He slowed, perhaps in concern at what the hell a workman was doing here, alone and this late at night. But then the exterior door opened behind him. I glanced right again and saw Larison coming in, looking formidable, purposeful, and deadly. Finch turned and I knew that for the next half second, his mind would be fully occupied with trying to place Larison’s face; realizing he’d seen it earlier, in Cafe Pruckel; weighing whether this could be happenstance or whether he should be concerned; deciding that the man he’d just made twice was too dangerous-looking to be merely a coincidence; combining that datapoint with the incongruous presence of a “workman” who was now behind him…
I set down the brush and headed in, taking hold of both ends of the length of plastic sheeting, palms up and thumbs out, turning my hands over and crossing my arms as I moved to create an isosceles triangle with my forearms as the long lines and the plastic as the base. Finch must have heard me coming because he started to turn, but too late. I dropped the plastic over his head and levered my forearms against the back of his skull, molding the plastic across his face, dragging him backward to ruin his balance. He clawed at what was covering his eyes and nose and mouth, but his fingers couldn’t penetrate the thick plastic. He got off a single, muffled cry, but then couldn’t draw breath for another. He tried to turn and I let him, staying with him, steering him toward the dark of the stairs, keeping him disoriented and off balance. He groped behind for me and I put a knee in his lower back, bending him over it, keeping my face well clear of his flailing arms. He tried scratching at my hands and forearms, but was stymied by the gloves and the same kind of wrist tape I had used in Las Vegas.
I knew his oxygen was getting used up rapidly and it was only a matter of seconds before his brain started to shut down. I glanced up and saw Larison, wearing his own gloves, his head turned to watch us, holding closed the exterior door against the small possibility of a late arriving hotel guest or apartment dweller. In a moment, Finch would be still, and at that point, even if someone came through the interior door, they would likely turn left toward the exterior door and key on Larison, remaining oblivious to the silent tableau in the dark behind them. And if anyone happened to come down the stairs, I would switch to Samaritan mode, talking to Finch’s body as though trying to rouse a drunken acquaintance. Not a great detail for someone to remember, especially after our earlier encounter with the cop, but not necessarily fatal, either.
Finch’s legs sagged and he went to his knees, his chest bucking and jerking as his lungs desperately tried to suck air, his hands again clawing, feebly now, against the plastic sealed across his face. And then, in extremis, some lingering, rational part of his brain must have asserted itself, because his right hand stopped clawing at his face and dropped to his front pants pocket. My mind flashed knife! and I shot my knee into his elbow to disrupt him-a second time, again. But the angle was awkward and the blow attenuated and he managed to get his hand into his pocket. I was about to change my grip to cover the plastic over his nose and mouth with my left hand while I grabbed the wrist of his knife hand with my right, but Larison had seen what was happening and came charging back from the exterior door, seizing Finch’s hand just as it came free, a gravity-assisted folding knife popping open en route. Larison started to twist Finch’s hand to make him drop the knife, and I whispered urgently, “No! No damage!” Finch’s arm shook and he tried to turn the knife to cut Larison’s hands, but Larison had too secure a grip, and whatever reserves Finch had drawn upon to access the weapon had been his last. His body went limp, the knife clattered to the floor, and he collapsed back into me.
“Get back to the door,” I said. “Fast.” Only a small chance anyone would come in at exactly that moment, but Murphy’s Law had a way of turning small chances into inevitable events, and this was the one moment there would be nothing we could do to conceal what was happening. Larison dashed back to the door while I dragged Finch to the stairs. “Two minutes,” I said, to let Larison know that’s how long I wanted to keep the plastic in place, to be certain Finch was done.
I counted off the time and, when I was satisfied, eased the plastic away and laid Finch out at the foot of the stairs. I examined his face for damage and noted none. I took the paint can and brush and replaced them as I had found them. Then I scanned the tile floor, looking for any scuff marks Finch’s heels might have left. Yes, there they were, two sets of about a meter each from when I had dragged him. I grabbed a cloth from where the painting equipment was placed, and rubbed them away. Larison glanced back but he must have understood what I was doing because he said nothing.
I recovered the knife and placed it back in Finch’s pocket. Hard to imagine anyone would be in a position to note its absence if we took it, but it’s best to doctor a crime scene as little as possible. The coveralls, though, I would keep. If they were missed at all, anything could explain their absence, and I didn’t want to chance leaving behind something that might be contaminated with my hair or clothing fibers. For the same reason, I kept the cloth I’d just used, which might be examined and found to contain some of the material from Finch’s heels.
I took a quick look around the hallway and saw nothing out of place. Well, Finch’s body on the stairs, of course, but that looked like what it was supposed to be: a man in sudden distress, perhaps respiratory, perhaps cardiac, staggers over to the stairs to sit, stumbles, and collapses. The manner of his death might have left some minor petechiae-ruptured capillaries-in his face and eyes, but I expected this would be minimal and of little forensic note under the circumstances. The truly suspicious might wonder at the coincidence of his being stricken in the very hotel where he had a reservation and where he might therefore be anticipated, but like car accidents, which happen mostly in a driver’s own neighborhood simply because that’s where he most often drives, the coincidence of the location of Finch’s collapse was also easily explained, and therefore, also, easily dismissed.
I nodded to Larison and we headed out, splitting up immediately. Larison went right; I went straight, crossing the street and cutting through a small shopping arcade, currently closed and dark. I would have gone left and therefore more directly away from Larison, but that was the direction in which we’d encountered the cop, and I didn’t want to risk bumping into him again.
I wondered about the knife. It had been a near thing and I realized I’d been complacent because Finch didn’t look the type. Plus, how the hell had he gotten it through security on his flights? Maybe he had a checked bag. Or maybe there was some sort of special dispensation for government officials. There usually is.
Twenty minutes later, after discarding in various refuse containers the coveralls and the plastic sheeting I had used to kill Finch, I called Dox. Larison would be doing the same with Treven. “It’s done,” I told him.
“No trouble?”
“A little,” I said, thinking about the cop. “But we handled it.”
“Good to hear. You’re okay?”
“Fine.”
“You want to meet and brief?”
“Better to do it on the other side of the pond. No sense being seen together here unless there’s a good reason.”
“Other than my fine company. But don’t worry, it’s okay.”
I wondered for a moment whether I’d hurt his feelings. Did he really want to just…get together? Celebrate, or something?
But he quickly disabused me with a laugh. “Just kidding. Actually, since there are no more trains at this hour, I was thinking I might find a companion more closely suited to my proclivities, as you like to call them.”
“Sure, knock yourself out. Just check for the Adam’s Apple, okay?”
Once, in Bangkok, Dox was all set to go off with a gorgeous lady boy when at the last moment I had taken pity and warned him. But saving him from an embarrassing mistake and letting him live it down were two different things.
He laughed. “Yes, sir, I have learned my lesson. Anyway, I’m looking forward to an evening on the town. Don’t forget, this was a nice payday. Though I feel like you’ve done most of the heavy lifting.”
“I wouldn’t feel comfortable doing it under the circumstances if you didn’t have my back.”
There was a pause, then he said, “I appreciate that, man. Thank you.”
I thought of the way he’d carried me, as I was bleeding out, over a giant shoulder in Hong Kong, of the transfusion he’d saved me with afterward. “It’s just the truth.”
“You’re not going to get all sentimental on me, though, are you?”
I smiled. “Never.”
“Well, it’s a good thing we’re not getting together tonight. I’d probably give you a big hug, and you might embarrass yourself by hugging me back.”
“Yeah, thanks for that. I appreciate it.”
He laughed. “Okay, then. Gonna party like a rock star and I’ll see you soon.”
I clicked off and walked alone through Vienna.
I thought about everything Larison had said earlier. I told myself, just one more.
The mantra of many an alcoholic.
Larison walked slowly back to the hotel, trying to avoid civilians, keeping to the shadows. His mind was racing and his emotions were roiling and he knew when he was feeling like this the people around him could sense it, like some weird disturbance in an urban force field. A prostitute trolling at the edge of a park he passed started to smile at him with practiced professionalism, and then the smile faltered. A cloud passed across her face and she took a step away, half turning as though preparing to run. In a more superstitious culture, he knew, she might have crossed herself.
He walked on, his head tracking left and right, checking hot spots, logging his surroundings. How could Rain be so stupid about what he was up against with Hort? With Treven, he understood the psychology-the attachment to the unit, the command structure, the blessing of higher authority. But Rain, obviously, didn’t need that kind of support network, and had long lived outside it. Then what was making the man hesitate? If his motives were purely mercenary, the diamonds were the obvious play. Was this really about doing something good in the world? The notion was vaguely seductive, but come on. All Larison wanted, the best he could hope for, was to eliminate the threat, get back the diamonds, and live out the rest of his days somewhere quiet with Nico, someplace with a beach and the sound of the ocean and no memories, a place where the dreams might eventually slacken and abate. Beyond that didn’t matter. If death were really the end, then everything Larison had done, and all the torments it caused him, would die with him. If there were a hell, it would be his new address. Whatever he might do in whatever time he might have left would have no impact on any of it, one way or the other, and to imagine otherwise was nothing but a childish fantasy.
It was a little sad, actually. He respected Rain. Felt in some ways the man was even a kindred spirit-another self-contained, lethal loner, professionally paranoid, personally aloof.
But what difference did any of that make? In his position, sentiment was a weakness, and in his line of work, weaknesses got you killed.
Still, he was surprised to feel an uncharacteristic sense of regret at the thought of taking out Rain and the others. He wondered if it was a sign of aging, or whether it might be some last, twitching vestige of a conscience he’d long since left for dead. What if it was? He’d read his Thoreau in high school. How did it go again? Something like, What’s the point of having a conscience, if you don’t listen to it?
But Thoreau had never been a soldier. And if there was one thing he’d learned from Hort, it was that the mission came before the man. The mission. And the current mission couldn’t be more clear: eliminate Hort and recover the diamonds. Protect Nico. Protect himself.
As for the rest…well, it was a rare mission that didn’t involve collateral damage. You didn’t welcome it, but you couldn’t shrink from it, either. In the end, he supposed, all men do what they have to.
The trick was living with it afterward. But he’d had plenty of practice with that.
I arrived in D.C. on an Amtrak train from New York, having flown to JFK from Munich. I preferred not to use obvious routes to or from the places I might be expected. Dox, Larison, and Treven had traveled somewhat less circuitously, and had therefore arrived ahead of me, but that was their risk, not mine.
The meeting was at the downtown Capital Hilton, a large and appropriately anonymous conference hotel Dox had recommended and where he’d made a room reservation. I had the cab drop me off at the Hay Adams, across from the White House, instead, thinking I’d walk the few blocks to the Hilton rather than give the driver a chance to note my actual destination. But instead of heading straight to the meeting, I succumbed to a strange urge to join the throng of tourists milling along the tall iron security fence at the edge of the expansive front lawn.
I strolled over, my pores opening immediately in the afternoon humidity. It was a cloudy day, but somehow the absence of sun exacerbated the heat, which felt like it was radiating from everything rather than from some single, identifiable source. Even the squirrels in Lafayette Square seemed listless, lethargic, as motionless as the nearby humans slouching on park benches and sweating under the useless foliage in rolled shirt-sleeves and loosened ties.
As I exited the park, I was immediately struck by how fortified the area was. Pennsylvania Avenue had been shut down to automobile traffic, presumably out of fear of truck bombs. There were steel vehicle traps through which delivery trucks had to pass for inspection; multiple guard posts; swarms of uniformed cops and military personnel patrolling on foot, on bicycles, and in cars. The windows of the far-off building itself stared insensate through the thick iron bars separating the grounds from the citizenry, as blank and impenetrable as the tactical shades of the scores of men guarding them. What had once been a residence and office was now, in essence, a bunker.
I moved on, heading southwest in the beginning of a long loop that would give me ample opportunities to confirm I wasn’t being followed before arriving at the Hilton. Outside the garrisoned grounds of the White House, the city was unremarkable, even bland. The streets were wide and straight; the architecture unimaginative; the ambiance, nonexistent. I noted that, along with London and New York, Washington seemed one of the few remaining cities where men were determined to wear jackets and ties even in the summer. The difference being that in London and New York, the men knew how to dress. But what they lacked in sartorial sense, Washington’s office workers made up for with a certain bounce in their gait. I wondered what might account for their perkiness, and decided it was proximity to power. After all, a dog wags its tail even when it’s begging for a scrap, not only when it receives one.
I had called Horton from the airport and briefed him on what happened in Vienna. As with Shorrock, he’d already heard. He told me the money had been deposited and proposed that we meet to discuss the next assignment. But I saw no upside to a face-to-face. We still had the communications gear he’d given me in L.A. I’d ditched the cyanide, and didn’t think I’d need a replacement. So I declined, telling him to use a secure site I’d set up, instead.
I paused in another park, fished the iPad out of my shoulder bag, and found a public Wi-Fi network. I checked the bank account and confirmed deposit of the three hundred thousand. Then I checked the secure site to see if Horton had uploaded the target file.