by Alex Archer
"No. Just tell me where you are. I can take the subway and it'll be faster."
"There's a hotel. The Clark Hotel. Heard of it?"
A pool of dread opened inside Annja. "Yes."
"Come there. And, Annja?"
"Yes."
"If you don't, I'm going to have you picked up."
"That's not very friendly," Annja said.
"I'm not in a friendly mood, Annja. Get here as quick as you can, okay?"
Annja promised she would. Bart hung up abruptly.
"Problem?" Nikolai asked.
"This is where we part ways," Annja said. "I have to go see the police."
"What about?"
"I'm not sure. Bart wants me to come to the Clark Hotel."
"Where Mario is supposed to be?"
Annja gathered her things, putting everything into her backpack. "Yes."
"And this guy? Bart? He's a homicide detective?"
Annja nodded.
"That can't be good."
Chapter 10
Erene Skujans hid in the darkness outside the castle walls she intended to breach and whose master she planned to kill.
She wore black clothing under a black cloak that absorbed the pale moonlight bleeding through the jagged clouds. The landscape was reduced to almost two-dimensional relief by the absence of the sun. If not for the snow-covered ground, the darkness of the forest and the night would have claimed the grounds leading up to the high walls.
Then she would have been able to approach the castle without fear of being seen.
Leaning against the tree, her long black hair pulled back, only her pale features would have given her away. Her cobalt-blue eyes were widely spaced under arched brows. She carried a crossbow with special-forces blades that were designed to penetrate Kevlar body armor. Over the past few years since she'd left the village where her grandmother had raised her, she'd had occasion to use other crossbows. None had ever failed her.
Besides the crossbow, the quiver of bolts lashed to her left thigh and the combat knife sheathed down her right calf, Erene also carried the weapons her grandmother had trained her to use. If the man she hunted had grown up in her village, he would have feared her wrath. Her warning alone would have sent him away.
Instead, the German – Wolfram Schluter – had chosen to defy her. Worse than that, he'd gone after Mario.
Stop thinking about that, she admonished herself. You're going to get yourself killed. If you're dead, you can't stop this man from hurting Mario.
Erene was still angry over the way that Mario had left without telling her. That had hurt a lot because Erene had thought he trusted her above anyone else.
But he had gone to New York City, pursuing the American woman, Annja Creed. Erene wouldn't have known that if she hadn't checked Mario's computer and discovered that he'd been looking for the woman online. Then she'd remembered how Mario had talked about her, about how he got the small scar above his eye.
What made it even worse was that Mario had tried to hide his Internet searching. Of course, he didn't know much about computers and there had been no way for him to know how much she did.
Getting the woman's cell phone number had been expensive. Erene still had contacts who could provide services that involved hacking into credit reports and finding out the woman's personal information. None of the information Mario had turned up had included that.
Erene knew more about Annja Creed than Mario had when he'd left.
The emotion that Erene felt about the American woman surprised her. In all her life, she'd never felt jealous. Not once. There had been many men in her life. Some she had used and discarded, and others she'd broken in the pursuit of her own goals. In the end, though, none of them had mattered.
But Mario Fellini did.
He had placed himself in danger, crossing the wishes of a very dangerous man, and Erene was going to do everything she could to see him through it. That was why Wolfram Schluter had to die.
She watched the castle for a short time, making sure she had the guards' pattern down. The castle was an eccentricity of a Russian political figure from back during the Cold War. For a time the Russian had been assigned to oversee the military occupation of Latvia.
While in his position, he'd built his castle, all without the knowledge of his superiors. In those days, it had been easy for a man so far from Moscow to hide much of what he did. As long as the fruits of his labors rolled down to the men who served him, no one would tell his secrets.
The Russian and his soldiers had lived there in the lap of luxury. Then one day someone had reported him to Moscow. A KGB strike force had come out and investigated. Then the bloodbath had begun. The Russian and almost all of his men were killed and carried over to Rumbula Forest where twenty-five thousand Jews had been executed during November and December of 1941.
Erene's grandmother had lived through that. She'd been a grown woman then, and her husband had been one of those who had been stripped naked, shot in the back of the head and buried in one of the mass graves.
Sometimes, Erene's grandmother claimed, she could go to Rumbula Forest and hear the voices of the dead screaming their outrage and crying for their lost lives. Erene believed her. Though she had gone there with her grandmother, and had seen her grandmother talking to the ghosts, she had never heard them herself.
Then again, Erene didn't want to talk to ghosts. In the dark, though, she wondered if the Russian politician still wandered the halls of his castle. She wondered what he would have thought of a man like Wolfram Schluter, whose own past was also tied somehow to Latvia.
The site was less than twenty miles outside of Riga. The location gave relatively quick access to Riga, as well as several other cities in Latvia. Schluter had purchased it for that reason.
The castle was built from native stone and was covered in ivy. One tower stabbed into the air on the north end. Two stories tall, it was an imposing edifice that looked as though it could withstand a siege. The high-peaked roof only held a little snow.
The private road that led to the castle began at the wrought-iron gates manned by Schluter's men. All of them were professional soldiers, hard men who didn't hesitate about taking the lives of others.
They're the same kind of men hunting Mario, Erene couldn't help thinking.
She'd killed one of them days earlier. A car had attempted to run Mario off the road near her grandmother's village. That was the first time she and Mario had known that Schluter had tracked them back there. Before that, Schluter had stationed men in Riga.
Looking back on things now, she believed that her execution of the man had damaged her relationship with Mario. Afterward, he'd been reticent about being with her. Before, since they both had knowledge of antiquities, legends and lore, they'd always found something to talk about.
For the last three days before Mario had gone to New York, there had been almost nothing between them. It had been as if she had died, not the man who had been trying to kill them.
Bright lights flared behind her. Erene leaned in closer to the rough bark of the spruce tree and trusted the shadows under its boughs to keep her hidden.
A luxury car, the kind that took Schluter back and forth to Riga, rolled up the private road. It stopped momentarily at the gates, then the guards opened them. The car continued up the road to the circular drive in front of the house.
Tense, Erene watched, waiting to see if her luck had run out and she could only sit back and watch as Schluter drove away. She knew she should wait, but she couldn't. If there was a chance that she could kill the man, she intended to take it.
Throwing off the black cloak and kicking off her snow boots, clad only in thick socks and the skintight black suit that she'd purchased from a dealer in military surplus, Erene held the crossbow in one hand and sprinted toward the nearest wall. She kept expecting to hear a guard cry out, but no one did.
At the wall, she ran close to it, heading toward the back of the castle. The biting cold helped numb her and
drive away the fear that might have otherwise been there.
Schluter had put in guards and an electronic surveillance system, but he hadn't installed motion detectors or dogs. Both of those were hard to beat.
Erene ran with impunity, knowing that the cameras couldn't see her up against the wall. As long as she wasn't seen by the guards, she would arrive unannounced.
The back wall was fourteen feet high, but the stones were irregularly spaced. A few hundred years ago, when invading armies had marched through Latvia, the wall would have been proof against hostile forces. Defenders would have poured boiling oil on them or simply pierced them with spears when they got close enough.
Erene sought out hand-and footholds and attacked the wall, swarming up it as quickly as a squirrel racing up an oak tree. At the top, she held the crossbow in close to her body, checked to make sure none of the perimeter guards were there and rolled over the edge of the wall.
Effortlessly, Erene landed on her feet without making a sound. She had the crossbow in her hands, ready to fire, but she was in motion at once, sprinting through the fruit trees.
The castle was made of the same stone as the wall, and the same weaknesses existed. She jammed her fingers into the crevices and pulled herself up, finding places for her sock-clad feet. She couldn't feel them at all anymore.
At the second story, she listened for a moment and heard American pop music in the background. Schluter liked his music loud.
Idly, as she broke the window glass with her elbow, Erene wondered what Schluter's society friends would think of his musical tastes. He moved in high circles within Germany. They might not approve of his common tastes.
Of course, they wouldn't approve of his trying to kill Mario to get the Viking treasure, either. Then again, some of the people Schluter spent his time with might have envied him the chance to profit from someone else's death.
Over half of her life, Erene had known men like Schluter.
She reached in and unlocked the window, then opened it and slid inside. The room was a bedroom, but the bed hadn't been slept in. At least, not recently.
Her legs and arms cramped, but she knew it was from the cold and not the exertion. She worked hard to remain physically fit. Her life had depended on that too long to ever forget it.
Breathing deeply, charging her lungs with oxygen so her body would acclimate faster and get warm again, Erene told herself that as long as she heard the music everything was all right. Then she hefted the crossbow and went hunting.
She had the blueprints to the castle memorized. Another acquaintance had provided those for the right price.
Glancing at the bottom of the door, she saw that only a faint stream of light flowed underneath. She guessed that a light was on downstairs.
Carefully, she opened the door and peered out. The crossbow rested naturally against her cheek. She dropped it into position and followed the weapon out of the room.
The passageway outside the bedroom went on for a short distance before turning to the right. Eight more bedrooms occupied the second floor of the castle. No one was in any of the rooms.
That began to bother Erene. Someone should have been there. Schluter's staff included a cook and three domestics. He'd hired them from Riga.
Erene paused at the stairway curving down to the lower floor. Hidden by the marble pillar, she studied the lower floor.
The grand ballroom had been set up to impress guests. Full suits of armor stood on display. All of the armor was Germanic, leading Erene to guess that Schluter had ordered those. Several paintings and vases filled the room.
The centerpiece was the painting above the large fireplace. Flaming logs crackled inside, providing a toasty heat that circulated throughout the room.
In the painting, a fierce-faced knight with curly blond hair and sapphire eyes sat holding a sword thrust up into the air while he was astride a rearing warhorse. The knight and the horse both wore white armor that carried black crosses.
Awfully proud of his ancestors, isn't he? Erene thought. But it suited what she had learned of Wolfram Schluter. The man was still in the Order of Teutonic Knights and took pride in his heritage.
Erene had to resist the impulse to put a crossbow bolt between those arrogant sapphire eyes.
Quietly, her weapon at the ready, she descended the stone steps. The carpet helped muffle whatever sound she might have made.
Too late, she realized that she had walked into a trap.
Chapter 11
By the time Annja arrived at the Clark Hotel, a crowd of media and curious spectators had gathered to find out what had happened. Night had descended on Manhattan, as much as it was able with all the bright lights and neon lighting up the city. The whirling lights of the police cars and the coroner's van stood out.
The Clark Hotel was a gray cracker box fourteen floors high. There were no service frills that came with the lodging, but cable television was offered. The pizza and coffee shops across the street looked as if they were doing great business with the people who had turned out to watch.
Annja headed for the nearest uniformed policeman.
Before coming to the hotel, Annja had stopped back at Tito's. She'd asked Maria to keep the mosaic in a safe place. There was no doubt that if Bart found the mosaic he would confiscate it as evidence.
Annja doubted that anyone at the New York Police Department would know what to make of the mosaic. She still didn't know what she was dealing with, and she was trained to handle investigations of that nature. Not only that, but Mario had sent her a message expecting her to understand it.
The policeman looked up as she approached. "Can I help you, miss?"
Holding out her driver's license, a New York one that she didn't often use except for identification purposes, Annja said, "Detective McGilley sent for me."
The officer waved to an older policeman. "Hey, Sarge. That woman the detectives were waiting on is here."
The sergeant took the proffered ID, consulted it, then grabbed a notebook and made a notation. Then he gave Annja a cord with a temporary ID on it.
"Wear this the whole time you're on the scene," the sergeant said. Then he told the younger officer to take her up to see McGilley.
****
"Are you some kind of crime-scene specialist?" the young policeman asked when they were in the elevator.
"No." Annja felt tired and worn-out. She wasn't looking forward to what she feared she was about to face.
"I just thought maybe you were some kind of specialist."
"Why?"
"What we're hearing out there is that the body is pretty bad. Whoever killed the guy had a thing for torture."
Annja's mouth dried at that.
"Or maybe it's some kind of ritual. That's what we're hearing."
Steeling herself, Annja watched the floor indicator hit fourteen. She glanced at the buttons that listed the floors. The numbers ran from one to twelve, then picked up again at fourteen, ending with the fifteenth floor.
That means that the fourteenth floor is actually the thirteenth, Annja thought. She wasn't superstitious, but she knew that some people were.
The officer guided Annja from the elevator to room 1412.
Bart waited in the hallway outside the room. Six feet two inches tall, a square jaw gone blue from too many hours away from a razor, broad shoulders and narrow hips wrapped in a quality dark blue suit that had been tailored to fit well, he was an imposing figure. He wore his dark hair clipped short. He carried a leather coat over one arm and a notebook in the other.
"Hello, Annja," he greeted. There was no trace of friendliness.
"Bart," Annja returned neutrally. She still hadn't made up her mind how she felt about being ordered to show up.
Bart shifted his notebook to his other hand and waggled his fingers. "Let me have the backpack."
"Why?" The request shocked Annja. Bart had never acted so impersonally.
"Because I want to see it."
"No," she replied stubbornly.
Bart sighed. "This is going to go a whole lot quicker and easier if I don't have to arrest you to make this happen."
"You can't just ask to see my computer."
"Sure, I can. I just did."
"You can't."
"I can," Bart insisted.
"Not without a court order."
Frowning, Bart said, "I want you to remember later that I asked first." He reached into his pocket and took out a folded piece of paper. "One court order." He offered it to her.
Annja took the paper, opened it and read through it. The paper was a court order authorizing Detective Bart McGilley to search her computer.
Bart waggled his fingers again. "Come on. Neither of us has all night."
Reluctantly, Annja reached into her backpack and handed over her computer.
"I want the backpack, too," Bart said.
Annja slid her backpack over her shoulder again. "Do you have a court order for the backpack?"
Bart sighed.
****
The hotel staff had opened up a room for the police to use as a command center for the homicide investigation. It was stocked with coffeepots and doughnuts, but there were some muffins in the mix, as well.
Annja helped herself to a cream-cheese muffin and a cup of coffee, then returned to the easy chair Bart had relegated her to. She did all of that under the stern supervision of an older policeman who looked as if he hadn't smiled in forty years. Bart had told the man, in front of Annja, that if she came anywhere near him she was to be taken into custody.
Noticing the television set in the room, Annja asked, "Can I watch television?"
"No," Bart answered without turning from her computer screen.
"I haven't called my attorney yet," Annja pointed out.
"You don't need an attorney. You're not under arrest."
"My computer is." Annja broke a piece off the muffin and took a bite. Even though she was irritated, she wasn't too irritated to eat. Besides that, she still had the mysterious mosaic Mario had sent her.
Part of the irritability she was feeling was from the certainty that Mario was lying dead in room 1412 and no one would simply tell her that. When she'd asked, Bart had only told her that the coroner's team would be done soon and they could both find out.