Munroe tossed an envelope onto the bed and watched for reaction as Breeden went through the eight-by-ten glossies. Breeden’s fingers held the photos lightly, flipped through them nonchalantly, and then there it was, thumb clamped tightly to a photo and a second of hesitation, and then another and another until the masked calm was replaced by true pain, and Munroe took the photos back and stuffed them into the envelope.
Breeden said, “Michael, this isn’t what it looks like … those photos. It’s not what you think.”
“Doesn’t matter what I think,” Munroe said. “It only matters what is. You fucking sold me out, Kate, to a man who cared less about his wife and daughter than he did about his Italian suits.”
Breeden’s face clouded over. She said, “What?” and Munroe held up the keys, jangled them. “You’ll save me … what? A minute? Two minutes? Which key is to his house?”
“The square brown one,” Breeden whispered.
Munroe laughed, hard and unfeeling. “I hope the betrayal was worth it.” She grabbed Breeden’s left wrist. Breeden struggled, and Munroe struck her again, then forced the wrist down onto the bed and, with the arm stretched out, wrapped the tape around it and anchored her to the side of the bed frame. Munroe took the other wrist and repeated the procedure so that Breeden was splayed like a crucifix. “So why’d you do it, Kate?” she said.
“It doesn’t matter,” Breeden said. Munroe snapped three leashes onto a choke chain, wrapped and knotted a length of one around Breeden’s feet, and repeated the procedure with the others around the wrists, then ran them under the bed, tested them for tension, and slipped the choke over Breeden’s head.
Kate’s eyes grew wide, and Munroe said, “I’m not going to kill you yet.”
Using a small penknife, she slit the taped anchors off Breeden’s ankles and wrists, removed the tape from the bed and balled it up, then leaned over Breeden and tugged on the choke, causing Breeden to gasp and struggle for air. Munroe released the pressure. “This little guy is attached to your hands and feet. If you try to sit up, move your legs, or pull your arms, you’ll die slowly, strangled by your own struggle. You understand?”
Breeden nodded, and Munroe said, “Good.”
She released the clip on the gun and removed the bullets. Wiped them down, pressed them against Breeden’s fingers, leaving a partial to solid print on each, and then returned them to the magazine. She could have gotten prints on the photos the same way, but provoking Breeden’s reaction had been so much more rewarding.
Munroe searched through the closet, and Breeden said, “You’re not going to be able to pull this off.”
The sweet, sadistic smile of Pieter Willem spread across Munroe’s face as she rifled through Breeden’s clothing. “Oh, Kate,” she said, “you know me so much better than that. Not only will I pull it off, I’m going to get away with it.” She removed a shoulder-length blond wig from the case she carried and placed it solidly on her head. Then, still wearing the smirk, she took a bottle of perfume off the shelf, sprayed it on her neck and wrists, tugged a suit off a hanger, and grabbed a pair of Breeden’s panty hose. “In fact, I can prove beyond reasonable doubt that I’m not even in the country.”
Using the hose and some bathroom towels, Munroe padded her body to fit the suit. She dressed in front of Breeden, who kept her eyes mostly on the ceiling or shut. Breeden’s breathing was calm and regular, and finally, in a near whisper, she said, “How bad could it have really been?”
Each word brought Munroe flashbacks of Francisco’s body in a pool of blood, lifeless on the ground. She breathed in the rage and allowed it to consume her, tore off a strip of tape and placed it over Breeden’s mouth, then jerked Breeden’s right hand up from the bed and watched her eyes bulge as she struggled for air. After a moment Munroe placed the hand back on the bed and ran a finger along the inside of the choke to release the pressure, then patted Breeden’s cheek. “For your sake,” she said, “let’s hope that things go well for me tonight.”
She placed the laptop and equipment into Breeden’s attaché case, picked out a purse, dumped Breeden’s keys and wallet inside it, and, careful to leave no trace of her presence or identity, walked out of the room. She placed a Do Not Disturb sign on Breeden’s door and then in her own room cleared it of any indication that she had been there.
RICHARD BURBANK’S HOME was an apartment that covered nearly the entire floor above his offices. Dressed as she was, Munroe didn’t even garner a second look from night security when she entered the building. A card on Breeden’s key ring took the elevator to the correct floor, and Munroe exited into a marble foyer that ended in a door opposite the elevator. The key card let her soundlessly into Burbank’s home, and although the unit was dark, city lights filtering through large plate-glass windows provided more than enough illumination to guide her through the maze of furniture and carpeting. In the living room, Munroe stuffed a pair of Breeden’s panties between the couch cushions and then followed voices to the far side of the apartment. She stood against the half-open office door and listened to one side of a phone conversation—Burbank and one of his many girlfriends, apparently.
She waited until the conversation had ended and then entered the room, weapon trained on the back of Burbank’s head. If revenge were to be saccharine sweet, she would have killed him with her bare hands, staring into his eyes as he died slowly. Unfortunately, a bullet to the head was necessary for consistency.
Her steps were soundless, but the oversize clothes rustled, and without glancing up from his desk Burbank said, “Katie, is that you?”
“No, asshole,” Munroe said. “Kate’s dead, and you’ll be with her shortly.”
Burbank turned, facing into the muzzle of the gun.
Like the rest of the apartment, the office was nearly dark, and Burbank was a silhouette against the city lights, but even in the dimness Munroe could see the terror in his eyes. His hands trembled, and his eyes twitched nervously in the direction of the phone.
“Hand it to me,” Munroe said.
Burbank gave her the phone and then, in a sudden shift to calm, put his palms out and said, “Look, you don’t want to kill me. Whatever this is about, we can work through it. I can give you anything you want. I have connections, power—you know that. You want money? I’ll give you money. I can set you up good, no more globe-trotting. Whatever it is you want, I can make it happen.”
“Unless you’re Jesus fucking Christ and can raise the dead, there’s no way you can give me what I want.”
Burbank’s face went blank, and a second later his negotiator personality resurfaced. “You were never meant to get hurt. No one was supposed to be hurt. We should talk about this some more, work through it, see if we can’t find those who were really to blame.”
“Shut the fuck up,” Munroe said. “You’re making me sick.” She placed a foot on his chair and pushed it away from the desk. “Stay seated and keep your hands and feet where I can see them.” She flipped through the automated records on the phone and, not finding what she wanted, said, “We’re calling Nchama. Give me his number.”
Burbank’s mouth dropped open, and he said, “What?”
“You heard me, you fucking bastard. Give. Me. Nchama’s. Number.”
Burbank sat without moving, and Munroe cursed inwardly, torn between the intense desire to inflict pain and the complications of fucking up the otherwise perfect forensics of Kate’s would-be murder-suicide. “Last warning,” she said. And when again he didn’t move, she fired a shot into his left thigh.
Burbank screamed, lurched forward, and grabbed at his leg, and Munroe slapped a five-inch strip of tape across his mouth. “You want me to do that again?” she asked.
Eyes wide, fingers streaked with red, and grasping his leg, he shook his head vehemently.
“Good,” she said. “I’m glad we’re on the same page. Now get me the fucking number.”
Burbank pointed toward the desk, and Munroe kicked the chair back toward it. “Keep your hands whe
re I can see them and don’t give me a reason to take out your other leg.”
Burbank nodded and fumbled with the desk drawer.
“Stop,” Munroe said.
He hesitated and then did as she’d instructed, placing his hands on the armrests.
Munroe stepped between Burbank and the desk, pushed him back again, and with the weapon trained on his chest used the other hand to open the drawer. She searched through it, then felt along the underside and located a small depression. She released it, and a hidden drawer sprang open. Munroe removed the handgun, checked the safety, and then slid it into the waistband at the small of her back. Then she nodded again in the direction of the desk. “Nchama’s number,” she said.
Whatever confidence Burbank had held in reserve was fast fading; Munroe could see it in his posture, in the way his hands shook, and in the tension in his face. He dug through a drawer, pulled out a notepad, and handed it to her. She motioned him away from the desk and to the floor, where, still clutching at his leg and moaning against the gag, he sat with his back to the wall.
With a sneer, Munroe came slowly after him, watched his eyes grow wide as she crouched down to his level. With the gun to his head and her eyes boring into his, she squeezed the wound on his thigh.
Burbank screamed under the gag, and then, when he had calmed slightly, Munroe said, “I will hurt you. I will hurt you badly if you are difficult. Do you understand me?”
He nodded.
She lowered the weapon, reached for the tape, and ripped it from his face.
He began to yell, and she shook her head.
Still crouched at eye level, she said, “You’ve read my dossier. You know what I’m capable of, and you know that I specialize in information. This means you also know that I’m not bluffing when I tell you that I know why you left Emily to rot in Africa.” Her voice was low, monotonous, deadly. “Don’t try to play innocent, because bullshit is only going to prolong your pain. I know what you’ve done, and I know why you’ve done it. What I want to know is what you told Nchama that caused him to hold Emily in Mongomo.”
Through gritted teeth and halted breath, Burbank said, “That Emily was an impostor.”
“And you ordered Nchama to kill her?”
“Not in those exact words.”
Munroe prodded again at his thigh, and he swore.
“I didn’t have to,” he said. “Nchama said he’d taken care of it.”
“She called you,” Munroe said. “Nearly a year later, she talked with you. You knew she was alive, and you could have brought her home.”
Burbank shrugged. “By that time it didn’t matter anymore. Emily was pregnant, and Nchama never would have let her leave with the child.”
“What you mean is that with her the soon-to-be-mother of his child, he wouldn’t kill her like you wanted him to.”
Burbank said nothing, and she saw the truth in his eyes.
“So he keeps her, alive but hidden. What is it that you hold over his head?” she asked. “What is he afraid of?”
Burbank gave no response, and Munroe smiled sweetly. “I haven’t time to waste,” she said, singsong and lilting. “It doesn’t matter to me if you have all your fingers and toes. Does it matter to you?”
When he still said nothing, she placed the muzzle of the gun over his thumb, and when her index finger coiled for the trigger, Burbank said, “Video footage—a huge under-the-table deal that I threatened to take to his president.”
There was no point in demanding he hand it over. Burbank surely kept copies. Munroe slapped the tape back across his mouth and said, “Fucking piece of scum.” Then she stood, took the handset off his desk, and dialed.
She greeted Nchama in English and said, “I’m the one you’ve been hunting,” and then for privacy she switched to Fang. “I took out your patrol and beheaded your commander. I am a phantom,” she said, “and if I must, I will hunt you down and destroy you. Is the girl impostor alive?” Munroe received an affirmative and so shoved the phone in Burbank’s face and again ripped off the strip of tape. “Tell him plans have changed,” Munroe said. “That you need Emily returned to the United States.”
Burbank managed to stammer only slightly as he spoke, and when he had finished, Munroe took the phone back and continued with Nchama in Fang. She bluffed through the remainder of the conversation as if she now had the information that Burbank held. In promising to control Burbank—to control the blackmail—she offered Nchama a way out. She twisted the promise into a threat should he fail to cooperate, and by the time the call ended, she was as certain as she could ever be that Emily and the children were free of Burbank’s perfidy.
Munroe had no need for Richard Burbank now. He could die. Then Kate Breeden. That was the plan. Put a bullet in his brain. Then leave the photos, bullet casings, and Kate’s undergarments and walk out into the night to take care of Breeden’s suicide. For such short notice, the strategy was impressively flawless, and she stared at Burbank now, the whining, sniveling excuse for a man who had been the cause of so much pain.
She prepared to fire, but then she stopped. It could have been a minute or two, or ten, that she stood rigid, staring down at him while he whined and shed crocodile tears. All the while, memory tapes of Pieter Willem and Francisco Beyard danced inside her head, recollections of one man overcoming the other. And she knew that Richard Burbank wasn’t worth it.
“Turn on your computer,” she said finally.
Burbank stood again and hobbled to the desk, and then, with the computer powering on, she tossed the extra DVD with Emily’s footage and the packet of photos on the desk. She shoved him into the office chair and sat on the edge of the desk, where she could observe his expression while she forced him to watch the entire length of footage.
Burbank’s face betrayed no emotion throughout the viewing, and if Munroe understood correctly, the wheels of his mind had kicked into action, calculating the damage and planning spin and information control. If he lived, he would attempt to talk his way out of this, just as he’d talked his way into Elizabeth’s life and so many business deals thereafter, and so she waited until the footage ended.
Then, when the room had filled with silence, she said, “I don’t have to kill you, Richard. You’re already dead.”
Burbank looked into her face, surprise written clearly across his.
“You seem to be a little slow in catching on,” she said. “So let me help you.” Munroe leaned forward so that her face was only inches from his. “This morning Miles will take a copy of that footage to the board.” She paused and allowed the information to sink in. “Do I need to get graphic, Richard? What will they do when the truth is known? How much power will they allow you, Richard? How much control will you retain? How much wealth?” She paused again. “You’ve lost it all. Gone. Poof.”
She waited for Burbank’s reaction, read it in the creases around his eyes, smiled Pieter Willem’s sadistic smile, and beat her fist into her chest in mock grief. “Poor Daddy Burbank. Lost his wife and lost his daughter. Oh! The pain!
“You buried it well, Richard, your dirty little secret—shell companies and corporations behind corporations, all hiding the truth that your wealth and power were nothing but a façade. You’re broke, Richard. You have nothing but debt. Everything you own, everything you have—including Titan—belonged to Elizabeth and now belongs to Emily. And with Emily missing, everything you retain is at the discretion of the board.”
She smiled again and allowed Burbank to mull this over, then said, “Oh, I forgot to tell you. Your nightmare doesn’t end with the board.”
His face turned quickly toward hers. “How silly of me,” she said. “But that would have been too easy for you and your smooth, glib tongue.
“Emily’s footage and a thorough explanation outlining all this are also being sent to media outlets and law enforcement. The charade of your persona may possibly survive the news-shark feeding frenzy, but without the power and money granted by the board of trustees, I dou
bt you’ll survive a courtroom.
“Motive is a powerful thing,” she continued, “and I do believe yours has now been thoroughly documented. When you’re arrested—and you will be arrested—your public defender is going to have his work cut out.
“No, Richard,” she said, shaking her head, “I don’t have to kill you. Death would be so much easier than what you have waiting. This is a revenge I will be able to enjoy every day for years to come.”
She smiled. “Every night I will think of you, a soft white man with gang members, killers, and rapists as bedtime companions. I’ll wake with a smile, knowing it’s another day in the life of Poor Daddy Burbank, the bunkmate’s bitch. Word will leak that you’ve gotten AIDS or hepatitis C, that you’ve grown older than your years, and that you’re wasting away. Every bit of news will make mine a good day. And when you get out, if you ever do, I’ll be waiting.”
She paused again and whispered, “So far the fall, so great the degradation.”
Munroe indicated the photo envelope she’d tossed on the desk. “Keep these as a memento, because once the shit hits the fan, memories are all you’ll have.” She stood, slid the silenced pistol into the far corner of the room, said, “Enjoy the rest of your fucking miserable life,” then turned and walked out the door.
MUNROE GOT AS far as the kitchen before the stillness of the apartment was split by the unmistakable hiss of the weapon. She returned to the office and stood in the doorway only long enough to ascertain that Burbank had been successful. She removed the DVD from the computer and then went quickly down the hall, through Burbank’s bedroom to his bathroom. She found a washcloth and soaked it, then repeated the procedure with a second, applying a generous amount of hand soap.
She returned to Burbank. Lifting his right hand with the damp cloth, she wiped it thoroughly, hand to wrist to forearm. She followed with the second washrag and for consistency did the same on the left. The soap and water would wash away enough of the trace powder to conceal the crime scene’s silent truths.
The Informationist: A Thriller Page 32