The Cotton Malone Series 7-Book Bundle

by Steve Berry

  People milled about. Some sat in pews. The woman he was following walked fifty feet to his right, beyond the pulpit, heading for another sculpted tympanum.

  She entered and closed a heavy wooden door behind her.

  He stopped to consider his options.

  No choice.

  He moved toward the door and grasped its iron handle. His right fingers stayed tightened around the gun, but he kept the weapon tucked into his pocket.

  He twisted the latch and eased open the door.

  The room beyond was smaller, with a vaulted ceiling supported by slender white columns. More rococo ornamentation sprang from the walls, but it was not as bold. Perhaps this was a sacristy. A couple of tall cupboards and two tables accounted for the only furnishings. Standing beside one of the tables were two women—the one from the cable car and another.

  “Welcome, Herr Malone,” the new woman said. “I’ve been waiting.”

  EIGHT

  MARYLAND, 12:15 PM

  The house was deserted, the surrounding woods barren of people, yet the wind continued to whisper his name.

  Ramsey.

  He stopped walking.

  It wasn’t quite a voice, more a murmur that drifted on the winter wind. He’d entered the house through an open rear doorway and now stood in a spacious parlor dotted with furniture draped in filthy brown cloths. Windows in the farthest wall framed a view of a broad meadow. His legs remained frozen, ears attuned. He told himself that his name had not been spoken.

  Langford Ramsey.

  Was that indeed a voice, or just his imagination soaking in the spooky surroundings?

  He’d driven alone from his Kiwanian appearance into the Maryland countryside. He was out of uniform. His job as head of naval intelligence required a more inconspicuous appearance, which was why he routinely shunned both official dress and a government driver. Outside, nothing in the cold earth suggested that anyone had recently visited, and a barbed-wire fence had long rusted away. The house was a rambling structure of obvious additions, many of the windows shattered, a gaping hole in the roof showing no signs of repair. Nineteenth century, he guessed, the structure surely once an elegant country estate, now fast becoming a ruin.

  The wind continued to blow. Weather reports indicated that snow was finally headed east. He glanced at the wood floor, trying to see if the grime had been disturbed, but saw only his footprints.

  Something shattered far off in the house. Glass breaking? Metal clanking? Hard to say.

  Enough of this nonsense.

  He unbuttoned his overcoat and removed a Walther automatic. He crept left. The corridor ahead was cast in deep shadows, and an involuntary chill swept over him. He inched forward to the end of the passageway.

  A sound came again. Scraping. From his right. Then another sound. Metal on metal. From the rear of the house.

  Apparently, there were two inside.

  He crept down the hall and decided a rushing advance might give him an advantage, particularly after whoever it was continued to announce their presence with a steady tat-tat-tat.

  He sucked a breath, readied the gun, then bolted into the kitchen.

  On one of the counters, ten feet away, a dog stared back. It was a large mixed breed, its head topped with rounded ears, the coat a tawny color, lighter underneath, with a white chin and throat.

  A snarl seeped from the animal’s mouth. Sharp canines came into view, and hind legs tensed.

  A bark came from the front of the house.

  Two dogs?

  The one on the counter leaped down and bolted outside through the kitchen doorway.

  He rushed back to the front of the house just as the other animal fled through an open window frame.

  He exhaled.

  Ramsey.

  It seemed as if the breeze had formed itself into vowels and consonants, then spoke. Not clear, or loud. Just there.

  Or was it?

  He forced his brain to ignore the ridiculous and left the front parlor, following a hallway, passing more rooms dotted with sheathed furniture and wallpaper bubbled from the elements. An old piano stood uncovered. Paintings cast a ghostly nothingness from their cloth coverings. He wondered about the artworks and stopped to examine a few—sepia prints of the Civil War. One depicted Monticello, another Mount Vernon.

  At the dining room he hesitated and imagined groups of white men two centuries ago gorging themselves on beefsteaks and warm crumb cake. Perhaps whiskey sodas served in the parlor after. A game of bridge might have been played while a brazier warmed the air with an aroma of eucalyptus. Of course, Ramsey’s ancestors had been outside, freezing in the slaves’ quarters.

  He gazed down a long corridor. A room at the end of the passageway drew him forward. He checked the floor, but only dust covered the planks.

  He stopped at the end of the hall, in the doorway.

  Another view of the barren meadow loomed through a dingy window. The furniture, like the other rooms, was sheathed, except for a desk. Ebony wood, aged and distressed, its inlaid top coated with blue-gray dust. Deer antlers clung to taupe-colored walls and brown sheets shielded what appeared to be bookcases. Dust mites swirled in the air.

  Ramsey.

  But not from the wind.

  He targeted the source, rushed toward a draped chair, and ripped off the sheet, generating another fog-like cloud. A tape recorder lay on the decaying upholstery, its cassette about halfway spun.

  His grip on the gun stiffened.

  “I see you found my ghost,” a voice said.

  He turned to see a man standing in the doorway. Short, midforties, round face, skin as pale as the coming snow. His thin black hair, brushed straight, gleamed with flecks of silver.

  And he was smiling. As always.

  “Any need for the theatrics, Charlie?” Ramsey asked, as he replaced his gun.

  “Much more fun than just saying hello, and I loved the dogs. They seem to like it here.”

  Fifteen years they’d worked together and he didn’t even know the man’s real name. He knew him only as Charles C. Smith Jr., with an emphasis on the Junior. He’d asked once about Smith Sr. and had received a thirty-minute family history, all of which was surely bullshit.

  “Who owns this place?” Ramsey asked.

  “I do now. Bought it a month ago. Thought a retreat in the country would be a wise investment. Thinking about fixing it up and renting it out. Going to call it Bailey Mill.”

  “Don’t I pay you enough?”

  “A man has to diversify, Admiral. Can’t be reliant on just a paycheck to live. Stock market, real estate, that’s the way to be ready for old age.”

  “It’ll take a fortune to repair all this.”

  “Which brings me to an informational note. Because of unanticipated fuel cost increases, higher-than-expected travel fares, and an overall increase in overhead and expenses, we will be experiencing a slight rate increase. Though we strive to keep costs down while providing excellent customer service, our stockholders demand that we maintain an acceptable profit margin.”

  “You’re full of shit, Charlie.”

  “And besides, this place cost me a fortune and I need more money.”

  On paper Smith was a paid asset who performed specialized surveillance services overseas, where wiretapping laws were loose, particularly in central Asia and the Middle East. So he didn’t give a damn what Smith charged. “Send me a bill. Now listen. It’s time to act.”

  He was glad that preparatory work had all been done over the past year. Files readied. Plans determined. He’d known an opportunity would eventually arrive—not when or how, just that it would.

  And so it had.

  “Start with the prime target, as we discussed. Then move south for the other two in order.”

  Smith gave him a mock salute. “Aye, aye, Captain Sparrow. We shall make sail and find the fairest wind.”

  He ignored the idiot. “No contact between us until they’re all done. Nice and clean, Charlie. Really clean.�
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  “Satisfaction is guaranteed or your money back. Customer satisfaction is our greatest concern.”

  Some people could write songs, pen novels, paint, sculpt, or draw. Smith killed, and with an unmatched talent. And but for the fact that Charlie Smith was the best murderer he’d ever known, he would have shot the irritating idiot long ago.

  Still, he decided to make the gravity of the situation perfectly clear.

  So he cocked the Walther and rammed the barrel into Smith’s face. Ramsey was a good six inches taller, so he glared down and said, “Don’t screw this up. I listen to your mouth and let you rant, but don’t. Screw. This. Up.”

  Smith raised his hands in mock surrender. “Please, Miss Scarlett, don’t beat me. Please don’t beat me …” The voice was high-pitched and colloquial, a crude imitation of Butterfly McQueen.

  He didn’t appreciate racial humor, so he kept the gun pointed.

  Smith started to laugh. “Oh, Admiral, lighten up.”

  He wondered what it took to rattle this man. He replaced the weapon beneath his coat.

  “I do have one question,” Smith said. “It’s important. Something I really need to know.”

  He waited.

  “Boxers or briefs?”

  Enough. He turned and left the room.

  Smith started laughing again. “Come on, Admiral. Boxers or briefs? Or are you one of those who are free to the wind. CNN says ten percent of us don’t wear any underwear. That’s me—free to the wind.”

  Ramsey kept marching toward the door.

  “May the Force be with you, Admiral,” Smith hollered. “A Jedi Knight never fails. And not to worry, they’ll all be dead before you know it.”

  NINE

  Malone’s gaze raked the room. Every detail became critical. An open doorway to his right drew his alarm, especially the unexplored darkness beyond.

  “It’s only us,” his hostess said. Her English was good, laced with a mild German accent.

  She motioned, and the woman from the cable car strutted toward him. As she approached he saw her caress the bruise on her face from where he’d kicked her.

  “Perhaps I’ll get the chance to return the favor one day,” she said to him.

  “I think you already have. Apparently, I’ve been played.”

  She smiled with clear satisfaction, then left, the door clanging shut behind her.

  He studied the remaining woman. She was tall and shapely with ash-blond hair cut close to the nape of a thin neck. Nothing marred the creamy patina of her rosy skin. Her eyes were the color of creamed coffee, a shade he’d never seen before, and cast an allure that he found hard to ignore. She wore a tan rib-necked sweater, jeans, and a lamb’s-wool blazer.

  Everything about her screamed privilege and problem.

  She was gorgeous and knew it.

  “Who are you?” he asked, bringing out the gun.

  “I assure you, I’m no threat. I went to a lot of trouble to meet you.”

  “If you don’t mind, the gun makes me feel better.”

  She shrugged. “Suit yourself. To answer your question, I’m Dorothea Lindauer. I live near here. My family is Bavarian, with ties back to the Wittelsbachs. We’re Oberbayer. Upper Bavarian. Connected to the mountains. We also have deep ties to this monastery. So much that the Benedictines grant us liberties.”

  “Like killing a man, then leading the killer to their sacristy?”

  The skin between Lindauer’s eyebrows creased. “Among others. But that is, you must say, a grand liberty.”

  “How did you know that I’d be on that mountain today?”

  “I have friends who keep me informed.”

  “I need a better answer.”

  “The subject of USS Blazek interests me. I, too, have wanted to know what really happened. I assume you have now read the file. Tell me, was it informative?”

  “I’m out of here.” He turned for the door.

  “You and I have something in common,” she said.

  He kept walking.

  “Both of our fathers were aboard that submarine.”

  Stephanie pushed a button on her phone. She was still in her office with Edwin Davis.

  “It’s the White House,” her assistant informed through the speaker.

  Davis kept silent. She immediately opened the line.

  “Seems we’re at it again,” the booming voice said through both the handset she held and the speaker from which Davis listened.

  President Danny Daniels.

  “And what is it I did this time?” she asked.

  “Stephanie, it would be easier if we could get to the point.” A new voice. Female. Diane McCoy. Another deputy national security adviser. Edwin Davis’ equal, and no friend of Stephanie’s.

  “What is the point, Diane?”

  “Twenty minutes ago you downloaded a file on Captain Zachary Alexander, US Navy, retired. What we want to know is why naval intelligence is already inquiring about your interest, and why you apparently, a few days ago, authorized the copying of a classified file on a submarine lost thirty-eight years ago.”

  “Seems there’s a better question,” she said. “Why does naval intelligence give a damn? This is ancient history.”

  “On that,” Daniels said, “we agree. I’d like that question answered myself. I’ve looked at the same personnel file you just obtained, and there’s nothing there. Alexander was an adequate officer who served his twenty years, then retired.”

  “Mr. President, why are you involved in this?”

  “Because Diane came into my office and told me we needed to call you.”

  Bullshit. No one told Danny Daniels what to do. He was a three-term governor and one-term senator who had managed twice to be elected president of the United States. He wasn’t a fool, though some thought him so.

  “Forgive me, sir, but from everything I’ve ever seen, you do exactly what you want to do.”

  “A perk of this job. Anyway, since you don’t want to answer Diane’s question, here’s mine. Do you know where Edwin is?”

  Davis waved his hand, signaling no.

  “Is he lost?”

  Daniels chuckled. “You gave that SOB Brent Green hell and probably saved my hide in the process. Balls. That’s what you have, Stephanie. But on this one, we have a problem. Edwin’s on a lark. He has some sort of personal thing going here. He grabbed a couple of days leave and took off yesterday. Diane thinks he came to see you.”

  “I don’t even like him. He almost got me killed in Venice.”

  “The security log from downstairs,” McCoy said, “indicates that he’s in your building right now.”

  “Stephanie,” Daniels said, “when I was a boy, a friend of mine told our teacher how he and his father went fishing and caught a sixty-five-pound bass in one hour. The teacher was no idiot and said that was impossible. To teach my buddy a lesson about lying, she told him how a bear came from the woods and attacked her, but was fended off by a tiny hound who beat the bear back with just a bark. ‘You believe that?’ the teacher asked. ‘Sure,’ my pal said, ‘because that was my dog.’ ”

  Stephanie smiled.

  “Edwin’s my dog, Stephanie. What he does gets run straight to me. And right now, he’s in a stink pile. Can you help me out on this one? Why are you interested in Captain Zachary Alexander?”

  Enough. She’d gone way too far, thinking she was only helping out first Malone, then Davis. So she told Daniels the truth. “Because Edwin said I should be.”

  Defeat flooded Davis’ face.

  “Let me speak to him,” Daniels said.

  And she handed over the phone.

  TEN

  Malone faced Dorothea Lindauer and waited for her to explain.

  “My father, Dietz Oberhauser, was aboard Blazek when it disappeared.”

  He noticed her continual reference to the sub’s fake name. She apparently did not know much, or was playing him. One thing she said, though, registered. The court of inquiry’s report had named a fie
ld specialist. Dietz Oberhauser.

  “What was your father doing there?” he asked.

  Her striking face softened, but her basilisk eyes continued to draw his attention. She reminded him of Cassiopeia Vitt, another woman who’d commanded his interest.

  “My father was there to discover the beginning of civilization.”

  “That all? I thought it was something important.”

  “I realize, Herr Malone, that humor is a tool that can be used to disarm. But the subject of my father, as I’m sure is the case with you, is not one I joke about.”

  He wasn’t impressed. “You need to answer my question. What was he doing there?”

  A flush of anger rose in her face, then quickly receded. “I’m quite serious. He went to find the beginning of civilization. It’s a puzzle he spent his life trying to unravel.”

  “I don’t like being played. I killed a man today because of you.”

  “His own fault. He was overzealous. Or perhaps he underestimated you. But how you handled yourself confirmed everything I was told about you.”

  “Killing is something you seem to take lightly. I don’t.”

  “But from what I’ve been told, it’s something you’re no stranger to.”

  “More of those friends informing you?”

  “They are well informed.” She motioned down at the table. He’d already noticed an ancient tome lying atop the pitted oak. “You’re a book dealer. Take a look at this.”

  He stepped close and slipped the gun into his jacket pocket. He decided that if this woman wanted him dead, he would be already.

  The book was maybe six by nine inches and two inches thick. His analytical mind ticked off its provenance. Brown calf cover. Blind tool stamping without gold or color. Unadorned backside, which pinpointed its age: Books produced before the Middle Ages were stored flat, not standing, so their bottoms were kept plain.

  He carefully opened the cover and spied the frayed pieces of darkened parchment pages. He examined them and noticed odd drawings in the margins and an undecipherable text in a language he did not recognize.

  “What is this?”