South of the city, the shore was heavily industrial, with factories and warehouses and docks and shipping canals. So she kept looking in the north.
The Argentine Yacht Club stood at the entrance to North Harbor. They parked their big old Lincoln convertible by the lighthouse. The car burned gas like crazy but they wouldn'
t let her buy any. They called it nafta and it cost a fortune. Finally, today, they had allowed her to pay for lunch—but only because it was Carlos's birthday.
"I think he'll come today."
The cousins shared a look.
"Perhaps," Carlos said gently, "he is delayed."
"Or had bad winds," said Ramón.
As Val McVay paced the floating docks on her third visit to the Argentine Yacht Club, scanning the basin yet again, her racing eye was drawn repeatedly to a giant black catamaran moored in a shallow, silted corner of the basin. Two knife-thin hulls straddled the water in a wide stance that promised it could carry an awesome spread of sail. The hundred-footlong hulls and rigging were as black as night, except for the red letters that spelled out her name: JoyStick. It intrigued her for some reason she couldn't quite explain. Surely she wasn't getting a yen to sail again.
The wind, she noticed, was veering to the northeast. Yesterday it had been so clear that Buenos Aires's high-rises
seemed carved out of the sky and she had seen the Uruguay coast all the way across the Plata. Today the air was thickening and she sensed an ominous change in the weather.
"Val!" An old friend smiled down at her from a several-million-dollar high-tech ketch.
"Watson!" She hugged the charter captain, a handsome, sea-worn Brazilian who could talk all night in nine languages. "What are you doing here?"
Watson indicated the ketch, the biggest yacht in the basin. "Leaving for the Med, soon as that bloody front passes. Do you have a boat?"
After having too many shipmates ask whether she or her father would like to finance a radical new boat, Val had taken to pretending she wasn't related to Lloyd McVay of McVay Microwaves, McVay Computers, McVay Internet, and the McVay Foundation: She was just one of the paid crew.
"Just looking around."
"See that Swan 76?"
"Beautiful."
"She's all provisioned for the Med, when her captain breaks his leg. The owners'll pay good. Nice people, gorgeous boat. Charters booked all summer in Greece. Brilliant cook.
And the mate's from Anguilla. What more could you ask for?"
Val's restless gaze settled on the Swan. It was a very beautiful boat. And she was stunned by the sudden desire to simply sail away. Maybe it was seeing Watson with his sleepy smile. Forget about goals—forget about Sentinel. Just meld into the sea. Catch up on her reading. Eat good food. Let the mate do the work. And when the wind honked have a little fun putting a thoroughbred through her paces.
How many years had passed since she had last allowed herself to drift—years of never letting go, except occasionally in bed with a carefully vetted man? She heard her own voice speaking from a distance, as if she were standing up on the seawall and calling down to the handsome Watson.
"Have you seen a sloop called Hustle? Fifty-foot. Center cockpit. Tall rig."
Watson shook his head. "I got your e-mail. Never saw the boat. Do you have a thing for the owner?"
"Hong Kong–registered?" Why did her voice sound muffled. Stop this! "Brand-new teak decks?"
"No," he said. "Take the Swan—we could hook up in Rio."
"Watson!"
"What, dear?"
"Oh, God. . . ." This is unprogrammed nonsense, she thought.
She saw a flash of gold hair far away on the Dresena Norte seawall. A girl who looked like Shannon Riley, sitting up on the back of a convertible, laughing with two men.
"Do you have binoculars?"
Watson ran up his gangway, but before he returned with the glasses, the threesome had driven off. How many beautiful young blondes were there in Buenos Aires? At least a million. She was getting nowhere.
Watson was purring. "If you meet me in Rio, I bet we hook up again in Antigua."
"Watson! For goodness' sake, I'm not eighteen anymore." She kissed his weathered cheek. A beautiful man. If a woman had time for a penniless thousand-dollar-a-week captain. She took one last look around.
"What's that JoyStick?"
Watson explained that the catamaran—formerly named Dot. Corn—had been gearing up for an around-the-world race when her owner went bankrupt. "I thought they changed her name to Dot.Gone. But they went with Joy-Stick."
"Is she as fast as she looks?"
"Cruise missile, downwind."
"But how does she point?"
"You would know better than I," said Watson. Val had skippered a cat for a maniacal owner bent on breaking speed records.
"Like a catamaran," she answered, which was not a compliment. "Why all black?"
"The owner believed that black sails pull more wind."
"Where did he get that idea?"
"He was a businessman." Watson shrugged. "But I hear she's a serious machine—they say faster even than old PlayStation. Were you thinking of 'persuading' someone to buy her for you?"
"No, Watson, I'm thinking of buying her for myself."
The Brazilian laughed. "And I'll buy mine. We'll be yacht owners! And hire each other. I'
ll crew yours. You'll crew mine. You bring me breakfast in bed. I bring you bed for breakfast."
A taxi stopped on the seawall. Andy Nickels got out, scoping the marina like a hungry wolverine. "Gotta go," said Val. "Happy voyage, Watson." She kissed his cheeks and the Brazilian surprised her by holding her very tightly.
"Take the Swan."
"I'm booked."
Watson knew something was off. "It's a better berth."
To Jim's ears attuned to wind and water, Buenos Aires was a thunderstorm of noise. And even though the cars were old, and the buildings were in disrepair, and the trees were browning in the dry southern autumn, to his eyes the colors seemed as bright as fire. He climbed out of a black-andyellow taxi a few blocks down a wide boulevard from Shannon's hotel so he could check it out and avoid blundering into Will's enemies.
He was pretending to browse at a newsstand—while he surreptitiously studied the entrance to the Plaza Hotel—when he suddenly realized that every newspaper had a picture of the same middle-aged woman on the front page. He didn't have to read Spanish to understand the name in the picture caption: Dr. Angela Heinman Ruiz. Headlines screaming "Muerte "—death. Desaparecidos: the grim word he had learned from Captain Faveros.
He bought an English-language paper called the Herald, sank to one of the park benches, and read in disbelief that Dr. Angela Heinman Ruiz had fallen from her high-rise terrace while attempting to escape kidnappers. The Herald
speculated that the prominent plastic surgeon—whose husband had been one of the "
disappeared" murdered twenty years ago by the junta—had mistaken a simple ransom kidnapping for a political one and had panicked and jumped from her balcony.
"Dear one," Angela had called Will, and it had sounded so intimate. Jim couldn't buy that her death was a coincidence. It had to be the McVays, trying to get to Will.
He walked as fast as he could to the Plaza Hotel.
Shannon's laugh filled the lobby as he entered. He whirled toward the unmistakable sound with an overwhelming sense of relief that he wasn't too late.
He saw the flash of her hair. She was at the bar, surrounded by guys, waving her empty Coke glass for a refill. Jim's heart jumped. Propped up on a bar stool, she had looked for an instant like she was standing on her own two feet.
Shannon sensed his rush. She stared blankly, then broke into a big smile. "Omigod! Jim."
She threw her arms around him.
Jim lifted her off the stool, felt the familiar strong grip of her arms, and drank the perfect fit of her lips.
She pulled back. "Let me look at you. Oh, Jim. You look so thin. You're so dark. Y
ou're so handsome. You're beautiful."
The men burst into applause and started pounding Jim on the back and kissing Shannon's cheeks. "Churro," one told Shannon.
"What's churro?" she asked.
"How you say? Good-looking."
"I told you."
"What do you think of Buenos Aires?" several asked Jim. He leaned in close to whisper in Shannon's ear, "We've got to get out of here. It's not safe."
"No one knows we're here."
"Yes, they do. Please, we've got to split—now." "Did Will—"
"Will is dead."
That stopped her. "Oh, Jim, you poor thing."
"So is a friend of his that he was supposed to meet here—oh, shit."
"What?"
"Over there, by the front door. Those suits are watching us."
Shannon said, "They're hotel security?'
"How do you know?"
"They're in the lobby all the time. it's okay"
Is this what it had been like for Will when I wouldn't believe him? Jim wondered.
Shannon saw how troubled he was. "Let's go to our room. Bye, guys. We're going to go—"
"You must dine with us:'
"Later, Carlos. Talk to you later."
Jim looked across the lobby again. The two suits in the doorway had vanished. He had to get Shannon upstairs and call for a cab to the airport. He scooped her into his arms. She grabbed her forearm crutches. "Tenth floor."
"I'm sorry about Will," she said in the elevator. "I know you liked him."
"A lot. Sometimes."
"You've changed. You're different:'
"Who are those guys?"
"Carlos and Ramon? Sweet boys. They drove me to the harbor every day to look for you:"
"How'd you hook up?"
"Here. In the lobby—are you jealous?"
"I would be, if I wasn't scared. Didn't it strike you as a little convenient that they just drove you around?"
"Why would a handsome Argentine pick up a cripple?" "No. Why would two of them stick to you like glue until I got here?"
"You really think I'm stupid?'
"Shannon, for Christ's sake—"
"Listen to me. When I checked into the hotel I went to the workout room. I made friends with a trainer—a girl. She helped me go shopping for clothes—I came with nothing, because they were following me."
"Who?"
"I got away from them. Before I went to the airport." "Who?"
"I thought it was the police or detectives—something to do with Will Spark. I didn't know he had died. Anyhow, when I got here, I went shopping with that girl and we had mate—it's this local tea . . ."
"I had some."
"And I asked her about these boys I saw every afternoon
in the lobby. She told me they were cousins who often
stopped for coffee with their father and uncle. Okay?" "All right. I guess they were safe."
"I knew what I'd got you into and I wanted to be absolutely sure it was safe. I kept my eyes open. No one followed me. No one is watching me. Are you sure we have to leave?"
"Will got me into bigger trouble than we thought. We're getting on a plane home."
"Help me pack." She pulled a brand-new travel bag from under the bed and struggled to the closet. "Call the concierge for our plane tickets and we're outta here. Use my card." The concierge put him on hold.
"How have I changed?" "You're more direct."
"Can you stand it?"
"I think so."
"I'm so happy to see you."
"Still?"
"Oh God, more than ever. Shannon, I—"
There was a knock at the door.
"Who is it?" Shannon called.
"Room service. Amigos send champagne."
"Those boys are so generous. They can't afford champagne."
Jim put down the phone. Through the peephole he saw a waiter with a bottle in an ice bucket. "It's champagne, all right. I wouldn't mind a glass in the taxi." He opened the door. Shannon said, "Wait! It's a hundred and fifty a bottle—no way they—"
The waiter was already coming through the door, launching a soccer kick at Jim's groin.
SHANNON'S WARNING ALMOST saved Jim's balls. He was already stepping backward. The kick brushed him with fiery pain, and as it peaked he was able to slip a hand under the guy's heel and keep lifting. As his foot traveled higher than his head, the waiter landed hard on his back in a shower of ice cubes and water.
The hotel security men Jim had seen in the lobby sprang in from either side of the door.
The first stepped on the bottle, lost his footing, and fell on the waiter. The second vaulted over both and attacked Jim with a blizzard of kicks and punches.
The man was big in the shoulders and devilishly fast, with a long reach and long legs. He landed a shoe to Jim's stomach, and two punches to his head. Jim fell back. In the instant when he tried to put himself between the others and Shannon, he caught a second kick to his torso.
Jim fell back again, still moving to cover Shannon. He felt wonderfully clear. The kicks were bouncing off muscle. The months of learning how to survive at sea had tempered his workout strength, boosted his reaction time, and focused his eye. Quick and sure, he could read the man's face, see that he was closing in for the kill, and anticipate how to beat the more experienced fighter in a wholly unexpected way.
Jim lowered his forearms, which had deflected most of the punches, and when the guy stepped boldly closer, he wrapped him in his arms and squeezed with all his might. The man screamed. Jim felt something snap—ribs, he thought, maybe spine. The body went limp, the voice silent.
Shannon screamed, "Jim."
The other security man jumped off the floor like a jack-in-the-box. Jim threw the man he had bear-hugged and the two went down in a heap, just as the waiter rose on one knee, yanking a gun from his cummerbund. Jim dove at him, frantically trying to grab the waiter's hand before he got the gun out. The waiter's wrist was wet and he slipped free, jerking the gun in a wide arc around the ceiling, at Shannon, past-her, into Jim's face.
Jim seized his wrist with both hands and bent it back, trying to break it to make him drop the gun. The waiter's arm was like cooked spaghetti. It wouldn't break. It just kept bending and bending and bending until suddenly the gun fired with a dull, quiet thud.
"Jim!"
"I'm . . ." He rose slowly, shakily, and stared at the waiter, who was sinking to the carpet.
"I'm okay. It hit him. It didn't hit me. I'm okay. Are you?"
"Oh my God, Jim. Look at this." The waiter lay gasping for air. The man Jim had bear-hugged was sprawled like a bent paper clip.
"Where's the other one?'
"He ran. Look out—"
The bent paper clip was straightening, pulling something black from his jacket. Jim flattened him with the champagne bottle. The man's hand convulsed. A black wallet flipped open as it fell.
Shannon rolled across the bed and snatched up the telephone. "I'll call the police."
A gold-and-black badge shone in the light that spilled from the hall. Jim kicked the ice bucket out of the way and closed the door.
"No. Don't call."
"We have to call the police." "They are the police?'
"Will warned me."
Jim was breathing hard, taking the steps two at a time down a utility stairwell. Shannon, as light as a feather on the tenth floor, was getting heavy. "He told me the people who want Sentinel are connected all over the world. I guess he wasn't exaggerating."
Shannon was clutching her backpack, her forearm crutches, and the Lonely Planet Guide to Buenos Aires; it listed the U.S. consulate in the Palermo barrio, about five miles to hell and gone across the huge city. The guide cautioned that embassies weren't much help if you were in trouble with the local cops. But it seemed to be their only chance to tell their story to officials who wouldn't slap them around, shoot them, or hand them over to the McVays.
"Why didn't they just arrest us? Why try to trick us?" "Because they
're freelancing. It wasn't official. Until one of them got shot. Now it's goddamned official."
One flight below the lobby floor he found a corridor reeking of garbage that opened onto a loading dock. The cooks and maids who were taking cigarette breaks watched them curiously.
Sirens sounded in the distance. Jim and Shannon exchanged a look. Fire? Cops? Who knew?
"There's a taxi." Shannon waved it down as Jim hurried them to the street. He got Shannon in one door, then ran around to the other side and hopped in. The driver seemed to understand, "U.S. consulate. Palermo. Por favor."
He drove like a madman through the evening traffic. Jim tried to follow along the Lonely Planet map as they crossed the Retiro barrio, skirted a dark shantytown, and plunged through the Recoleta. He got confused in the Palermo barrio and suddenly they were there, the driver slowing in a traffic jam caused by a dozen police cars blocking the front of the U.S. consulate.
"Oh, shit."
Shannon was quick. "We said, British consulate. U.K. Not U.S. UK"
The driver shrugged and turned away.
"Now what?" she asked.
"We'll get out there, and hail another cab."
"Then where?"
"I don't know." If the cops were looking for them at the consulate they'd be watching the airports, too.
Shannon said, "There's a ferry to Uruguay."
"Then what?"
They rode in frightened silence.
At last Shannon asked, "Where's the boat?"
Jim glanced at the driver. God knew if he spoke English. He leaned in close to whisper in her ear, and despite his growing terror, he thought she smelled lovely.
"About a hundred miles downriver. I came in by train." "They'll be at the station."
"We'll rent a car." The boat was low on diesel, but the north wind was still blowing and they could sail out of the Rio de la Plata and into the open Atlantic in half a day and be gone on the limitless sea. Low on diesel, low on water, low on food, but gone.
They changed cabs outside the British consulate and told the driver to take them back toward Retiro, where the guidebook said the rental agencies were clustered. Police cars were screaming all over the place. Every traffic cop seemed to stare at the taxi. The driver had an all-talk program blaring on the radio. News? He kept watching them in the mirror. He spoke enough English to ask Shannon, "How you break leg?"
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