by Jan Coffey
“Please help yourselves at the bar over there and to the hors d’ oeuvres.”
From their faces, she could see that David and Jay were both surprised that she’d already met Galvin. She looked at the others in the room. From the way everyone was conversing, it appeared that they were either employees of Steven’s or people who’d worked for him before. There were men and women of varying ages.
“Alanna,” Steven said, touching her arm as the other two moved off. “Are your living arrangements satisfactory?”
“Yes, absolutely. Everything is lovely,” she told him, looking around the room again. “Was my friend, Ray Savoy, invited to this gathering, as well?”
“Yes, of course,” he said, looking past her. “But he’s not here.”
She nodded. The hostess came up from behind her.
“Pardon me, Steven. May I have a word, sir?”
“Sure.” He looked back at Alanna. “Excuse me for a moment.”
As he walked away, she turned around to find David Collier, two glasses of wine in hand, standing next to her.
“White wine okay?”
“Sure, thanks,” she said, taking the glass.
David nodded toward their host’s back. “You knew about him?”
“I only found out this afternoon,” she told him. “When we got back from the airport. I was really surprised.”
“Did you have a guy named Hank Diarte interview you for the position?” he asked.
“I had two people interview me,” she told him. It was nice to talk to someone who admitted being as confused as she was. “One of them was Diarte. The other was Lyons.”
“I don’t see any sign of Diarte.”
“I didn’t see Lyons, either,” she told him. “I guess since we’re here, their job is done.”
Galvin was speaking to Jay Alexei. If Alanna thought the young men was nervous before, he showed no sign of it now. She figured, like herself, adrenaline rush took over in the situations that really mattered.
“You wanted to leave here today,” Collier continued. “Would you mind my asking why?”
Alanna looked toward the door again. No sign of Ray. “It was something personal,” she said quietly, taking a sip of her wine.
“I saw your friend leave this afternoon,” David said casually. “About an hour after we arrived.”
Alanna looked up at him in surprise. “My friend?”
“I thought he was your friend. I might be wrong. I thought you two were arguing at the airport. He sat in front in the van on the ride over here. His name was…Roy…Ray…”
“Ray Savoy,” she told him. “We came here together. You said you saw him leave?”
“On one of the power boats.”
“Oh.” She thought about that a moment. “Maybe he was going on a sightseeing tour. He likes boats…fishing.”
“Maybe,” David said quietly. “But I saw them load his luggage onto the boat.”
CHAPTER 45
Dundalk, Ireland
The people working at the Hughes & Hughes Bookstore were definitely going out of their way to be accommodating, but Amber Hersey knew that nothing short of going on the street with a lasso would bring people in. Other than selling a book to the store manager and one of the employees, they hadn’t had a single customer. Of course, the teeming rain might not be helping.
The whole tour was ridiculous, though, and she knew it.
She was a twenty-four-year-old American graduate student. True, she’d written a reasonably successful children’s book. Still, without stressing her brain too much, Amber could list ten reasons why she shouldn’t be here. But it was even easier to list ten reasons why she was here, after all.
First, she was the daughter of a longtime senator from Pennsylvania and the current presidential front runner. That was why her book had been published by a major New York publisher in the first place.
Second, she was the daughter of a longtime senator from Pennsylvania and the current presidential front runner. That was the reason for this international book tour.
Third, she was the daughter of a longtime senator from Pennsylvania and the current presidential front runner. That was why everywhere she went, her picture showed up in the local papers.
Real authors couldn’t buy this kind of publicity with any amount of money, but the truth was that the press coverage of an American girl with one book out just wasn’t going to help sell books in a rainy, gray Irish town.
But that wasn’t the point.
Amber knew that the campaign publicity machinery was getting great, positive images to use as a sidebar for her father’s press releases.
When Amber’s cell phone rang, she decided not to bother remembering any other reasons that she was sitting here talking to herself.
Her father was on the phone. Impeccable timing.
“Well, how’s the Grand Tour going?” he asked.
“This was a mistake, Dad,” Amber said in a tone hushed enough not to hurt the store manager’s feelings.
“No customers?” he asked.
“Zip,” she replied. “Once gain, another country, another city, another beautiful and charming bookstore, and zip, zip, zip in book sales. Has the publisher called looking for their advance back?”
“No. That money is yours to keep.”
“I know, dad. I’m kidding…sort of.”
“Listen, honey. You aren’t really there to sell books,” her father said in an upbeat tone. “You’re there to travel, to have a good time.”
“Oh, yeah! How could I forget?” Amber said quietly, looking toward the front of the store, where one of her escorts was sitting and reading an Irish name book. “It’s such a good time traveling with two Secret Service agents who have the combined personality of a dried lentil. I don’t think I could stand having any more fun.”
“Why don’t you call one of your friends and have them meet you in Ireland for the weekend? I’ll even spring for it,” he offered.
“I have no friends, Dad. None that like me enough to hop on a plane and come to Ireland for a weekend and sit in a bookstore with me.”
She didn’t want to complain about her mother backing out on the trip. These two found enough faults with each other without any extra help from her. Amber knew things would have been a lot different if her mother had come. They’d have had their arguments and fights, but she’d also have had someone to talk to and go sightseeing and shopping with.
“Well, after this, you’ve just got London and then home, right?”
“And then, next summer, all those children’s bookstores in the U.S.,” she reminded him.
“Hey, if you don’t want to do that tour, I’m sure you could get out of it.”
She sat back in the chair, realizing what she was doing. She was bored out of her mind. But this wasn’t her father’s fault. Nobody had forced her to try her hand at writing a children’s book. She’d enjoyed it. And going on a book tour had sounded great to her, at least in theory. But Paul Hersey was too classy a father to remind her of any of that.
“I’m sorry, Dad,” she told him.
“Sorry for what?”
“For whining like a three-year-old,” she admitted. “Actually, that’ll be my next book. A whiny three-year-old who moves into the White House when no one is looking. I’ll name the character after myself, Amber. How does that sound?”
His laughter coming through the phone made her smile. “Honey, you can always cut the trip short and come home.”
Amber had thought about that herself. It was nice to get this kind of encouragement, too.
The chimes above the front door tinkled as a customer entered. The tall man stepped inside and with him came the smell of rain and wet wool.
“I think the real Ireland just came in.”
As she talked, the man peeled a wool hat off his head and curly brown hair tumbled down to his shoulders. He nodded to the Secret Service agent sitting by the door, and then turned and smiled in her direction.
; The reaction was immediate. Amber felt a swell of heat wash right down into her belly. Ireland just got a lot more interesting.
“Sorry, Dad. I have to go.”
“What is it?”
“I might have a customer,” she said, hoping.
CHAPTER 46
There was nothing to keep her here, but she’d stayed.
Around 8:15, Alanna stopped looking for him. Ray never showed up during the cocktail hour, nor was he here for dinner. Alanna noticed the extra setting at the dining room table that was removed after everyone sat down.
She did find it curious that Steven Galvin didn’t know that her fiancé had left. Maybe he did, she thought, but didn’t want to be the one bearing bad news.
In any event, she was determined to enjoy the night in a civilized manner. No matter what was going on with Ray, Alanna had decided that she was leaving tomorrow morning on the first available flight.
Overhearing the conversation at dinner, she learned that Galvin’s other employees had been moved down here for the short duration of this project, as well. Some talked about their families being here with them. Everyone appeared to be staying on the property.
After dinner, she and David and Jay were led back to the library. The long table had been cleared of the hors d’oeuvres, and the room was spotless. Galvin took his seat on one side of the table where his open laptop sat, and gestured for everyone to sit down.
“I know each one of you is anxious to learn why you’re here, what this mysterious job is that requires your particular talents or knowledge.” He made eye contact with everyone at the table. “And I’m sure you have dozens of other questions that you have been waiting to ask.”
Alanna was relieved that Galvin started right away. She didn’t need any more cocktails or dinners or general schmoozing.
“I know that at least one of you is still not committed to staying,” he continued. “I’ll go through the background of this project and my proposal and how the expertise each of you possesses fits into my plans. Please feel free to interrupt me at any time.”
He looked around the room.
“The only thing that I ask of you is that if you choose not to participate, that you will honor my request of confidentiality. This is extremely important to me.”
Alanna wasn’t imagining it. Galvin was looking only at her now.
She nodded.
If she was looking for some 3-D, high tech, attention-grabbing opener, what came up on the screen wasn’t it.
A baby picture. A bald-headed, chubby little baby lying on his stomach and wearing only a diaper.
“My son,” he started, his voice husky. “Nathan Robert Galvin.”
The next picture showed Nathan as a toddler sitting on Steven’s shoulders. Next to them stood a stunning young Asian-featured woman.
“Nathan, age two and half,” Steven continued, his voice clear now. “And this is my late wife, Kei. This picture was taken at the Grand Canyon, during the good old days when I used to actually take time away from work and go on vacation with my family.”
The slideshow continued, showing Nathan on his fourth birthday, blowing out candles on a cake, but Steven wasn’t looking at the screen anymore.
“I haven’t lost my mind and forgotten why you’re here. I promise to get to the point very shortly,” he told them. “The only reason I’ve started with Nathan’s pictures is to have you understand the trigger behind what I am going to ask you to do.”
He looked at Jay. “You are a new father, Mr. Alexei.”
Jay nodded.
“And you, Mr. Collier. I know you’ll go to the ends of the earth to be there for your daughter.”
“That’s true,” David said cautiously.
“You both know how far a parent will go to protect their child.”
Both men nodded.
Alanna felt suddenly defensive that Galvin thought she might not have that understanding. Her defensiveness quickly gave way to sadness; the truth was, she did lack such love from a parent in her life. Her grandmother had been her only support. She’d had no mother or father to go to the ‘ends of the earth,’ as Steven put it. At the same time, she knew deep inside that she was capable of having such strong emotions toward another human being, especially one who depended on her.
She’d come here.
The photos now showed Nathan graduating from high school. The proud parents were in some of the photos. He’d become a very handsome young man, a combination of both of them in looks. The pictures following it were of the young man working on a roof, hammer in hand, doing some kind of community service project. Nathan was getting older before their eyes.
“There comes a time in every parent’s life when you have to let go. As painful as it is, you have to cut the ties and let your son or daughter float free and start that adult chapter of his or her own life. That time came for me and Kei when Nathan graduated from Georgetown.”
The next few slides showed the young man’s college graduation. Again, the proud, smiling parents.
“He had no interest in engineering or going into the line of business that I was in. Nathan’s one love was travel, seeing the world. So when he told us that he planned to spend some time traveling, we did the only thing we could. We let our only child go.”
A picture of Nathan came up that was obviously taken at an airport. Baseball cap, a backpack on one shoulder, wearing a T-shirt and jeans. Unlike the others, the photo didn’t advance. It remained on the screen.
“This was the last time Kei and I saw our son,” he said in a low voice.
Alanna looked at Galvin. He was staring at the picture. This might have been what she couldn’t remember from the headlines before. He’d lost his son and then his wife. No one said anything. The air in the room had become scarce.
“Nathan Robert Galvin, age twenty-three, was kidnapped from Kapali Carsi, the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul thirteen months ago,” Steven announced.
Shivering involuntarily, Alanna sat straighter in her chair. She’d never expected to hear that.
“Five weeks later, we were told that we needed to make the arrangements to bring Nathan’s dead body home,” Steven said unsteadily. “Twenty days after Nathan’s funeral, my wife Kei took her own life, deliberately overdosing on prescription antidepressant and sleeping pills. She couldn’t stand the pain anymore.”
They were all frozen at the table. Alanna didn’t know how to respond. She didn’t think any of them knew. They were here because of what had happened to Nathan.
The picture of Nathan remained on the screen. Steven raised the lights and turned to them. “I’m sorry. I guess I caught all of you by surprise.”
“The ones…” Jay started hesitantly. “The ones who kidnapped your son. Were they caught?”
“No,” Steven answered. “Unfortunately, the Istanbul police didn’t pursue the criminals as vigorously as they could have. Even Interpol failed to act as we…as I believe they should have. There were no arrests, not even fake arrests for our sake. In fact, as to the cause of Nathan’s death, the final reports that were made public were so vague that no individual or groups could be held responsible for it.”
“Why your son?” David asked. “Why kidnap a tourist?”
Steven Galvin looked away from them, focusing on the faded image of his son.
“Nathan was in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Galvin explained. “I was later told by the U.S. government that they believe the kidnappers thought him to be a CIA operative.”
To have the kind of wealth these people possess and to be so helpless. She couldn’t imagine it.
“I hope you don’t mind me asking, Steven,” Alanna said gently. “But did you try to offer money for his return?”
He nodded. “We tried. I used every contact I had in Washington, overseas, in Turkey. I was willing to pay any amount, but it was too late. The communications were botched. We were never able to establish a clear dialogue with the kidnappers.”
Silence settled again i
n the room. Nothing could take away the pain that this man was living with. He’d lost two people that he loved. Alanna remembered how she felt last fall when she thought Ray had died in the boating accident. She shut down, mentally and physically. She couldn’t remember a blacker period in her life. But Ray’s accident had been a set-up. That nightmare had been staged.
Alanna’s gaze wandered, coming to rest on David. She thought he must understand better than anyone else in this room what Galvin had gone through. His own wife was dead. His daughter had a potentially terminal illness.
“Well, there you are,” Steven told them. He still didn’t seem to have his emotions completely under control. He shut off the photo of his son.
“I don’t need to describe to you the anguish I went through over Nathan and Kei’s deaths,” he said, clearing his throat. “But I’m the one who is left. And it hasn’t taken me too long to figure out what I have to do.”
“If I were you,” Jay said quietly. “I’d be looking for revenge.”
The statement rang true. She could easily see herself angry enough to want an ‘eye for an eye’ in a situation like that. But how?
“I wanted revenge more than anything else,” Steven agreed. “But I didn’t have the names or faces of the animals that kidnapped and killed my son. So I hired detectives. I worked with agents and former agents of the U.S. government. I went to Istanbul myself, repeatedly. I retained the services of an international security outfit that looks after private contractors working in the Middle East. I wanted information. Anything they could give me.”
“And did you have any success?” Alanna asked.
He nodded. “Yes, I was able to discover the terrorists who kidnapped Nathan were operating under an umbrella organization that funded them. They were definitely not just run of the mill kidnappers, grabbing a tourist. That much was true.”
“Al Qaida?” Jay asked.
“Not exactly.”
“How large is this umbrella organization?” David asked.
“I can’t tell you. They are an amorphous, shadowy group. But they seem to have a steady stream of money, and as long as the funds are there to support them, the activities they fund continue.” Steven looked at each one of them in turn. “And that’s why I invited a scientist, a banker, and a computer security specialist to join me in this battle. I don’t intend for you to help me go after individuals. I want to dry up the well. My plan is to wipe them out the only way I know. I want to ruin them all financially.”