by Gayle Lynds
He drove the Durango into the alley. Trash cans over-flowed at either side of the entrance. He stopped before a double-car garage and jumped out. He unlocked the padlock, easily swung open the wooden doors, and drove into the dark cavern. Inside was a Chevrolet from the early 1980s parked with its nose facing the street
"It's my parents' old car," he told her. "As long as it runs, they can fly into Baltimore and not have to worry about renting one. They keep the front part of the theater habitable with electricity and water. The apartment's upstairs." He smiled slightly. "It usually has a freezer full of food."
He left the Durango's headlights on as they got out. She felt weary to her marrow, and from the strained look on his face she knew he was as tired as she. But his gait was quick as she followed him through the shadowy garage to a doorway that looked as if it must lead into the theater. He found a switch on the wall next to the door, flipped it, and low-watt bulbs hanging throughout the two-car area turned on.
"We made it." He looked down at her and grinned with a relief that touched her. Then his pale eyebrows shot up. Her jacket had fallen open, and in her bandaged hands he saw—"Jesus Bloody Christ! Where did you get that!"
She held the gun firm, despite the dull pain in her hands. "It was one of the Janitors'. I'm going to keep it. Don't bother trying to talk me out of it."
"You're crazy, Austrian! You don't know a damn thing about guns. You're more likely to shoot yourself than anyone else. Give it to me!"
She shook her head. Her blue eyes shot ice and fire. "I appreciate everything you've done, but they've killed my mother and Orion, and they're trying to kill me and probably you, too. I'll be damned if I sit around and wait like some fairy princess to be protected. I want to learn how to shoot. You're going to teach me. And if you refuse, I'll go outside and knock on doors until I find someone who will."
"You could get yourself killed here, too, you know. This is a rotten part of Baltimore."
"Here. There. It doesn't matter. Whatever's necessary, I'm going to do it."
He studied her. He frowned. She wasn't kidding. "Okay, keep it. Now, I'm hungry. Can we at least eat and rest before we go out gunning for the enemy?"
"That's reasonable," she told him, her face set in defiance.
He shrugged, and she followed him through the doorway into the old theater. She smiled deep inside herself. She was going to learn how to shoot. She was going to find her mother's murderer. And she was going to find whoever was really behind her mother's death. She hoped he'd stay with her and help, but if he didn't, she'd do what she needed to do. With her sight and a gun, everything was possible.
Julia was acutely aware of Sam, of his long lean body, the quiet strength in his muscular face, and the very maleness of his gestures as he switched on lights and led her through the movie house's grand foyer and upstairs to the handsome apartment where his grandparents had raised their children. She found herself studying his every move, trying to comprehend why she found him so attractive.
He walked her through the living room and took her to the kitchen, where he popped frozen chicken dinners into a microwave.
As they ate, she asked, "Is everyone in the CIA like you and Vince?"
He frowned, a forkful on its way to his mouth. "You've got me. Explain."
"You have this air of suppressed secrets. Things you know but can't or won't say. Or maybe do."
He chuckled. "Is that how we appear? I never thought about it. I've probably been at it too long to see anything unusual."
"You're unusual. Take it from me. Now, in my business, we have our weirdos—"
"You mean among concert pianists?"
She nodded. "Among all kinds of classical musicians. Take Juilliard, where I studied. Everyone had their own little fetishes. I remember one girl who always wore her underwear backwards for good luck when she performed. Several of the guys got into drugs and dropped out. They said they got so turned on they tuned out. Another girl graduated from Juilliard with honors, debuted at Kennedy, and the next day went home to Omaha to go into her father's meatpacking business. She, said she couldn't spend another day in the middle of big-city sin." She shrugged and grinned. "Maybe she's right. Look where sticking with it's gotten me."
He was watching her with an amused glint in his gray eyes. "If you think I'm strange, consider how most field agents spend their time—at cocktail parties, in lonely parks, and in public bathrooms of all kinds, just waiting to pick up information from a source."
"Public bathrooms? Are you kidding?"
"I'm serious. And the country spends a fortune to train them to do it."
They laughed and finished their dinners. He continued to watch her, and she found herself watching him as he took her to the bedroom where she'd sleep. They stood in the open doorway, and her gaze swept the neat room with its patchwork quilt and sunny yellow walls.
"Thank you," she said simply.
Sam's heart was banging against his rib cage. He stared into her blue eyes and was as utterly certain that he wanted her as he'd ever been certain of anything. He wanted to devour those provocative lips, bury his face in her golden brown hair, feel her length against his. He started to reach out, but almost instantly felt something wrench inside him. Abruptly he was jumpy, as if some old door to the past were closing. Love for Irini washed over him, followed by a backlash of guilt. But this time the guilt wasn't just because he'd not saved her, but because what he was feeling for Julia might be disloyal to Irini.
He looked away and said brusquely, "You're welcome. Good night." And he walked off.
Her pulse hammered as he disappeared into the bedroom next door. Emotions ricocheted through her. Any man so attractive, so alluring, must have a girlfriend, and she'd seen evidence of one in the perfume she'd discovered on the stadium blanket in his car. She pressed her bandaged palms against the heat of her cheeks. He must be in love with his girlfriend.
She wanted Sam, and it'd been a long time since she'd felt that kind of deep desire. As she turned into the bedroom, she made a conscious decision that she had to put him out of her mind. He was helping her, nothing more. She didn't need the aggravation of romance. It'd never worked for her anyway. She had only one goal—find and stop Maya Stern. With an ache in her throat, she closed the door behind her, willing her truant heart to behave.
30
MEMOIR ENTRY
You must understand about Selvester Maas. He was an officer in a bank on the Bahnhofstrasse in central Zurich. It is still there, an imposing building with a marble façade. He was not only a banker but a widely respected civic leader. He lived and breathed his work.
He slept at his simple home in the north part of the city. He ate at home. Kept his clothes at home. And saw his wife, daughters, and son at home. But sometimes he went to a bar downtown near where he kept his mistress. He was fond of her, and together they had a child who died of influenza in the winter of 1943. After that, his mistress was never quite the same.
She found a new man, and Maas returned to his family with tears in his eyes. He had been weak and had sinned. He blamed himself for his child's death. He begged forgiveness from his family, and his entreaties were so sincere that they eventually took him back, because they had never stopped loving him.
7 00 AM, SUNDAY
LONDON, ENGLAND
At precisely seven o'clock on a chilly, fog-drenched Sunday morning, Chief Inspector Geoffrey Staffeld strode into his den and threw the Sunday Times onto his open roll-top desk. He'd picked it up from his front stoop at this time as ordered. Now he sat behind his desk and lighted one of his Player's Specials cigarettes. He inhaled a lungful and opened the bloody paper. A key dropped into his hand.
Before he could examine it, he spotted the headline on the front page. The bold words seemed to leap out at him:
Powers, U.S. front-runner, suspected of illicit sex affairs
IN THE United States, it is an axiom that only those with clean pasts dare run for President. The nation's public demands
it, and since the days of Gary Hart's aborted campaign, the U.S. press has provided watchdog services to assure it.
When hard evidence exists of behavior considered not only immoral but illegal in strait-laced America, what will happen to a candidate who is so far ahead that polls and pundits agree his victory is inevitable?
This newspaper has acquired documents from Prague and Monaco allegedly showing Douglas Powers, leading contender for the U.S. presidency, has been traveling to Europe for the past two decades to lead a sybaritic life of high-priced hookers, ménage à troises, and orgies. . . .
His chest tight, Staffeld read the article. He studied the reproduced documents. Several were police reports from Monaco from 1977 to 1980 and described an incident of group sex that had gotten out of hand and spilled outdoors, with naked men and women copulating on the beach. Children had been running through the group, which had prompted the police to be called in for what in those days in freewheeling Monaco was not such an unusual affair. But in America today, it could be political suicide.
The second set of excerpts was from the ledgers of a Prague businessman who was identified in the article as a well-known sex dealer with ties to the Russian mafia. The excerpts showed Douglas Powers's name alongside dates, amounts, and the girls he'd paid—sometimes one at a time, sometimes two together—from 1990 to 1998.
Staffeld was afraid. Immediately fury washed it away. He jumped up, jammed the key into his trouser pocket, and strode through the house to the warm country kitchen, where his wife stood at the stove stirring scrambled eggs. The room smelled of wheat toast, sizzling butter, and good hot English tea.
Calla took one look at him, and the eyebrows on her flushed face rose.
"I know it's Sunday," he growled. "You'll have to go to church without me." Despite his other physical needs, he'd never grown tired of her. She was the perfect mate. He was squat and ordinary looking, with no family connections and a brisk manner that some found offensive. She was slender, with soft skin and a haughty tilt to her head that announced she came from gentility. Her father had been an Anglican priest, and she'd grown up in parishes where aristocrats, the educated, and the wealthy broke bread with her family daily. She was the one who'd smoothed his climb up in Scotland Yard. He'd solved the cases, but she'd made certain the right people noticed.
Calla wore a clinging knit suit and a frilly apron. She glared at him. She'd been through these sudden trips to the police station many times, but she still hated them.
As if it were a flyswatter, she slammed her spatula on the stove. "Geoff!"
Geoffrey Staffeld grabbed his coat. " 'Bye, old girl. Keep a good thought." And he banged out the door to his car.
11:47 PM, SATURDAY
SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA
It was nearly midnight in Sacramento, and presidential candidate Creighton Redmond chatted with one more in the endless parade of politicians and power brokers. He planned to go to bed early for a change. The campaign was winding down to apparent defeat, and he was playing the role of an also-ran—no point in making one more phone call, creating one more tactic, identifying one more issue. It was almost Sunday now, and the election was Tuesday, just a little more than two days away.
He repressed his excitement and sense of urgency. He pumped the state senator's hand and ignored his suspicious gaze. Like everyone else, the senator thought he was going to lose. "It's always a pleasure to see you," Creighton said with his usual warmth. "I'll expect you at the previctory party on Monday at Arbor Knoll. Quite a bit of press coverage. We'll get election day off to a fine start."
The senator's face turned bland, but Creighton read wariness behind the mask. Like so many of his so-called supporters, the senator wanted to distance himself from a loser. "I'd like to be there, Judge." He cleared his throat and turned out the door. "Surely would like that. But I'm afraid I'm going to have to stay in Sacramento. Local matters to attend to, you understand. But you can count on my vote."
Inwardly Creighton grimaced. As the senator and his two aides escaped to the elevator, he nodded at the Secret Service agents standing guard on the plush carpet of the hotel hall. Respectfully they nodded back. With a surge of energy, Creighton returned to the presidential suite, closed the door, and strode to the wet bar. He poured himself one more glass of 1985 Dom Perignon champagne. From the platter on the coffee table he chose a crostini piled with slivered portobello mushrooms.
Then he ambled to the floor-to-ceiling windows that displayed the California night. He was on the top floor of this luxury hotel, and the view was panoramic. In the center, the golden dome of the state capitol rose above the glittering city. He thought of all the cities in which he'd campaigned. All the towns and farms and rural outposts. He felt a hunger in his soul so deep it almost shook him. He'd sacrificed everything for these cities and America—fought valiantly in Vietnam, given up his career on the Supreme Court, and now he was taking the perilous gamble that violence could protect his plan two more days and give him the presidency.
Ever since childhood he'd expected to be president. It was the only goal his father had wanted and never gone after. Now it was so close he could feel it hovering like a wild bird just above the palm of his hand—beautiful, elusive, and ready to land. The senator was a fool. Creighton wouldn't forget his treachery.
He smiled as he ate his crostini and drank his champagne. When his private phone rang, he finished off the crostini and picked it up.
His voice was cheerful. "You have news?"
"Bad news." It was his son, Vince.
Creighton made himself remain calm. "All right, tell me."
It was nearly three o'clock in the morning in Georgetown, and Vince was tired and discouraged. He drank deeply of his whiskey. "The two Janitors we posted at Keeline's place have been shot to death. One bullet each. In the heart."
Creighton set down his champagne glass. "Sam Keeline killed them?"
"It had to be someone exceptional to have stopped those two."
Creighton's voice rose. "You told me Keeline didn't have the guts for that anymore!"
"That's what his Company personality tests say. They've been right on target with him since 1990 after that ex-Stasi girlfriend of his got killed. I know, because I studied them. Something's happened to change him in the last twenty-four hours."
"It's got to be Dad's packet. It gave him hope he could find the Amber Room."
"Or it could be Julia," Vince reminded him. "Remember, he blamed himself for the death of his girlfriend. Maybe now he sees a chance for redemption."
Creighton said thoughtfully, "So, saving Julia will save himself."
"That's the idea."
Creighton stared out at the sparkling city. "Whatever the explanation, he's obviously dangerous now. Stern should've killed them both in the alley beside Brice's place. We'd be a lot better off."
"She was just following your orders, Dad. The two Janitors had the same orders—to capture them and take them someplace to make it look like suicide. That may have been what got them killed. Following your plan may have slowed them enough to make them vulnerable."
Creighton sighed. Vince was likely right, but it was too late to change. He wanted no more murder victims in the family. Julia's death had to be carried out as stipulated. "They probably won't go to Oyster Bay now because they'll know it's too dangerous. Pull Maya Stern from there and put another Janitor in her place. I want Stern free and centrally located in New York so we can use her as soon as we find them. I assume you're watching Keeline's friends and family."
"We are."
"And what about the police?"
"Our sources are keeping us informed. The NYPD is still looking for Julia all over New York. They don't know about Keeline. The two Janitors in Alexandria were carrying excellent fake ID that said they were Lithuanian nationals. The Virginia cops have no suspects for the murders, so it's an open investigation. But it'll go nowhere, and their identities are covered."
Creighton nodded to himself. "Good. It
won't boomerang back to hurt us, but it keeps the pressure on Julia and Keeline. Anything else?"
"More bad news. I still don't have credit card numbers on Keeline because dear Uncle David won't cooperate. That's the other reason I'm calling. He just phoned to say he'd been up all night wrestling with the ethics involved. He's decided helping us might mean he's participating in abuse of power."
A bolt of anger rocked Creighton. "The bastard. He wants to know how bad we want it, and how high he can push his goddamn demands."
"That's my reading, too. I told him I'd pass the information along."
Creighton swore again but found himself smiling. The son-of-a-bitch David was as bad as he was. Well, there was always Tokugawa's Fist. "I'll deal with him. You get some sleep, you're going to need it when our Staffeld's bombshell hits the New York media in a few hours."
In Georgetown, Vince smiled. "It's going to be a pleasure, Dad. I wish I could see Powers's face when he sees it on TV."
Creighton chuckled. "Good night, son." He hung up, and his smile broadened into a loud laugh as he raised his solitary glass of Dom Perignon in a toast to himself.
3:05 AM, SUNDAY
NEW YORK CITY
David Redmond stood looking out the windows of his swank penthouse high above Wall Street. From here he ruled a financial empire that encompassed Europe, Asia, South America, and Africa. But at this hour the city below slumbered, and his focus was narrower. He was waiting for the phone to ring.
When it did, he picked it up at once. "Creighton? What took you so long?" There was no sound of sleep in David's voice.
Creighton chuckled. Obviously David had been expecting his call. He and David understood one another. They'd lived in each other's pockets so many years that parts of them seemed almost indistinguishable. Money—its disbursement, its investment, its control, its worth—united them like irrevocable glue. They'd always known they were brothers not only in blood but in an ability to cost out value.