The Cabal (32 page)

Sandberger was in a booth at the bar in the Ritz-Carlton when Weiss phoned to tell him what had happened on the path between the two hotels, and for several long seconds he could not answer. His throat was constricted and the muscles in his face were rigid.

The American call girl he was seated with turned pale.

“Mr. Sandberger?” Weiss said.

“Just a moment,” Sandberger said, coming down. He laid the phone on the table, pulled a hundred-dollar bill out of his pocket and handed it to the girl with a smile. “Next time I’m in town,” he said.

The girl took the money, grabbed her purse, and slid out of the booth, her short skirt riding up. She had great legs and a tight ass. “Sure thing,” she said, and she left.

Sandberger picked up the phone. “Tell me everything,” he said, his voice even. He was back in control.

“McGarvey came out of the hotel and headed over to the Hamara about five minutes before our guys showed up. I told them where he’d gone, and they went after him. A couple of minutes later they came back in a big hurry, without their weapons. I told them to go back to their hotel and fly out first thing in the morning. We don’t need them here now that McGarvey’s made them.”

“How do you know they had no weapons?”

“Their jackets were open, the Velcro pads were empty, and no shots had been fired,” Weiss said. “What do you want me to do?”

“They didn’t say anything else to you?”

“They didn’t even want to look at me.”

McGarvey was a sharp bastard, easily still as good as his reputation, and he didn’t know that Kangas and Mustapha had been the triggermen on his son-in-law and for the IED at Arlington, otherwise he would have killed them.

“Stay where you are,” Sandberger ordered. “He’s probably coming over here next. I want to know when he leaves.”

“Yes, sir,” Weiss said. “I’d still like to take the bastard out myself, if the opportunity is there.”

Sandberger was about to tell him no, but he realized all of a sudden that he was being stupid. “If you get the chance, do it,” he said, and he broke the connection.

His bodyguards, drinking Cokes, were seated together at a table near the door. He waved them over.

“Kangas and Mustapha screwed up,” Sandberger told them. “McGarvey will be coming here tonight.”

“When?” Alphonse asked.

“I don’t know yet. But I have a spotter watching him.”

“What do you want us to do?”

“Station two of our people on each side of the driveway. He’ll probably be showing up in a cab, and I’ll have the tag number for our guys. I want him taken down, priority one.”

“What about us?” Hanson asked. He looked as if he were itching for a fight.

“You’re sticking with me, because I think we might have underestimated the son of a bitch. And if he actually makes it this far, I wouldn’t put it past him to know my room number.”

“There are two stairwells plus the elevators. We’ll need an extra hand if we’re to cover all three,” Alphonse said.

“I want one of the stairwells wired. One pound of Semtex should be enough.”

“Could be collateral damage.”

“We’ll blame it on McGarvey. He’s a ruthless son of a bitch who’s practically under indictment for treason, and who’s unhinged by the deaths of his wife, daughter, and son-in-law.”

“When do you want it done, sir?”

“Wait until we find out if he’s gotten past our people and is actually inside the hotel,” Sandberger said.

“Where will you be?” Hanson asked. “In case we have to fall back for some reason.”

“In the suite with a surprise, because if he gets that far it’ll mean at least one of you is down.”

Hanson smiled. “Not a chance in hell of that happening, Mr. Sandberger,” he said.

McGarvey had walked the rest of the way up the path to the Hamara, but instead of going inside he handed the doorman a hundred-dollar bill and had him call for a taxi, which had just come through the blast-barrier entry that served both hotels.

“Where would you like to be taken, sir?” the doorman asked.

“The American embassy,” McGarvey said, and got in the cab.

Before the driver had got the cab turned around, McGarvey held another hundred-dollar bill over the seat. “Do you understand English?”

“Yes, sir,” the cabbie said. “Very much.”

“This is yours if you do exactly as I say with no questions.”

The driver looked uncertain for just a second but then he nodded and snatched the hundred. “Where do you want to go?”

“Not far. And when I tell you to stop, do it immediately. I’ll get out and you will drive away. Do you understand? There’ll be no shooting.”

“Yes, sir. Perfectly.”

McGarvey slid over to the driver’s side of the rear seat and unlatched the door but did not open it. “Now, head to the exit, slowly.”

The driver did as he was told, and at the end of the Hamara’s driveway McGarvey sat back so that his face and shoulders were in deeper shadow. “See the Mercedes parked by the blast barrier?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Drive close to it, slow down so I can get out, and then leave.”

The cabbie glanced in the rearview mirror for just a moment, and once they were out in the Baghdad Hotel’s driveway, still moving slowly, he swung close to the Mercedes and pulled up short.

McGarvey slipped out of the cab and drew his pistol as the driver immediately made for the exit through the concrete barriers.

Keeping low McGarvey used the retreating cab as a shield until at the last second he ducked around the trunk of the Mercedes and yanked open the passenger-side rear door, and slipped inside, laying the muzzle of the big pistol in the side of the spotter’s face.

Weiss was reaching for something on the console beside him, but McGarvey jammed the pistol harder.

“Do exactly as I say or you die now.”

Weiss stopped short.

“If you were reaching for a pistol, pick it up by the barrel and hand it back to me.”

For just a beat Weiss hesitated, but then he slowly handed a standard U.S. military-issue Beretta 92F 9mm autoloader over the seat.

McGarvey pocketed the weapon. “I assume that you work for Admin, and it was you who brought Kangas and Mustapha over to take me down on Sandberger’s orders.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Weiss said.

“If you know who I am, you’ll know what I’ve gone through, and you’ll have to guess that I don’t give a shit who I take out,” McGarvey said, his voice reasonable.

“Okay.”

“Was the IED at Arlington planted on Admin’s orders?”

“I don’t know,” Weiss said, but McGarvey slammed the muzzle of his Glock hard against the man’s cheek, opening a two-inch gash, which immediately began to bleed. “Christ!”

“Tell me what you do know,” McGarvey said.

“You can beat on me all you want, you bastard, but I don’t know,” Weiss said. “If it was a Admin operation it could only have been authorized by Mr. Sandberger or Mr. Remington. No one else in the company has the power to make that kind of a decision.”

McGarvey glanced over at the armed guards sitting just inside the blast barriers, but they hadn’t moved from their folding chairs. “Why were Kangas and Mustapha brought over here?”

“To kill you.”

“On Sandberger’s orders?”

“Yes.”

“Why?” McGarvey asked.

“Mr. Sandberger thought that it was likely you were coming here to assassinate him.”

“And why do you suppose I’d want to do something like that? What do you think I have against your boss?”

“Because you think he ordered the assassination of your son-in-law. And maybe had something to do with the Arlington thing.”

“You’re learning,” McGarvey said. “And you know goddamned well that your boss ordered the hits on my son-in-law and the newspaper
reporter because they were getting too close to the Friday Club. And the IED at Arlington was meant for me, but a mistake was made.”

Weiss said nothing.

“Call Sandberger and tell him that you spotted me leaving in a cab, but that you have no idea where I was going.”

Sandberger was still in the booth when Weiss called the second time. Since then the bar had filled up, and he’d switched from martinis to Bud Lite. Four of his people were outside watching the driveway, and Alphonse and Hanson were nursing their Cokes across the barroom near the door.

“He just left in a cab.”

“Which way is he headed?”

“I didn’t see.”

“Aren’t you following him, for Christ’s sake?” Sandberger demanded, his voice rising.

“It happened too fast. By the time I realized it was McGarvey in the back of the cab, it was out on the street and for some reason the stupid bastards at the barrier wanted to check my ID.”

Suddenly nothing was making sense to Sandberger, and he had a strong premonition that wherever Weiss actually was at this moment, McGarvey was there with a pistol to his head. Weiss was too good to have been taken like that, but he was also smart enough to give some sort of a clue if he got any opening. “Who was the lead man on the barrier? Was it Johnny Karp?”

Weiss had no reason to know the names of the contractors guarding the hotel entrance. They operated out of a small and not very well known company headquartered in Los Angeles.

“Johnny left around four, I don’t know who the hell this guy was,” Weiss said.

That was it, McGarvey was with him. “Okay, I want you to get back here as fast as you can. I think McGarvey’s probably going to
back off for now, but I want to talk to you.” He motioned Alphonse and Hanson over.

“I think you’re right. He might even be trying to catch up with Tim and Ronni.”

“I’ll be in my suite,” Sandberger said. “Come right up.”

“Yes, sir,” Weiss said and the connection was broken.

Alphonse and Hanson slid in the booth across the table from him. “I just got off the phone with Harry. I think McGarvey got the drop on him and they’re on their way over. Alert our people outside—Harry’s driving a dark blue Mercedes C class—I want them both taken out. Then get upstairs and wire the east door. I’ll be in the suite with a little surprise.”

His two bodyguards got up and left the bar.

Sandberger finished his beer, laid a couple of twenties on the table, and went out to the elevators just off the lobby. He’d always been of the opinion that second-rate personnel were not capable of handling first-rate problems. Sometimes the only way to make sure that a job was done right, was to do it yourself.

The McGarvey problem would end tonight.