Gawain (Knights of Excalibur Book 1)

by Hanley, Donald

“Who? Someone … like him?”

  Lionel hesitated and then shook his head. “Not like him, no. She’s his boss.”

  “I thought you said he works for Arthur Pendragon.”

  “Officially, perhaps, but Nim is Pendragon’s personal assistant. She oversees his Knights and their Quests.”

  “Nim? What sort of name is that?”

  “It’s a bit of a long story,” he sighed. “The key point is that if she’s here in Boston, something big is about to happen.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know. That’s why I have to go.”

  “But –” Trisha looked around apprehensively. “You’re leaving me here? By myself?” Her voice squeaked at the end.

  “You’ll be fine,” he assured her. “The only people who know you’re here are Chantal and myself.”

  “But –”

  “Don’t worry, Trisha. As soon as we sort out what’s going on, I’ll send Chantal back here to keep watch.”

  That didn’t make Trisha feel much better. Lionel’s assistant or whatever she was seemed a little odd and it wasn’t clear how much protection someone as thin as that could offer. Still, Lionel had a job to do and he was trying to help her.

  “All right,” she nodded reluctantly. “Just … be careful.”

  “I will.” He walked around the counter and gently cupped her cheek with his palm. “I’d hoped to make you breakfast this morning,” he said softly, “but perhaps dinner tonight instead?”

  “Sure,” she said, forcing a smile onto her lips. “That’ll be great.”

  He nodded and then surprised her by leaning down and pressing his lips against hers. He smiled at her wide-eyed expression and then strode away into the atrium. A few moments later, the front door opened and closed solidly, leaving her alone in a sprawling mansion with no one to talk to and nothing to do except worry.

  21

  Hawk stood at Nim’s shoulder, glowering at Tam Nguyen as he typed on his laptop. Nim patted the conference table in front of the chair beside her.

  “Stop looming, Gavin,” she told him mildly. “You’re making me nervous.” Hawk doubted that very much – she looked far more poised than he felt – but he seated himself with a grunt and crossed his arms, keeping his gaze fixed on Nguyen. “Do you have it yet, Doctor?”

  “Yes, just a moment while I put it on the screen.” The large monitor hanging over the end of the table lit up, displaying a long list of names, places, and dates. “This is yesterday’s report.” Nim and Hawk leaned closer.

  “Where is Lionel?” she asked. Nguyen scrolled down until the L’s appeared. Lionel’s name was in the middle. “Berlin,” she murmured thoughtfully, leaning back in her chair. Her immaculate white-tipped nails tapped on the tabletop.

  “One hundred percent confidence,” Hawk pointed out. Most of the other entries were in the eighties and nineties. “They’re convinced he’s actually there.”

  “That requires eyewitness confirmation,” she noted, scanning the notes on the entry. “One of our people actually saw him there.”

  “Except he was actually four thousand miles away,” Hawk grumbled.

  “We’ve used doubles before, I’m sure they do as well.”

  “Does Lucas have a double in Berlin?” Nim nodded silently. “So we pretended Lucas was actually in Berlin and they pretended to be fooled.”

  “Apparently so.”

  “So how did they find out?” Nim was silent, her lips set in a tight line. “That ... situation in New York?”

  “I think there’s very little doubt of that now. The question is who specifically.” Nim tapped her nails again as Nguyen watched them both with a worried expression. “Where is Savard now, Doctor?”

  “Savard?” Nguyen obviously didn’t recognize the name. Nim nodded to the screen. “Oh! Sorry.” He scrolled down to the S’s. “I don’t see him listed.”

  “René Savard, Doctor.”

  “Ah. He’s in ... Chantelouve? Where’s that?”

  “The French Alps,” Nim said absently. “It’s the closest town to le Château-des-Ombres.”

  “The Castle of … Men?” Nguyen hazarded.

  Hawk snorted. “The Castle of Shadows. They have no idea if he’s really there,” he observed. “Fifty-fifty chance.”

  “That’s not surprising,” Nim noted. “It’s hard for anyone to get close.” She resumed her tapping as she perused the tracking report. Hawk was tempted to cover her hand with his just to make the noise stop. “Doctor, can you display Lionel’s reported whereabouts over the last three months?”

  “I’ll have to run a custom report. Give me a minute.” Nguyen typed and clicked as Nim turned her startlingly blue eyes on Hawk.

  “This narrows down my search considerably,” she said quietly. “Very few people saw Lucas at HQ when he told us of his Quest.”

  “If they were just doing routine surveillance in New York, they might have noticed he didn’t actually board the flight to Berlin and followed him to Boston,” Hawk argued, just to be contrary. “Or maybe Lionel saw the double in Berlin and realized it wasn’t him. Lionel knows Lucas well enough to tell the difference.”

  “Perhaps,” she sighed.

  “Here we go,” said Nguyen. They turned back to the screen as a new report popped up. This one showed a long list of dates and places. “Looks like he spent most of his time in Paris.”

  “Other than a trip to Grenoble in October,” Nim observed thoughtfully.

  “Is that significant?”

  “Grenoble is the largest city near Chantelouve.”

  “You think he met up with Savard there?”

  “Possibly. Scroll down further.” Nguyen obeyed. “So Lionel arrived in Chicago a week later, stayed a few days, and then returned to Paris. The tracker’s notes don’t indicate any suspicious activity.”

  “Lionel being anywhere is suspicious,” Hawk growled. The faintest hint of smile touched Nim’s lips for a moment.

  “I concur. Keep going, Doctor.” The rest of the report showed only one other trip, to Berlin. “Last Tuesday. The same day Lucas was supposed to go. That is suspicious.”

  “Why?” asked Nguyen with a puzzled frown.

  “We took pains to keep Lucas’s travel plans a secret, even the fake ones. Somehow, Lionel was able to set up his own false itinerary that very same day, well enough to fool our agents in Berlin.”

  “Which means he knew what the plan was before Lucas even left the building,” Hawk added. “There’s definitely a problem,” he told Nim quietly.

  She nodded thoughtfully. “I’ll take care of it. In the meantime, we need to know where Lionel is now.”

  “How? Boston’s a big town. He could be anywhere.”

  “He and Savard found Lucas easily enough.”

  “Well, he was staying at the Pendragon apartment. They probably know all of our sites here.”

  “And we know theirs. Doctor, pull up a list of all properties owned by Les Securités du Lac, say within twenty-five miles of the city center.”

  “Um, I’m not sure how to do that,” Nguyen admitted. “That’s not an area I’m involved in.”

  “If I may.” Nim gestured and Nguyen slid his laptop across the table to her.

  “They probably own half the city,” Hawk grumbled, sitting back in his chair with a scowl. “Real estate is their thing.”

  “As may be. I’m only interested in residential properties. With any luck, it’s a short list.”

  She typed quickly, flipping through a dozen screens faster than Hawk could read. Finally, she pulled up a report with only five entries on it.

  “So what’s this?” Hawk asked, peering at the addresses. He had no idea where in Boston any of them were.

  “These are the unoccupied residences owned by Les Securités du Lac and its subsidiaries within the greater Boston metropolitan area.”

  “Unoccupied? Why couldn’t he be staying with someone?”

  “He has no more interest in revealing the details of
his missions than we do, especially if he’s taken Miss Macmillan.” Nguyen looked alarmed at that statement but held his tongue. “He requires privacy.”

  “Okay,” said Hawk, although he didn’t sound convinced. “Can you print out a copy of that for me? I’ll check them out.”

  “We’re in something of a hurry, Gavin. We’ll divide the work. You take two, I’ll take two, and whoever finishes first takes the last one.”

  “Are you crazy, Nim?” Now Nguyen looked shocked that anyone would dare raise his voice and argue with her. “Lionel’s a Chevalier and Savard is probably with him.”

  “If I find them, I’ll wait for you before barging in on a rescue mission,” Nim told him dryly. “I’m perfectly capable of – what’s the expression? – casing a joint on my own. Doctor, can you arrange a car for me? I came here with Gavin.”

  Nguyen’s eyes flicked back and forth between them. Nim was calm and controlled while Hawk shook his head in resignation. He obviously thought Nim’s plan was a mistake but he didn’t try to talk her out of it. Nguyen swallowed nervously as he nodded. “Of course.”

  “Thank you.” Nim rose to her feet and took a picture of the screen with her phone. After a moment of stubborn resistance, Hawk did the same and Nim deleted the report. “You can head out now, Gavin. Take the first two addresses and I’ll take the next two. I’ll wait downstairs until the car arrives.”

  She strode to the door but paused with her hand on the latch. She looked back at Nguyen. “Thank you for your assistance, Doctor. As a reminder, if we discover that anything we discussed here today has been repeated to anyone, inside or outside of Pendragon, we’ll know who was responsible. There will be severe consequences.” She waited until Nguyen nodded, unable to find his voice, and then left the conference room with Hawk just a pace behind.

  22

  Lionel stared out of the driver-side window at the office building across the way. The only hint about what was going on inside was the black-and-chrome sign by the entrance to the parking lot: Pendragon Security – Boston Regional Office. There were a surprising number of cars in the lot, considering it was Saturday. Hawk’s white Corvette sat alone in the visitor’s parking area near the front door.

  The passenger door opened and closed beside him, letting in a wave of cold air. Chantal held her hands over the dashboard vents. “There is no way in,” she reported, “and the windows are too dark to see through.”

  Lionel nodded silently. He suspected as much but it was best to check. “How long were they in Trisha’s house?”

  “So she is Trisha to you now?” She shrugged off his irritated glance. “Five minutes, perhaps.”

  “And they came straight here? They didn’t stop anywhere along the way?”

  “Non.”

  “They couldn’t possibly have found anything there,” he said to no one in particular. He’d barely taken two steps inside. “So why did they need to come here?”

  “Perhaps they received news of Butler? No one else has seen him.”

  “Perhaps.” Lionel doubted it. Hawk would have gone straight to wherever Butler had been spotted. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. He’d have to move soon, before Pendragon’s security team noticed the Range Rover sitting motionless for too long.

  He straightened as the front door opened and Hawk’s familiar figure stepped out, trudging across the parking lot to his car. He started it up and backed out immediately.

  “Where’s Nim?” He thought perhaps Hawk was pulling around to the door to save her the short walk across the icy sidewalk, but the Corvette turned around and headed straight for the exit. “Damn it, they’ve split up. Follow him, I’ll wait to see what Nim does. Call me immediately once you figure out where he’s going.”

  Chantal didn’t bother responding. She just slipped out and ran for her own car with her strange loping gait. By the time Hawk reached the traffic light at the corner, her nondescript sedan was just a few lengths behind.

  Lionel left his parking space as well, moving further down the block and backing into a spot between a dry cleaners and a Thai restaurant, neither of them with any customers at the moment, unfortunately. He fixed his gaze on the Pendragon lobby and sat back to wait, hoping Nim wasn’t planning to spend the rest of the day working inside.

  A few people bundled in winter clothing came and went, but none of them resembled Nim, even if she’d changed her outfit. Then a late model Jaguar pulled into the lot and stopped right in front of the entrance. A man in a dark suit jumped out and went inside. A few moments later, Nim came out alone, easily recognizable in her long white coat. She slipped into the driver’s seat and drove off, turning in the opposite direction that Hawk had taken.

  Lionel eased out into the street a few hundred feet behind her, trying to keep at least one other car in between them. The Jaguar was easy to spot and he wondered why Nim chose such a conspicuous vehicle. He finally decided that she simply enjoyed her luxuries and wasn’t expecting to be followed.

  She seemed to know exactly where she was going, staying just at the posted limits as she headed west on Commonwealth Drive and then merged onto the Massachusetts Turnpike. Traffic was quite a bit heavier on the highway and he had to move closer to make sure she didn’t suddenly veer off onto a side street. She kept going, though, and he couldn’t imagine where she was headed. The next big city was Worcester, an hour’s drive away. It probably had another Pendragon office, but he doubted it had anything she needed that the Boston office couldn’t provide.

  Does she know I’m following her? he wondered uneasily. Is she just trying to keep me out of the way while Hawk does whatever he’s doing? It was possible, he supposed, but there were simpler and easier ways to get him out of the picture. She has to be going somewhere important. She didn’t fly all the way up here and visit Trisha’s house just to take a leisurely drive through the countryside.

  He was so lost in thought trying to figure out where Nim was going, he almost missed seeing the Jaguar move over to take the exit to I-95 North. Now what? What the hell’s in New Hampshire? Nim didn’t stay on I-95 for very long, though. She turned off less than two miles later, taking the Highway 20 loop over the freeway and continuing west towards Weston.

  “Shit,” he breathed. He fumbled in his jacket pocket for his phone and pulled up his contacts, trying not to drive off the road as he scrolled down near the bottom of the list. He thumbed the entry and listened to the interminable ringing. “Come on, answer, damn you.”

  The ringing suddenly stopped. “Quoi?”

  “Savard,” he said grimly. “We have a problem.”

  23

  Trisha explored the entire mansion, from the empty four-car garage to the upstairs sunroom overlooking the expansive pool in the back yard, now covered until spring finally thawed everything out.

  Everything was neat and tidy, but only four of the bedrooms had furniture and only two of those showed any signs of recent occupation, hers and another one in the opposite wing, presumably Lionel’s. Other than the kitchen, the living room, and the small office where Lionel and Chantal had their late-night meeting, the place felt more like a builder’s showcase than someone’s actual home.

  There was absolutely no one else here, but that didn’t stop Trisha’s shoulders from tightening at every random sound. Halfway through her tour, she hurried back to her bedroom and dug the Glock out of her purse. As an afterthought, she stuck her cell phone into her back pocket as well. She told herself these were just sensible precautions, just in case Hawk somehow found his way here. Nevertheless, she felt foolish stalking through the hallways with the pistol clutched in her hand.

  She finally made her way back to the kitchen and perched on a stool, wondering what she should do until Lionel returned. The library on the first floor had enough shelves to hold a thousand books but they were completely bare. The flat-screen TV in the living room wasn’t hooked up and there didn’t seem to be a radio or music system anywhere. There was nothing for her to do except wait f
or Lionel to get back from wherever he went, but she couldn’t begin to guess how long that might be.

  Her eyes strayed to Lionel’s laptop, still sitting on the counter where he left it. She chewed her lower lip, looking around guiltily as if someone was watching her wrestle with temptation. I won’t look at anything, she promised herself, slipping off her stool. I just want to check the news or watch a video or something. He won’t mind. I’m sure he didn’t mean to be away so long.

  She winced as she carefully lifted up the lid, as if she was disarming a bomb. Nothing exploded, but the login screen lit up, prompting her for a password. The screen was otherwise blank, offering no hints as to what the password might be, and she closed the lid with a sigh. God, I’m already going stir crazy. Who would have thought being hunted by a demented killer would be so boring?

  She looked around for inspiration. She needed to do something about the mess on her sheets before bedtime, but doing the laundry didn’t hold a lot of appeal. Does Lionel do his own laundry or does this place come with a maid service? There was another building out back, visible from the upstairs windows. Maybe the servants stayed over there. Except I would have seen them by now.

  She peered out through the glass-paned door that led out to the patio and the pool deck beyond. The other building was half-hidden by a row of tall but leafless trees. I could go take a tour of the property, I suppose, she thought, although she wasn’t all that keen to go out in the cold. That’ll kill another half hour. She grimaced at her inadvertent choice of words. She didn’t need another reminder about what Hawk might do to her if they ever crossed paths again.

  She made her way back upstairs to retrieve her coat, scarf, and shoes, wishing she’d brought her hat as well as she bundling herself up. She tucked the Glock into her coat pocket, patting it to make sure it was secure, and then returned to the kitchen, unlocking the back door and stepping out onto the patio, already shivering as the cold bit at her unprotected hands and face.

  The concrete patio was slick underfoot, a layer of frozen snow on top of a sheet of ice, and Trisha had to take little steps to keep her balance. There was no furniture out here, although the frame of a gazebo of some sort was tucked in among the brick-edged flower beds. The pool itself was huge, a long twisted oval covered by a tarp crusted with snow, and she skirted it carefully as she headed for the wide steps leading down to the lawn.