Arctic Fire (24 page)

“Can I help you?” she asked shyly. He looked so out of place here in the projects. Like Jack did when he came to visit her.

“My name’s Bill Jensen,” the older man said, moving into the apartment without being asked. “I’d like to talk to you for a few minutes.”

President Dorn gazed into the autumn darkness outside the West Wing window. Rex Stein had left the office a few minutes ago,
and Dorn was congratulating himself on what he considered an Oscar-winning performance.

Stein had left here thinking that his president really had no intention of shuttering Red Cell Seven, that it was all a big misunderstanding. He’d left thinking that his president was still inexperienced and didn’t truly understand the grave message that the request for information would send.

Dorn chuckled. He’d played it perfectly. Now Stein was going to quietly run around Washington and Northern Virginia trying to convince the senior men in the shadows that it really was all a misunderstanding. Stein was going to tell those important individuals that the president was still wet behind the ears and had no idea how his message would be taken. That would give Dorn more time to get the information he needed to actually shut the thing down for good.

But there was no misunderstanding. Red Cell Seven was done as far as he was concerned. He couldn’t have those bastards out there killing anyone they wanted to anytime they wanted to. It wasn’t right. The world could never become the place it was supposed to be with men like Roger Carlson out there acting unilaterally. Even close allies would never truly trust the United States until the decks had been scrubbed clean of men like Carlson and his associates.

He picked up the phone. It was time to get a face-to-face report from Daniel Beckham without Stein around.

Hunter stared blankly into the darkness. The temperature had dipped into the thirties as the December night had fallen. But he barely noticed how cold it was as he stood beside his car in his shirtsleeves and smoked his first cigarette in twelve years.

They’d laughed as they’d led Amy away, and he’d heard her scream once after he’d lost sight of her. But there was nothing he could do to help her. They had him tied up and had let him go at gunpoint only after she was long gone.

He hadn’t cried in a long time, but as he finished the cigarette and tossed it to the parking lot, sobs overtook him as his tears began to flow. They’d made it all very clear to him. Help them find Jack…or Amy would die.

J
ACK GLANCED
up as Karen came out of the bathroom. He wanted to take a shower, and he’d been watching a movie while he waited for her to finish.

“Hey there,” he said as he stood up from the chair in front of the TV. “Feeling better?”

She had on the pair of jeans and the top he’d bought her at a Target on the way over to the hotel. He’d bought her a new coat too. It was chilly in Baltimore, but it was going to be a lot colder where they were going.

“So much better,” she answered.

He’d offered to get her a separate room, but she wouldn’t accept. There were two double beds in the room, and she’d told him that was fine, that she trusted him after everything they’d already been through tonight—and because the name Jack Jensen was printed on his license, which convinced her he was Troy’s
brother. It turned out she had only a few hundred bucks to her name, and she didn’t want to be a burden.

He’d offered her the room twice, but she’d gotten that look in her eyes as he’d started to ask the second time, so he’d quit in midsentence. It was the same look she’d given him on the bench when he’d asked her if she wanted to go to the hospital. She looked so soft on the outside, especially now that she’d showered. But underneath she was turning out to be a firecracker.

“You look great.” She did too. Her still-wet long black hair was down on her shoulders; she’d put on a little makeup she’d picked up at the store too, and she seemed to be in a much better mood. “I mean it.” He liked that she’d put on that makeup. They’d already eaten and they had no plans to leave the room tonight, so it sent him a nice signal.

She smiled back at him. “Really think so?”

He checked her arm when he thought she wasn’t looking, but he couldn’t see anything. They’d bought some stuff at Target to dress the wound, and she’d covered it with bandages while she was in the bathroom. He thought about asking her how it was feeling, but he didn’t. She seemed OK, and they were getting along too well. He didn’t want another one of those looks flashing his way.

“Definitely.”

“Thanks.” She glanced uncertainly at their third-story window. “I hope we’re OK here.”

The hotel was in West Baltimore away from city center. It wasn’t a great place, but it wasn’t too bad. He’d wanted a place where he could bribe the guy behind the front desk so he didn’t have to put down his credit card—the same way he hadn’t last night up north—and that wouldn’t have been possible at a nice place. With no credit card imprint on the room, he was confident no one would find them.

“We’ll be fine.” They were going to get a good night’s sleep before heading west in the morning.

Karen sat down on the edge of the bed. “Do you want to see a picture of Charlie?” she asked.

“Sure.”

He took the photo from her carefully after she took it out of her wallet. It was still wet.

Banks was an athletic-looking guy with a great smile, just like Troy. But that wasn’t what caught Jack’s eye. Instead, he focused on how Banks was holding his hands. His thumbs were hooked into his jeans with most of his fingers out of the belt and pointed straight down.

Jack counted the fingers in the picture again, for the third time. Four on the right hand and three on the left were pointed down at the ground. Only his thumbs and the last finger of his left hand weren’t visible.

“My God,” he whispered as it hit him, as four and three became seven. “Karen,” he said loudly, “what did you say the name of that group was again? The one Charlie told you he was in?”

“Red Cell Seven.”

“Red Cell Seven,” Jack repeated. “
Holy shit.
”

“What is it?” she asked, staring at him intently.

In the picture, Charlie Banks was holding his hands exactly the same way Troy had been holding his hands in front of the
Arctic Fire
, as he stood defiantly in the photograph Cheryl had enlarged and put on the easel in the great room for the memorial service.

And the same way Bill was holding his hands in the photograph of him standing with the governor of New York that was on his office credenza. Thumbs hooked into his belt, seven fingers pointed at the ground—four on his right hand and three on his left, Jack remembered.

The realization hit him hard. This was no coincidence. It couldn’t be. Charlie Banks and Troy Jensen were members of Red Cell Seven. Karen had made that clear as they were sitting on the bench.

But now he knew Bill was connected to it as well.

“D
ID YOU
say you were a cop?”

Karen glanced over at Jack from the passenger seat of the rented Taurus as they sped west away from Baltimore. “Yeah,” she answered deliberately. “So?”

He raised both eyebrows. “Wow.” He was pretty sure she’d dropped that main-course cut of background data on him last night as they were sprinting down the alley trying not to get killed. “Isn’t that interesting?”