by Kyle Mills
Chapter NINE
Brandon rolled down the window and adjusted the car's side-view mirror, burning his fingers on the sun-heated metal in the process. The white Chevy tailing them was unimaginative to the point of looking government issue. The major difference between it and the one he was riding in was that instead of being driven by the lovely yet undoubtedly deadly Catherine, it was piloted by a square-built man who looked like he'd spent his childhood pulling the wings off flies. The guy riding shotgun looked marginally less Gestapo, but that was probably just the reflection off the windshield talking.
"Could you move that back, please?"
"What?"
Catherine slammed the accelerator to the floor and changed lanes, squeezing into a gap in traffic about six inches longer than the car. He could see the surprise on the face of the chase car's driver, despite the fact that this was about the tenth such pointless maneuver Catherine had performed. They seemed to be the equivalent of a nervous tic for her.
"The mirror," she said, ignoring the chorus of honks coming through the open window. "Move the mirror back. I can't see."
Once he'd readjusted it, she raised his window and cranked up the air-conditioning, trying to dry the sweat beginning to stain the back of her blouse. Though all evidence seemed to be to the contrary, she continued to exude more apprehension than threat. Not that she really needed to be all that intimidating -- the guys behind them were doing a good job handling that angle. They'd been waiting on the tarmac when the private jet that had delivered him and Catherine arrived. And that was yet another thing to worry about. He'd looked into private jets once -- stealing, not owning -- and knew that the one they'd arrived on was worth at least twenty million, confirming again that whoever was behind this thing wasn't your average criminal loser.
Catherine slammed on the brakes and they were briefly surrounded by a group of Japanese tourists crossing the street. The chase car hadn't managed to fully catch up yet and was hanging three cars back, but the guy in the passenger seat had popped his door open slightly and was staring straight at Brandon. Making a run for it seemed like a good idea on so many levels, but suffered from a few logistical issues. First, he couldn't seem to figure out how to unlock his door, and second, he wasn't such a fast runner.
"So . . . ," Catherine started hesitantly. "Can I ask you a personal question?"
"Why not?"
"In Chicago. How did you get away with the money?"
He turned in his seat to look at her. "That's it? That's your personal question?"
"I'm just curious. From what I read, you'd have had to make it from one side of the city to the other in less than five minutes. It's not physically possible."
"I don't have any idea what you're talking about or where you're getting your information about me. I'm a law-abiding citizen falsely accused and erroneously convicted."
"Come on. What would it hurt to tell me? What if you just give me a hi--"
"Maybe you're just a cute cop and all this is a setup. Maybe you're just trying to close the files on a few unsolved cases."
"You think I'm a cop?" She was vaguely pleased.
"Not really, no."
The bright sun coming through the window created a halo around her hair, taking her face slightly out of focus. He concentrated on that for a moment, then down her torso and to the legs protruding from her cotton skirt. "Honestly, I'm not sure what you are."
She looked over at him and, as if by clairvoyance, stepped on the gas just before the light changed to green. One of the pedestrians had to break into a jog to avoid getting clipped.
"Did you just imply a question? Is that curiosity I'm hearing?"
She was, of course, referring to the fact that he changed the subject every time she began rolling around to what she wanted from him.
He shook his head. "I know everything I need to and almost everything I want to."
"Oh, really? What is it you think you know?"
"Well, you're a very classy and well-funded outfit, despite your taste in cars. You want something stolen and you can't figure out how to get your grubby little hands on it. So you give a guard some money to throw me out of prison and set it up so I can't really go back. Then you have me chased through the woods by a bunch of guys with guns to see if I still have what it takes to help you. Now you're feeling good about the fact that I'm between a rock and a hard place and you're going to spring what's probably an impossible job on me while you butter me up with images of a vineyard in South Africa." He took a breath. "Pretty close?"
She didn't react at all, instead concentrating on weaving through the traffic in a way that seemed more like meditation than impatience. Brandon pushed his seat back and turned toward the window, gazing at the graceful lines of the Stratosphere as they passed by. If there was one positive thing that had happened to him in the last forty-eight hours, it was ending up in Vegas. The city was, more than anywhere, his home. He knew every casino, every strip joint, every cheap diner. Hell, he'd worked in about half of them at one time or another -- covering the full spectrum from front-office suit to dishwasher.
"So if that's everything you need to know," Catherine said finally, "what is it you want to know?"
He rolled down the window again and subtly felt around for the latch on his seat belt. His stop was coming up.
"Where they found you."
"Me? Why?"
"Because I've been around a lot of criminals over the years and they all have a certain ... I don't know. A certain je ne sais quoi. You don't have it. Which means either you don't belong here or you're the most amazing liar I've ever met."
"If I don't belong here, then where do I belong?"
"Advertising. You look like an advertising person to me."
"Do you know a lot of advertising people?"
"Not a single one, actually."
They rode in silence until Brandon saw an almost imperceptible shaking of her head in his peripheral vision.
"What?"
"Nothing," she said.
"Come on. What?"
"Nothing . . . It's just that . . . Well, it's funny. I actually thought about going into advertising when I was in college."
"Why didn't you?"
"I wish I had."
The Treasure Island hotel and casino became visible ahead and Brandon leaned a little farther toward the open window. The entire front of the building was dominated by a man-made lagoon with life-size floating pirate ships. They were props in what had been "The Battle of Buccaneer Bay," an over-the-top exhibition of sword-wielding pirates and dangerous-looking stunts that an old girlfriend of his used to perform in. A few years before he'd been sent away, she'd given him a tour and explained how it all worked.
He'd heard that show had been replaced with a more sexed-up version now, but the set looked pretty much the same. Or at least he hoped it was.
"I'm not feeling good about that," Catherine said suddenly, disrupting his concentration.
"Huh?"
"You said I was feeling good about you being between a rock and a hard place. I'm not. It's just that you don't understand how important this is. We --"
"Do you gamble?" he asked, trying to change the subject while he searched the rearview mirror for the chase car.
"Do I what?"
"Gamble. Do you gamble. We're in Vegas."
He finally spotted the vehicle tailing them. Catherine's opportunistic driving had left it four cars back in traffic too thick to move through. They were traveling at about ten miles an hour at this point, though it looked like the cars ahead were starting to slow. Treasure Island was only about twenty yards away.
"Slots sometimes," she said. "That's about it."
"Slots are for suckers, you know."
"You sa--"
Brandon pressed the button on his seat belt and pulled himself through the open window all in one semigraceful motion. He had his butt on the sill and was trying to slip the rest of the way out when Catherine's hand clamped around his ankle and th
rew off what he'd hoped would be a balletlike maneuver. Instead, he fell backward, ramming his head into the asphalt with his legs still inside the car. The driver of the truck coming up alongside them slammed on the brakes and narrowly missed running over his face.
"Brandon!" Catherine shouted. "Get back in the --"
He managed to get his free foot out of the window and used it to push against the door, holding his pants up with both hands. A moment later, she lost her grip and he was free.
Traffic around him had completely stopped, and a few people had gotten out of their cars to watch. A little more scrutiny than a guy in his position really needed, but his audience was unintentionally doing its part to slow the guy who was bearing down on him from a few cars back.
Brandon struggled to his feet and slid across the hood of the truck that had almost run him over, landing on a sidewalk full of staring tourists.
"Look out!" he shouted, shoving his way through them. The man chasing him was already halfway across the same hood Brandon had come over.
The crowd on the sidewalk thinned a bit as he ran, stumbling gracelessly every time he looked over his shoulder. The guy was only ten feet back now and closing fast. Brandon faced full forward and ran hard, skirting along the railing that bordered Treasure Island's huge lagoon for a few seconds and then throwing himself over it.
He was five feet into what was about a ten-foot fall when it occurred to him that the performers never came to this part of the lagoon. For all he knew, it was six inches deep.
He heard the splash when his feet hit, and tensed for an impact, but instead felt the water slide over his body and cover his head. He opened his eyes and looked up at the railing, seeing the wavy form of the man who had been chasing him, along with countless other people pointing and shouting soundlessly.
He kicked his feet and started swimming underwater toward one of the large ships, surfacing only when the burning in his lungs became too much for him to stand. A glance back confirmed that the man pursuing him was moving along the railing toward the hotel, but not diving in after him.
Brandon went under again, making it to the back wall and skirting along it, starting to feel dizzy from lack of air. Despite his increasing disorientation, though, he found what he was looking for: an underwater passage that was used by the stunt people to get back into the hotel. He ducked through it and broke the surface, feeling his head clear as he gulped in air and looked around him at the locker-lined room stacked with dry towels.
Chapter TEN
"Slow down and tell me exactly what happened," Scanlon said, closing the door to his office and giving it an extra shove to make sure it was fully latched.
"I lost him, that's what happened! I was stupid. I thought ... I let you convince me that I could han--"
Scanlon held his hands up, but she ignored him for one of the first times in her life. "I let him roll down the window and jump right out of the car. How could I have been such an idiot? I didn't think he'd run."
"Catherine . . ."
"You've never met him, Richard! You can read reports about him all day long, but when you're actually sitting there with him . . . Even with everything I knew about him, even knowing he was playing me ... I let my guard down."
"But you got along?"
"What?"
"You liked him. And he liked you, yes?"
"What the hell are you talking about? He isn't capable of liking anybody -- of anything resembling a normal relationship. He just uses people." The words came out a little angrier than she intended.
"I'm not sure that's entirely true, Catherine."
"With all due respect, Richard. Trust me. It's true."
She finally fell silent, moving behind a chair, as though she could hide there, unable to meet Scanlon's eye.
"You weren't there as an enforcer, Catherine. I'm sure you did more than anyone else could have to win him over. I'm not holding you responsible for this."
She stared down at her hands. Whether he held her responsible or not, she was responsible. She'd been put in charge. He'd been in her car. And now he was gone. There was too much at stake for these kinds of stupid mistakes.
"What happened to the chase car?"
"It wasn't their fault. There was a lot of traffic and I wasn't careful enough to make sure they were behind us. Daniel's feet hit the ground probably before Brandon's did. But he was too far back."
"Does Brandon still have the phone we gave him?"
"He had it when he ran."
"Is it working?"
"In theory it's water and impact proof."
"It has a built-in GPS, yes? One that transmits even when the phone's turned off?"
She nodded submissively. "No signal. Either it's not as tough as the specs say or he pulled the battery out."
Scanlon walked behind his desk and dropped into his chair. "Clever boy."
"Richard?"
He looked up at her.
"I . . . I'm so sorry. I know that --"
He waved a hand dismissively. "Relax, Catherine. And sit down. There was no sure way to play this. If I'd assigned an entire SEAL team to watch him and he wanted to walk away, he would have figured something out. That's why we want him, right?"
"But I should have --"
Another wave of the hand. "Maybe we can make this work for us. Use it as a chance to prove a point. Or maybe not. I don't know. The bottom line is that this was never going to be an easy courtship."
He turned his chair to fully face her as she finally sat down. "I assume he knows basically nothing. That he changed the subject every time you tried to tell him why we broke him out of jail."
"How did you know? Did you bug the --"
He shook his head. "The less he knows, the less motivated he thinks we'll be to find him. How much money does he have?"
"None. I mean, we didn't give him any."
"IDs?"
She shook her head. "He didn't give us time to make any."
"Do we have a photo of him with the short hair and new glasses?"
"No, but we can Photoshop the one we've got."
Scanlon drummed his fingers on his desk. "I assume his prison escape hasn't gotten much press in Nevada."
"None at all, really. It's more of a local story up north."
"Okay. We're going to have to risk it. Quietly fax a photo of him to our friends in casino security. Tell them he's a suspected cheat and to contact me if they see him."
"What about his accounts?"
Scanlon leaned a little farther back in his chair and let out a long, slow breath. They'd done a great deal of research into Brandon Vale and found a number of his bank accounts spread out across the country under various aliases. The problem was that there was no way to know if they'd found them all. Worse, they'd never turned up any documents relating to those aliases, making it likely that he had IDs stashed in places they couldn't track. Probably just buried in the woods along with a stack of hundreds. Someone like Brandon could be counted on to be well diversified in that area.
"Drain them," he said finally. "Let's not make this easy for him."
Edwin Hamdi watched the flashing light indicating that he had a call on the secure private line he'd had installed. It had been a precaution, really. Nothing more. Nothing he'd expected to ever use.
"Hello, Richard," he said, when he finally picked up. Scanlon was the only person with the number and had been given instructions to use it only in the event of a dire emergency.
"He's gone, Edwin. He jumped out of a moving car on the Strip."
Hamdi's breath caught in his chest for a moment and he glanced up to confirm that his door was shut, despite already knowing that it was. "How could this happen? He's one man, wanted by the police! How could he get away from your people?"
"It was quite a production, actually. You'd have been impressed."
Hamdi's jaw clenched at the lack of gravity in Scanlon's tone.
In the beginning, the only significant weakness in his plan was the overrelian
ce and irreplaceability of Jamal Yusef in the Middle East -- a situation that couldn't be remedied and therefore had to be endured. Then Congress had suspended all new Homeland Security funding, leaving them without the resources to go forward. And now this.
"What does he know?"
"Nothing."
"Don't you --," Hamdi shouted, but then caught himself and lowered his voice. "That seems very unlikely to me."
"Relax, Edwin. I handpicked everyone involved in this and none of them know anything about you -- no one but me does. And Brandon's completely in the dark. All he knows is that someone broke him out of prison, and the only face he has is Catherine's."
"But he was told what we wanted from him. He can use that --"
"She never got the chance. He kept changing the subject. Figured we wouldn't put as much effort into finding him if he didn't have any information."
Hamdi tightened his grip on the handset but didn't speak, just breathing into the phone. It was becoming harder and harder not to look back fondly on the cold war. In retrospect, it had been nothing but a game. Two opponents, playing for insignificant pieces, neither daring to make a meaningful advance. Errors -- even serious ones -- rarely cost more than brief embarrassment or the loss of secrets with no long-term significance. But now the world had changed. The U. S. government, still accustomed to the glacially paced, low-stakes competition with the Soviet Union, was struggling to adapt to a completely new enemy. An enemy that could appear from nowhere and kill thousands -- perhaps millions -- for no rational reason at all. It was a difficult transition and one that wasn't moving fast enough to avert disaster.
"Are you going to be able to find him?"
"I think so. I hope so."
"You hope so?" Hamdi said. "You hope so?"
"I'm not going to make promises about something I can't control, Edwin."
Hamdi didn't immediately respond. He was becoming increasingly concerned about Scanlon's attitude toward this little thief. He didn't seem to be treating him as the necessary -- and ultimately temporary -- evil he was.
"And if you do find him?"
"I don't understand the question, Edwin."
"I think you understand it quite well."
"What do you want me to say? That I'll take him out back and shoot him? Unless you've come up with an alternative you haven't told me about, we're stuck with him."