Call After Midnight

by Tess Gerritsen

  The woman was nowhere to be seen. The smell of burning candles, bayberry and pine and lavender, filled the dimly lighted room. On display tables sat strange little creatures shaped from wax. A flame burned brightly on the figure of a twisted old gnome, slowly melting away his face. On the counter sat a candle in the shape of a woman. Melted wax had streamed down her breasts, like strands of hair.

  Sarah started with surprise when an old man popped up on the other side of the counter. He nodded at her. “Geradeaus,” he murmured. She gave him a quizzical look. He pointed to the back of the shop. “Geradeaus,” he repeated, and she understood. He wanted her to move on.

  With her heart in her throat, she walked past him, through a small storage room and out the back door.

  Sunlight blinded her. The door slammed shut, locking immediately. She was now standing in an alley. Somewhere to her right lay Potsdamer Platz. She could hear the distant sounds of traffic. Where was the woman?

  The roar of a car engine made her whirl around. From nowhere a black Citroën had appeared and was barreling down the alley, straight at her. She had no way to escape. The shop door was locked. The alley was an endless tunnel of buildings set tightly side by side. In terror she fell back, her hands pressed flat against the wall, her eyes fixed on the gleaming black hood of the Citroën, looming closer and closer.

  The car skidded to a halt. The door flew open. “Get in!” hissed the woman from the back seat. “Hurry!”

  Sarah peeled herself from the wall and scrambled inside.

  “Schnell!” the woman snapped at the driver.

  Sarah was thrown backward as the car jerked ahead. One block up, it turned left, then right, then left again. Sarah lost her bearings. The woman kept staring over her shoulder. At last, satisfied that no one was following them, she turned to Sarah.

  “Now we can talk,” she said. At Sarah’s questioning glance toward the driver, the woman nodded. “He’s all right. Say what you want.”

  “Who are you?” asked Sarah.

  “I’m a friend of Geoffrey’s.”

  “Then you know where he is?”

  The woman didn’t answer. Instead she said something in German to the driver. He responded by turning off the main street and heading onto a quiet park road. A short distance beyond, they stopped among the trees.

  The woman tugged on Sarah’s arm. “Come. We’ll walk here.”

  Together they crossed the grass. A fine haze seemed to hang over the city, dulling the sky to a silvery blue.

  “How did you know my husband?” asked Sarah.

  “Years ago we worked together. His name was Simon, then.” She nodded, remembering. “He was most promising, Simon was. One of my best.”

  “Then you’re also…in the business?”

  “I was. Until five years ago.”

  It was hard to imagine this woman as anything but a plump housewife. Her hair was already streaked with gray; her face was round and moist. Perhaps that was her strength, the fact that she looked so ordinary.

  “No, I do not look the part,” said the woman, reading Sarah’s mind. “The best ones never do.”

  They walked a few paces in silence. Even here, in the midst of trees and grass, the smell of the city hung in the air. “Like Simon, I was one of the best,” the woman confided. “And now even I am afraid.”

  They stopped and looked at each other. The woman’s eyes were like two brown raisins pressed into a face of bread dough.

  “Where is he?” asked Sarah.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Then why did you ask me here?”

  “To warn you. As a favor to an old friend.”

  “You mean Geoffrey?”

  “Yes. In this business we have few friends, but the ones we do have mean everything to us.”

  They began to walk again. Sarah looked back and saw the black Citroën, waiting for them by the road.

  “I last saw him a little over two weeks ago,” the woman continued. “What a shock, to meet after all this time! I knew Simon had left the business. Yet here he was in Berlin, carrying his tools once again. He was worried. He thought he had been betrayed by the people he was working for. He was going to drop out of sight.”

  “Betrayed? By whom?”

  “The CIA.”

  Sarah halted, an expression of amazement on her face. “He was working for the CIA?”

  “They forced him into it. He had skills—he knew things that made him vital to their operation. But too many things were going wrong. Simon wanted out. He came to me for a few essentials. I provided him with a new passport, identity cards. Things he’d need to leave Berlin, once he’d disposed of his old identity. For a few hours, we visited.” She shook her head sadly. “The turns our lives have taken! I saw your photograph in his wallet. That’s how I recognized you yesterday. He told me you were a very…delicate person. That he was sorry you’d been hurt. When he left he promised I’d see him again someday. But that night I learned about the fire. I heard a body had been found.”

  “Do you think he’s dead?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “If he’s dead, then why are they still following you?”

  “You mentioned a CIA operation. Does it have anything to do with a man called Magus?”

  The woman’s eyes showed only a faint trace of surprise. “He should not have told you about Magus.”

  “He didn’t. Eve did.”

  “Ah. Then you know about Eva.” The woman gave her a searching look. “I hope you aren’t jealous. We can’t be jealous in this work.” She smiled. “Little Eva! She must be close to forty now. And still beautiful, I imagine.”

  “You mean—you haven’t heard?”

  “Heard what?”

  “Eve is dead.”

  The woman froze, all color drained from her face. “How did it happen?” she whispered.

  “A back alley in London…just a few days ago.”

  “She was tortured?”

  Sarah nodded, feeling sick at the memory.

  Swiftly the woman scanned the park. Except for the driver in the Citroën, there was no one else in sight. “Then we’ve no time to waste,” she said, turning to Sarah. “They’ll be coming for me. Listen to what I’m going to say. After we part you will not see me again. Two weeks ago, when your husband came to me, it was on business. Deadly business.”

  “Magus?”

  “Yes. What’s left of him. Five years ago the three of us were given an assignment. It was—how should I put it—to terminate with extreme prejudice. Our target was Magus. Simon planted the explosives in his car. The old man always drove himself to work. But on that one morning, he stayed home. His wife took the car instead.”

  The woman’s voice held Sarah in a trance. She was afraid to hear the rest; she could already guess what had happened.

  “The woman died instantly, of course. After the explosion the old man ran out of the house and tried to pull her from the car. The flames were terrible. But somehow he survived. And now he wants us.”

  “Vengeance,” murmured Sarah. “That’s what he’s after, then.”

  “Yes. Against us all. Me. Eva. And most of all, Simon. He has already found Eva.”

  “What do I have to do with all of this?”

  “You’re his wife. You’re their link to Simon.”

  “What should I do? Should I go home—”

  “You can’t go home. Not now; perhaps never.” She looked toward the Citroën.

  “But I can’t run forever! I’m not like you—I don’t know how to live this way. I need help. If you can just tell me how to find him….”

  The woman studied Sarah for a moment, sizing up her chances of survival. “If Simon is still alive, then he is in Amsterdam.”

  “In Amsterdam? Why?”

  “Because that is where Magus is.”

  * * *

  THE PHONE SEEMED to ring forever. Nick’s fingers tapped nervously against the booth. Where the hell was the operator? he w
ondered.

  “American Consulate.”

  Instantly Nick snapped to attention. “Mr. Wes Corrigan,” he said.

  “One moment, please.” There was a pause. Then another voice came on. “You’re calling for Mr. Corrigan? I believe he’s somewhere in the building having lunch. I’ll page him. Please hold.”

  Before he could protest, she cut him off. For five minutes he waited on the line. Then, just as he was about to hang up, she returned.

  “I’m sorry. He’s not answering. But he’s due back any minute for a meeting. Can I take a message?”

  “Yes. Tell him Steve Barnes called. It’s about my passport trouble.”

  “Your number?”

  “He knows it.” Nick hung up.

  By their arrangement, Wes would leave the embassy grounds and use an outside line to call Nick’s pay phone. Nick would give Wes fifteen minutes to get back to him. If there was no call, he’d try again later. But something told him he was taking a risk, waiting around for the phone to ring. This last exchange with the operator worried him. Especially that pause at the beginning. He glanced at his watch. It was 1:14 p.m. He’d wait until one-thirty.

  Someone tapped on the booth. A young woman was standing outside, waving a coin. She wanted to use the phone. With a silent oath, he left the booth and waited as she made her call. The conversation seemed to last for hours. At 1:25 she was still talking. He held up his watch and pointed at the time, but the woman merely turned her back on him.

  Cursing, he started up the street. But he had already waited too long.

  Out of a crowd of pedestrians standing on the corner emerged a man in a charcoal-gray suit. He was walking toward Nick. Something about the way the man reached into his jacket told Nick he was in trouble. In one smooth motion, the man crouched and brought up his hands. Nick found himself staring into the barrel of a gun.

  “Freeze, O’Hara!” shouted Roy Potter from somewhere behind him.

  Nick spun to his right, poised to bolt into the busy street. Instantly two more guns appeared. A cold steel barrel was pressed against his jugular. He heard the resounding click of a pistol hammer being cocked. For a few seconds, no one moved, no one breathed. A few feet away in the street, a limousine screeched to a halt and the door flew open.

  Slowly Nick turned to look at Potter, who was now cautiously edging forward, his gun aimed squarely at Nick’s head. “Put the damn thing away, Potter,” said Nick. “You’re making me nervous.”

  “Get in the car,” Potter commanded.

  “Where are we going?”

  “To a little debriefing with Jonathan Van Dam.”

  “Then what happens?”

  Potter’s grin was distinctly unpleasant. “That all depends on you.”

  * * *

  “WHERE IS SARAH FONTAINE?”

  Nick slouched down in the leather chair and gave Van Dam his best go-to-hell look. He was surprised to find himself in such comfortable surroundings. He’d expected glaring lights and a hard bench, certainly not the expensive armchair in which he was now sitting. He had no doubt things would soon get less pleasant.

  “Mr. O’Hara, I’m getting impatient,” said Van Dam. “I asked you a question. Where is she?”

  Nick merely shrugged.

  “If you care at all about her, you’ll tell us where she is, and you’ll tell us fast.”

  “I do care,” said Nick. “That’s why I’m not telling you anything.”

  “She won’t last a week out there. She’s inexperienced. Frightened. We’ve got to bring her in—now!”

  “Why? You need her for target practice?”

  “You’re a royal pain in the ass, O’Hara,” muttered Potter, who stood sulking a few feet away. “Always have been, always will be.”

  “I’m crazy about you, too,” Nick grunted.

  Van Dam pointedly ignored the interchange. “Mr. O’Hara, the woman needs our help. She’s better off under our wing. Tell us where she is. You may be saving her life.”

  “She was under your wing at Margate. What kind of protection did you give her then? What the hell is going on?”

  “I can’t tell you.”

  “You want Geoffrey Fontaine, don’t you?”

  “No.”

  “You arranged her release in London. Then you followed her. You thought she’d lead you right to Fontaine, didn’t you?”

  “We already know she can’t.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “We’re not after Fontaine.”

  “So tell me another story.”

  Potter couldn’t stay silent any longer. “Dammit!” he blurted out, his palms slapping the desk. “Don’t you get it, O’Hara? Fontaine was one of ours!”

  The revelation stunned Nick into a momentary silence. He stared at Potter. “You mean—he’s with the Company?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Then where is he?”

  Potter sighed, looking suddenly tired. “He’s dead.”

  Nick sat back, floored by the new information. All the running, all the searching, had been for nothing. They’d crossed half of Europe in pursuit of a dead man. “I—I seem to have a major gap of knowledge here. Enlighten me. Who’s after Sarah?”

  Van Dam broke in, “I’m not sure we can—”

  “We’ve got no choice,” said Potter. “We’ve gotta tell him.”

  After a pause Van Dam nodded. “Very well, then. Go ahead, Mr. Potter.”

  Potter paced as he talked, moving like an old bulldog between the chairs. “Five years ago, one of Mossad’s top agents was a man named Simon Dance. He was part of a team of three. The other two were women: Eva Saint-Clair and Helga Steinberg. They were assigned a routine termination job, but the operation got fouled up. Their target survived. Instead the man’s wife was killed.”

  “Dance was a hired assassin?”

  Potter halted and scowled at Nick. “Sometimes, O’Hara, you’ve gotta fight fire with fire. The target in this case was the head of a worldwide terror cartel. These guys don’t operate on ideology; they do it for hard cash. A hundred big ones gets you a bombing. Three hundred will sink you a small ship. If you’re a do-it-yourselfer, they’ll get you the equipment. A crate of Uzis. A surface-to-air missile. Anything your little heart desires, for a price. There’s no way to deal with a club like that, except on terms they understand. The job had to be done, and Dance’s team was the best.”

  “But the target got away.”

  “Unfortunately, yes. Within a year a contract was out on all three Mossad agents, with the biggest price on Dance’s head. By that time they had wisely dropped out of sight. Helga Steinberg, we think, is still in Germany. Dance and Eva Saint-Clair vanished. For five years no one knew where they were. Then, three weeks ago one of our London agents was sitting in his favorite pub when he just happened to overhear a voice he recognized. He’d worked with Dance some years ago so he knew that voice. That’s how we found out about Dance’s new identity: Geoffrey Fontaine.”

  “How did he come to work for the Company?”

  “I persuaded him.”

  “With what?”

  “I tried the usual. Money. A new life. He didn’t want any of it. But he did want one thing: to be able to live without any more fear. I pointed out to him that the only way was to go back and finish the job on Magus, the man he should have terminated. For years I’d been trying to track Magus myself, without luck. I traced him only as far as Amsterdam and I needed Dance’s help. He agreed.”

  Magus, thought Nick. The old man, the magician. At last he was beginning to understand. “Couldn’t do the job yourself,” he said. “So you hired a hit man for the good old U.S.A.”

  “Oh, yeah. Yeah, tell me your old-fashioned diplomacy’s any damned good in this situation. A bullet, at least, gets results.”

  “The easy answer to everything. Just blow off their heads. So what went wrong? Why didn’t your hit man deliver?”

  Potter shook his head. “I don’t know. In Amste
rdam Dance got…nervous. He took off like a scared rabbit. For some weird reason, he flew to Berlin and checked into that old hotel. That night there was a fire. But you know about that. And that’s the last we heard of Simon Dance.”

  “It was his body in the hotel?”

  “We’ve got no dental records to prove it, but I’m inclined to think it was. No one else from Berlin has been reported missing. Dance hasn’t surfaced anywhere. How it happened is anyone’s guess. Murder? Suicide? Both are possibilities. He was depressed. Tired.”

  Nick frowned. “But if he died in that hotel—then who called Sarah?”

  “I did.”

  “You?”

  “It was a composite message, spliced together from recordings of his voice. You see, we’d tapped his London hotel room.”

  Nick’s fingers tightened around the armrest as he fought to keep his voice steady. “You wanted her here in Europe? You’re telling me you set her up as a target?”

  “Not a target, O’Hara. Bait. I heard Magus still had the contract out on Dance. Obviously he didn’t believe Dance was dead. If we could make him think Sarah knew something, he might make a move on her. So we drew her to Europe. We were hoping Magus would show his hand. The whole time, we had our eyes on her. That is, until you pulled her underground.”

  “You bastards,” cried Nick. “She was nothing more to you than a—a goat tied to a stake!”

  “There are deeper issues here—”

  Nick shot to his feet. “To hell with your issues!”

  Van Dam shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “Mr. O’Hara, please sit down. Try and see the broader situation….”

  Nick turned on Van Dam. “Was this your bright idea?”

  “No, it was mine,” Potter admitted. “Mr. Van Dam had nothing to do with it. He found out about it later, when he showed up in London.”

  Nick looked at Potter. “You? I should’ve known. It smells like your kind of job. So what’ve you got planned next? Shall we tie her up in the town square with a big sign saying Fair Game?”

  Potter shook his head and said quietly, “No. The operation’s over. Van Dam wants to bring her in.”