The Spy's Little Zonbi (27 page)

“
Well, the young daughter was not interested. She stopped hiding in my armpit and climbed out of the tub. She ran off to the ladies toilet room. That was very disappointing because I was not finished, if you know what I mean. It is very frustrating for a man to be interrupted, am I right?”

“
This had to be Anna Collins,” said one of the men next to Bernie. “She blew out of the hotel after dinner. I know her girl, Bernie, she's gotta be six feet tall.”

“
The mother helped my condition very much,” Bernie said, signaling to get the attention of the bartender. He bought a round of drinks for their group, and Chase saw the bartender slip a scrap of paper into Bernie's hand when he tipped her.

Much later that night, Chase had discovered Bernie behind an artificial bamboo tree next to the snack machines, sleeping off the Kranbitter gin he couldn't seem to stop drinking once he'd started.

“
What's your secret?” Chase asked, after untangling him from the plastic leaves and getting him to his wobbly feet.

“
I'm going to kill Americans,” Bernie said, his head lolling.

“
I mean what's your secret with women.”

Resch clung to Chase in the cramped elevator, attached like a pet monkey. His arms wrapped around Chase's neck and his legs entwined around his left leg. Chase prayed the elevator wouldn't stop for more passengers; the sniggers from the young couple trapped behind them had been bad enough.

“
Do not confuse secrets with talents,” Resch replied in Chase's ear, his breath moist. “Do you want to see my best talent?”

Chase was pretty certain what Bernie considered to be his best talent was pressed up against his left pants pocket, but Bernie let go of his neck and dismounted. Apparently also curious, the young couple stopped sniggering. Bernie took a wide stance, battling the heavy seas of the rising elevator before plunging his right hand deep into his front pocket. Pitching and swaying, he withdrew his hand. It held a wallet-sized laminated photo, which he waved triumphantly over his head.

“
My secret weapon!” He showed it to Chase, who recognized Bernie's late wife. Chase had a copy of this same photo in a CIA file. “You fucking Americans would never understand.”

Chase had a vested interest in keeping Bernie from being drowned in a hot tub or choked to death by a jealous husband. As the race series passed the halfway mark in the season, exactly two years remained until the Olympics. That gave Bernie thirty weekends' worth of opportunities to seduce the wrong female, prematurely blowing both of their chances at a big time public relations coup. The CIA wanted the Iranian plan disrupted at the last possible moment, under the spotlight of the Olympics. Their motive was to show the world the true evil empire, perhaps getting some meaningful U.N. sanctions in place.

The Iranians simply wanted mayhem and death.

M
asters ski racing began a late season swing at East Coast resorts—four consecutive weekends in Vermont. Chase skipped the first two, spending ten days at home, the longest stretch since November. He'd gone to his daughter's races instead, joining the throng of noisy parents lining the slopes and ringing cow bells. Mitra stood at his side with the video camera. Tylea wore a bubblegum pink speed suit, and he was sure he could see her smiling as she conquered the tricky flush gates and icy headwalls.

“
Go, go, go,” he shouted, heart in his throat until she was safely in the finish corral.

Then Chase packed and headed for Vermont. Three days at Killington, then a final weekend up the road at Sugarbush. After arriving at his hotel Friday evening, he'd been trying to reach Mitra, getting only the machine. He wondered if she might be on the road with Tylea for a surprise visit, but knew that was unlikely. Both Mitra's Saturday library volunteers had called out, and his daughter wouldn't want to miss ski team practice even to come see her dad race. He didn't mind her priorities one bit. It would soon be spring and time for soccer.

Chase skipped the late dinner and drinks with other racers. He waited by the phone, calling every twenty minutes and getting nothing but Tylea's recorded voice. By midnight he knew something was terribly wrong. He sat in the padded vinyl chair, elbows propped on the round table of the musty room.

Chase gave up, grabbed his ski jacket, headed downstairs to his Jeep in the frigid air. His tank was full and he had every intention of driving through the night, pulling into their driveway as the sun was coming up. He detoured instead, driving to Bernie's townhouse rental through a steady snowfall. Parked in a recently plowed space was Mitra's little red car with Pennsylvania plates and its “I Love Libraries” bumper sticker. Somehow he'd known it would be in that exact spot. In the back of his mind he heard Limp's voice asking if he could kill someone without getting all crazy.

Chase felt the blood drain out of him as his Jeep headlights washed over the back of her car, his right foot pressing down on the brake pedal, the left on the clutch. He hadn't needed the wipers because the fluffy snowflakes simply blew off the glass. He sat there frozen, idling in the cold night, staring at the license plate, reading the letters and numbers one by one. He remembered watching Mitra attach the yellow and white bumper sticker, teasing her because it was crooked. The snow fell straight down in clumps, slowly cocooning his Jeep. He had never in his life felt more alone.

He switched off the ignition and killed the headlights. Chase reached under the driver's seat for his gun—Hitler's PPK—and slipped it inside his ski jacket next to a small plastic container of race wax.

Chase decided this must be the reason Bernie had disappeared for five days last month, passing up bigger Masters events in the Rockies. Chase's cover had been blown and Bernie had done what all spy agencies had been doing since the beginning of spying: he'd gone for the loved ones, the family. But instead of kidnapping or killing, Bernie had attacked with his best weapon, his strong point.

Chase slipped on his calfskin gloves, pushed open the Jeep door and stepped out into the icy air. The townhomes were all dark, too expensive for the college partiers. Killington had dozens of neighborhoods of townhouses spread across its hills and valleys. Each group of two hundred or so homes formed a maze of entryways and stacks of protected firewood. The complexes were designed to create the appearance of privacy. White exteriors matched the white interiors. Floor plans were mostly the same, depending on the number of bedrooms, but Chase knew where he'd find Bernie this time of night, knew where he'd take Mitra.

Chase forced himself to slow down and be deliberate, not to break into a jog. Resch's front door was locked, so he popped out a single pane of the closest window with his elbow, just above the locking mechanism. The window slid up smoothly and he stepped over the low threshold.

Depeche Mode blasting from the living room stereo had covered the sound of breaking glass. He allowed his eyes to adjust, taking in the dark room. The final glowing embers in the fireplace provided most of the light. The disheveled blanket in front of the brass-trimmed hearth was where they had screwed the first time. Chase had listened to enough of Bernie's stories to know how he worked. He got their attention with his accent and his swagger. Bernie had explained that the key to seduction was the art of the balancing act. You had to appear as though whatever might happen didn't matter, while making her feel more desired than anyone else in the world. It was a skill not easily mastered, according to Bernie, but once perfected, deadly.

And now Bernie was about to be dead.

A used condom, like some piece of gore from a gutted trout, screamed at Chase from the stones in front of the fireplace. Along with a hunk of yellow cheese and a few red grapes, it lay crumpled on a plate left on the hearth, the firelight reflecting off its latex skin. His heart raced and raced.

Chase knew everything. He could hear Bernie's voice telling the story of how he had manipulated a lonely wife who had come to one of the races here in Vermont. The super fast racer with the exotic accent set the hook with a single unexpected compliment. After the nightly awards ceremony, in which he'd accepted the first place trophy—a little boyishly embarrassed by all the over-the-top praise from the announcer—he'd catch her eye and smile in a way that made her flushed and curious. He'd hold her gaze for an extra second or two. It was always the same when it came to wives and girlfriends.

Bernie would make sure these women knew that their secret was absolutely safe, despite his reputation. He'd come up behind them a little later and gently touch their waists in a non-threatening way. That was the first touch. And the fact that it lasted only a moment and was quickly withdrawn built some measure of trust. It let the wife or girlfriend know he was aware of a boundary to be respected in public. Then Bernie would pick a time to lean close in a friendly, playful way and say how much he wanted to make love to her—just one time.

“
I knew I must do it since I first saw your beautiful eyes,” he'd say in a low voice, milking his Austrian accent. “Don't say no right away.”

They rarely said no. Mitra hadn't.

Chase looked up from the plate full of evidence toward a light glowing down the second floor hallway. He was drawn to the short flight of wide oak stairs and took slow, deliberate steps toward the master suite's open doorway. As each step brought him closer, he was able to see the bed, lit bright as a movie set, with disheveled silk sheets and a twisted down comforter in the middle. His heart pounded as he recognized his wife's soft black hair. Her legs were entwined in the sheets, naked, almost the same ivory color as the silky fabric. He couldn't hear what she was saying because of the music, but she laughed and raised herself up on her elbows, looking toward the far corner of the bedroom. She was so happy in that instant. He couldn't hear words, but he could hear the laughter.

The last inch or two of a candlestick flickered in the bright room. As he crept closer—within a few feet of the open bedroom door—he could see Bernie, a towel wrapped around his waist, using a second one to dry his hair and upper body.

Hot tears bubbled to the surface, but there was too much pressure. He wouldn't have been able to let a word escape, let alone tears. The music was swallowed in that unbearable pressure, like diving down into the deepest end of a pool. His temples throbbed, about to explode.

Chase stood watching a silent movie scene and was surprised when he noticed the gun extended in front of him. It was his gun and his hand and arm. And then he realized it was aimed at Bernie's naked chest. The PPK was smooth and hard, and still cold in his palm after being stored in his frigid Jeep. His focus went from the center of Bernie's chest back to the two small sighting nubs at each end of the sliding barrel.

Bernie stood at the far side of the large bed and let the towel slowly slip from around his waist to expose his flaccid penis to Mitra. He had a hair brush in his right hand and reached up to run it across his head as Chase's aim moved with it. Chase picked a spot directly in the center of Bernie's forehead.

He pulled the trigger.

Chase didn't hear the shot, but a tiny wisp of smoke escaped the un-silenced barrel and momentarily blurred his view. Then he saw a small dark spot appear in the middle of Bernie's forehead, and time and sound suddenly returned to normal. Bernie's head snapped back and hit the wall as if he'd been punched in the nose. His body slid to the left and down to the floor, creating a giant bloody comma on white paint.

Not in a million years could Chase have predicted what happened next, after Mitra turned to look back over her shoulder to see him lowering the smoking gun.

“
We'll have to clean this up,” she told him in a matter of fact tone, swinging her legs off the bed and looking to find her shoes. “I'll tell you everything that happened and why, but not right now.”

“
What are you talking about?” His voice seemed to come from far away. Red drips formed on the comma.

“
Get in here and help me clean this up. Now!” Mitra shouted. “We'll talk later.”

Chase stepped into the room. What else was he going to do? He looked down at the dead, naked Bernie and his wife rummaging the bedroom closet and then the master bathroom. She was finding towels. He hadn't planned on cleaning up this mess. He hadn't planned on anything.

“
Think about Tylea!” Mitra threw an armload of towels down from a high shelf, the lovely muscles of her calves dancing beneath the skin. She was wearing a pair of Adidas running pants rolled up to Capri-length, and a thin, bright yellow sweater. Had he thought she was naked? Bernie had sure been naked, so he assumed she was, too, since she was on his bed, mixed up in the sheets.

Bernie's wound was seeping dark stuff onto the hardwood floor.

“
Jesus Christ, wake up!” she yelled, as he knelt down next to the body. Was she talking to him or Bernie? “You have to think about Tylea, right now. If we don't get this cleaned up, you'll end up in a jail cell and you'll lose her. You got that?”

“
What have you done to us?” Chase asked, not in anger. All emotion had been drained away. He hadn't really expected committing murder to have such an odd effect. It had sapped away all his rage and passion and somehow plunged his wife into a crazy cleaning mode.