The Nowhere Man--An Orphan X Novel

by Gregg Hurwitz

  He waited at the edge of the bed, staring over at the ceiling vent, straining his ears.

  When the halogenated ether hissed through, he rolled over and buried his face in a pillow. He felt the draft across his back, the gas moving past him, filling the balcony, dissipating in the night air. He waited until the hissing stopped and then waited twenty minutes more. Breathing grew hard, the feather pillows trapping his breath. But he managed. Finally he lifted his face.

  Awake.

  He moved carefully around the foot of the bed and walked lightly into the bathroom, keeping to the strip of concrete next to the sink. With his toe he snared the edge of the trash-can liner. He fluffed it open, filled it with water, carried the bulging bag back into the bedroom and over to the hearth.

  He poked a hole in the bottom of the liner and used the bursting bag as a watering can, flooding the cedar logs. They popped and hissed, giving off smoke that the chute suctioned up. The fire died down to a cherry glow, the logs disintegrating into ash.

  Evan retrieved his hiking boots from where he’d placed them by the footboard and used them to stamp out the remaining embers. Then he moved them from his hands to his feet, lacing them up tightly. After waiting for the flue to cool, he pushed it open.

  Wide enough to fit his shoulders. Barely.

  Time for a recon mission.

  Sitting on the fireplace, he leaned back and slid his head and torso through the flue. It was tight, the walls crowding in, the stink of wet ash clogging his throat. He wiggled up to a standing position.

  Past the vent the chimney opened up a bit. That made it easy for him to shove his way up off the floor, using his forearms and the tread of his boots to push outward against the scorched brick. He moved in lurches, a few inches at a time.

  Every foot or so, he’d stop and listen. He’d pulled a similar Santa ploy once in a chimney in the Czech Republic, squirming his way between floors to eavesdrop on a conversation. But given the thick walls of the old chalet, he had no luck hearing anything aside from his own breathing.

  He made slow, painful progress. Grit caked his cheeks, crammed itself beneath his nails. The glow of his bedroom vanished underfoot, leaving him in absolute darkness. After a time he saw a spill of golden light from a room above. He wormed his way up toward the next floor.

  His calves cramped, his thighs burning. He was unable to wipe off the sweat tickling his brow, so he blinked hard, contorting his face. He couldn’t look up to gauge his progress because flakes of ash fell down into his eyes. But he sensed the light growing stronger, sweeping across his shoulders.

  At last his hand made contact with a lip in the flue. After so many tentative climbing holds, the firm grip felt reassuring. He grabbed the lip with both hands, put the soles of his boots against the wall beneath, wedged his back against the opposite wall, and rested.

  He wiped his forehead on his sleeves and then took stock.

  He’d arrived at the edge of a shaft angled down to a fireplace on the fourth floor. The log holder below was stacked high with unlit cedar logs.

  Before scouting the room he wanted to check what was above.

  Gathering his strength, he pulled himself farther up the flue, put his boots on the lip he’d just been gripping, and strained to reach above him.

  Two thick bars, coated with soot and welded into place, blocked the way up.

  He stood there, balanced above the fourth floor in the guts of the building, breathing away his disappointment. There’d be no going up and out onto the roof, which would have afforded him an ideal vantage to pinpoint the locations of René’s men. But all hopes for intel gathering weren’t dashed; he could still make it down through the fireplace beneath him and into that fourth-floor room. And if there was one thing Jack had taught him, it was that there was useful information to be had everywhere.

  He led with his arms, like going down a playground slide face-first. Halfway down the shaft, his grease-slicked hold failed and he tumbled into the fireplace, his shoulder smacking into the stack of cedar logs. A crooked, upside-down view told him the room was empty.

  It was a study.

  Careful not to upset the pyre of logs further, he eased his way out of the fireplace, emerging into the room. Using a towel slung over the stack of extra logs on the hearth, he wiped his hands and the soles of his boots.

  Then he stepped tentatively onto an elaborate Pakistani rug. He checked behind him to make sure his boots left no track. His shirt and jeans remained filthy—he’d have to take care not to brush up against anything.

  Brass sconces painted dim sprays of light on the walls. Dark bookshelves towered on either side of an imposing desk. An ergonomic chair sat cocked and waiting. Casting a glance over his shoulder at the closed door, Evan moved across the room. He pulled the chair out and checked the wall beneath the desk, confirming that the electrical outlets were indeed standard North American. Then he turned his focus to the file drawer. Its thick, shiny lock did not look factory-installed. There was no give when he tugged the handle.

  The desk surface was spotless and bare, save a bouquet of pens and pencils sprouting from a leather cup and a pair of slender reading glasses resting on a desk mat. No letter opener.

  Evan slid open the top drawer. Nothing inside but a few paper clips, a roll of Scotch tape, and a scattering of file tabs. The other drawers were empty.

  The lack of personal items seemed in keeping with René’s obsessive use of his DNA privacy spray. He went to great lengths to keep his identity hidden, to leave not a trace of himself behind. I rent this life. What is mine is hidden away down a rabbit hole. A necessity with which Evan was all too familiar.

  He knew he was living on borrowed time by now—if they hadn’t already figured out that he wasn’t in his room, they would at any minute. He made the choice to keep looking. The key was finding something before they showed up. Something he could use.

  He quickened his search. The trash can held only a balled-up junk-mail envelope. He uncrumpled it and checked the address label. It had been mailed to the Chalet Savoir Faire in Maine. Maine. Another piece of disinformation? He doubted it; no one would expect him to be snooping through trash cans on the fourth floor. He wadded up the envelope again and dropped it back into the bin.

  As he rose, his face came level with the spectacles folded on the blotter. Something on one of the rectangular lenses caught his eye. He tilted his face to peer at it. A fingerprint-size smudge marked the glass.

  Evan worked swiftly. After positioning the readers faceup on the mat, he snapped a pencil in half, then bent a paper clip open and used the tip to scrape the lead, letting graphite dust fall onto the lens. Once the dust coated the lens, he blew it gently off. Graphite particles held only where the oils of René’s finger had touched the glass, forming two-thirds of a fingerprint.

  Grabbing Scotch tape, Evan stripped a three-inch piece off the roll and pressed one end of the sticky side carefully over the print. The graphite dust clung to the tape, the fingerprint lifting away from the lens. Evan folded the tape over itself, sticky side to sticky side, sealing in the fingerprint to preserve it. Then he stripped off another short length of tape and adhered the fossilized print to the inside of his arm above the elbow, protected from friction and hidden from view.

  Next he lifted the top drawer, pulling it off the tracks and setting it on the blotter. He felt in the space where the drawer had been in case René had taped the key on the underside of the wood. No luck. He tried the same with the drawers to the side. Nothing.

  Stepping back, he assessed the dusty bookshelves. They were filled with venerable hardbacks stripped of their covers, the spines forming fashion-statement stripes of faded gray and olive green. It seemed more like someone’s idea of a library than an actual library.

  Evan’s attention caught on a gap in the dust on the second shelf, a thin slot where one of the books had recently been removed. He walked over and plucked the book from the shelf, smiling at the title.

  He cracked t
he cover of the Robert Louis Stevenson classic, and a key fell out, landing softly on the carpet. It fit the file drawer.

  Crouched, he tugged the drawer open.

  It was crammed with files, each tab featuring a different name. He thumbed through the first one. Bank-account details. A Social Security number. The photograph paper-clipped to the back of the folder sent a prickle across the nape of his neck. It was a middle-aged man lying unconscious and naked on the bed downstairs.

  The same bed Evan had slept in the past few nights.

  Shaking off his discomfort, he continued to flip through the files. So many men and women had gone through René’s operation before Evan. Every mini-dossier contained financial information. Clipped to each back cover was a photograph of a different naked, drugged victim positioned on the bed. He’d figured that René had run his scheme a time or two before, but seeing the crammed rows of file tabs, Evan grasped just how routine and efficient the process was. From what he could piece together, René had extorted over $300 million from these people.

  The rear file tab had not a name but a question mark.

  Evan pulled it free and opened it.

  A printout of the katana sword on the auction Web site. His Privatbank AG account information. A fingerprint card. And a photograph of him sprawled unconscious across the mattress in his bedroom cell, just like those who had preceded him.

  He studied the picture of himself, emotions moving in him like dark currents. Then he tore the photo and the fingerprint card into tiny bits and pushed them down a heating vent beneath the desk.

  Behind him he heard the door creak open.

  Manny shouted, “I got him!”

  Keeping his back turned, Evan rose. He gripped the broken pencil.

  Footsteps pounded the hall.

  “Turn around,” Manny said.

  Evan did. “It’s about time,” he said.

  Manny stood just inside the threshold, his less-lethal shotgun aimed not at Evan’s face but at his crotch.

  “Drop the pencil.”

  Evan eyed the angle of the barrel and dropped the pencil.

  Nando eased through the doorway, and then the fresh recruits poured past him and spread across the room’s perimeter. Shotguns with neon stocks all around.

  They waited.

  Heavier footsteps announced Dex’s approach. He broke through the ring and contemplated Evan, snake eyes peering through an expressionless mask. René entered a step behind him. He took in the open file drawer, anger lurking behind that plastic grin.

  “I like a challenge,” he said. “But you’re testing my patience.”

  Evan said, “And you’re testing mine.”

  He stepped back until he felt the desk pressing against his hamstrings. René gave a nod to the men, who closed in on Evan from three sides, leading with their shotguns. Evan looked for any break or opportunity, but there would be none tonight.

  Dex strode up to him, a needle flashing in his hand. A well-placed smack spun Evan into the desk, and he felt the pinch above his shoulder blade. Warmth spread beneath his skin, his muscles jellying. As he slipped to the floor, he caught a tilted glance of Dex peering down at him, his head cocked, his expression something between hunger and curiosity.

  31

  A Hard Man

  Evan awoke naked on the floor of his bedroom, blinking into the harsh light of morning. His head throbbed. His mouth was chalky, his throat dryer than it had ever been. A single breath led to a coughing fit.

  He started to rise when a ring of fire ignited around his neck.

  His body slapped the floor, his muscles twitching against the rustic oak planks. He managed to fight one hand up to the blazing nerves of his throat and felt a metal band clamped into place.

  A shock collar.

  Behind him he heard Manny laugh. “This is gonna make our job easier, ése. No more getting our arms all tired holding up the shotgun and shit.”

  Evan pushed himself onto all fours, managed to get a wobbly foot down beneath him.

  His neck caught fire once more, nerves burning up through his face. His chest struck the floor again. Convulsing, he couldn’t tell if the shock was still running or if he was just feeling the aftereffects of the current sizzling through his skin.

  When his vision unblurred, he watched Manny turning the transmitter over in his hand, admiring it. “This thing is great.”

  “Take it easy,” Nando said. “René’ll be furioso if you fry his brain.”

  “It’s not gonna fry his brain. People use it all the time.”

  “For chimps in labs. At the lower setting.”

  Manny grinned. “Boss did say to put a little more oomph in it.”

  Evan shoved himself up again, wiped drool from his lower lip. He sneaked a glance at the inside of his arm, saw the tab of Scotch tape preserving René’s fingerprint stuck there, hidden from view. “No breakfast cart this morning?”

  The next shock flipped him onto his side. Through the static he heard Manny laughing.

  “Gimme that.” Nando wrestled the transmitter away. “It’s time for his exercise.”

  Manny walked over and kicked Evan’s feet. “Hurry up and get dressed. Or I take back the transmitter.”

  * * *

  Evan trudged across the snow-dusted ground, scratching at his skin beneath the shock collar. The new guard in the tower watched him not with binoculars but through the scope of a dedicated marksman rifle. It wouldn’t have the range of the sniper rifles in the mountains, but the right one in the right hands could be effective to six or even seven hundred meters. When Evan paused to identify the gun from its silhouette, the guard reached into his pocket.

  Evan barely had time to wonder what he was doing before countless needle tips jabbed into his neck. He lost his legs again. Snow against his cheek, crusting the hollow of one eye. He lay there, panting for breath. There’d be no getting used to the shock level.

  So the tower guard was also armed with a transmitter for Evan’s collar. And God knew who else. Evan pulled himself up and staggered for the tree line, keeping his gaze low.

  He’d thrown on multiple layers again. He felt bulky beneath two shirts and two sweaters, ballooning at the midsection like Tweedledee.

  Once he was hidden by the evergreens, he sat with his back to a tree and groped around the collar. Contact points rimmed the inside, metal prongs grouped in twos, the rounded tips jutting into his skin. His thumb found a notch near the back where the band snapped into place. No keyhole that he could discern. Perhaps the release was remote-controlled as well? The collar had little give; there’d be no moving the contact points off the skin. It was tight enough that swallowing was hard, like having a peach pit at the base of his throat that would not go down.

  Rising, he hiked up the gradual slope of the northern face, wanting to get a better look at the entire valley. He crested a bulge in the mountainside and assessed his options. From this vantage it was clear that the western and eastern sides of the range were too steep to be traversed. Clifflike runs of shale would prevent any ascent while simultaneously leaving him exposed. He doubted that René had bothered to place snipers on those ends of the range. One shooter to the north and one to the south, aided by the eyes of the guard in the tower, could contain Evan in the valley.

  Since the northern slope provided the best route to freedom, René had positioned the stronger sniper there. Which meant that when Evan made a break, he’d head up the opposite mountain. Wanting a better view of the southern rise, he hiked higher up the northern range now.

  This was his last chance to recon.

  He was leaving tonight.

  Tomorrow René was planning to force him to empty out his bank account. Which was unacceptable for a host of reasons, not least of which were the ramifications of wiring money from his account without his own meticulous encryption procedures in place. Charles Van Sciver and an array of the most powerful search-software programs ever created were working around the clock for the faintest trace of th
e Nowhere Man to blip onto the radar. One click of the mouse would make Evan disposable to René and put Van Sciver onto his scent at the same time.

  He was unwilling to deal with either complication.

  Not with Alison Siegler and the boy out there waiting.

  The thought sharpened his purpose, quickened his step. He fell into a rhythm, making decent time. The sun dominated a blue and cloudless sky, warming him enough to break a sweat despite the temperature. He stopped at intervals to eye the mountain across from him, mentally charting courses and backup courses, noting potential positions the sniper might take and the blind zones of those respective positions.

  The Third Commandment: Master your surroundings.

  He’d just started up again when a loud crack announced itself and a football-size chunk of bark flew out of the tree trunk to his side.

  Evan halted. His breath wisped from his mouth once, twice.

  He took a small step forward, and another rifle report sounded. Wood splintered overhead, and then a heavy bough rushed down, crashing a few feet in front of him.

  He paused again, oriented upslope, trying to zero in on the sniper’s position. He stepped to the left. This time he saw the muzzle flare an instant before the round kicked up dirt to the side of his boot.

  The sniper was herding him down the slope toward the chalet.

  Knowing he was clearly visible in the scope, Evan raised a hand: Got it.

  Turning around, he started down the mountain.

  He kept on in the direction the sniper had indicated, moving swiftly. Once he’d crossed a ripple in the mountainside, he knew he’d moved out of range of the scope. Rather than continuing down, he carved along the hillside, keeping to the dense trees. The pine air tingled in his mouth, his throat. At last he circled to the rear of the barn.

  Bellying down behind the tree line, he peered through the trunks at the back door about fifty yards away. Two of the narcos patrolled the barn at intervals, the Dobermans trotting alongside. Evan watched and timed them.

  In the tower beyond, the guard scanned the woods with his scope, holding his radio to his face with increasing frequency and agitation. A few minutes later, a contingent of three guards exited the barn and jogged into the forest to the north. Though it wasn’t yet dusk, they wore night-vision goggles pushed up high on their foreheads in case the hunt went long.