Blood Trust (23 page)

“Someone must know,” Jack said.

“Do you think her disappearance is relevant to Billy’s murder?”

“I don’t know,” Jack said. “But I keep coming back to that take-out menu you found in your uncle’s study.”

“It seems both irrelevant and somehow important. I mean, he wouldn’t be caught dead eating Chinese take-out.”

“Which is why it’s sticking in my mind,” Jack said. “Anomalies are always important.”

Alli stared at him for a minute. “What are you thinking?”

“I’m wondering if there’s a link between the Stem, that take-out menu, and Caroline.”

“You think Caro was kidnapped and auctioned off?”

“I’m wondering if that’s the direction your uncle is going in.”

“But if he knows about what was going on at the Stem, why didn’t he have it shut down?”

“That’s an interesting question,” Jack said.

Alli dug in her pocket. “Maybe this will be of some help.” She handed over the cell phone. “I also found this in Uncle Hank’s study.”

Jack was about to open it when Paull came up to them.

“Okay, we’re all set. You need to get into your mountain gear.”

Jack pocketed the cell as he took a look at the forbidding mountains. “How are we getting up to Tetovo?”

Paull drew out a map covered in clear waterproof plastic and opened it. He clicked a pen flash and pointed. “This is the best route, according to our geotech boys.”

Jack nodded. He didn’t bother studying the map because he wouldn’t be able to make sense of it. “What about the kid?”

Paull’s eyes were dark and hooded. “We can’t trust him to go any farther.”

“You can’t just cut him loose out here in the middle of nowhere.”

“He stays with the plane until we get back,” Paull said curtly.

“That would be a mistake.”

They all turned to see Thatë standing behind Paull.

“Get back,” Paull flared.

Alli held up a hand. “Hold on a minute, you two.”

Paull’s head swiveled around and he glared at her. “Listen, missy, Jack may cut you an unreasonable amount of slack, but as far as decisions here are concerned—”

“Thatë’s been here before,” she said. “He knows the mountains, he knows this area of Macedonia.”

Jack turned to the kid. “Is that true?”

Thatë nodded. “I lived in the mountains for eighteen months before I came to Washington.”

Jack beckoned him with a finger and the kid joined their circle.

“Show him the route we’re taking, Dennis.”

When Paull made no move, Alli traced the route on the map.

Thatë shook his head. “There are at least two good reasons why this route will get you into trouble. The first is here.” His forefinger stabbed out. “This village, Dolna Zhelino, belongs to Xhafa. If we go anywhere near it, he’ll know within an hour that you’re coming.”

Paull rolled his eyes.

Jack said, “What else?”

“The route takes you along this ridge above the Vardar River.” His fingertip traced a line. “Here.”

“It’s the most direct route,” Paull said. “Otherwise, we’ll waste time going miles out of our way.”

“It will be a waste of time,” Thatë said, “once you’re buried in a rockslide.”

Paull made a noise in the back of his throat. “Alli, take the kid back inside the plane.”

When the two had mounted the folding stairs and vanished into the jet’s interior, Jack said, “What’s your problem, Dennis?”

“My problem is this kid.”

“Really? He’s already proven useful.”

“Why the fuck should I believe anything he says?” Paull’s eyes engaged Jack’s. They had dark circles under them. Lines of tension scored his face. “My sense is he’s working for Xhafa, and if he is, he’ll lead us right into a mortal trap.”

“What if he’s telling the truth?”

“Jack, he has no incentive to tell the truth and every reason to make sure we wind up dead.”

*   *   *

I
NSIDE THE
plane, Alli sat down in the seat nearest the door. After a moment’s hesitation, Thatë sat beside her.

“Dennis Paull.” She shook her head. “What a dickwad.”

He laughed. “You’re not afraid of anything, are you?”

“Shit,” she said. “I’m afraid of everything.”

“You’re lying.”

She laughed softly, mocking him.

“Then you hide your terror well.”

“I’ve had a lot of practice, believe me.” As if realizing she had possibly revealed too much, she launched into another topic before he could respond. “What were you doing up in the Tetovo area?”

Thatë stared straight ahead. “I was sent by the people who trained me. Russians.
Grupperovka.
” His eyes cut to her briefly. When she gave no visible reaction, he said, “You know that word?”

Alli nodded. “Yeah. Mobsters, whole families of ’em.”

He appeared somewhat surprised. His eyes reflected the dim lighting of the jet’s interior, turning them as glassy as marbles.

“I’ve been to Moscow,” she said. “Why did the
grupperovka
send you here?”

“To train with Xhafa’s freedom fighters.”

Alli was aware of the slight hesitation; she didn’t need to see his face to know that he was lying.

*   *   *

P
AULL SHOOK
his head. “What gives me pause is why you and I aren’t on the same page.”

“I have a feeling about him, Dennis.”

“Jack, he’s the fucking enemy.”

“If you believe that, then kill him. Right here. Shoot him in the back of the head like the Russians do. If he’s the enemy surely he deserves nothing less.”

The two men stood toe to toe, their eyes locked, their wills silently battling. The spangled sword was gone. In its place was a sky compressed into layers of low cloud. A chill wind whipped through the trees, causing a great rustling, as if an armada of insects was moving through them. Paull had flicked off the pen flash. There was almost no light. The thick air made it seem as if they were on the ocean floor. Somewhere, not far off, an owl hooted.

“I’m not giving in, Jack. And I’m not going to kill him,” Paull said. “We’ll let him go when we get back here. Until then, the pilot and crew are more than qualified to keep him under wraps.”

Jack took a step closer, his voice lowered. “You said you trust me. Well, I have a feeling about him, Dennis. I think he can help us get to Xhafa.”

“That’s why we have a geotech department.”

“Has any one of them been to Macedonia, let alone anywhere near Tetovo?”

“Not necessary,” Paull snapped. “They have computers—”

Jack leaned in. “Dennis, don’t you get it? Computers don’t mean shit out here. This is the wilderness, this is a zone that’s redder than red. Don’t you think the SKOPES unit relied on computer-compiled data?”

Paull’s mouth was a stubborn line. “I can’t hear you.”

“You haven’t been in the field for years, so don’t be a fool, Dennis. Fate has given us an edge the SKOPES unit never even dreamed of, and you want to ignore it?”

Paull’s mouth opened to reply, then he shut it with a snap. He let out his breath slowly and deliberately, as if he were mentally counting to ten to calm himself down.

“This is so fucked, Jack.”

“Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t.”

Paull looked as if he wanted to hit Jack. “We follow my route. Period.”

“You’re not thinking straight, Dennis.”

“He stays right here with the plane.”

Jack read the stubbornness on Paull’s face and understood that his boss needed to feel in charge. This was his first field mission in a number of years; he was understandably nervous. He’d worked hard on the details of his chosen plan; deviating from it now would seem rash and dangerous to him. He couldn’t win this fight. Pushing Paull further now would only damage their relationship.

“Whatever you say.”

Paull’s finger pressed against Jack’s chest. “This is on you. If he steps out of line, my men have orders to subdue him but not to harm him, because you’re the one who’s going to put a bullet in the back of his head.” He glared into Jack’s face. “Are we clear?”

“Absolutely, but Alli is coming with us.”

Paull hooked his thumb over his shoulder. “Do you really think I’d risk the life of my friend’s daughter?”

“She’ll be a help to us,” Jack said. “She brings unique—”

“No.”

“She can take care of herself.”

“So we’ve seen.”

Jack thought a moment. “How about this. If she can take you off your feet, she comes with us. If you put her down, she stays.”

Paull snorted. “You can’t be serious. She’s only a wisp of a thing.”

“You’re not afraid, are you?”

“Fuck, no. But—”

“But nothing.”

Jack went to the foot of the stairs and called to her. A moment later, Alli came down to them. He told her what he had proposed.

She stared up at him. “Are you insane?” she whispered.

“Do you want to come with us or don’t you?”

He took her over to where Paull stood. She didn’t waste a second, but strode inside Paull’s defenses, extended her left leg, hooked her boot behind his ankle, and yanked him off his feet.

He sprang up and went after her. Alli calmly stood her ground and, when he reached out for her, grabbed his arm with her left hand and drew him forward. Using his own momentum against him, she drew him around and, as he stumbled, she kicked out. He went down on his face.

He lay there for a moment, one hand beneath him. When he rolled over, he had a Sig Sauer pointed at her.

Alli kicked to the side, the sole of her boot pinioning his gun wrist to the ground.

From his position flat on his back, Paull stared up at Jack. “You fucker,” he said.

*   *   *

S
TAKEOUTS WERE
the worst, Naomi thought, as she shifted her position behind the wheel of her car. First, your filled bladder caused your head to throb, then the cramps started behind your knees, then your ankles started to swell from a combination of the inactivity and the salty snacks you consumed out of sheer boredom.

Sitting several car lengths down the block from the entrance to McKinsey’s building, she had cause to think of the blood spatter she’d found at the Stem. Was it Arjeta Kraja’s blood? Was Jack right, was she dead?

She was Secret Service, not a homicide detective. She’d had no experience with murder investigations—with murder at all, for that matter. She’d been trained to preserve life, to forfeit her own in order to protect the POTUS and the FLOTUS. Heinous crimes were beyond her ken, and as she sat shivering in the night, waiting for something—anything!—to happen, she was haunted not only by the murders of Arjeta Kraja, Billy Warren, and the two men in Twilight, but by the specter of the person or persons capable of such extreme cruelty, such contempt for life. Who were these people and what were they doing infecting her country? She was gripped by both fear and a sense of outrage. She harbored fantasies of doing to them what they had done to their victims.
Christ,
she thought,
the world is a terrible place.
And she was in a position where it chose to reveal that side of itself over and over. Not so for her sister, Rachel, happily married to a divorce attorney who made seven figures a year. She lived in a huge house in Maryland, had two beautiful children, an Airedale named Digger, and a seven-series BMW. For Rachel, the world was a dream come true, filled with roses and candy canes. Naomi might be jealous, except for the fact that she’d suffocate in the banality of that life. She was quite certain she was not cut out to be a wife with two children. When she’d been younger, she had envied Rachel, but now her sister’s life terrified her.

Shifting in her seat again, she stifled a moan. Her butt was killing her and she was dying to get out of the car and stretch her legs, but she couldn’t take the chance of being spotted. So here she sat like a spider in the center of her web, waiting for a fly to entangle itself in the sticky strands.

Her thoughts returned to the Stem and its slavery auctions. Dardan had been part of it, certainly, but in his phone call Jack had mentioned someone named Mbreti, Albanian for “king.” Who the hell was Mbreti? She had so little to go on—just the name—it was like trying to find a needle in a warehouse full of haystacks.

And then there was McKinsey. It was no coincidence that she had seen Pete coming out of the Fortress Securities building. Connected with Fortress, he had to know more about the three guards than she did, yet he’d failed to mention it over dinner. He was hiding something from her, maybe a great many things. The thought chilled her to the bone. The one person she needed to trust now seemed to be entirely untrustworthy. Minute by minute, she felt the ground slipping out from beneath her.