So far, all my assignments have been in cities.
All except one, that is. It started out OK. I had a roof over my head, running water, cooked food. But things soon went downhill. It spread into the jungle. In Colombia. And I hated it. The entire place was full of creatures that spent every waking moment trying to kill you. Everything that walked or crawled or slithered or swam or flew was absolutely lethal. Even the frogs were poisonous. Apart from one type. Some exotic species that was all covered in bright red and yellow blotches. They’d evolved that way to fool people into thinking they were dangerous, apparently. Like the guys who’d taken Julianne, in many ways. Only there was a problem with that approach. Some predators fell for it and walked away, unwilling to take the risk. The rest just steamed in harder.
That may have worked for the frogs, half the time.
But neither result was going to suit me.
Julianne was brought back after only twenty minutes. I took a good look at her as the driver shoved her through the cage doorway. She seemed pretty composed. Not in any obvious pain, anyway. I tried to catch her eye but she didn’t lift her head. She wouldn’t stop staring at the floor.
The driver opened my door and glared across at me, alert and anxious. He was standing bolt upright, chest out, chin up.
“Your turn,” the driver said. “The hell you waiting for?”
“Nothing,” I said quietly, making sure not to look him in the face.
I hesitated for a moment, then wearily hauled myself to my feet. I made a real meal of it, slumping my shoulders and bowing my head. Another few seconds slipped away. The driver was beginning to relax, not perceiving a threat. Another long pause dragged by and, finally satisfied, I crept timidly out of the cage.
The passenger took my right arm and held it while the driver swung the cage door shut. When he had both hands on the padlock, concentrating, I stamped my right heel down sideways into the passenger’s left kneecap. He yelled, dropped my arm, and doubled over in pain. Struggling for balance, he hopped drunkenly back, hunched up, hugging his injured leg to his chest.
The padlock hit the floor. The driver was starting to react. His right hand was moving to his waistband, toward the shiny. 38. But before he could grab it, my left elbow reached the side of his face. It was hard to get the power with my wrists bound so close, but I caught him well enough. His head flopped sideways, full into the frame of the cage door, and he went down.
I turned back to the passenger. He’d straightened up and was taking some weight on his left leg again. His face was twisted with fury. His left hand was clenched into a fist, and as I watched his right hand appeared from behind his back, holding his. 45. I sprang forward, slamming into him, hands out in front of me, pushing his arm back down. The gun jammed into his groin. I went to twist his arm up and around, ready to break his elbow, but I couldn’t get the leverage with my wrists tied. I was short of options, so I just drove my forehead straight into his face. It was rushed, but still enough to break his nose-I heard the crack-and knock him backward onto the floor.
He dropped the gun as he went down. I kicked it sideways under the nearest set of shelves. He lay still for a moment, then rolled onto his front, struggled onto all fours, and clawed himself upright using the wooden frame like a ladder. He turned to face me. Blood was gushing from his nose, covering his chin, and already soaking into the front of his shirt. He took a limping, unsteady step toward me. I let him take one more, then swung my right knee up hard, high into his rib cage. He folded over in front of me, too winded to yell any more, so I smashed my fists down into the base of his skull, stepped aside, and left him to fall.
The driver’s Colt had fallen out of his waistband when he went down, so I leaned over and retrieved it. It was a nice weapon. The wooden grip felt good in my hand. My thumb hovered over the safety. Two each in the head would seem like a fair return. But that would be too noisy. It would attract the wrong kind of attention.
The driver had landed facedown, so I put his gun in my pocket and knelt down beside him. I put my right knee between his shoulder blades and took hold of his head, hands by his ears, ready to twist.
“David,” Julianne said, in a kind of hissing whisper. “What are you doing?”
She was at the front of her cage, only a couple of feet away. Her fingers were through the mesh and her eyes were wide and staring.
“Oh, my God,” she said slowly, her voice shaking. “You’re going to kill him.”
It was a long time since I’d worked with civilians. I’d forgotten how they can react in this kind of situation. Failing to neutralize those guys would be ridiculously naive. Let them live, and you know what would happen. They’d pop up later, guaranteed, trying to put a bullet in your back. But on the other hand, I couldn’t tell how she would respond to seeing me do it. If she panicked I wouldn’t be able to take her with me. She’d been upstairs. She might be useful. And if I had to leave her behind, I couldn’t see her getting out on her own.
That wasn’t really a problem. I’d only just met her. It was too soon to say I really liked her. But this whole thing had started because I’d tried to help someone. The old tramp in the alley. Or the agent, as he’d turned out to be. I was too late then, but there was still a chance with Julianne. I didn’t want to walk away without at least telling myself I’d given it a decent shot.
I took a careful look at her. She was trembling. Her breathing was fast and shallow. I decided I couldn’t take the risk. She was too close to hysteria already.
“Kill him?” I said, sliding my hands smoothly around to find his carotid artery. “Are you joking? I’m doing first aid. I’ve got to check his pulse. And breathing. Make sure he’s not hurt.”
I got off the driver’s back, picked his keys up off the floor, and opened Julianne’s door. She took two quick steps back. Her arms were out as if to fend me off and her hands and fingers were rigid. I went back to the bodies. She stayed in the cage.
“We need to search them,” I said. “Come and give me a hand.”
I rolled the driver onto his back.
She didn’t move.
“We need a knife,” I said. “Or scissors. Something sharp. To get these ties off our wrists.”
She came to the cage door.
“We haven’t got long,” I said. “Someone will come looking, soon.”
“What do you want me to do?” she said.
“Start with him,” I said, nodding toward the driver. If she was hesitant already, seeing the passenger’s blood wasn’t going to encourage her any. “Turn out his pockets. Put the stuff in a pile on the floor. I’ll do the same with the other guy.”
She came out and moved cautiously away from the cage. She knelt down next to the driver, stretched out her hands, and touched him delicately on the hip. Her hands hovered there for a moment and then slid slowly toward his pants pocket, but as her fingertips reached the opening she snatched them back as if she’d been stung.
“Can’t do it,” she said. “I’m sorry. It doesn’t feel right.”
“You can,” I said. “One pocket at a time. Pants and jacket. Just stick your hand in, grab whatever’s there, and pull it out.”
She didn’t look convinced, but she had another try.
The passenger’s pockets were disappointing. Apart from three cable ties and $400 in notes there was nothing I could use. Julianne had similar luck with the driver, except that he only had $260 in his wallet.
Neither had anything with a blade.
“Not very impressive,” I said. “Put the average ten-year-old to shame, where I grew up. But never mind. We’ll find something upstairs. We’ll start with the kitchen. There are bound to be knives in there.”
“Good thinking,” she said. “Let’s go. I know the way.”
“Hold on. I need to put these guys where they won’t cause trouble. We’ll use the cages.”
The driver’s legs were blocking the door to the cage I’d been in so I grabbed his pants at the ankles and heaved them to the side, out of the way. His body bowed awkwardly from the waist, but his jacket didn’t follow the curve. It didn’t fold properly. There was still something inside it. I looked at Julianne. She looked away.
“Well?” I said.
“Well, what?” she said.
“I told you to look in his jacket.”
“I did. I thought I’d got everything.”
“Doesn’t look like it.”
“Don’t start. I never wanted to search him, anyway. That was your genius idea. So if I missed something, big deal.”
“Unless it’s a knife…”
I checked his pockets again, myself. All were empty except the one inside his jacket. It held a brown envelope. It was folded over in both directions to form a little package, about two inches by three and a half. I unwrapped it. It was A5 size, unsealed, with no name or address. There was no marking of any kind.
“What’s inside?” Julianne said, curious now.
I opened the envelope and shook the contents into my hand. It was a Social Security card. About a hundred years old, judging by the creases and stains. It was hard to read. I could just about make out a name-Charles Paul Bromley-and a number, 812-67-7478.
“What do you make of it?” I said. “Does it look normal?”
“Well, yeah, pretty much,” Julianne said. “But I wonder why he kept it in an envelope, not his wallet? Seems a bit unusual.”
I wrapped the card up and put it back in the driver’s pocket.
“Maybe it wasn’t his,” I said, thinking of the one in Agent Raab’s jacket. “We’ll figure it out later. No time now.”
Julianne halfheartedly guided the driver’s feet while I dragged him into the cage, attached his wrist to the back wall with a cable tie, and went back for the passenger. I put him in Julianne’s cage and secured him to the side wall, well out of the driver’s reach.
“Happy now?” Julianne said. “Can we go?”
I took the padlock from Julianne’s cage and fixed it onto my door.
“What are you fiddling around with now?” she said.
I picked up the other padlock and hooked it onto Julianne’s door.
“You’ve already beaten the crap out of them and tied them to the walls,” she said. “Who do you think they are? A pair of Houdinis? Let’s just get out of here before someone comes.”
I locked the padlocks and tossed the keys into an open box on one of the shelves. It wasn’t a perfect solution-those guys were still breathing-but at least it would slow them down. And sometimes, you just have to go with what you’ve got.
Julianne went up the stairs like a greyhound out of a trap. She didn’t waste any time in the hallway, either. It was a spacious, rectangular area with tall white walls, quarry tiles on the floor, and a dramatic angled ceiling above a galleried landing. There were two internal doors to our left, an external door on the far side-I could see bushes and a brick path through a window-and a wide arch in front of us leading to a formal living room with two low white sofas, several abstract paintings on the walls, and a variety of tall bookcases overflowing with hardbacks.
Julianne ignored all these and headed through another, narrower archway to our right. It led to a combined kitchen/family room. The center of the space was taken up with a large blue L-shaped sofa and a glass coffee table on wheels. It sat on a rug with a Picasso-style design woven into it, and was piled high with all kinds of magazines and catalogues. Fashion, design, music, cars, art, you name it. A long bookcase ran all along one wall-hardbacks at the bottom, paperbacks at the top, except for one section that held five small trophies. Next to that was an elaborate wood-burning stove, and in the far corner there was another doorway. I couldn’t see where it led.
The kitchen was separated by a peninsular unit that housed some cupboards and a dishwasher. The worktop was black granite, immaculate, uncluttered by kettles or toasters or other utensils. The sink was under a small window that looked onto a screened porch. It was empty. There was another archway in the wall to the left leading to a dining room, as well as some more units and a gas cook top. Next to the cook top was a wooden block holding five steel-handled chef’s knives.
“Grab one of those,” I said. “The center one.”
“A knife?” Julianne said, disappearing through the archway. “Scissors would be better. There must be more cutlery somewhere. I’ll check through here.”
I had no idea what she was thinking, turning her nose up at a chance like that, but there wasn’t time to argue. I put the driver’s gun down and took out the knife. It was solid and heavy with a gleaming five-inch Sheffield steel blade. There were five drawers under the cook top. I opened the top one a couple of inches and wedged the knife inside, sharp side up. But before I could get enough pressure on the blade to cut the tie, I heard footsteps from the dining room.
Two sets.
Julianne came into the kitchen first, followed by the older guy who’d brought my food. His right arm was around her neck, and he was holding an old Army Colt to her left temple. She was standing stiffly, back arched, grimacing. He was smiling. His throat was unguarded. I closed my fingers around the knife blade. It was a good weight for throwing. How much did I want to save this woman? It was unlikely I could stop the guy getting one shot off. But certain I could stop him getting two.
I heard the clatter of heavy feet on wooden stairs. Someone was coming down. They paused in the hallway and then appeared through the arch. It was someone new. He was huge. At least six feet seven. His head was shaved and he had to duck as he came in. He was wearing a smart blue suit with a white shirt and striped tie. It was hard to tell without the hair, but I put him in his late thirties. Apart from his freak size he looked like a businessman stepping out of a meeting to grab a coffee.
“What’s going on, George?” he said. “Where’s Jason and Spencer?”
“Don’t know,” the older guy said. “Found this bitch sneaking around, and him in here playing with the utensils. Haven’t seen the pretty boys.”
“Where are Jason and Spencer?” the tall guy said, looking at me.
“Who?” I said.
“The two guys I sent to fetch you.”
“Oh, them. Downstairs.”
“Dead?” he said, looking at the knife.
“No. Just… resting.”
“George, take the woman back down there. Lock her up, and see what’s going on with those fools.”
The tall guy stepped aside to let George get past with Julianne. Her eyes stayed on me, wide and frightened, as if begging for help.
“Let’s you and me go upstairs,” the tall guy said. “We need to talk.”
I didn’t move. The knife was still in my hand.
“Going to use that?” he said. “Go ahead. I’m not carrying.”
He held his arms out to the sides, as if inviting a search.
I stayed where I was.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s go. My boss is upstairs.”
I didn’t reply.
“Come on,” he said. “My boss is waiting. That’s not good.”
“Your boss?” I said.
“Right. Wants to talk to you.”
“You think I’m one day old?”
“What?”
“You think I was born yesterday? You snatch me off the street and lock me in a kennel like a dog because your boss wants to talk?”
“OK, look, I won’t bullshit you. The thing with the kennel-that was wrong. But with everything jumping off at once-journalists sniffing around, FBI all over the place, you suddenly on the loose-we had to move fast. We made some mistakes.”
“Just a few.”
“We know that, now. We should have shown more respect, but we needed you off the street.”
“Why?”
“To keep you out of anyone else’s pocket. We heard some rumors. Needed time to check them out.”
“Rumors? About me?”
“Look, put the knife down. Come upstairs. Hear what we’ve got to say. It’ll make sense. And what’s to worry about, anyway? If we wanted you dead, you’d be on the slab already.”
“I’m not meeting anyone like this,” I said, holding up my hands.
The tall guy came over and very gently took hold of the knife handle. He waited for me to clear my fingers, then severed the tie. It fell to the floor, leaving a narrow red welt around both my wrists.
“Happy now?” he said. “So let’s go.”
He slid the knife back into the block, picked the driver’s Colt up from the countertop, and turned to lead the way. As he walked toward the hallway he slipped the gun into his jacket pocket. It rattled against something metal.
And as sincere as the guy had seemed, I doubt it was his keys.