And, Harper thought grimly,I would not want to be Javier Machado, wherever he is.
CHAPTER 46
PUERTO SAN JULIÁN, ARGENTINA, FIVE MONTHS LATER
The old café was a modest establishment at best, but thanks to its location, the center terrace in a row of dirty brick buildings overlooking the port of San Julián, it catered to a steady stream of customers. Nearly all of them were men, because it was that kind of place. For the most part, they were large, grizzled individuals who earned a hard, dangerous living on the unpredictable waters off the southern coast of Argentina. The young waitress who moved through the tightly grouped tables was tired of the work, tired of trying to repel their interest, which usually presented itself in the form of lewd comments, lascivious stares, and even the occasional grope as she dispensed their food, drink, and more hard liquor than even they could handle. For the most part, she thought they were scum, and for the most part, she was right. However, even in this grubby place—
and she knew what it was, because she had once lived in Buenos Aires and often wondered why she had left in the first place—there was the occasional person worth serving with a genuine smile. She offered one now, though it temporarily froze on her face as she skirted a table surrounded by four burly, drunken fishermen, doing her best to give them a wide berth. Ignoring a slew of crude sexual advances, she made her way to the lone table by the large plate-glass window overlooking the pier. As she approached, her smile resumed its natural warmth, and her dark eyes shone with genuine pleasure. The man who sat there was about seventy, she surmised, with an iron gray beard and bushy, overgrown eyebrows. He had been coming in for about a month now, and she had never found him to be anything other than quietly respectful. She always looked forward to his visits, just as she was always sorry to see him go. In appearance alone, he did not differ much from the men who occupied the other tables. He dressed in a similar fashion: thick woolen sweaters, tarpaulin rain pants, and black rubber boots. Despite his rugged appearance, something told her he had never worked on the ocean. It was his demeanor, though, that really made him stand out, the way he carried himself with quiet dignity. She often found herself watching him when business was slow, wondering about the sad look on his face and the defeated slump of his broad shoulders. He looked at her, too, but not in the way the fishermen did. Rather, he looked at her the way her grandfather once had, and for this reminder of happier times, as much as his polite manner and generous tips, she found herself visiting his table as often as she could get away with.
As she approached now, she was more than disappointed to see him place his money on the table. It was too much, as always; she didn’t have to look to know that. She asked him, almost with a sense of quiet urgency, if he wouldn’t consider staying for one more drink, but he shook his head and politely declined. As he stood, she stepped back to let him pass. She told him it was on the house, but still he refused. He returned her smile, bid her good night, and walked through a haze of blue smoke to the door. As she watched him leave, the waitress felt a sense of deep, unaccountable sorrow. She stood there for a moment, deaf to the cruel snickers of the men sitting behind her, and wondered if she would ever see him again. Somehow, she doubted it, but she didn’t know why. It wasn’t until later that evening, as she gratefully locked the door behind the last drunken customer, that she realized what had triggered the thought.
It was the smile. Before he’d walked out, he’d given her a strange, sad parting smile, and she didn’t have to think about where she had seen it before, because she already knew. Her grandfather had given her that very same smile two years earlier, on the night he had died. After the old man left the café, he wandered along the pier for an hour, looking out at the lights bobbing up and down on the gentle swells of the South Atlantic. It had rained heavily that afternoon, and the pier shone with large puddles, the still water reflecting the lights from the buildings across the road. There was almost no activity at this late hour; the pier was largely deserted, which was when he liked it best. It gave him the time and solitude he needed to think things through, to weigh the life he had led, as well as the many thousands of decisions he’d made along the way. With increasing frequency, he found himself regretting the things he’d done, and one thing above all. At the same time, he did not regret the reasons behind his actions, and he knew that he never would. After all, how did one apologize for loving his children? How could he regret wanting to protect them by any means necessary? The answer, of course, was that he could not, and in the end, that was what it all came down to. That was the simple truth that allowed him to sleep at night, secure in the knowledge that if nothing else, he had at least acted with the right intentions all along. He stopped at the end of the pier and stared into the black water, listening to the sound of slow waves swarming around the sturdy cement pillars that held up the pier. He had been standing there for about ten minutes when he heard a sudden noise behind him. A very deliberate noise. He froze for a moment; then he slowly turned, arms away from his body, to face his killer.
The American was hardly recognizable, and it wasn’t the fact that the pier was draped in shadow. Even with the low light, Javier Machado could see that the young man had lost a great deal of weight, perhaps as much as thirty pounds, and there were lines in his gaunt face that should not have existed for another ten years. Machado was so focused on the incredible changes in his physical appearance that he nearly missed the gun in his right hand, which was extended at arm’s length, the muzzle centered on his chest. Without even looking, he knew that the weapon was a .22-caliber Beretta, a competition-style handgun fitted with a 6-inch suppressor. He had used the same weapon himself on countless occasions, and while he was aware of the irony, it didn’t mean a thing to him. After seventy-two years, there wasn’t much that still surprised him.
Machado waited for the American to speak, and when he did not, he said, “You’ve been a busy man.” He was surprised by how steady his own voice was; he had always thought that when the time came, he would be afraid. “You killed my colleague in Karachi.”
“I assume you mean Fahim. Isn’t that what you called him the last time we spoke?”
“And Rabbani in Paris. I assume you’re responsible for that as well.” The knowing look on the young man’s face told Machado that he was, and he didn’t feel the need to list the half dozen other business associates of the Afghan smuggler who had died over the past eight weeks. Machado had seen the pattern after the third man, a money launderer in Antwerp, had disappeared without a trace three weeks earlier. He had seen it then, but he had not tried to run, and when Fahim had died in Karachi the week before, he had known it was just a matter of time.
And now his time was up.
“Where is she?” the young man asked. He might have been asking for directions, for all the emotion in his voice. “Where is Naomi? What did you do with her?”
Machado cupped his hands in front of his body, palms up, and opened them slowly. “I told you she would disappear if you disobeyed me, and you did. I’m afraid she’s gone.”
“Her body—”
“There is no body.” Machado shook his head in a barely noticeable manner, as if the younger man should already know what he was being told. “Don’t you see? She never existed to begin with. That’s all there is to it . . . I don’t know what else you want me to say.”
There was no reply. Machado knew he had just seconds to live, and there was one thing he had to know. “Does my daughter know what I did? Does Marissa have any idea?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t spoken to her in months.” There was a long, unsettling pause. “Why, Machado? Why did you do it? You had already lost, so what was the point in killing her? I don’t understand it.”
At last, Machado caught a hint of emotion, a slight catch in the younger man’s voice. He thought for a moment, then lifted his arms out by his sides.
“What can I tell you?” he finally said. “Would you really be satisfied with any explanation I hav
e to offer?”
“Probably not.”
“Then why ask?” Machado said. “Just do what you came here to do. Just finish it.”
He closed his eyes, but nothing happened. He waited, but still, there was nothing but the sound of wind sweeping in from the ocean. He opened his eyes in time to see a pair of brief flashes, followed by a sharp pain in the center of his chest. He staggered back, then tumbled into space. He was falling, plunging toward his final resting place, and the last thing he saw before he hit the water was a face in his mind. It was Caroline’s face, the unmistakable image of his long-dead daughter, and as he took his last breath, pulling the black water into his lungs, he saw her open her arms and smile. She was bringing him home.
Kealey stood at the edge of the pier, holding the Beretta against his right thigh, staring down at the churning surface of the ocean. He stood there for several minutes, waiting for the weight on his chest to lift, waiting for the sense of relief that Machado’s death should have brought, but nothing changed. And then he realized that it never would. Naomi was still gone, and there was nothing he could do to bring her back.
There was no point in hurling the gun into the ocean; there was no one around to witness so dramatic a gesture. Instead, he simply dropped it over the side.
Then he turned to walk away.
KENSINGTON BOOKS are published by
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Copyright © 2008 by Andrew Britton
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The Invisible Page 44