Jenn and George huddled in place, trying to keep warm. With nothing else to do, the guards circled Jenn and George and awaited instructions. She was flattered, but it didn’t take four of them to watch her unarmed. To a man, they were miserable and on edge. They all had the look of people who woke up knowing where they stood with the world, only to discover the world had walked away.
A lurching mechanical sound boomed through the warehouse. It was only the air handlers shutting down, but the guards all flinched in the direction of the shipment. Jenn wouldn’t mind it if they’d keep their fingers off the trigger if they were going to be this jumpy. Things were tense enough as it was without adding automatic-weapons fire to the already-combustible mix. The noise also signaled the end of Baltasar’s patience for Anibal’s patter. He silenced Anibal with a hand and returned to the desk where his son waited.
Fernando had always struck Jenn as a man trying hard not to care about anything. Up until now, she’d credited him for succeeding spectacularly. He was charming enough in small doses, and Sebastião loved him like a brother, so she tolerated him. But she had always suspected that Fernando Alves was probably a bit of a sociopath. There were more of them around than people thought, and most weren’t what the movies made them out to be. Most weren’t even dangerous, not in a basement-dungeon kind of way, at least. Many tended to gravitate toward, and excel in, fields in which a lack of empathy was an asset—politics, medicine, finance . . . you couldn’t throw a rock in Langley without hitting two.
But watching Fernando now, she saw that that was anything but true in his case. When he’d moved to follow his father and Anibal over to the shipment, Baltasar had rebuffed him and told him to wait behind. To look at Fernando, it would be easy to think he’d been relieved. With a one-shoulder shrug, as if he couldn’t be bothered to lift both, he’d wandered over to the desk and leaned against it. Ankles crossed, he’d become engrossed in his cuticles and even stifled a yawn. But it was all for show. Jenn saw the way he’d angled his body so that, although it looked like he wasn’t paying attention, his eyes never once left his father. The pain in his expression when he thought no one was watching would have been heartbreaking if Jenn weren’t so preoccupied with ripping it out of his chest.
Still, Fernando barely acknowledged his father’s return. Kept his back turned even when Baltasar sat down behind him. Fernando pointed to the shipment and asked a question. Judging by Baltasar’s alarmed reaction, it was a good one that neither Baltasar nor Anibal had anticipated. Fernando turned his head but kept his back to his father, said something further, and pointed a manicured finger in Jenn and George’s direction. Whatever he suggested met with Baltasar’s approval.
That didn’t give Jenn the warm and fuzzies.
Fernando strolled over and conferred with the guards, then turned to her. “You two. Come with me.”
He led Jenn and George to the edge of the yellow circle and ordered them to sit. She realized they were being used as human shields in case Gibson got a mind to detonate the shipment. The refrigeration might be off, but the floor felt like a block of ice through their summer clothes.
“Could we get some blankets? Or maybe a stool?” Jenn asked, worried about how much George could take.
“You’ll survive until Gibson arrives,” Fernando answered. “Provided he’s on time.”
“Why’d you do it?” Jenn said, meaning Sebastião. The question caught Fernando off guard, and his eyes stuttered out of focus for a half second.
“What?” he asked.
When she’d been stationed in DC early in her career, Jenn had briefly dated a meathead with the Secret Service who lied the same way. The same vacant expression, the same telltale pause, and the same playing for time by asking for the question to be repeated as if he’d gone momentarily deaf. She didn’t want to say it was genetic, but a lot of men simply lied more slowly than women. Suddenly, she understood that Baltasar’s attempt to keep Fernando away from a life of crime had failed long ago.
“What have you done?”
Fernando recovered his poise and gave her a crooked smile. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“You know when people say that, it’s because they’re ashamed of why.”
Fernando straightened, smile falling away. For a moment, in between, Jenn saw the face he kept so carefully hidden. As if Fernando’s whole life was a play and the curtain had accidentally reopened too soon, revealing the barren, undressed stage.
“I’m not ashamed of anything,” Fernando said.
Maybe he was a sociopath after all.
Jenn beckoned him closer. Unafraid with the guards nearby, Fernando squatted down to look her in the eye. She leaned in close, her voice the raw hiss of steam escaping a cracked nuclear cooling tower. “No way your dad or Anibal would have known how to get to me. Only you. Only you, Fernando. You might not have swung the club, but you put it in their hands.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. He’ll be fine,” Fernando said, dropping the pretense that he didn’t know what she meant. “Providing.”
“Providing what?”
“Providing I check in with Tomas regularly. You remember Tomas? The boy has a natural swing. And he doesn’t care for our dear Sebastião. Not. One. Bit. But as long as I keep calling him and telling him that you’re cooperating—”
“We’re cooperating,” Jenn cut in.
“Then he’ll be fine.”
“He’d better be.” Jenn didn’t hold out any hope for herself. On the beach, she’d accepted what surrendering her weapon meant, how it was likely to end for her. It had been a desperate act, but she’d known that Baltasar wouldn’t stop at the knee. She’d seen it in his face. The exact moment when “desperate times call for desperate measures” went from abstract to literal. Her choice was either to watch Sebastião die or to take his place. She hoped it had counted for something. He was an innocent in all this. A loyalist too. Even after all this, he would still keep Baltasar’s secrets. There was no reason not to let him go. None but pure spite. “Please, Fernando,” Jenn said, changing tack. Begging didn’t come naturally to her, but she’d do it if that’s what it took. “Let me see him.”
“I’m afraid Sebastião is at my father’s house enjoying his hospitality.” Fernando’s face softened. “As long as Gibson shows up and does exactly what my father says, then no further harm will come to Sebastião. However, if he doesn’t, and I don’t check in, well . . . Tomas will practice his long game.” Fernando stared into her eyes. “The club’s in Gibson’s hands now.”
“Fernando. Sebastião’s not a part of this. He loves you like family.”
“Yes,” Fernando agreed, his outward cool returning. “But he’s not. There’s a difference.”
Baltasar was calling him. Fernando took that as an opportunity to have the last word. Jenn watched him go, wondering whether she’d gotten through to him at all.
She took off her jacket, light as it was, and draped it over George’s shoulders. His teeth were clenched, but she could see the muscles in his jaw working.
“I’m going to freeze to death in August,” George said with a thin smile. “There’s a metaphor here somewhere.”
“It’s Fernando,” Jenn said.
“Yes,” George agreed. “It is. It would appear I owe Baltasar an apology of some kind.”
“May be a little late for that now.”
George chuckled. “Yes, I think that ship may have sailed. No pun intended.”
“I’m sorry,” Jenn said. “This is my fault. I shouldn’t have—”
George cut her off. “No. I’m sorry we got Sebastião dragged into this.”
“He asked me to marry him yesterday. Can you believe that?”
George took her hands in his. “He’s a wise man.”
“I don’t know about all that.”
“I do, and he is. Unless loyalty, strength, smarts, and toughness don’t count for anything anymore.”
“You forgot looks and charm.” She smirked.
&
nbsp; “No, no, I didn’t.”
Jenn rested her head on his shoulder for a moment. “Hey, here’s a weird question, but would you walk me down the aisle? Is that still a thing?”
“It is if you want it to be.”
She looked around them, at their situation. “Well, it’s kind of a moot point now. I just hope Gibson and Dan get to the boat and get away from this mess.”
“They’re coming.”
His certainty dismayed her. One of her only silver linings was the thought of them getting away. Under his breath, George laid out plan B—the drone and the exploit it had delivered.
“You can’t be serious,” she said when he was finished. It was the most Gibson thing she’d ever heard. And, no, that wasn’t a compliment. Even if it were feasible, it was the kind of operation that would take months of planning, not one that could be thrown together overnight.
“He thinks it will work. So he’ll come,” George said.
“If it works, why doesn’t he just do it where he’s safe?”
“Unfortunately, he has to be on the same Wi-Fi network. He needs to be in the building.”
“Christ. Well, I hope at least Dan’s smart enough to sit this one out.”
George gave her a disapproving look. “Of course Daniel will come.”
“Why?” Jenn said. “If all four of us are here, and Gibson is wrong, then we’re all as good as dead.”
“If it were you, would you stay where it was safe? This is who we are, Jennifer. This is why I hired you and Daniel in the first place.”
“Well, you hired a couple of idiots,” she said with a bitter laugh. “Gibson fits right in.”
“Yes, he does,” George said. “Yes, he does.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
The clock in the Peugeot’s dashboard read 10:48 when Gibson and Hendricks arrived back in Olhão. A little over an hour until the hijackers’ original deadline.
Hendricks was in a nostalgic mood. He’d talked the entire drive, telling stories from his childhood. As if his memories were heirlooms that he was wrapping in gentle cloth and passing on to Gibson for safekeeping ahead of a coming hurricane. Without prompting, he reminisced about growing up in Oakland, his father working as a studio engineer across the bay at the Wally Heider Studio in the Tenderloin. Hendricks rattled off the names of some of the artists his father had helped record: Jefferson Airplane, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Santana.
“I met Van Morrison in ’71. He was working on a couple tracks for Saint Dominic’s Preview. I must’ve been seven, eight? Pops said I could stay in the studio as long as I kept quiet and did my homework. Van sits down beside me on the couch with a guitar, working out a piece of ‘Jackie Wilson Said.’ You know that song?” Hendricks sang the chorus in his sandpaper baritone. “Turns to me serious and says in his thick Belfast accent, Whaddaya think, little brother? Swear that man thought he was black. Carried it like that anyway. Van the Man. Kind of an asshole if we’re being honest, but then they all were once they’d been in the studio long enough.”
“What did you tell him?” Gibson asked.
“Said it sounded cool. What else I’m going to say to the man paying my dad?”
Hendricks explained that Wally Heider Studio had changed hands in 1980, becoming Hyde Street Studio. Robert Hendricks had been forced to look elsewhere for employment. He’d moved the family south back to Los Angeles, closer to his parents and siblings, where he’d gotten steady work in the punk scene with SST and Slash Records, recording bands like Black Flag, Minutemen, Hüsker Dü.
“Pops worked on I Against I with Bad Brains. You believe that? Those guys were incredible.”
Gibson said he couldn’t.
“Anyway, Pops died in ’92, month after the riots. June 27,” Hendricks said wistfully.
“What of?” Gibson asked.
“Emphysema,” Hendricks said, tapping his chest and plucking the last cigarette from the pack. “Don’t ever let them say that Hendricks men don’t know the score. Although, I wouldn’t bet on emphysema getting me at this point.
“Those were strange days,” Hendricks said, drifting back to the riots. “Almost quit the department over some of that shit. Still went to Pops’s service in my dress blues. Was not the most popular man at the funeral, I can tell you that. Too stubborn to change, I guess. But what else did I know how to do?”
Hendricks fell silent and smoked his cigarette, blowing the smoke out his window. It was the most Gibson had ever heard Hendricks talk about himself. Getting personal information out of the normally recalcitrant Dan Hendricks was like hacking the NSA, but something about the long odds facing them had turned the key in the lock. Gibson, sensing the door might not open again, asked a question that had been on his mind for months.
“Why are you here? I mean, Jenn and I are wanted by the FBI. The man who broke George is still out there. We don’t have any choice but to hide. But nobody’s after you. You could have gone home anytime you wanted. Why did you stay? Why are you staying now?”
Hendricks flicked his cigarette out the window and reached for a fresh pack. “I don’t know. And that’s the truth. I was only going to stay a couple of weeks. Maybe it was the weather? We don’t get much sun out in California.”
“In California?”
“Nothing but gray skies. How could I leave all this? Course, if I’d known you were going to go full white savior, I might’ve made other arrangements.” He caught Gibson’s expression. “Man, I’m kidding you. I’m kidding. I’m with you. Jenn and George too. We all are.”
Hendricks parked near the docks where the fishing trawlers bobbed lazily in the sunshine. Across the harbor, the white rooftops of Fresco Mar Internacional stood out among the older industrial buildings. That would be their next stop, but first they needed to drop off their things. Showing up to meet Baltasar Alves with one hundred thousand euros was a good way to wind up one hundred thousand euros the poorer.
Hendricks popped the trunk, which opened only halfway before grinding stubbornly to a halt. “I hate this car.” They wrestled it the rest of the way open and divided the bags between them.
“You sure we can trust this guy?” Gibson asked. “This is a lot of money.”
“George said he’s cool.”
“Imagine my relief.”
Hendricks shot him an exasperated look. “You know, I’m not real comfortable being the voice of reason, but you might want to think about giving that shit a rest.”
The docks were deserted at this time of day. The boats had all been squared away, and the crews had long since dispersed to their beds. The Alexandria, moored at the far end, was painted a weathered green and red to match the Portuguese flag. Her size surprised Gibson; the Atlantic was an awfully big ocean for such a small boat. A young man no older than twenty sat on deck, repairing a net. He stopped when he saw them. Wincing when he stood, gingerly, like an old man who had exercised hard for the first time in years.
“João Luna?” Hendricks asked.
“Sim,” the young man said warily.
It took some pointing and blank faces to establish that they didn’t share a common language.
“George Abe?” João asked.
Hendricks and Gibson both nodded vigorously, and both said “George Abe” in unison as though it were the basis of a new language. João relaxed visibly now that he knew they weren’t there to kill him. He welcomed them on board and took them below to stow their bags. Back up on deck, João pointed to his watch and looked at them quizzically. They didn’t have an answer for him, and even if they did, Gibson didn’t think that “George Abe” was enough to communicate it. João pointed at the sun and then pointed at the horizon, his message simple—hurry.
Walking back to the car, Hendricks looked out across the water toward Fresco Mar. “Can’t believe we’re going back in there again. Three times is kind of asking for it.”
Gibson agreed. They were pushing their luck.
“Enough to put me off sardines for life,” Hendricks
said.
“You eat sardines?”
“Yeah, I tried the spread. It’s good on a little bread.”
“No, thanks,” Gibson said.
“Expand your horizons before the horizon expands you.”
Gibson thought about it. “What does that even mean?”
“I don’t know. Just made it up. Sounds good, though.”
Back in the car, Gibson opened his laptop.
“What are you doing?” Hendricks asked.
“Getting the lay of the land.”
Using Dol5’s air card, Gibson opened his back door into Baltasar’s network. Now that he knew where Baltasar would be, he modified the firmware on Fresco Mar’s Wi-Fi access points using Dol5’s malware. Effectively weaponizing it against Baltasar Alves. Assuming, of course, that Dol5 knew his or her business.
In addition to the explosives, Gibson had also seized control of Dol5’s cameras inside Fresco Mar. Powering them up now, Gibson angled the laptop so Hendricks could see what he saw.
“Oh, that’s pretty slick,” Hendricks said.
“Why is everyone always so surprised?”
Gibson scrolled through the four camera feeds that gave Dol5 three-sixty coverage of the warehouse. There was even one pointed straight up to cover the roof. Everyone was clustered in the northeast corner around the security desk. Gibson enlarged the video to fill the screen. Jenn and George sat cross-legged on the ground but didn’t look injured. That was something anyway. Their backs were up against the yellow line that marked the beginning of the no-fly zone. If the shipment blew, they’d catch the brunt of it. Gibson had entertained a vague hope of catching Baltasar napping and blowing him and his goons to heroin Valhalla. So much for that.
Hendricks read his mind. “You didn’t think Baltasar Alves would be that easy?”
“A man can dream.”
Baltasar sat at the makeshift security desk. Anibal stood nearby. Both looked anxious and checked the time with reflexive urgency. A man squatting by Jenn and George stood.
Debris Line (Gibson Vaughn) Page 23