Trust Me

by Jeff Abbott

  At the end of the hall stood a man in a dark turtleneck and jeans, salt-and-pepper hair, broad shoulders. Not tall but heavily muscled. He had a pugnacious face that looked like it had been battered over the years. His eyes were slightly pinched; it made Luke think of a reader who spent a great deal of time peering through books he found disagreeable. ‘A weapon. I blush with pride. Hello, Luke.’ He didn’t smile.

  ‘Hi, Mr Drummond,’ Luke said. He wondered if Drummond knew Eric was dead? He must know. This man looks like he knows everything. ‘May we talk?’

  ‘I have dreamed of the day.’ Drummond raised an eyebrow. He seemed to survey Luke’s face, as though it were a map he’d seen once before but that had been redrawn over time.

  The doorman turned and left.

  Drummond watched him. A slight smile crept onto his face.

  Luke decided to play his card. ‘Is Aubrey Perrault here?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do you know where she is?’

  ‘Yes, I do, and she’s safe.’

  ‘I doubt that. Your people shot at us last night.’

  ‘Rubber bullets. They hurt but they don’t kill unless you don’t know what you’re doing.’

  He remembered the bullets spraying up the grass at their feet. They could have shot him and Aubrey in the legs, but they didn’t.

  ‘You gave everyone a fright running into traffic. You could have gotten yourself killed, Luke.’

  ‘You look at me like you think you know me.’

  ‘I know who you were, Luke. I’m more interested,’ Drummond said, ‘in who you’re going to be.’

  37

  The apartment had the most disturbing walls Luke had ever seen. Giant photos covered them like wallpaper. One image per wall, each a massive enlargement. One picture was a young girl, huddling in the bombed ruins of a stone cabin. Her face looked like a surprised ghost. Another photo showed people in a Middle Eastern bazaar, expressions contorted in naked fear as they looked over their shoulders at an unbidden and dawning threat. A gunman, a car bomb? Who knew? The terror and the resignation on their faces was a timeless stamp. Another photo of a man Luke recognized, a former senator, clearly staggered by loss, leaning against a porch railing.

  ‘That senator. His son died. I remember it in the papers. Shot to death by a terrorist in Japan while studying abroad,’ Luke said. ‘You have odd decor.’

  ‘I am an odd man,’ Drummond said. ‘After all, I am welcoming you into my office and you had a hand in my friend’s death.’

  ‘You kidnapped my friend last night.’

  ‘Your friend is perfectly safe. My friend is dead.’

  ‘I had nothing to do with Allen Clifford’s death. I was kidnapped, forced to drive at gunpoint. Then chained up in a cabin your company paid for.’

  Drummond raised an eyebrow. ‘We financed a cabin. You being taken there was not our doing. But you killed Allen Clifford…’

  ‘I didn’t kill Allen Clifford. I know who did.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Eric Lindoe. Operating under orders from a British woman named Jane, who kidnapped Eric’s girlfriend. Kidnapping me and killing your friend was Jane’s ransom demand for Aubrey’s safety.’

  ‘Convenient to blame him since he’s not here to defend himself.’

  ‘He’s dead. Back in Chicago. He kidnapped me in Austin to force information from my stepfather.’ He thought it would be better to hold off on mentioning the fifty million; it would take over the conversation and he wanted to know more first.

  ‘Tell me everything,’ Drummond said. ‘I think to get to the truth, we must trust each other. We’ve been pitted against each other, Luke, and we should not be enemies. You must think the same, or you wouldn’t have come here after running from us.’ Drummond gestured at a large glass table. ‘Sit.’

  Luke sat down and Drummond sat across from him.

  Drummond’s faint smile inched wider, went crooked. ‘Like Eric, you wish to make a deal. Tell me everything and I’ll give you something in exchange.’

  ‘I ask, then you ask, we can hammer out a deal.’

  ‘All right. You first, you’re the guest,’ Drummond said. ‘I’ll judge whether or not to trust you further by the intelligence you show in what you ask.’

  If he failed – if he asked the wrong questions – he might never learn the truth. Or Drummond could be playing him. He wasn’t ready to offer the encrypted file yet; he wanted to see what he could learn first. Drummond studied him, a cat easing on its haunches before the mouse hole.

  ‘First question. Is Quicksilver behind my kidnapping?’

  ‘No. The cabin had been rented in advance, to be used by Clifford for an interrogation of a suspect. The man he was meeting – a loser named Bridger, who ran when you and Eric approached – was selling information on a domestic terrorist network to Clifford. I suspect that he was killed, and the cabin used, to make your stepfather and the Night Road aware of Quicksilver’s existence since Clifford and the cabin point back to Quicksilver. Someone wanted the Night Road to know Quicksilver is chasing them. To put us in each other’s sights.’

  ‘You know about the Night Road?’

  ‘I didn’t know the name until Eric mentioned it two days ago. We know it’s a loose affiliation of extremist groups, turning toward violence, working together to share resources, tactics, and information. And I suspect the Road’s hand in the Ripley attack, and the attacks over the past week.’

  ‘Attacks?’

  ‘ E. coli infecting a food plant in Tennessee. Pipeline bomb in Canada. Attempted bombing of a pipeline in Alaska. And last night, a bombing at a high school football game in Kansas City, eight dead, a hundred injured. And one of our leading thinkers in counter-terrorism was slaughtered with his family while leaving a restaurant in Los Angeles.’

  ‘Oh, God, no. You should know I found these people.’

  ‘You found all these people for who? Henry?’ When he said Henry’s name his mouth made a curl of distaste.

  ‘Under the false pretense of doing psychological profiling for his think-tank. I gave him thousands of names. He whittled it down to the most committed and dangerous. My role is a pawn who got played.’

  ‘Henry used you. And you’re a pawn who’s pissed off about it,’ Drummond said.

  ‘Yes. What is Quicksilver?’

  It was as if Drummond did not hear the question. ‘I can offer you what I offered Eric. Get you out of the country, hide you under another name. You’ll be safe. You give me all the information you have on the Night Road. That’s the deal.’

  ‘No. I don’t want to be stashed away. I want my life back. My good name. I want to be cleared of Clifford’s death, and the officer in Chicago. And I want to help stop the Night Road.’

  ‘Noble of you, but unnecessary,’ Drummond said. ‘My offer is what it is. You’re not part of this battle, Luke, and I think it best you hide until the danger’s passed. Know that you’re helping us by telling us everything about the Night Road. That’s your contribution.’

  ‘It’s not enough. Please. I helped build that network. I want to help destroy it. I can’t just sit someplace safe while Henry runs a terror cell.’

  Drummond studied him. ‘Why did Henry use you?’

  ‘I don’t know; I was handy, I guess. What is Quicksilver? Are you CIA? FBI? A black ops group? What?’ He took a breath. ‘Are you like the Book Club?’

  ‘How did you know about the Book Club?’

  ‘Henry. He was desperate that I not see you.’

  ‘Oh, I’ll bet he was.’

  ‘Did you know my dad? Did you work with him in the government? What did he do?’

  ‘I said no more on Quicksilver.’

  They stared at each other. Luke tried a different tack. Drummond wouldn’t answer his questions but oddly, he seemed to want to hear what Luke wanted to ask. ‘What are all these pictures?’

  ‘My many failures.’

  Luke turned away from the portraits of suffering. ‘What, you
screwed over all these people yourself?’

  ‘Consider them salt in the wound. I failed in these instances, so these people suffered. I remember them. Every day. I have no choice.’

  ‘The Book Club tried to help people?’

  ‘Mostly succeeding but not always. Good doesn’t always win out.’

  ‘You could take the pictures down.’

  ‘I would still see their faces. It’s easier to see them on the walls than in my dreams.’

  ‘I don’t understand why you would help Eric get out of Chicago when he killed your friend.’

  ‘Because stopping the Night Road is more important than revenge. Eric made a bad choice, under tremendous pressure, and then when it all unraveled he was ready to betray the Night Road. I didn’t like him but I do what’s necessary to save lives.’

  ‘I will trade everything I know for Aubrey’s release and information about Quicksilver. Otherwise, we have no deal.’

  ‘You assume that we would hurt Aubrey. We won’t. We’re the good guys,’ Drummond said.

  ‘Then please, tell me what I need to know.’

  ‘I can’t. I need you to trust me, entirely. I need you to tell me everything, Luke, and to please, please ask me no questions. I need you, for the sake of your country, to cooperate fully and to let me hide you some place where you’ll be safe.’

  ‘Why should I trust you when you won’t trust me?’ Luke said.

  Drummond sighed. He reached under his turtleneck and lifted up a piece of silver from under the sweater’s black weight. A Saint Michael’s medal, an exact duplicate of the one that Luke wore. The archangel stood tall, sword in one hand, shield in the other, wings of steel spread.

  Luke’s eyes widened. ‘Where did you get that?’

  ‘An old friend gave it to me, a few weeks before he died.’

  ‘An old friend,’ Luke echoed.

  ‘Your father. One of my closest friends. Now. Knowing that, will you trust me?’

  Luke studied Drummond’s face. ‘I will.’ Seeing the twin of his own medal around Drummond’s neck filled his head with a hundred questions. ‘My dad…’

  ‘Would order you to listen to me and to do as I say. Please. For your own safety, I cannot explain more. Now. Help me the only way you can. Tell me everything about the Night Road.’

  ‘I guess I should start with the most important part. The fifty million dollars.’

  Drummond raised an eyebrow. Luke could see he hated to be surprised. But he was.

  ‘The fifty million what?’ Drummond asked.

  38

  Henry Shawcross leaned forward across the table and said, ‘Quicksilver has my son. We are going to get him back.’

  Mouser and Snow glanced at each other. A thin haze of smoke from Mouser’s cigarette hung above the hotel room table; they sat at a window, but Snow insisted the curtains be kept drawn. She said satellites could spy on them. Henry thought she might be right. He studied their faces; they looked haggard, tired. They could not be. He needed them sharp.

  ‘There was a police incident report filed, shots fired near the air park where Luke’s plane landed, a man running into traffic, causing a couple of accidents. Quicksilver grabbed them.’ He’d driven up from Washington late last night when the news came from Mouser that Luke was headed for New York.

  ‘Who the hell are these Quicksilver clowns?’ Mouser asked.

  Henry waved the smoke away from his face. ‘I gave some of my think-tank clients a security exercise to perform, to find every record affecting Quicksilver Risk and my old friend Drummond and Clifford, who are not much more than hired guns. Quicksilver is a small risk management consulting group, but I’m sure it’s just a front. But they have also bought, sometimes through front companies, buildings around the US, Europe, Asia and the Middle East. They have accounts in banks around the world, again, under a set of holding company names.’

  ‘Are they CIA?’

  ‘Drummond used to be State Department. I don’t think it’s State. But I’m not sure why the CIA or FBI would go to this trouble to hide, unless they’re simply breaking the law and avoiding congressional oversight.’

  ‘You want us to attack a building,’ Snow said.

  ‘I live for this,’ Mouser said.

  ‘It’s not a typical building. There are no tenants. They will have a skeleton staff. All you have to do is get Luke back. Kill everyone else, I don’t care.’

  ‘And this is to save Luke? You know we’re just going to have to kill him, Henry, face facts. He’s not coming over to your side.’

  ‘I want to talk with him. Hustle him into a van and bring him to me.’

  ‘Face facts,’ Mouser repeated. ‘You’re deluded.’

  ‘I am in command here, Mouser. Not you.’

  Mouser said, ‘For the moment.’

  Henry ignored him. ‘Quicksilver knows of us, thanks to Bridger. So we have to decapitate them before they can act.’

  ‘Just the two of us and you?’ Snow said.

  ‘I have some important Hellfire work to do. I’ve arranged for some Night Road help for the two of you.’ He looked at Snow. ‘And, Snow, we need to move your bombs. I need to know you didn’t leave booby traps around your storage space in Houston.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You’re not there to handle the distribution. I’ve gotten a Night Road team to go to Houston to transport the bombs to a new location.’

  ‘Where are you taking the bombs?’ Snow asked.

  ‘That’s need to know. You’re about to go on a job where you could be captured.’

  ‘No traps,’ Snow said after a moment. ‘Take good care of my babies.’

  ‘You’re running this show,’ Mouser said, ‘but it’s your fault we’re in the hole we’re in.’

  ‘Your continued failure to capture Luke is our hole,’ Henry said, ‘but I’ve gotten you some more muscle.’

  Sweet Bird was not a man who enjoyed waiting for other people, but impatience got you killed these days. Mr Shawcross had offered him enough arms to eliminate every rival gang in Queens and New Jersey. The Albanians, the leftover Italians, the mean Russians and the Asian tongs. He couldn’t say no to such a deal. Even if the risk was high. His grandmother, who never lived to see him become a leading kingpin and had hoped he would become a physician, had drilled that lesson into his head, by soft cajole and hard belt: take your opportunities, don’t waste them.

  So when Shawcross called him early that morning, he’d listened to the delicious sound of a rare chance to make a powerful friend.

  I may need you to assault a building.

  A building? You’re kidding me.

  I don’t like the sound of hesitation.

  Ain’t hesitating, I’m listening. You probably don’t like the sound of some idiot leaping before he looks.

  You do this, you’ll be one of the most powerful men in New York by the end of the day. I have a lot of work for you. Mr Shawcross’s voice had carried a low gleam over the phone. And Mr Shawcross always delivered. In the past two months he’d sent Sweet Bird real nice Belgian rifles to use, trained his men, helped them take down rival drug lords and a bothersome DA. Given him army-quality grenades to eliminate a couple of informants, right in their cars, no need to bother with unreliable handmade pipe bombs. And, from the Night Road website, handed him a couple of small insurance agencies that sold cheap policies, made it easy to shine and polish and legitimize the cocaine money.

  He was waiting for Shawcross’s two people at a back room at one of the agencies, a few blocks from Greenwich Village. He waited with five of his regular guys, one who was Sweet Bird’s cousin, a violent gangster wannabe Luke had found two months before on a board discussing urban warfare, the others hardened street fighters. He watched as they double-checked their weapons. He had one of the nice Belgian rifles and he ran his hands over the cool, fine metal. He had modified a raincoat so he could carry the rifle in it unseen. In the background CNN played, talking about the spate of attacks across America,
a rapid rising of violence that was undercutting Americans’ confidence to simply go about their lives.

  Two minutes later there was a knock on the door, and he opened it to find a lean, muscled guy with a crew cut and a pretty but scowling woman who had a scary mop of white hair. They gave the right password.

  ‘Mouser. Snow. Pleased to make your acquaintance. I ain’t never met anyone from Night Road face to face.’

  ‘You understand the plan as presented?’ Mouser said. ‘And you understand I’m in charge.’

  ‘It’s not rocket science,’ Sweet Bird said. ‘Let’s go get it done.’

  They left, in two cars. Mouser drove. Snow said, ‘Did you tell that guy you want Luke Dantry dead if he’s there?’

  ‘No,’ Mouser said. ‘You and I will handle it. I don’t trust anyone else.’

  ‘He’s Night Road, he’s okay.’

  ‘Nobody’s okay. I thought Henry was. He’s distracted by his affection for his stepson. It’s become a problem. If Luke’s at this building – he stops being a problem for us.’

  39

  ‘You don’t know about the fifty million dollars,’ Luke said. ‘You have to be kidding.’

  Drummond measured his expression, looking for a sign of bluff. ‘No, I don’t.’ His head tilted slightly, as though listening to the soft hiss of the air conditioner. He flicked his glance at the kitchen corner, for the barest of moments. If Luke had not been watching him so closely for his reaction, he wouldn’t have noticed. Luke glanced at the corner as well. He saw a pinpoint hole in the ceiling. A camera, maybe.

  He had the sudden sense they were being watched. Maybe his imagination. But the past few days had taught him to trust his instincts.

  ‘A man as desperate as Eric would have mentioned every asset to win his safety.’ Luke put his gaze back on Drummond’s face. ‘He wouldn’t forget to mention fifty million.’

  ‘Offering us information on the Night Road would have won him ample protection. He didn’t have to mention money.’ For the first time Drummond looked shaken. ‘We were working on IDing him from the airport garage video and the speeding ticket video. He contacted me.’