm, two others carefully, smilingly cross-examined her. They asked so many questions (Was this book the way you left it, ma’am? Did you remember dropping a glass under your sofa? Notice anybody following you the past few days, spending any extra attention? Are you sure the books were like this when you left earlier this evening, ma’m?) she began to wonder herself at the interior of her house. The repeated questions, she knew, were making her suspicious, skewing her view of the house. She began to feel as if she was on a movie set, a sham, living a made-up version of her life someone had thrown together after researching her down to the minutia, and she knew the cops had better leave before she went completely crazy.