Killer Focus (16 page)

Headlights flashed through the windows. Closing the file, she reinstated the file Tripp had been reading, her fingers fumbling slightly on the mouse in her haste to scroll back to the correct page.

A car door slammed. Heart pounding, she activated the screen saver, grabbed the printed pages of the file and walked quickly down the hall. There was no time to climb out the bathroom window. She would have to position herself in one of the back bedrooms, wait until Tripp disabled the alarm system, then unlock a door and slip out before he could reinstate the alarm.

The sound of Tripp's step was clear as she turned into a bedroom that had a set of French doors opening out onto a small patio. The room was obviously Tripp's.

Walking quickly to the French doors, she opened the drapes and pulled the security bolts.

Closing her eyes so her night vision would be better when she stepped outside, she waited for Tripp to open the front door. The second she heard the faint click of a key in the dead bolt, she turned the key in the lock. Stepping outside, she drew the drapes to conceal the fact that when she closed it the door was going to be unlocked.

With any luck Tripp would think he'd simply forgotten to lock up.

Stepping with care on slippery, moss-encrusted pavement, Taylor worked her way around the side of the house. Seconds later, she collected her backpack and the toolbox from beneath the bathroom window. Returning the box to the garden shed, she pushed through the perimeter plantings and stepped out onto the sidewalk.

It was fully dark now, with a thin sickle of moon climbing slowly in a sky hazed by mist and smoke.

Cold night air penetrated the fabric of her tracksuit as she loped across the road. Craning over her shoulder, she glanced at Tripp's house. The kitchen light was on, which meant he had probably walked directly to the kitchen counter and not into the sitting room.

Retrieving her car keys from a zip pocket in her track pants, she deactivated the lock on her car and shrugged smoothly out of her pack. Opening the driver's-side door, she slung the pack on the passenger seat, started the car, did a U-turn so she didn't have to drive past Tripp's house and headed for her motel.

 

Martin Tripp pushed the computer keyboard forward, making room for steaming hot containers of Beef Rendang and rice. Returning to the kitchen, he collected the glass of water he'd filled and a silver fork and cloth napkin. The food was takeout and he'd hardly notice what he was eating once he became absorbed in his work, but the food
was
high-quality takeout, and he didn't like eating with plastic forks.

Shifting the mouse to bring up his screen, he sat down.

The seat was warm.

Frowning, he rose to his feet and placed his palm on the nubby fabric. It was definitely warm.

A second problem registered. His printer was making a humming noise. The cooling fan was working, which indicated it had just been used.

He hadn't used the printer at all today.

Reaching down, he located his briefcase, which was lodged beneath the desk. Placing it on the seat, he entered the combination and extracted the weapon he always kept there.

The gun in hand, he stared around his warmly lit lounge, a sense of unease growing. He lived quietly and very privately. He doubted that any of his neighbors even realized he was an FBI agent, which suited him. If people knew what he did for a living they would annoy him with concerns about breakins and expect him to check their alarm systems, which had happened at the last place he'd rented.

He did a slow circuit of the sitting room, his nostrils flaring as he caught an unfamiliar scent. It didn't appear that anything had been taken, but someone had been in his house, using his computer. If he wasn't mistaken, that someone had been female.

When he reached his bedroom, a faint gap in the curtains made all the hairs at his nape stand on end. Stepping forward, he yanked the curtains wide, then used a hank of curtain fabric to depress the handle so that he wouldn't spoil any prints. The unlocked door swung open.

“Clever girl.”

But not clever enough. She had gotten into his house, probably through the bathroom window, which he hadn't gotten around to repairing yet, and so bypassing his alarm system, but she hadn't been able to get out without leaving a door unlocked.

Stepping outside, he walked around the house then checked the sidewalk, studying the vehicles parked outside neighboring houses. He didn't expect to find her. Taylor—and he was certain it was Taylor Jones—was long gone.

Walking back inside, he picked up the phone and made a call. It was a call he didn't want to make because it exposed his own incompetence. He was the one who had left his computer on, unsecured, and dialed into the Bureau network.

Colenso's answering machine picked up, which figured. Colenso had an active social life. It was likely he was eating out or had female company.

Tripp made a second call. Bayard picked up on the second ring, which Tripp had expected. One of the things that had persuaded Tripp to stay with the FBI when he could have taken easier and more lucrative positions in several other government agencies was Bayard's example. He had worked his way up through the ranks and he knew the Bureau inside out. In contrast to Colenso, who lived for the more dangerous aspects of the job, Bayard was subtle and intelligent. Those qualities would take him to the top, and Tripp would be right behind him.

Briefly, Tripp related what had happened. Taylor had to be stopped. He might be perceived to be a bungler in the field, but he had never flinched from doing what needed to be done.

T
aylor closed the door of her motel unit, walked through to the bedroom and began to pack.

She had been shot at three times, once almost fatally, because she had information or evidence that could break the case open. Now she had an additional problem. There was only one reason for a set of bogus surveillance reports to be produced. She had been set up to take the fall for the real mole. With her out of the way, he could continue undetected.

And whoever the real mole was, he wanted Taylor dead before she worked out what was happening and exposed him.

She walked into the bathroom, emptied the bathroom cabinet and packed the items in her case. Zipping the case closed, she carried it out to the car. It only took a matter of seconds to collect the food she'd bought from the kitchen. Within minutes she had checked out and was once again back on the road.

She could have stayed the night, but she no longer felt safe in D.C. She had taken an unconscionable risk breaking into Tripp's house, especially in light of the fact that someone within the Bureau had set her up and was now systematically hunting her down.

It crossed her mind that the mole could be Tripp…or Colenso or even Janet Burrows. It could be any of a hundred agents who had worked some aspect of the Lopez case. The only certainty was that it was someone Bayard believed, when he didn't believe her, because that kind of surveillance could only be sanctioned at the highest level.

When she reached Dulles airport she called Jack and relayed the information she had just discovered. Dana came on the line, demanding to know where she was and if she was safe. Taylor repeated the information she'd given to Jack but refused to give Dana any details about her whereabouts. She couldn't afford to assume that Jack's cell phone and hers were unmonitored. Right now, the fact that no one knew where she was or what her plans were was her only security. Jack and Dana needed to be kept in the loop, but only because they were, potentially, as vulnerable as she was.

Taylor didn't know at what point she had begun thinking of Dana and Jack collectively as “parents,” but she had. They were not by any definition a
cozy
family, but they were
her
family.

She made another call, this one to Neil. It was a risk, but there was no one else in Cold Peak she could call whom she could guarantee
wasn't
under surveillance. She needed someone to look out for Buster if she didn't get back within the time frame she had stated. She had paid for two weeks. In theory it would be an easy enough matter to ring up and pay for longer. The main hitch to that solution was that if she couldn't get back in two weeks' time that would probably be because she wouldn't get back, ever. In the event that something did happen to her, she needed to make sure Buster was cared for.

Neil sounded relieved when she identified herself. “I've been trying to call you about some information I found. I tracked down that server, and you'll never guess who it was.”

“The CIA.”

“How did—”

“Don't worry about the server, and don't make any more inquiries. Just drop it. There's something else I need you to do.”

“Say the word.”

“I've had to go away—a family emergency—and I need you to look after my cat.”

There was a moment of silence.
“Your cat?”

“Buster. He's at the Cold Peak Cattery. I've paid up until the end of the month, but if I don't get in touch with you before then, I'll need you to go and collect him. If that happens, you'll need to ring Pete Burdett. Just tell him Buster's my cat and he'll make arrangements from there. Get hold of a pen and I'll give you the number. And don't worry, this is just a precaution. I will be back.”

He sounded a little shaken, but he got the pen.

When she'd double-checked that he'd written down the number correctly, she hung up.

 

Wearing the blond wig and using her fake identity, she caught a late flight out of Dulles. Using the alternate identity was a risk, but a calculated one. She was banking on the fact that even if the name she'd used had been flagged, Colenso would be slow to move so late at night.

The flight landed in Chicago just before midnight. An hour later she caught a connection to San Francisco.

Geographically, the West Coast was about as distant as she could get from Cold Peak and D.C. without leaving the country. From an investigative point of view it made sense, too. There were two angles she could research. The first and most important was the lead Jack had on the hit man who had shot her in D.C. The second was a wild card. Dennison, who had been listed on the file she'd gotten off Edward Tripp's computer as the South American source who had informed on Lopez, had had a wife, a quadriplegic who had been a resident in a rest home in Eureka. Anne Dennison had died almost two years ago. Taylor didn't expect to discover anything new in Eureka, but the fact that she would be close to the town was enough to pique her interest.

As she waited for her suitcase to appear on the luggage carousel, she studied passengers and airport staff. Her spine tightened at the possibility that she had picked up a tail although, in all likelihood, if she was being scrutinized, it was by airport security.

Ever since she had left Cold Peak, she had been watchful. Fischer had tracked her as far as Cold Peak but, as deceptive as Fischer had been, he'd had no interest in terminating a federal witness who was important to his investigation. That meant that someone else had killed Letty and Hansen, then taken a shot at her.

In the drafty, open area, she felt naked and exposed. Her fingers itched to reach for the Glock, but she had left the handgun behind in a locker at Dulles. Without her badge, there was no way she could have gotten it through the security checks.

The only man who came close to Fischer's description was a tall European-looking guy, but he wasn't dark, he was blond. Frowning, she continued to study the passengers as she collected her case and loaded it onto her trolley.

She caught a glimpse of the blond man again as he talked into a phone. He was definitely European. At first she thought the accent was French, then he uttered a brief phrase and the harder consonants registered. The back of her neck crawled. He was talking English, but she was almost certain he was German.

The village of Marciano, Turin, Italy

Sixty-two-year-old Xavier le Clerc woke with a start, his father's name in his head. He stared through the murky darkness for long seconds, still caught in the grip of a dream where it was possible to reach out and touch a man who had been dead for more than fifty years.

Pushing the covers back, he rose to his feet and padded to the French doors that led to a small balcony. Opening them wide, he stared out at the mountain village that had become his refuge. The moon had risen. Its dim glow illuminated the narrow, cobbled street below and the simple villas and apartments crowded over tiny shops. He had lived in Marciano on and off for almost twenty years. He was far from being a local but, courtesy of generous annual donations to the tiny school and medical clinic, the locals had taken him in and had gradually come to view him as one of their own.

Closing the doors against the crisp night air, he walked to the bathroom, filled a glass with water and drained it. This time the dream had been stark and clear. Sometimes the details differed, but certain elements were always the same: darkness, unbearable tension followed by a struggle, then the fire.

He doubted that the dream had any basis in reality. It was more likely a product of his imagination, but whether he dreamed or not, nothing could shift his certainty that Stefan le Clerc had died violently.

His father's body had never been found, but Xavier knew what he had been doing when he had disappeared, and why he had been murdered. Stefan had been hunting for justice, for his elderly parents, for his brothers and sisters and their families, and for countless others who had been swallowed by the death camps. The hunt had been intense and utterly personal.

He had had a name. It had taken years of searching and the last remnants of the le Clerc wealth to find even that, but his father had succeeded in picking up on the trail of an SS colonel tasked with removing wealth and assets from Jewish families in France. An ex-banker, Heinrich Reichmann had, ironically, been a former colleague of Stefan's.

According to the information he had obtained, Reichmann and his death squad had consigned countless families to the death camps—old people, women, children, babies. As part of the process, Reichmann had systematically confiscated all identification papers. Once the human factor was removed, he had harvested assets and bank accounts.

Stefan had obtained evidence that huge amounts had been transferred, but the bank involved had stonewalled him. Until he obtained documentation that proved the owners of the accounts were no longer alive and that he had the authority to access their accounts, legally they couldn't disclose any information about those accounts.

Aware that Reichmann had cut a deal with the bank, Stefan had been forced to drop that avenue and had followed a trail that was more than seven years old to Lubeck and an interview with the daughter of the captain of the
Nordika.
The hunt had eventually led him to America, where he had disappeared.

Replacing the glass, Xavier padded back to bed. Seconds later the phone rang. His mind suddenly clear and sharp, Xavier answered the call. Only a handful of his most trusted people knew the number, which was unlisted.

“I picked up Taylor Jones flying out of Dulles.”

The French was clipped, the intonation German, although Maximillian Schroeder was Swiss by nationality. Before Schroeder had agreed to work for him, he had been one of Mossad's top agents, specializing in computer espionage. Give Schroeder a computer hookup and he could access almost any information network in the world. Ever since Taylor had disappeared off WITSEC's scope three days ago, Schroeder had been coordinating surveillance on the East Coast with particular regard to monitoring flights. “Where are you? San Francisco?”

“Where else?”

Xavier's attention sharpened. Taylor had been one of Bayard's most competent agents. She'd had an eye for detail and a natural instinct that had broken cases open on more than one occasion. That instinct, combined with a bulldog tenacity, made her something more—a catalyst. “Any sign of Dennison?”

“Not yet.”

Xavier terminated the call then made another, booking flights to the States. When the tickets were confirmed, he replaced the phone, dressed and began to pack.

He believed there was a certain order to life, that sooner or later, sometimes very much later, justice would be done. But not on his schedule. Always, it was in the time of
le bon dieu.
He had searched for Reichmann and the cabal for thirty-two years and poured millions into the effort. He had pushed to find and expose Alex Lopez. None of those things had happened on a scale that was acceptable to him.

Just months ago, Lopez had acquired a book from a safe-deposit box in Bogotá. Le Clerc had missed him by hours. Days later, he had almost had him in El Paso but, again, Lopez had been wily enough to elude not only him and his men, but a number of FBI and CIA personnel.

The instant Xavier had heard about the book, he had known what it was: Reichmann's ledger. The book had slipped through his grasp in Cancun. There had been a gap of years following Marco Chavez's death when he had assumed the book had been lost. Now Lopez had it and he was using it as a weapon against the cabal.

Over the past few months, Xavier hadn't detected any signs of Lopez inflicting damage either politically or internationally and the lack of news wasn't just puzzling, it was incomprehensible. Lopez was a master tactician and ruthless, and the book gave him an advantage he would never have been slow to utilize. It was possible he was negotiating terms with Helene Reichmann, despite the fact that the last attempt had ended in a bloodbath. It was equally possible that he was lying low, playing some kind of waiting game.

Either that, or he had lost the book.

The thought that the ledger, after all these years, was no longer in Lopez's hands sent tension humming through Xavier. It was the breakthrough he had been waiting for.

Zipping the suitcase closed, he carried it through to his study, removed a watercolor from the wall, tapped in the code that unlocked his safe and confirmed with a thumbprint scan.

He extracted the passport and identification papers he needed, relocked the safe and repositioned the painting. Opening his briefcase on his desk, he slipped the papers into a side pocket, along with a small, state-of-the-art satellite phone. The laptop itself was also wireless and fitted for satellite coms. Together the two pieces of equipment formed the basis of a traveling office that kept him informed and hotwired for communication, no matter where he happened to be.

As he picked up the briefcase, his gaze caught on a small grouping of photos on his desk. The most prominent was of his father just before he went into the French military. The second was a portrait of his family taken two years after the Second World War had ended, the third a black-and-white that he had taken years ago of Esther Morell in Bern.