The Overseer (53 page)

“Of course he did. Why do you think Tieg wanted him dead?”

“Pritchard’s not important.”

“He needed something from you, something he kept from the others.”

“I said it’s not important.”

“Why? Why won’t you admit there was something else?”

She turned to face him. “Why are you pressing this?”

“Does this have to do with the tunnel,” he said, ignoring her question, “in Florence—”

“Let’s just drop this, okay?”

“No.” He took her arm as she tried to move past him. “Not okay.” Their eyes locked. “Do you know how close to the edge I am here? Have you let yourself see that at all? You’re talking about killing, and I’ve … shut down just so I can keep what little sanity I have left. The problem is, it’s not working. I guess I’m not strong enough to carry all of this around inside me. But I don’t think I’m alone. Maybe you’ve been trained to do something else, act with absolute control, but I don’t think that makes any difference. I’m asking what happened to you because
I
need the help. Do you understand that? I’m asking because when everything went crazy in Germany, I had nothing else but you.
Find Sarah.
That’s what I was told to do. … No, that’s what I
needed
to do. I need
you
, not the assassin you think you are. Because you’re not. You can’t be. I need you to be as frightened as I am and as close to the edge, to be so much stronger, so much more in control, and … I don’t know.” He let go of her arm. “I need you to need
me
.” He moved to the bed. Lying down, he looked to the ceiling. “Sorry, Feric. I guess I didn’t learn that lesson too well.”

Sarah stood alone, suddenly cold by the window. She looked at his long frame draped across the blankets, his eyes shutting out the pain. Slowly, she moved to the bed. Slowly, she sat and laid her hand on his chest. Tears crept down her cheek as she gently stroked his hair. “I’m sorry,” she
whispered
. “I’m so sorry.” Soon, they were side by side, his face nestled in her neck, their bodies tight together, rocking back and forth, she trying to quiet him through her own tears. “I
do
need you. More than you could possibly know.”

“Why?” he whispered.

“Because …” She held him even more tightly, her tears falling to his cheek, her voice fragile. “I let someone die once. Someone like you. And I can’t live with that again. I can’t. …”

He took her in his arms, rocking her back and forth.

They fell asleep, clasped in each other’s arms.

 

They awoke an hour later, she first, then he, neither willing to rejoin the stark world beyond them. Together, they remained safe, protected.
Minutes
passed before she found the energy to pull herself up on an elbow, her other arm not ready to release his chest. She stared down into his eyes and, without thinking, lowered her lips to his. Soft, simple, the tenderness of a first kiss, the velvet of her tongue gently playing with his. She stopped and looked at him. He began to speak, but she dipped low to him again. She then sat up, stretching the sleep from her shoulders. “I know. I wasn’t expecting that, either.” She turned and caressed his cheek.

“It wasn’t your fault, Sarah. Amman … it wasn’t your fault.”

She stared into his eyes and again drew her fingers across his cheek. Another kiss and she stood, moving toward the bathroom. At the door, she asked, “Do you think Schenten has the schedule?”

It took Xander a moment to shift gears. “Schenten?” he answered, his legs swinging off the bed as he pulled himself to a sitting position. “Yes. I would guess as overseer, he probably wrote it.”

Sarah popped her head out, her eyebrows thick with soap. “Overseer?”

“It’s what Eisenreich called the ringleader, the linchpin.” She nodded and returned to the sink. Xander tucked his hands under his thighs. “Will you have to kill him?”

The water fell silent, Sarah reappearing a moment later with a towel. “Why ask?” Xander said nothing. “If we can find the schedule without him, no. No one would have to die.” She placed the towel by the window. “Is that what you wanted me to say?”

“I don’t know.” He released his hands and reached for the envelope. “A great many people have died already. A few more won’t make that much of a difference.” He placed the loose pages inside and looked at her. “It’s not why you were chosen. I won’t believe that.”

“I’m glad you have so much faith in me.”

“I have to. You’ve left me little choice.”

She allowed herself a smile and moved to him on the bed. Cupping his cheek in her hand, she drew him to her. This time, though, no kiss, only his gaze. She pulled away. “We need to get in there tonight,” she said,
reaching
for her bag. “His house is about a twenty-minute drive from here. The last two miles will have to be on foot.”

“And the girl?”

“She’ll sleep. She’s safe.” She handed him a pair of black pants and a dark turtleneck. “You take her gun.”

Xander picked up the pack. “Was it loaded?”

“No.”

“Then I’ll need some bullets.”

 

Moonlight crept through the leafless branches, speckling the ground in pale shadows of shimmering white. Sarah led, hidden beneath the dark contours of her clothing, Xander behind, his eyes fixed on her. In and out of the slats of light they moved, carefully, urgently, without a sound.

They had left the road over a mile ago, finding stray branches to cover the car. Not once had she said a word, pressing ahead even when he had become entangled in the brambles of an unseen bush—her message clear:
You’re here for the schedule, to identify it. If it’s not there, I will kill him. If you fall behind, I will kill him.
Her gun remained at her side as she pushed through the branches, its silencer once or twice catching the moon’s
reflection
before she was forced to slide it into the small of her back. He had done the same.

At the next turn, a clearing came into view, beyond it a wire fence, farther still the vague outline of Schenten’s mansion, the house dark save for a
single
light shining from a room on the third floor. The old man was awake. They would have to be careful. The moon had mercifully ducked behind the cloud cover, shrouding the approach in blackness. Sarah stopped, Xander at her side, both crouching in the undergrowth. She was staring at the western end of the fence, tapping her thumb against her thigh, waiting, watching. A minute into the count, a figure appeared, his gait slow, relaxed. Sarah kept her eyes trained on the man as he neared the other end. She then waited another cycle. When he had slipped from view a second time, she darted out, no word to Xander, no warning. He followed.

A moment later, she was sliding toward the fence. Dragging himself along the grass at breakneck speed, Xander felt the strain in his shoulders. His upper arms were also aching; he was letting his chest drag. Shutting out the pain, he pulled himself to the wire and sucked in as big a breath as his lungs would allow. He then watched as she positioned a pair of clippers on the wire and began to snip, just enough for one body to slide under and through. A minute later, they were ten feet beyond the fence and making their way toward one of the first-floor windows.

Within half a minute, both stood flattened against the wall of the house, Sarah tracing her fingers along the sill of the window. She peered up and around the frame until she located the wire. The alarm system. Taking little time, she crosscut the wires, attaching an extra large loop of coil at two points—sufficient to open the window without breaking the connection—and snipped. The lock proved far less demanding, a minor obstacle to their arrival in what looked to be a sitting room—love seat, lamps, and chairs all facing a small brick fireplace. She turned and shut the window.

It would not be here; they both knew that. They needed to find the study, the place Schenten kept things of value. Sarah moved to the sliding doors, quietly pulled one to the side and stepped into the foyer, its green marble floor agleam even in the relative darkness. Directly across from them, another set of doors stood ajar, a quick perusal revealing the dining room. The other doors were equally unkind, opening to the music room, living room, but not the library. Xander pointed up and moved toward the stairway. Sarah scampered past him, leading them up to another foyer, another set of four doors, three of which opened easily; the pair on the far left, however, did not. A moment with the lock, and Sarah led them into the study, a simple room, even in shadow, with a touch of personality. Chairs sat thick with books and newspapers, a half-drunk cup of tea visible on one of the end tables. Sarah checked the cup—ice-cold—as Xander headed for the desk, a sturdy block of oak somehow neater amid the
surrounding
clutter. She then pulled two fine-beam flashlights from her pack and handed one to him. The beam was less than half an inch wide, enough to light objects within a three-inch radius, but not enough to cast a glow. He had told her to look for a diary.

For ten minutes, they pored through anything that might hold the
schedule
. This time, though, there was no Augustine to keep it hidden, no clever little codes from which to work. All they had was instinct, a sense that it was here, in the room, waiting to be found. Two minutes into the search, Sarah discovered a safe behind one of the paintings, the voice-activated lock,
however
, too much for her primitive tools. She had not anticipated such
high-tech
equipment from the senator.

“Very good, Ms. Trent.” The lights came on around them, Schenten alone at the door, bathrobe and slippers his attire. “That is, in fact, where I keep it.” In his hand, he held a small black book. “Tonight, though, it’s been on my night table. A bit of reading before bed.”

 

S
ARAH DREW HER GUN
and aimed it at Schenten. His eyes, however, had moved to Xander.

“You surprise me, Dr. Jaspers. I wasn’t aware you were so quick with a pistol. Even quicker, it seems, than our young lady friend.”

Sarah turned and saw Xander’s gun leveled at Schenten’s chest, both hands gripped tightly around the trigger. The senator, meanwhile, had raised his arms in mock surrender. “You can see I’m alone. Nothing with me except this book, and I have no interest in forcing your hand, as it were.” He began to move forward, then stopped. “May I come into my library?”

Sarah motioned for Schenten to take the chair in front of the desk. She then moved to the side of the window and peered out into the darkness.

“If you’re concerned with the guards, don’t be,” said Schenten, shifting a pillow as he sat. “I told them I was coming down to the library. They weren’t looking for you.”