Rise of the Order (17 page)

Anna got up and went to the liquor cabinet. “I need a drink. How ‘bout some sherry? No. Something stronger than that.” She shuffled a few bottles and came up with one that satisfied her. “Here we go. Single malt scotch.” She poured two small glasses, came back to the sofa, and handed one to Jake. “Prosit.” She sipped the scotch.

Jake did the same and waited for her to say something. When she simply sat there looking at her glass, Jake said, “You've been feeding the mole misinformation.”

She finally said, “It has nothing to do with this current case. The man was using the information he collected for others for monetary gain. It was sensitive information. We had to stop him.”

“But something got the guy killed.”

“That's why I'm worried,” she said. “Why would they kill him? He was their source.”

“Who's they?”

She took another sip of scotch.

“I think his death has everything to do with this current case,” Jake said. “He could see every bit of information you looked into on the computer. But here's what I don't get. Martini seemed to just find out about the mole today. You didn't tell him. Why?”

“I was ordered not to let it out of Interpol. Franz had no reason to know.”

“When did you first suspect there was a mole?”

“Six months ago.”

Jake thought about that. “That's when Martini took over his current job.”

She downed the last of her scotch and said, “Martini wasn't involved. I've known him since I was a little girl. He and my father served together in the army. He used to come and stay with us in Zell am See.”

“But still, you wondered.”

“No, I didn't wonder.” Her disposition became much more determined as she got up and filled herself another glass of scotch and sat down again.

“So it was just a coincidence that information started leaking and your old friend shows up?”

“Yes. Franz Martini recommended me for this job. I owe him so much.”

Jake was starting to understand her relationship with Martini. An uncle, perhaps. She would protect him as best she could. And he knew Martini well enough to know he was not a bad cop. They had worked together before. No, Jake had a feeling their cryptic display moments ago was due to the fact that neither one wanted to admit they were close. It was better if the Vienna law enforcement community didn't know that fact.

Jake finished his scotch and said, “So, what was that warrant? Martini's grocery list?”

Anna finally smiled. “A department purchase order for office equipment.”

“Well,” Jake said, “the two of you won't make the Burgtheater, but maybe the Volkstheater.”

Anna got up and went to her bedroom door before turning back to Jake. “I believe you promised me dinner tonight. Let me shower and put on some of my clothes.” With that she closed the door behind her.

Jake got another glass of scotch and sat down again. He had almost forgotten she was wearing no underwear and his T-shirt. He reached inside his coat and pulled out his cell phone. It was still off. He normally kept it on, but had turned it off the day before when he and Anna had been chased in Budapest. Sure as hell didn't want it going off and giving away his position. He checked to see who had tried calling his number. Damn it. He had missed a number of calls from Kurt Lamar. And then he saw it. One from Toni Contardo. All within the past six hours. Something was up, but he didn't want to bother with it now. He was hungry. As a compromise, he turned the phone back on.

●

Across Vienna at that moment, Hermann Conrad sat with Alexandra at the Maestro Restaurant on Lothringerstrasse, a concert hall with some of the best cuisine in Austria. They were eating early before the opera at the Staatsoper, where it was the first night for Puccini's Gianni Schicchi. Alexandra got so horny after Puccini. Like she needed encouragement. Conrad poured her another glass of Chianti, finishing the bottle.

“Are you trying to get me drunk,” Alexandra asked him, her eyes sparkling. She was wearing a tight black dress with a slit up the leg. The V-neck provided everyone a view of her substantial cleavage, accented nicely with a string of pearls.

“Of course not,” Conrad said. “We just can't waste. We have to get moving soon if we plan on making the first act.”

Conrad's cell phone rang. He pulled it out and saw the number of the caller. Miko. “I have to take this,” he said to her. “Why don't you make a trip to the little Fraulien room?”

Reluctantly, she got up and left, making damn sure everyone saw her strut across the restaurant, her hips swaying and mesmerizing all of the men and most of the women.

“Ja,” Conrad said. “I'm at dinner.” He looked at an older couple who seemed disturbed by the intrusion.

Miko said, “Got him.”

There was road noise in the background. “That's great news,” Conrad said. “Surgery won't be necessary, then.”

“What? You don't want us to kill him, right?”

“That's right. Bring him home.”

“To the castle?”

More road noise.

“That's right. I've gotta go. Good work.” Conrad shut the phone and put it back inside his tux. Good thing he had turned it on. Damn, this was going to be a great evening. A wonderful meal with Italian wine, followed by a splendid Italian opera, followed by a great fuck or two with a Ukrainian beauty. He didn't like Italian women. Too much hair on the pussy and they didn't like to trim it.

Alexandra strolled back from the restroom, her walk just as entrancing as her departure. Damn she was hot. After the opera, he'd have to give her a good licking for being that steamy. Followed by the Prussian monster.

“What?” Alexandra said, sitting down across from him.

He leaned across the table and took her hand. “Just thinking about how beautiful you look tonight. Every night, actually.”

She kissed his hand. “You are too good to me.”

“I treat you like the lady you are. Let's go do some Puccini.”

She met him at the edge of the table, nuzzled next to him and whispered into his ear, “Puccini. It just sounds like sex.”

With raised brows and a smile, he had to admit she was right.

●

It was closing in on ten in the evening and Jake and Anna had eaten at a Japanese restaurant a short distance from her apartment. Considering how things had gone during the day, Jake was more tired than normal. And he knew he needed to get some sleep before their long drive in the morning.

They sat in her living room now drinking a glass of red wine. He had thought about her all evening—his thoughts carnal in nature. What happened next, though, even he could not have imagined.

She excused herself for a moment. Probably going to the bathroom, Jake thought.

Soft classical music played in the background and Anna had lit candles around the room when they first got back from the restaurant.

When Anna showed up in the doorway of her bedroom, her completely naked body lit only by those candles, it finally hit Jake. She was seducing him.

She was beautiful from top to bottom. A true blonde. Her breasts were not large, but in proper proportion to her slim, firm body. Her nipples were hard and seemed to be begging him to come and play.

“I have no secrets from you, Jake,” she said, her words breathless.

He got up and started toward her.

“Right there,” she said, her hand up and stopping him in his tracks. “I want to see you first from there.”

He did as she said, slowly taking his clothes off and dropping them to the wooden floor. He stopped with only his underwear on, turned around, and then lowered them to the floor, his bare buttocks facing her.

Seconds later, he felt her nipples against his back as she wrapped her hands around to his hairy chest and ran her fingers across his nipples. She nibbled him on the side of the neck and then lowered her right hand to his erection.

“Oh, my,” she said, working her hand from the base up to the tip, feeling every inch. “An added bonus.”

He wanted to burst, it had been so long. Turning to face her, he took her breast in his hand and then lowered his head, taking her nipple in his mouth, his tongue making it even harder.

She gasped as she worked on him. Pulling away slowly, she led him to her bed.

A long time later, they lay together in her bed, their arms wrapped around one another. The familiar smell of lust and sex lingered in the air.

“I didn't mean for this to happen,” Jake said.

She kissed him on the lips and said, “I'm glad it did, though.”

“Well, me too. You're fantastic.”

“You have some skills yourself.”

Jake laughed. “I meant not only with lovemaking.”

“Same here.”

She lowered her head to his chest and they fell asleep that way.

The black Skoda Fabia RS with Miko and friends, Albrecht in tow, had gotten as far as Salzburg, Austria when it pulled over to a small mom and pop hotel on the outskirts of town with the sound of the autobahn nearby.

Toni and Kurt had found a room at a chain hotel across the street, insisting on a third-floor room overlooking both parking lots. That had made it easy for them to keep an eye on the Skoda, even though Kurt had set up his computer to run all night and monitor the GPS tracking of the car. If it moved they would get an obnoxious beeping warning from the computer. Still, Toni had ordered that they take two-hour shifts watching the car with the NVGs.

Morning was coming, the sky getting lighter, with red and blue hues painting the eastern cloud bank like a fresco.

Toni was on the watch now in a hotel chair, leaning against the marble windowsill, her mind reeling. Maybe she should have never shut off Jake Adams like that. They had too much history to let the Chinese woman get between their friendship. Yet, she also knew that he had hurt her only after she had left him, and that had made it even more difficult to turn him away. Perhaps she was kidding herself. She wasn't getting any younger, and the other woman was in her late 20s. She also felt guilty having looked into her background. Did she still have feelings for Jake after all? Glancing around at Kurt in the bed, she had to believe that her feelings for Jake were just as they were for Kurt. Professional. Nothing more. But she could sure use Jake's knowledge and his skills at this moment. Kurt was fine, but she could anticipate how Jake would respond in every situation. The military had conditioned Kurt to act in a certain way—Jake had left after only a short stint, and his departure from the old CIA had been less than acrimonious. They had used Jake, and the Agency continued to use him, knowing he would have a hard time saying ‘no' to national security. That was their ace in the hole.

“There,” she said softly to herself. One of the men, Jiri Sikora, was putting something in the trunk. A small bag.

She turned to the bed and said, “Kurt. They're getting ready to move.”

The naval officer rolled over and grunted. “Need a shower.”

“No time,” she said, her eyes on the car again. “Besides, you took one last night before bed.” That had been an awkward moment. He had offered to save water by showering together, but she thought of Kurt as a younger brother. They could never be intimate, even though he was a fine physical specimen and she had not had sex in. . .well, she didn't want to think how long.

She could hear Kurt getting dressed behind her as she saw the three men haul Albrecht out to the car. He didn't have tape over his mouth now—that would have alerted the gasthaus staff.

“Let's go,” Toni said. “We'll have to skip check out. Call them later.”

They hurried around the room gathering their belongings and then rushed out the door to Toni's Alfa Romeo. Moments later they were on the autobahn heading west.

“Told you Germany,” Kurt said.

Shit. He had guessed Germany last night and she had said they'd stay in Austria. If they had wanted to go to Miko Krupjak's Czech Republic, they would have gone north to Linz after picking up Albrecht. A couple of kilometers later, though, Autobahn A1 ran into Autobahns A8 and A10—the first going toward Munich, Germany, and the second heading south into the heart of Austria. When the Skoda took the A8 toward Germany, Toni said, “Looks like you win.”

“Whatever.” Kurt was looking at the GPS tracking on the laptop.

The roads were almost empty at this time of the morning. Toni still wasn't sure where in the hell these guys were taking Albrecht. Why not just kill him like they tried to do in Vienna?

Just before the German border the Skoda exited toward Bad Reichenhall, Germany, a town on the road to the German resort town of Berchtesgaden, where Hitler had his Eagle's Nest retreat.

“I have no clue what these Bozos are up to, Kurt. Why don't you try calling Jake again? He might want to know Albrecht has been kidnapped.” They had not tried calling since the prior evening.

“I'll give him a try in a minute,” Kurt said. “We'll have to switch to a different satellite soon. I don't want to miss that.”

They went right through Bad Reichenhall and on toward the Austrian border again. Toni remembered that Germany poked down here like an appendix. Now what?

●

In Vienna, Anna Schult had gotten up early, still dark, thrown on her running clothes, and was now on her third kilometer, keeping a steady pace on an uphill grade in the hills west of the city. She was running a narrow path used by bicycles, runners and those on roller blades in the summer. A path that followed a tiny creek. On heavy snow days, which were rare in the city, she and others would use the trail with cross country skis.

She couldn't get her mind off of Jake Adams and the great sex they had had the night before. Twice. She smiled thinking about that—the second time being even better than the first. Was it just sex? Or was it love making? Whatever it was, she sure wasn't complaining.