by Dana Haynes
Fiero wore a fitted jacket and skirt, her hair up in a Spanish chignon. She’d switched to riding boots. She tucked her leather satchel with the shoulder strap tight between her torso and her elbow. She was once again Señora Elisabet Falcón, the disgraced Madrileña.
She’d programmed the address of the cottage into her iPhone and started walking uphill, away from the downtown core.
Two blocks from the rendezvous, Guy Lacazette surprised her by tooting the horn of a Renault and waving from behind the steering wheel.
Fiero crossed the road and climbed into the passenger side. “Monsieur Lacazette. I thought we were—”
“Yes, yes.” The private investigator nodded. “The seller is inside the house. But he’s the paranoid type. Not like me. He’s afraid of cops, don’t you see?”
He reached for the Renault’s glove box, his wrist brushing her bare knee. He produced a scanner baton, used to detect EM fields. “Do you mind?”
He ran the baton from her boots, up her legs, and across her torso and arms. He held it decidedly closer than would be necessary to detect listening devices.
“Mind if I look in the satchel?”
She hesitated, then lifted the strap off her shoulder and set the bag in her lap. She unlatched the fold-over cover, opened it wide for him to peer inside. The bag carried her pocketbook, a matching leather portfolio stuffed with documents, and a fat buff envelope.
Lacazette removed the last item, undid the red twine, and peered inside. It was stuffed with euros. He redid the twine and slid the envelope into his blazer pocket.
“I haven’t—” She reached for the bundle and her bag slipped off her lap and landed near her feet.
“There, there.” He patted her knee. “Dangerous, a pretty woman walking the streets with so much cash. I’ll keep it safe. Shall we?”
He opened the driver’s-side door and stepped out.
“Aren’t we driving somewhere?”
“Did I say we were?”
Fiero sighed and climbed back out of the car.
“This way, please.”
Lacazette led her uphill toward the cottage.
Stevan Sorak stood in the bedroom, facing the only window in the cottage with a half-decent view of the street. His radio thrummed and the readout said five: the soldier on foot, waiting for the arrival. “I see Lacazette and the girl. Over.”
“Confirmed.” Sorak said. “Four?”
The soldier in the bakery truck responded quickly. “Not yet, sir. I … No, there they are.”
Fiero and Guy Lacazette passed Soldier Five, who stood in the shadows and kept an eye on the likely approach to the cottage.
They reached their destination: a small house elevated on a hillock behind a retaining wall. The Frenchman unlatched the gate, which led to eight steps, then an S-shaped walkway of river stones, and then the front door. He said, “After you.”
Fiero’s eyes shot wide and she halted so quickly that Lacazette stumbled. “My bag. Where’s my bag?”
She had left it on the floor of his car.
She turned to go back. Lacazette caught her arm and restrained her. “The car is locked. We’ll get it when we return.”
“I need it.” Her voice rose slightly, insistent. That caught his attention.
“Do you, now?”
“Yes, please. I need—”
He held her firm. “It’s fine. We’ll get it later. Promise. Shall we?”
“But—”
He gestured toward the stairs.
Fiero hesitated, then stepped forward.
Lacazette drew the phone that the Kosovars had given him and toggled the switch, calling Soldier Five. He spoke in French; a language he already knew she didn’t speak. “The girl’s bag, in the car. I think she brought a gun. Get it.”
She pivoted back. “What was that?”
“Nothing, dear.” He slid the phone away. “Shall we?”
Fiero hesitated, turning again to mount the stairs. Lacazette watched her ass and legs, then followed.
Before they reached the door, he said, “The air-conditioning is shit, I’m afraid. Hot as a sauna in there. May I take your jacket?”
She turned to him. “I’ll be fine.”
“I insist.”
She paused, studying his eyes. Fiero reached for the single done button on the jacket and slid out of it, handing it over.
Lacazette held it by the collar and ran his other hand over the material, feeling for anything suspicious and finding nothing.
He stepped to the door, laying a sweaty hand on the small of her back, just above her skirt. He felt nothing to indicate a gun, or a knife or a radio, under the crisp white blouse.
Lacazette rapped three times on the door—all clear—and turned the knob. The door opened. “My dear?”
Fiero stepped into the cottage and faced a squat, powerfully built man in a blazer.
Lacazette entered behind her and locked the door. He grinned. “Ah. Here we are!”
For the sake of appearances, Soldier Two sat in the living room of the cottage wearing a blazer and nice trousers and dress shoes. His job was to keep the Spanish woman calm until she was inside the house.
Once inside the house, and facing the front door, the kitchen stood to a person’s left and the only bedroom to the right.
Soldier Three stood in the kitchen, his Glock 17 automatic pistol holstered.
Captain Sorak was in the bedroom with a Taser.
The optimum plan was to take the girl alive and find out who was paying her freight. And if she wouldn’t talk, to use her as leverage to get her American partner to talk.
Sorak was hoping for the latter scenario.
C26
St. Nicholas had known in advance that the address on the Frenchman’s matchbook would lead to a one-story cottage off an isolated lane. Bridget Sumner, their office manager and an experienced legal researcher, had done title searches throughout the Loire Valley, looking for any property linked to the Kosovo Army, Ragusa Logistics of Zagreb, the corrupt attorney in Paris, or his ex-soldier private investigator. It had once been said of Bridget Sumner had she could follow a paper trail in a Category 5 hurricane.
While Fiero met with the French PI for the first time, Finnigan had checked out the cottage. He picked the lock, scoped out the entire one-story cottage, and found the duffel bags of the Kosovar soldiers in the bedroom. He rooted through the bags and found plenty of ammunition, flash-bang grenades, ballistic vests, Tasers, and extra communications gear. He also found bondage essentials, necessary for detaining and questioning people against their will.
Any hope of luring Lazar Aleksić to France evaporated like dew.
He had the place to himself, and the time, so he disassembled the lock on the door that separated the kitchen from a short mudroom and, beyond, a thin sliver of backyard with a high fence and an umbrella-shaped clothesline on a standing metal pole. They’d likely need that egress later.
Before her rendezvous with Lacazette, Fiero called Finnigan for a debrief. He had the Kosovars under surveillance. “Five bravos,” he whispered, using their usual code: Finnigan and Fiero, and any allies in the field, were alpha. Any opponent was bravo. “Soldiers, for sure. Three inside, two out. Plus the French creep, for a total of six. Figure they’ll be watching your approach.”
“All right,” she said. “See you in ten.”
Now, as Lacazette led the lamb to slaughter, Soldier Five returned to the Renault. He cupped his hands around his eyes and peered through the passenger window.
There was the girl’s tote bag, on the floor near the emergency brake.
Even before Lacazette called in the information, Soldier Five had overhead the conversation from the shadows, less than half a block away. The girl had been determined to get the bag. Even though the money had been removed.
Why?
<
br /> Lacazette assumed she’d brought a gun. Soldier Five figured it was either that, or a radio for her partner. Either way, he decided to pick the lock, get into the car, and find out what she was hiding.
While lurking outside, Finnigan had peered through the windows. He clocked a bravo in the bedroom with all the duffel bags, and another in the front room. He knew Fiero would be with the Frenchman, plus the soldier riding drag. Another one waited in the bakery truck out front. Six on two. And Fiero was unarmed.
A fair fight.
As Fiero and Lacazette approached the cottage, Finnigan snuck into the kitchen via the mudroom. A soldier waited in the kitchen with an automatic in a hip holster. Finnigan recognized the Glock 17—among the most common guns in use for law enforcement and military around the globe—although this one looked different. He didn’t have time to figure out why. He snuck up behind the soldier, clipped the guy behind the ear with a lead-and-leather sap that an uncle had given him when he graduated from the NYPD academy. Finnigan caught him and eased him to the floor without a sound.
He listened to the front door swing open. He heard the Frenchman say, “Ah. Here we are!”
The front door closed again and the locking mechanism snicked.
Before everyone arrived, Finnigan had borrowed a flash-bang from the duffel of one of the soldiers and had rigged it behind the dresser in the bedroom.
Finnigan now held a wireless detonator in his left hand. He hit the button.
Guy Lacazette said, “Ah. Here we are! Signora, plea—”
He was surprised when the Spanish beauty covered her face in her arms. She was more frightened than he imagined.
Then the light of God, or perhaps of Satan, spat from the bedroom on his left, followed by the boom of thunder that shook the tiny house. Lacazette could feel the noise in his chest and his head as it reverberated around the room.
In the living room, Soldier Two yelped and ducked, arms flying over his head as if expecting shrapnel.
Finnigan stepped out of the kitchen and clobbered Soldier Two with his sap. The soldier folded like a road map.
That was Lacazette’s last memory before Fiero’s elbow snapped back into his nose. His head ricocheted off the door and he slumped to the floor.
Finnigan knelt and drew the downed soldier’s holstered handgun. He whistled high-low and underhanded the auto in a soft arc toward Fiero.
She turned and caught it one-handed.
Fiero identified it as an Austrian-made Glock 17, but retrofitted with the longer, thirty-three-round mag, not the traditional seventeen-mag. She ejected it, checked to see it was full, and slapped it back home. She pulled back the slide an inch to confirm a bullet already in the pipe and released the tension.
She stepped to the bedroom door and kicked it open. Or rather, kicked it about ten inches. The door bounced off the top of the head of a man who knelt, hands over his ears, eyes screwed shut, all but catatonic with pain from the flash-bang that had gone off just a few feet from his body. Fiero shouldered open the door and noticed that a chest of drawers had been turned into kindling, and the room’s window was blown out.
Finnigan raced back into the kitchen, one hand over his left ear, listening to the radio that they’d secreted inside Fiero’s satchel. He heard a rattle as the car’s door was jimmied open.
Finnigan set down the remove detonator he’d borrowed from the soldiers and reached into his jacket for a second remote.
Soldier Five sat in the driver’s seat and reached across the emergency brake handle for the tote bag, just as another flash-bang, sewn into the lining, erupted.
The noise shattered both eardrums and the light scarred his eyes. He threw his hands over his face and slid out of the car, onto the grass, screaming in pain.
Finnigan emerged from the kitchen, dragging an unconscious soldier in his wake. “Sounds like we got one more by the car. That’s five.”
Fiero dragged out the stunned man from the bedroom and dumped him on the floor with Lacazette and the man in the jacket and dress shoes.
Finnigan searched the soldiers, then Lacazette. The private investigator had carried a small ziplock bag of cocaine. Finnigan studied it and grinned. He opened the pouch and knelt, dusting the guns and the hands of the fallen soldiers with the white powder.
“Ooooh,” Fiero smiled. “Nice touch.”
“It’s the little details that count.” Finnigan winked at her. “No chance the neighbors missed this racket. Did you see the …”
“… bakery truck?” Fiero finished the sentence.
“Here.” He tossed her a Taser from the soldiers’ duffel bags. “Through the back, round to the left. There’s a latched gate. Have fun.”
Fiero whisked off her white blouse and dropped it on the floor. The camisole beneath was matte black; the better for skulking. Skulking was also the reason she’d switched from low heels, earlier in the day, to riding boots. She slipped through the kitchen door, into the narrow backyard, and heard neighbors muttering on the far side of the high fence. Despite what she had told Guy Lacazette, Fiero’s French was quite good. The neighbors had heard explosions; two of them, one from down the hill by the main street, and another from the cottage owned by the strange foreigners.
Fiero assumed the flash-bang in the Renault would occupy the town police first—it was nearer the town’s only police station.
In the meantime, she opened the latch, snuck around the left side of the cottage, and emerged on the street behind the bakery truck. She saw the silhouette of a man sitting on the driver’s side. She cut behind and around the van, and tried the door. Unlocked.
The man was on his radio, shouting in what Fiero assumed was Serbian or Albanian; the primary languages of Kosovo. She whisked open the door, stuck the Taser against his flank, and pulled the trigger. He flopped over like a fish.
Earlier that day, Captain Stevan Sorak had bet a hundred euros that the takedown would proceed without a single shot being fired.
As it turned out, he was right.
C27
Moving quickly, Finnigan and Fiero took the soldiers’ duffel bags and any ID with them, plus their communications gear, and piled them into the bakery truck. They shoved the unconscious soldier into the back.
It was Fiero’s idea to take the soldier from the truck with them. He appeared to be the youngest of the lot. She figured they might get him to talk.
They found a cheap, blue-and-white striped shirt in the back of the truck with Andre stenciled over the breast. Fiero slipped it on, put the van in gear, and rolled downhill. Finnigan stayed in back with the unconscious soldier. At the bottom of the narrow lane, she came upon a police car, three officers, and the Renault parked amid a halo of shattered glass. One of the Kosovars lay on the lawn, temporarily blind and deaf, howling in agony, hands cuffed behind his back.
The cops were pointing uphill, toward the cottage, where neighbors must have reported hearing another explosion. There, they’d find four unconscious men, fully armed and with evidence of narcotics use, in a country where the police don’t take lightly armed gangs selling drugs.
It would be the town’s biggest, strangest arrest in decades, and the authorities would be talking about it forever. The officers on duty that night could be forgiven for urging a bakery truck to get out of the way.
At the downtown core, Finnigan hopped out, grabbed the rental car, and followed Fiero across the city bridge to Lesser Amboise. They ditched the twice-stolen bakery truck a kilometer from town in a secluded turnout, and wiped it down. They transferred the duffel bags to the back seat and the soldier, hogtied and Tasered again, to the trunk.
They drove westward toward Tours, the de Havilland, and Lachlan Sumner.
It was going on midnight by the time they carried the soldier aboard the de Havilland. Lachlan watched for trouble as the partners secured the soldier in the aft storage hold, handcuffing him to the D-r
ing restraints bolted into the deck. The hold was fully ventilated but soundproof; this wasn’t the first guy they’d held back there.
They decided to let him stew. Lachlan would sleep on board in a hammock that took up most of the amidships cabin. Finnigan and Fiero walked to a hotel a quarter mile from the marina, where they’d earlier rented a room.
They slept side by side. Like many a trained soldier, Katalin Fiero slept like the dead immediately following a field operation. She stripped down to a tank and boy shorts and fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.
Finnigan stayed up an hour with a gun in his lap, near the window, where he could keep an eye on the seaplane in the marina. When it became clear that nobody had followed them, he stripped to his boxers, lay beside his partner, and drifted off.
He woke in the morning when he heard Fiero turn off the shower. Finnigan rolled out of bed, groaning, and checked his watch. Then he called Shan Greyson.
“We were hoping to get Aleksić here, with evidence that he’s trafficking humans. No dice. We failed.”
“Failed?” the Englishman laughed. Fiero stepped out of the bathroom, wearing a towel and drying her hair with another. Finnigan put the Englishman on speaker.
“You had six-to-two odds and bested them! You have solid proof that the Kosovo soldiers are involved in the trafficking. Send me their IDs and we’ll find out if they all come from the same unit. We identify their commanding officer, and we’ll be that much closer to shutting down their trafficking. How is this a bloody failure?”
Finnigan ran a hand through his unruly hair, sitting on the edge of the bed in his boxers. “Dude. Our goal was to get Aleksić next to the victims, so we could make the case and haul him in. We didn’t do that. Alternatively, we hoped to get the son of a bitch away from his babysitters in Belgrade. We didn’t do that, either.”
“You’re alive,” Shan replied. “We’ll call this one a win.”
Finnigan disconnected and tossed the phone onto the nightstand. Fiero sat on the corner of the bed, toweling her hair dry.