Blood Trust (50 page)

The building was old, the stairs bare wood. He removed his loafers, climbing in absolute silence. Reaching the third floor, he went along the hall. He could hear a radio playing, also a baby crying briefly. Then only the music, muffled to almost all percussion, rose up the stairwell. No one was in the hall.

For some time he stood in front of Billy Warren’s door, simply breathing. The yellow crime-scene tape had been taken down; everything appeared normal. Then, leaning forward, he put his ear to the wood. When he was certain no one was moving inside, he picked the lock. Then slowly he turned the doorknob and pushed the door inward.

He let the door swing all the way open. Standing on the threshold, he stepped back into his loafers. From the attaché case, he produced a plastic hood with elastic around the opening for his face. He slipped it over his head and adjusted it. Now he was protected from inadvertently leaving a hair in the apartment. Then, softly and silently, he entered, closing the door behind him.

He found himself in a small three-room apartment, bright and relatively neat, considering all the recent activity. It was furnished in fairly upscale style, tasteful in a modern way, but without much flair. Placing his attaché case on the carpet beside the coffee table, he stood in the center of the room, turning slowly in a circle in order to take in everything that came in sight. He went methodically through the bedroom and bathroom without finding anything. Returning to the living room, he let his eye fall on one piece of furniture after another—the sofa, the pair of easy chairs, the rug, a Travertine marble–topped coffee table on which was a ceramic decorative vase, a green crystal sculpture of a frog, a stack of coasters, along with a single coaster marred by a water stain. Pawnhill looked more closely. It was logical to assume that the glass that had recently sat on the coaster had been taken by the forensic team, along with Warren’s personal computer and cable modem.

Against one wall was a modern lacquer sideboard above which was a cabinet that held a bookshelf stereo, stacks of CDs, a flat-screen TV, a cable box, Blu-Ray DVD player, and a couple of popular commercial DVDs. The rest of the space was taken up by books—mostly texts, but also a handful of contemporary thrillers—and a couple of photo albums. Pawnhill leafed through one without interest. He wasn’t interested in a visual chronicle of Billy Warren’s early life. The second held Warren’s doctorate paper, according to the title page. Pawnhill slid it back beside its twin. Then he opened every CD jewel case and DVD package. In this case, he was looking for a DVD onto which Warren might have burned the incriminating data. He’d already tried to hunt down a USB thumb drive that Warren might have used for the purpose.

The result was that after spending almost an hour carefully ransacking the apartment, he had found nothing. He was on his way out when his gaze happened to fall on the stack of coasters, which were discs that seemed to him larger than normal. He went through each one in the stack, but they were precisely what they purported to be.

Then he picked up the coaster with the water stain and turned it over. There, winking up at him with its rainbow glimmers, was the slick surface of a DVD.

T
HIRTY

T
HE SAFEHOUSE
was a three-story building on the corner of a quiet residential street. An alley along one side revealed a wall almost completely covered with mature ivy vines. There was a streetlight at the rear, but it wasn’t on. The other side of the house overlooked a narrow, heavily shaded street. The windows had been boarded up. At the rear was what looked and smelled like an open sewer. As they had crossed the city, they had observed periodic blackouts; many of the intersections were in chaos. Homemade banners announced student protests starting at dawn.

“There’s only one way to do this,” Alli said when she, Thatë, and Vasily had completed their surveillance circuit of Xhafa’s safehouse. “You take me in.”

“Impossible,” Thatë said at once.

Vasily watched the two of them with complete impassivity.

“The place is a virtual fortress,” Alli said. “There’s only one way in or out. What’s our other alternative, to let Vasily bull his way in?”

Thatë licked his lips nervously.

“As far as these people know you’re part of Xhafa’s American operation. You have the medallion, you know the code words. You’ll bring me in as a new cherry.”

Thatë grinned suddenly. “More like a cherry bomb.”

Alli turned to Vasily. “Do you have a better idea?”

“Once you’re inside, I can’t help you,” he said.

“But you can,” Alli said. “Give us—what, Thatë?—fifteen minutes, then create a diversion.”

“A big one,” Thatë added.

Vasily flexed his muscles and hefted the flamethrower he’d salvaged from the military vehicle. “No fucking problem.”

“Okay, then.” Thatë glanced from one to the other. “Let’s synchronize watches.”

*   *   *

W
HEN
A
LAN
Fraine was a decade younger, he was a successful hostage negotiator. Before that, he was the best sharpshooter Metro had seen for more than twenty years. People inside the department still talked about him and the string of astonishing hits he’d made without ever harming a civilian even though some of them were standing right next to or right in front of his target.

Stepping up off the street had been a mixed blessing. It had brought with it a higher salary, an entrée into the inner circle of Metro police, as well as an opportunity to come to the mayor’s attention, never a bad thing in the highly politicized atmosphere of D.C. Occasionally, though, when he played poker with the mayor, or with his belly full with rich food, he felt a shadow of sadness pass through him, as memories of his salad days surfaced, and he turned briefly melancholy.

Following his electrifying phone conversation with Dennis Paull, he’d got to work, pulling together a team of experts from all divisions of Metro—a half-dozen men he knew personally and trusted implicitly.

They had no difficulty locating John Pawnhill. Almost immediately, they reported that he was traveling with a crew of three—an antisurveillance team. So he ordered his men up onto the rooftops. He himself and one of his team rode Harleys, dressed in Hell’s Angels leathers they had borrowed from the impound room at HQ.

The moment Pawnhill pick-locked his way into Billy Warren’s building, Fraine gave the order for his men to go to work. In short order, they had picked up all three of Pawnhill’s men. He spent a fruitless thirty minutes interrogating them.

“This is useless, they won’t give me anything,” he said when he’d turned away from the third of the men. “Tony, take them down to HQ for arraignment.”

“On what charge?” Tony said.

“Suspicion of terrorism,” Fraine said. “A matter of national security, so no calls whatsoever.”

“Got it.” Tony passed them off to the patrol officers they’d called in.

“Go with them,” Fraine said. “I don’t want any fuckups.”

“Yessir.”

Fraine returned his attention to the rear of Billy Warren’s building. Then a thought struck him and he turned back. “Tony, on second thought keep them here. I want them in a lineup.”

Tony laughed.

*   *   *

T
HATË
’
S ABSOLUTE
calmness served to keep Alli’s mind clear as they approached the front of the safehouse. Apart from the two men lounging on the steps, it didn’t look much different than the other residences on this fringe of the city.

The guards rose, their bodies tensing, as Thatë approached with Alli in tow. She was squirming, trying to get away from him. Her fear and anxiety, expertly feigned, had the expected effect on the guards. They smiled and engaged Thatë in a short exchange, during which Thatë produced his pendant. Another even terser conversation ensued, which Alli assumed was an exchange of code phrases.

She must have been right because one of the guards nodded and went up the stairs while Thatë dragged her along. The guard unlocked the door. As she passed alongside him, he gave her a hard pinch. Snarling, she lunged at him, and bit off the lobe of his ear.

He yelped, the other guard came running, and Thatë kicked him hard in the groin. He went to his knees without a sound, and Thatë drove the heel of his shoe into the side of his head. At the same time, Alli slammed the heel of her hand into the bleeding guard’s mouth, then drove her knee into his solar plexus. As he went down, she took his head in her hands and smacked it against the side of the door frame.

They went inside, closing the door behind them.

*   *   *

P
AWNHILL OPENED
the attaché case and thumbed the laptop out of sleep mode, inserted the DVD, and had a look. Sure enough, the Gemini Holdings account data was there. Enormously relieved, he closed the attaché case and pressed the metal tabs home one at a time.

Exiting the apartment, he made sure the front door was locked before he closed it. In the stairwell, he took off his hood and booties, but kept the gloves on. The same radio was playing, the music louder now. The baby had returned to squalling. The stairwell smelled of cold pizza and the grease that’s left in a bucket of KFC when the chicken is eaten.

Down on the first floor, he stood very still, listening for any anomalous noise. Hearing none, he pulled the locking lever down, opened the rear door, and stepped out. The moment he did so, a thin man in Hell’s Angels leathers appeared.

“Mr. Pawnhill.” He gestured. “Walk with me.”

Pawnhill said, “Do I know you?”

“You will,” Fraine said.

Pawnhill shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

Fraine pulled back the flap of leather jacket to show his service revolver.

Smiling with his teeth, Pawnhill revealed the Sig Sauer in its shoulder holster.

“You don’t want a shoot-out,” Fraine said.

Pawnhill moved his hand toward the butt of the Sig Sauer. “You ever see
Reservoir Dogs
?”

“Actually, it’s a favorite of mine. But that won’t happen today.” Fraine called and two Metro officers paraded Pawnhill’s team, hands behind their heads, into view.

“You’re out of uniform,” Pawnhill said.

“Surveillance work.” Fraine grinned, then motioned with his chin. “Whatcha got in there? Something you picked up while you were ransacking Billy Warren’s apartment?”

“Your people did too good a job. I didn’t find anything.”

“Uh-huh. Walk the attaché case halfway to where I’m standing, set it down on its side, lay your weapon next to it, then back up.”

“I told you I didn’t find—”

“I have men on the rooftops,” Fraine said. “If you don’t comply, you’ll be dead inside of thirty seconds.”

Pawnhill shrugged and followed Fraine’s instructions. When he had backed up sufficiently, Fraine said, “Now raise your hands and don’t move.”

“I wouldn’t think of it.”

While his men kept a bead on Pawnhill, Fraine walked over to the attaché case. He pocketed the Sig Sauer, then put his hands on the snaps.

“Go ahead,” Pawnhill said. “I’ve got nothing to hide.”

The snaps popped open and Fraine lifted the lid. Instantly, there was a loud hiss, and a thick black cloud billowed into the air. Fraine leaped back, his eyes already on fire. The
pop-pop-pop
of rifle shots were heard, but when the smoke cleared Pawnhill was nowhere to be seen.

Fraine did not have to order his team to spread out in a dragnet; they were already sprinting in every direction.

One of the officers came up to him, slipped an oxygen mask over his head, and made sure he was breathing okay. “Shifty fucking bastard,” he said. “Cheer up, sir. At least we have the evidence.”

Fraine’s throat and nostrils felt as if they had been scrubbed raw with sandpaper. Coughing still, he returned to the open attaché case and crouched down. Then he tore off his oxygen mask. The acrid stink of acid stung his eyes.

“Godammit!”

Everything inside the case was melted. He could see the vague outline of a laptop computer and a curled section of what once must have been a DVD. All useless now.

*   *   *

J
ACK AND
Annika were crouched in the darkness of the trees surrounding Arian Xhafa’s compound. They both wore lightweight backpacks into which Annika had placed various paraphernalia.

“According to Baltasar, there are seven guards and two attack dogs protecting the compound,” she said.

“Do you believe him?”

She glanced at him. “Do you have a better idea?”

Jack pointed. “One thing your victim failed to mention is the electrified razor wire on top of the wall.”

Annika rose. “Let’s take a walk.”

They picked their way slowly around the compound until they came to the rear. Then she pointed upward to the branches of an ancient oak tree, two of which arched over the wall and its lethal top.