Sam Capra's Last Chance

by Jeff Abbott

  I slipped in earbuds connected to my custom-made smartphone and tapped an application Mila had given me: the modified smartphone could pick up sub-rosa radio broadcasts, such as those that might be used by a surveillance unit. If a team followed me—either from the CIA or from Nine Suns—then I’d hear them. Hopefully. I slipped on a pair of sunglasses. Tiny mirrors on each side of the lenses gave me a backward view, although any surveillance team would probably put someone in front of me first, whoever had been close to me on the train—again, if anyone—hanging back a fair distance.

  I turned and walked. I was dressed in a good quality blue jacket, no hat, and jeans. I looked like I was trying to find the right playlist for my stroll through London.

  The shadow picked me up two blocks from St Pancras. I caught a glance of him in the lenses; I’d seen him on the train, on the other end of my car. Youngish, brown haired, plain faced. On the train he’d worn a cap, low over his eyes while he studied his tablet computer, but out in the breezy day he didn’t. Okay, maybe he was just walking, too. I turned at the corner, walked past Russell Square. He followed. I didn’t show alarm; in my earbuds I didn’t hear any nearby radio chatter. Maybe he was alone.

  I walked for a while through Bloomsbury, enjoying being back in London, pushing against every happy memory of Lucy. Seeing if my shadow stayed. He did. I turned again, stopped in a currency exchange, converted some euros to sterling. I came out of the exchange and he was gone. Four blocks later, when I stopped for a bottle of water at a Pret A Manger takeaway, he reappeared when I came out of the store, a block ahead of me. I turned and went down the stairs at the Tottenham Court Road tube station. I didn’t see him follow; I didn’t see him get on a train. I couldn’t hear chatter that I was being followed.

  Maybe a shadow, maybe not. I rode the Central Line to Liverpool Street, one of the busiest train stations in Britain, and as I headed through the heavy throngs I caught sight of him. He was very, very good. I kept a lot of surging and seething crowd between us, walking toward the express as though I intended to take that train to the Stansted Airport. Then I cut across, heading into a store, removing the sunglasses, putting on wire-framed glasses pulled from my jacket pocket, and dropping my nice blue jacket behind a shopping display, walking on in a thin gray hoodie jacket I’d kept on underneath. The hood covered my dark blond hair. Time for transformation: five seconds. He’d lost me, suddenly craning his neck around. I hurried up out of the station and began to walk toward the Adrenaline bar in Hoxton.

  If he could still be my shadow, he was now welcome to follow me to my turf.

  As I walked the streets of Shoreditch and then Hoxton, seeing no pursuit, I considered. If the regular CIA was hunting me, they’d ask their British cousins for help, and I would have been taken at St Pancras or on the streets. But CIA Special Projects, being a dark corner, might not ask the Brits for help. Perhaps the Brits had told the CIA to keep their most secret, most dangerous branch off their soil.

  Or he might be a hired gun from Nine Suns. Perhaps Pierre Krug had already been missed.

  When I arrived at Adrenaline, I studied the bar’s sign. The last time I’d been in Adrenaline it wasn’t my bar—it was simply the safe house Mila and I had used as we hunted Lucy and those who had taken her. A former power station, it featured high-end cocktails in a worn-brick, industrial setting.

  The bar was open, but not doing much noontime business—two young men who looked artistic, glum as Van Gogh, drinking pints. Kenneth stood behind the bar and his smile brightened when he saw me. He hurried around the bar, his hand outstretched.

  “I understand you’re officially the new owner.”

  I shook his hand. “I am. Good to see you again. Let’s talk upstairs.” He introduced me as Mr. Capra to the on-duty bartender and we went up to the large office-apartment above the bar. I activated a screen that showed a camera feed outside the bar. No sign of my friend from the train.

  “I understand you want to know about baby-selling rings.” Kenneth had a quiet but firm voice.

  “If she’s going to sell Daniel in London, she must have an operation here already.”

  “So Mila suggested. The Nigerian community in London has several grapevines that can be of use if you get the right people working them. The right people are my five aunts. They are walking, tea-drinking databases. This is, by far, our most promising lead. One of my aunts, this morning, has learned of a young woman in Kilburn.” Kenneth sat down and wrote a name down for me. Mary Obinna. “I spoke with Mary this morning. She’s eight months pregnant, unmarried, and a few months ago she decided to put the baby up for legal adoption. But a few weeks ago she was approached to abandon her plans and sell the child in an illegal adoption.”

  “Who approached her?”

  “She told me it was a Belgian woman named Anna. Mary thought she’d gotten her name off a medical file, as she seemed to know confidential information.”

  Anna. “Would Mary still have a way to get in touch with Anna?”

  “My five aunts, rallied, are most persuasive. Mary finally gave us a number Anna had given her. It is a French number.” He showed me the number.

  My heart stuttered. “It’s the same number that I found on Pierre Krug’s mobile phone last night.”

  “My five aunts will be pleased they were so helpful.” Kenneth smiled.

  “Do you think Mary’ll talk to me?”

  “Not a chance.” Kenneth held up a cheap prepaid cell phone and gestured toward his laptop. “But I have, er, accessed Mary Obinna’s mobile phone account, and I’ve cloned her number to this phone. And temporarily, Mary’s real number has been changed. For all intents and purposes for today and tomorrow, this phone is Mary Obinna. You see what I am going to suggest?”

  “Yes,” I said slowly. This was a big risk.

  “We call Anna on the cloned phone. Make her think it’s Mary, or in this case, me, calling as the father of Mary’s baby. We’ve reconsidered; we want the better money offered by Anna. So we want to talk to her about selling the baby now. Ask for a meeting.”

  I crossed my arms. “But I don’t want to put Mary or her baby in any danger.”

  “They’ll be fine. Mary has a large family around her; Anna won’t bother going after her. There is no profit in it. After all, how many people would she suspect could be hunting her, other than you?”

  True enough. “It’s a risk,” I said. “Anna might not show up.”

  “A newborn is the highest profit margin, Sam. Forgive me, but it’s true.”

  “Call her,” I said.

  “And set up a trap?”

  “No. Better to draw Anna out, have Mary not show up, and track Anna back to where she lives or works. There could be records there. Clues to her real identity. A trail to where she had sold my son.”

  Maybe even Daniel, if she hadn’t sold him yet. I didn’t dare hope. I needed more time to set the trap, to form a cogent battle plan. But the world wasn’t giving me that; it was giving me an impossible situation. I’d dealt with those before. I had never held Daniel. It seemed insane to me to think I was a father with a child I’d never seen, I’d never held.

  Kenneth dialed the number on the cloned phone. He waited. I leaned close so I could hear.

  “Yes?” a woman’s voice.

  “Hello. I am looking for Anna.”

  “There is no Anna here. You have the wrong number.”

  “Anna met with my girlfriend. Mary Obinna, in Kilburn, a few months ago. Mary has changed her mind. She told me about Anna’s offer and I have, well, convinced her of the wisdom of it. She wants to see Anna again. To see if Anna’s offer still stands.”

  “You have the wrong number.” The woman insisted.

  “Please. Mary and I must speak to her.”

  The woman hung up.

  “I failed,” Kenneth said.

  “No,” I said. “She’s verifying that the number you called from is Mary’s number. If she has Mary’s medical file, she’ll have her contact informa
tion. She could have hung up instantly, she didn’t. She’ll call back.”

  “It didn’t work.” Kenneth looked pained. “I’m so sorry, Sam…”

  The cloned phone rang in his hand. Kenneth clicked on the phone. “Yes?”

  “Hello.” It was the woman again. “May I speak to Mary?”

  “She can’t talk right now… her mother is here.”

  “I would need to speak with her directly about any arrangement.”

  “Can we meet you somewhere?”

  “Yes. At Kennington Park in Lambeth. Near the corner of Kennington Park Road and Brixton Road. Tomorrow afternoon at four. Bring Mary.”

  “Yes, fine. But I will handle the arrangements for Mary. She cannot get away from her mother right now.”

  “We will not deal without Mary,” the woman said. “Obviously she has, shall we say, the keys to the kingdom.”

  “I know. I understand that she could have the baby at a clinic you arrange.”

  “Yes.”

  “Well. She wants that. Her mother is a different story.” Kenneth cleared his throat. “But we will prevail. I will have her there.”

  “If we don’t like the look of you, we leave.”

  “I understand. How will I know you?”

  “You won’t. We’ll approach you. Wear a red shirt with a black cap. And you should be with a heavily pregnant woman, yes?” The woman sounded amused.

  “Even if Mary doesn’t come…I will be there.”

  “We won’t talk to you alone.”

  “I will be there and ready to negotiate on her behalf.”

  “We’ll see,” the woman said, and hung up.

  Kenneth clicked off the cloned phone. “I don’t think that went well. She’s suspicious.”

  “She’s also eager for a newborn,” I said. “She’ll show.”

  That night at Adrenaline was busy, and I forgot my worries by helping Kenneth. There was nothing more I could do tonight to track Anna. Mila called to say that Pierre Krug was recuperating, safely hidden now in Geneva, eager to share the little he knew about Nine Suns. She would arrive tomorrow morning. She could help me track Anna when she showed up for the meeting with Kenneth. Even if she didn’t approach Kenneth, we would see her coming, would follow her and never be seen as her shadows.

  It was hope for me. So that night I put on my owner’s suit and greeted customers and served pints and made martinis and glad-handed my way around the tables. Sam Capra, bar entrepreneur. And if I hadn’t had to still be playing at spy, if most every waking moment wasn’t spent thinking about Daniel, I knew I would enjoy owning this bar. That night I slept, holding the pillow close, praying my private little mantra: Hold on, Daniel, Daddy is coming to get you.

  The next day dawned bright and clear, beautiful London weather that felt like a temporary pleasure; the forecast was for graying skies in the afternoon. Kenneth had a tap into the closed-circuit security cameras used to monitor London traffic and he set the taps to record and dump imagery from the feeds near Kennington Park in Lambeth. Mila arrived in the morning, accompanied by a young man named Stavros. He was tall and thickly built, like a rugby player, walking with the rigid yet graceful posture of a soldier.

  “Stavros’ll help us track and he’s good in a fight,” Mila said. Stavros nodded.

  “I hope it won’t come to that,” I said. I felt nerves far greater than when I was embarking on a CIA job. I wondered: Will I hold my son in my arms tonight? Will I get to see him for the first time? In my mind I’ve named the day I get my son back Daniel Day—is that today?

  Closing in on four in the afternoon, Kennington Park. The brilliant sky had clouded into a gray ceiling and I told myself it wasn’t a bad omen. I watched the ebb and flow of people into the big park. Long ago Kennington was the site of public hangings, and I hoped that dark history of death would not reassert itself today.

  This had to go perfectly, or I could lose my son forever.

  Kenneth sat on a bench near the edge of the park where Anna had directed him, wearing a red shirt and a black fedora. He looked like a jazz musician in search of a gig. He paced before the bench, papers curled in his hand. No very pregnant Mary Obinna stood nearby. He looked nervous, and I thought he was playing the part of the antsy boyfriend well. I hovered a distance away, near a bus stop, ready to follow Anna. Mila sat on a motorcycle on the opposite side of Kenneth, idling, consulting a map, chatting on the phone. Stavros orbited the park in a Prius, ready to pick up Anna’s trail if she departed via cab.

  I was counting on greed trumping safety here. Anna could walk away when she saw Kenneth had no child. She might never come close to him. Or she might talk to him, just for a moment, to see if he could be trusted. I listened to my smartphone’s radio app, trying to pick up chatter. If I had a team, maybe Anna did as well, sweeping the area to make sure it was safe before she deigned to appear. I heard only static. I dropped the earbuds and slipped in a Bluetooth earpiece and conference-called Stavros and Mila.

  “Anyone watching Kenneth?” I said.

  “Not that I see,” Mila answered.

  “No,” Stavros said. He seemed a man of few words.

  I kept my gaze locked on Kenneth. I stood and pretended to play games or text on another smartphone that I held, the way nearly everyone seems to do these days when they have an idle moment. I wasn’t far from a bus stop, so an observer studying the scene might mistake me for a man waiting on a bus. My hair was dyed black from its usual dirty blond (Mila’s idea), I wore black-framed sunglasses and a dark woolen cap. Under my jacket was a jersey for a Spanish soccer team. Was it disguise enough? I had to assume Anna knew my name or face.

  “Here she comes,” Stavros said into my earpiece. “Approaching Kenneth from the south.”

  Then I saw her. The woman from the photo. Tall, with an athletic build. She wore a dark knee-length raincoat, and was walking toward Kenneth. Her hair was raven black and short; she wore heavy, large sunglasses despite the gray cloudiness of the day. I moved away from her, toward the bus stop, where others were intent on an approaching bus. I stood very close to the curb.

  I turned away because I didn’t want her seeing my face and it saved my life because then I saw the gun, rising from the jacket, aimed at me by a man walking from the bus queue toward me.

  “Sam!” Mila said. “Approaching you! Armed, navy jacket.”

  She’d had seen it, too, just the hint of metal.

  He fired. He missed and I threw myself into traffic, two cars veering around me; there was no place for cover. I could see his face.

  The man from the train yesterday. Now trying to kill me.

  The shots echoed across the park and people slowed, stunned, their minds not wanting to acknowledge the horrible sound, the dawning danger, then reacting and panicking. The bus queue devolved into a scattering stampede. The bus itself slowed, as if unsure of the wisdom of stopping. I ducked behind a cab caught in the traffic; I could hear the cabbie cussing in fluent Russian. The gunman leveled the gun at me again; he wasn’t running when he still had time to take a head shot. He missed and I dashed across Kennington Park Road, trying to draw his fire away from the bystanders, fumbling for the gun at the small of my back. But he turned and he ran, his sleeve close to his face.

  The job had gone bad, he’d missed, he couldn’t be caught. Time to run.

  So—hunter to hunted. I ran after him, charging back into the park, people scattering in panic. The police in London respond very quickly and I would hardly have any time to catch him before a swarm of officers descended.

  A man—some do-gooder bystander—tried to tackle me, assuming that the gun meant I was a threat. I struggled free of him, costing me precious time, and I decked him with a blow to the chest that left him landing on his back. I’m sorry, mister, I know you meant well.

  But twenty seconds is twenty seconds and the gunman was moving fast across the park and then Mila’s motorcycle drove straight over him.

  He sprawled and rolled and I thought:
She’s killed him. He dropped his gun and writhed on the grass. She spun the bike back around and aimed it again at his spine, engine revving.

  He screamed a very American-accented, “No, don’t, please.” And she stopped just short. Then she kicked him in the face and he went down. She grabbed his gun.

  “Sam,” she said. “Priorities, yes? On bike, please, now.” I got on and she roared away from the park. I didn’t care about the shooter, I didn’t care which one of my enemies sent him. He was the police’s problem. Anna was all that mattered.

  “Anna! That’s her, she was here!” I yelled into Mila’s ear.

  “Yes! She ran at first sound of gunfire. Kenneth is useless now, she knows his face. But Stavros…” She shrugged. “We can hope he tailed her.”

  I held on to the motorcycle for dear life. Mila exploded out onto Brixton, weaving madly through traffic.

  “Where is she?” I screamed. No. We couldn’t lose her, we couldn’t.

  Stavros called in from the car, voice calm. “She’s on foot. Running. The shooting clearly scared her.” Pause. “She just went into a parking garage on Brixton. I’ll circle back around…”

  “Follow her. She can lead us back to Daniel,” I said. I felt the obvious needed to be stated. We’d already been screwed by a mistake. If the gunman was with Anna, then she’d set her own trap for me. But if he wasn’t… if he was CIA Special Projects, just looking to clean house, then Anna might well run home. We needed to let her run and not know we followed.

  For the next ten minutes we listened as Stavros charted her course. To her car, avoiding the police jam caused by the attempted shooting, driving past the Oval cricket ground, toward Vauxhall.

  Stavros trailed her. One chaser, instead of three. Mila shot past Stavros, shot past Anna. I wanted to reach out and pull the woman through her car window, force her to tell me where my son was. But no. There was a better way. With us in front, with Stavros behind, we couldn’t lose her. Stavros would follow, we would circle, staying close, out of sight, she couldn’t make us even if she made Stavros.