by Rachel Lee
But what was he doing in Rome? Was he being set up yet again by the shadowy powers? Or hiding from them? How had he come to be there?
Steve Lorenzo.
If Miguel was in Rome, he was with Steve Lorenzo. Miriam was certain of that. But what was it Father Steve had told her in the jungle? He’d warned her about an impending religious war. He’d gone so far as to use the word “Armageddon.” Steve had gone to Guatemala to look for some ancient text that, if revealed, would set off a war beyond imagining. And he didn’t seem the type to give up on a quest. If the text existed, and if Steve was back in Rome, then he’d found it.
“No, I’m not all that surprised,” Miriam finally said.
“Should I ask?” Renate said.
“No,” Miriam replied. “Miguel Ortiz is not a threat. You have my word on that, and that is all you need to know about him.”
“Too much is happening here,” Renate said. “I need to know why an assassin from Guatemala has entered the scene.”
The German woman was nothing if not persistent, Miriam thought. And reasonably so. But there were confidences she could not give up, and this was among them. “He is not an assassin. Not anymore. I’m sorry, but I can’t say more than that.”
“I understand,” Renate answered.
“How is he?” Miriam asked, suddenly struck by the fact that it was Renate and not Lawton calling her.
“A few years older and a few kilos heavier,” Renate said. “He looked healthy.”
“Not him.”
“Oh.” Renate paused. “He was fine when we spoke this morning. He is on assignment.”
There was something in Renate’s voice. Longing? Yes. Renate missed Lawton.
“I’m sure he’ll be home soon,” Miriam said, trying to conceal her smile.
“It is not that,” Renate said, too quickly. “And now it is I who cannot say more. Operational security.”
“I understand,” Miriam said. Renate’s response had more than confirmed Miriam’s intuitive reading. And, she thought, perhaps that was good. Lawton had been alone for far too long. “Take good care of him.”
“Thank you for taking my call,” Renate said.
“Stay safe,” Miriam replied.
Hanging up the phone, she glanced up at the muted television screen. As it had been for the past week, the news was filled with images of European Muslim families piling their belongings into cars, pickups or trailers and heading for the protection zones. In far too many cases, people in the streets pelted them with eggs or worse as they drove away. The bombing in Hamburg had been the last straw. The city had been spared a catastrophe of ghastly proportions only because the terrorists had blown up comparatively harmless nitric-acid tanks, but no European leader was willing to pin his hopes on the terrorists making that mistake twice.
The Europeans had decided to solve their “Muslim problem,” and European Union member states were implementing the new solution with chilling efficiency. On the one hand, Miriam could understand people’s fear and anger. But what she saw now sickened her, calling to mind horrific images from grainy newsreels.
How much time did they have? she wondered. How long until the Islamic world struck back in force? And how long after that until the West reacted with terrifying finality, leaving mushroom clouds in its wake? They had come to the brink of that less than a year ago, when Harrison Rice was within a single word of launching a nuclear strike on an al-Qaeda base in Pakistan.
Rice had been acting under duress, pushed into the decision by a National Security Advisor who had been an agent of the banking cartel that had organized the shooting of Grant Lawrence and catapulted Harrison Rice into the Oval Office. Now Grant Lawrence held that post, and Rice seemed to have grown the kind of backbone that even Miriam could admire.
Yet did she feel safer today than she had on that afternoon in the Oval Office, when she and Grant had stared down Phillip Bentley and stopped a nuclear war?
No, she didn’t. If anything, open and escalating warfare seemed more likely now than it had then. If she knew anything at all for certain, she knew that Steve Lorenzo would be on the side of peace. And he would not stand there alone.
She rose from her desk, once again feeling that steely, almost predatory resolve that made her at once admired and feared by her peers. People stepped aside as she strode through the tunnel that ran beneath the Ellipse from Building Seven to the West Wing. Someone had to calm the waters, before the whole world exploded in fire.
“Grant,” she said, stepping into his office and closing the door behind her. No one except his wife had this kind of access to the National Security Advisor, but Miriam did not shirk from that. “We need to talk.”
“Please, have a seat,” Grant said, his blue eyes and chiseled features every bit as Redford-esque as they had been when he was running for President. “What’s going on?”
“Europe is about to explode. What’s more, I don’t think any of this is mere coincidence.”
Grant leaned forward and braced his elbows on his desk. “Tell me more, Miriam. Tell me everything.”
Berlin, Germany
“We’re getting nowhere,” Lawton said to Margarite as they sat in the Vorgarten of the Galeriecafé Silberstein, across the street from the Judicial Centrum. Much as he loved the Maultaschensuppe at this café—a rich chicken broth with spinach ravioli and leeks—he had only sipped a little. Frustration was not good for his appetite. “We know those bombers weren’t working alone in Hamburg. We know Bundeskanzler Vögel was murdered. But whoever is behind this is…sehr sauber.”
Margarite laughed softly. “Oui. Very tidy.”
“Why do you laugh?” he asked.
“You’re starting to think in German,” she said. “I find it charming and admirable, especially as you are an American.”
Lawton shook his head. He was sure there was a compliment buried in there somewhere. “And that means?”
“Most Europeans know at least two languages,” she explained. “Almost all European children learn English in school, but most also study other European languages, as well. A German visiting Paris will probably massacre our beautiful language, but he will at least speak it. Too many Americans know only English.”
“Well, America is a much bigger country,” he said. “You could spend your entire life traveling and never leave the U.S. In Europe, your countries are much smaller, and more people cross national boundaries more often. You need to know each other’s languages.”
“That is probably true,” Margarite said, nodding. “Still, the reputation—fair or not—is that Americans cannot be bothered to learn the languages of others, yet expect others to learn English. And not only English, but American English.”
“It’s a fair criticism,” Lawton agreed. “Most American children have to study a foreign language in high school or college, but only for a year or two. I took Spanish, and for a while I thought I was pretty good. Then I had an undercover assignment in L.A., and I learned just how little I knew.”
“You’ve studied no German?” she asked.
He shook his head. “Not in school. I’ve used the language software at the office, of course. But most of what I know I’ve learned from Renate, or from getting by during my assignments here.”
“Then I am impressed,” she said.
“I still miss more than I catch,” he said with a shrug. “If you weren’t here, I’d be lost.”
Margarite shook her head. “I doubt that.”
“Regardless,” Lawton said, “we’re still stuck. I talked to Renate this morning. Jefe wants us to pack up and come back to Rome.”
She nodded. “But?”
“I don’t want to go back empty-handed.”
“What do you propose?”
Lawton watched the pedestrian traffic on the Oranienburger Straße. Across the street, protesters marched in front of the Centrum Judiciaum. Some were objecting to the Muslimschutzgesetze, while a smaller but louder number demanded an end to the subsidies for Musl
ims moving into the protected zones. The atmosphere was charged with tension, and only the firm if restrained hand of the Polizei had thus far kept the two factions in check.
“It can’t last forever,” Lawton said.
“What?” Margarite asked.
“This tension,” he said, nodding across the street. “Sooner or later, someone will do something. Then…”
He didn’t have to finish the thought. Nor did he get the chance.
Through a crowd of antisubsidy demonstrators, he saw the flicker of flame in the instant before the Molotov cocktail arced up and over the police line, into the crowd of mostly Muslim protestors.
“Lawton, no!” Margarite cried, but too late.
He was already out of his chair, neither running nor quite walking, eyes focused on the green-striped shirt he had seen nearest the origin of the firebomb. While the crowd was surging forward, this man was casually backing away, as if content with what he had begun and looking to avoid further attention. And he had begun it. Of that, Lawton was certain.
The man spotted Lawton approaching and broke as if to run, but he was far too late to escape. Lawton accelerated quickly, his muscles remembering his days as a four-hundred-meter runner in college, his stride eating up the distance between them. When the man saw that he could not escape, he reached around, beneath the back of his shirt, and into his waistband, and Lawton spotted the flash of blue-black steel emerging.
Like most American boys, Lawton had played sandlot football, and now he lowered his shoulder and drove it into the middle of the man’s back. The man’s breath rushed out with a grunt, and Lawton heard the satisfying crack of a rib giving way under the impact.
Lawton’s legs still churned, powering his body weight forward, his arms pinning the other man’s arms against his sides, as their bodies surged together for one more stride before balance gave way to gravity and they crashed against the pavement.
Another crack emerged from the man’s torso as Lawton landed atop him, and the arm reaching for his pistol seemed to lose its focus, now twitching as Lawton rose to his knees and wrenched the weapon from the limp hand.
Lawton did not hear the cries of “Halt!” as he twisted the man’s other arm behind him. Out of instinct, Lawton reached for handcuffs he no longer carried, and he cursed as his quarry kicked weakly beneath him. Only when he looked for something with which to disable the man did Lawton see the German police officers coming toward him, their sidearms drawn, their mouths moving.
“Halt!” they said again.
Between them, he saw Margarite approaching, looking around as if searching for witnesses who might stand ready to defend what he had done. But he knew that was a vain hope. If anyone had seen what his captive had done, they were up the street, trying to force their way through the beleaguered police and add to the fray that was erupting. It would be his word against the word of the man pinned beneath him. But that man had been armed.
Lawton raised his hands, expecting the man beneath him to resume the fight as soon as he was released. But he lay there, eerily still save for weak, sucking twitches that finally attracted Lawton’s notice. Carefully watching the police, Lawton moved off the man and grasped a shoulder to roll him over, but a weak scream stopped that action as soon as it was begun.
Minutes seemed to stretch like hours as Lawton knelt beside the man, trying in nerve-wracked German to explain what he had seen. The police, having heard the man’s cry when Lawton tried to roll him over, made no attempt to move him. By the time the ambulance arrived and the paramedics turned him over, the man’s glassy eyes merely confirmed what Lawton already knew.
He was dead.
“Serienbruch,” the paramedic said. Then, seeing the confused expression in Lawton’s eyes, he added, “Series break. Two ribs…nebeneinander…adjacent. The chest wall failed. He could not inhale.”
“Er hat die Bombe geworfen,” Lawton said, over and over to the policemen. “Und er hatte eine Pistole.”
When an English-speaking detective arrived, Lawton repeated it. “He threw the bomb. And he had a pistol. Why would he carry a pistol if he didn’t intend to start something?”
The detective looked at the man’s identification and then at Lawton. “Of course he had a pistol, Herr Caine.”
“He did,” Lawton insisted.
“I saw it also,” Margarite said, stepping forward. “Herr Caine tackled and disarmed him.”
“Oh, I believe he had the pistol,” the detective said. He held out the man’s identification. “But he did not throw the bomb. He was an agent for the European Security Service. You have killed a police officer, Herr Caine.”
12
Rome, Italy
A lthough Renate took the call, Jefe saw the look of shock in her eyes. He picked up another telephone and keyed in his security code to pick up the line. He could plainly hear the anxiety in Margarite’s voice. “What’s going on? This is Jefe. Start at the beginning.”
“Lawton has been arrested,” Margarite said. “There were demonstrations at the Judicial Center. One of the anti-Muslim demonstrators threw a firebomb. Lawton thought he saw who did it and gave chase. The man tried to draw a pistol. Lawton knocked him to the ground, like in American football.”
“Tackled him,” Jefe said.
“Lawton was running very fast,” she continued. “He broke two of the man’s ribs. Lawton did not know this, and he knelt on the man’s back, trying to subdue him. The man could not breathe and died.”
“What aren’t you telling me?” Jefe asked.
“The man was a European Security Service agent,” Margarite said. “Lawton had the wrong man. He killed a police officer.”
“Shit,” Jefe said.
“What exactly did Lawton say?” Renate asked.
“He said the man threw the bomb, and that he had a pistol,” Margarite said. “He kept repeating it.”
“He actually saw the man throw the bomb?” Jefe asked.
“I’m sure he thought he did,” Margarite said. “But we were across the street, and the man was in a crowd. I am not sure Lawton could see it clearly. I tried to stop him from interfering, but he was already running.”
“Did you see the bomb thrown?” Renate asked.
“Non. I was sitting with my back to the street. By the time I turned, Lawton was already crossing the street, chasing the man.”
“Lawton didn’t get the wrong man,” Renate said. “He is too good to make that mistake.”
“Oui, he is very good,” Margarite said. “But we are all human. The man Lawton saw could have been next to the man who threw the bomb. It would be impossible to be certain in a crowd.”
“Yes,” Renate said, “but if the man were an ESS agent and standing next to the bomb thrower…”
“I see where Renate is going with this,” Jefe said. “What was the man doing when you first saw him?”
“I think walking away from the protesters who were fighting,” Margarite said. “I am not sure when I first saw him as an individual. I did not know who Lawton was after for a moment. Then this man saw Lawton and began to run.”
“Toward Lawton?” Jefe asked.
“Non. He ran away. Always away from the protesters. When he saw that Lawton would surely catch him, he reached for a pistol. He did not have time before Lawton hit him.”
“Where is Lawton now?” Renate asked.
“We are at the Section Thirty-Two police station,” Margarite said. “They are holding him here. Interrogating him, I think. They will charge him with Totschlag. In English you would call it manslaughter. Killing without intent.”
Jefe heard voices in the background. Margarite spoke quickly. “Wait, please.”
“It doesn’t make sense,” Jefe said to Renate.
“No. Why didn’t the ESS agent arrest the bomb thrower? Why was he first walking and then running away from his duty?”
“He might have been frightened,” Jefe said, knowing as he said it that the answer was flimsy at best. “Perhaps
he was going to call for backup.”
Renate shook her head. “If that is the case, then the ESS chooses very poorly in hiring its agents. If he were BKA, he would have had a radio on his person. And he would have taken down the bomber immediately, before the suspect could disappear into the crowd.”
“Any FBI agent would have done the same,” Jefe agreed. “Something smells wrong here.”
“Lawton did not make a mistake,” Renate said firmly. “I have worked with him. He would not have relied solely on believing he had seen, from across the street, the act of a single man in a crowd. He must have seen something more or he would not have focused on that suspect.”
“I am back,” Margarite said. “He will appear before a judge soon for charging and his bond hearing. Then they will take him to jail. They ask if I am his attorney.”
“Tell them yes, for the time being,” Jefe said, grateful that Margarite had attended law school before joining the Sûreté. “Stay in contact. Hourly.”
“Oui,” she said. “I will. I am sorry….”
“Save the apologies for later,” Jefe said, realizing immediately that his words sounded harsher than he’d intended. “Look, what’s done is done. You didn’t do it. Lawton did. Now we have to figure out what to do next. So stay sharp and keep us informed.”
“Oui. They are saying I can see him now. I will call back soon. Au revoir.”
Jefe hung up and looked at Renate. Her pale blue eyes had faded to a frightening shade of icy gray. “Renate…”
She did not allow him to finish. “I must go to Berlin. He needs me, Jefe.”
He put a hand up. “Renate, you’re not a lawyer. Margarite is.”
“Does she understand the German courts?” Renate asked. “Is her German good enough to understand the intricacies of German legal speech and writing?”
“Let me think on it. You can’t leave right this moment, regardless,” Jefe said. Part of him knew she was right. Part of him knew she would almost certainly be recognized, her cover blown. And then, as one thought led to another, his stomach dropped. “Damn it!”