Rogue Angel 54: Day of Atonement (13 page)

As darkness began to swirl around her, all she could think of was Roux.

It turned out to be easier than Roux had hoped.

It hadn’t taken long to pick out a decent suit that hung well enough that it could be mistaken for a made-to-|measure garment if a person wasn’t sophisticated enough to know better. It still cost more than the average policeman’s monthly salary and looked like it did. That was what mattered. The clothes maketh the man. In this case, one of wealth and taste—a successful man who meant business. The manager of the store had been only too happy to come to his hotel room with a selection once he had been given his measurements over the phone, and in less than two hours Roux was ready to play his hand.

What had taken a while was getting the names of the two men being held in custody. But he’d worked his magic, contacting an old flirtation at Interpol who called in a couple of favors to access the information for him in return for a promised dinner next time he was in town. Of course, there was always a risk that the local law enforcement officers would get huffy because some distant agency was muscling in on their turf, but huffy or not, they gave up
the names. Garin would have been able to do it, and probably faster, but right now Roux wasn’t inclined to offer him the time of day, let alone ask for his help.

He strode up the steps of the police station, pausing on the threshold to adjust his suit, before approaching the desk sergeant.

“I’m here to see my clients,” Roux stated, putting his gilt-edged business card on the desk in front of the uniformed man. “Marcel Dugarry and Étienne Rameaux.”

The desk sergeant looked him up and down slowly, taking in the sharp suit and the crisp white shirt as well as the ridiculously expensive diamond studded cuff links that completed the ensemble, then returned his attention to the card again.

“You got here quickly,” he said.

“As I am sure you appreciate, my clients get the best treatment money can buy.”

The officer snorted and made a note in his ledger. “One minute,” he said, picking up the telephone on the desk beside him.

He talked quickly to a colleague somewhere else in the station, and a moment later a sallow-eyed man emerged through a combination pass-locked door.

“Mr. Reyes?” the young plainclothes officer said.

Roux inclined his head.

“Follow me, please,” he said. He seemed polite enough, but give him enough time down here swimming amid the detritus of humanity, and all of his smoothness would rub off and leave a jagged disdain for officers of the court who represented the men they had in custody. It was inevitable. The legal eagles were the enemy of the honest cop, twisting words and truths, looking for any technicalities they could wrangle out of a situation to get guilty men
off. He didn’t say another word as he led Roux down the institutionally grim corridor, stopping at the fourth door.

He opened it and stepped aside to allow Roux to enter.

“There will be someone outside at all times,” he said. “Just knock when you’re ready to come out.”

“I know the procedure,” Roux said. He waited until the door had closed before taking a seat on the other side of a steel table across from the man who was sitting there. He had no idea which of the two thugs he was dealing with, but judging a book by its cover, he didn’t think he was dealing with the brains of the operation.

“Who the hell are you?” the man asked.

“I am your salvation,” Roux replied.

“Huh?”

“I’ve been asked to get you out of here,” Roux said, which wasn’t entirely a lie. Annja had probably said something like that during the conversation, even if not explicitly using the words
spring them
as a request but rather as a question.

“Yeah?” His eyes had brightened, though now it was a case of the lights being on but no sign of anyone at home. He shuffled in his chair, pulling himself upright.

“I need to make sure that you’ve got your story straight.”

The man nodded. “Sure. Yeah. Of course. Are you going to spring Étienne, too? Or just me?”

“What do you think? Would I be sent to get you out of here and leave him to take the rap?”

“Right, yeah, of course. Leave no man behind.”

“Indeed. I need to get you both out of here if I’m going to make this all go away.”

“You think you can do that?”

“I know I can,” Roux said.

“Right, so what do you want me to say? Anything you need saying, just give me the script.”

“Before we start, I need you to tell me what you’ve told the police so far.”

He’d found one of the easiest ways to gain a man’s trust was to get him to repeat whatever story he had trotted out—truth or lies, it didn’t really matter. It was the sharing that did. It built a bridge between them, made them feel complicit. Roux was confident he would be able to tell truth from fiction, particularly when he had spoken with the second man. There was bound to be some common ground in their stories that would come together as a reasonable recollection of the sequence of events.

If Annja was right about how far away the police were when she left them standing by their car, they hadn’t had time to concoct an elaborate story. And going back to that book-cover judgment, this guy didn’t seem as if he was all that creative.

Roux sat back and listened as the man rambled on without making eye contact.

Every now and then he looked up at Roux for a reassurance that he hadn’t told them anything he shouldn’t have.

“So who is the woman?” Roux asked.

“Her name is Creed. Annja Creed. She’s supposed to be some kind of television personality. I’ve never seen her on anything, though, so she can’t be all that famous.”

Roux wasn’t surprised. Dugarry looked like the kind of man who preferred sport, action movies and porn, though not necessarily in that order.

“And you say that she attacked you?”

“Yeah, the crazy woman pulled a kind of sword out of nowhere like she was a magician or something.”

“And you pulled a gun on her in self-defense? Is that what you’re saying?”

“Self-defense, that’s it, man, right there, that’s it.” Dugarry nodded just a little too rapidly, a smile starting to spread across his face to reveal a missing tooth.

“And that’s what you’ve told the police?”

More nods.

“So how did you know her name?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, if she attacked you, and you were acting in self-defense, how did you find out what her name was?”

The man’s face went blank again. He was clearly so used to telling lies that the truth wasn’t always easy to find when he went looking for it.

“Did you tell the police that you knew her name?”

He paused again, perhaps trying to play the whole of the conversation back inside his head.

“I don’t think so,” he said at last.

“So Cauchon told you what to do?” he said, providing the answers, but making it sound like a question rather than a statement. The nod came easily to the man.

It had been a long shot.

Dugarry could have denied having anything to do with Cauchon. He might even have known him by a different name, but Roux had gotten lucky.

The thug glanced toward the door, then leaned in to make sure that no one could overhear what he was saying. “I didn’t think he would send anyone to get us out of here,” he confided.

“How many times have you worked for him?”

“A few. Usually just collecting things, carrying packages, you know?”

“Did you ever look at what was inside?”

The man shook his head rapidly. “Never,” he said. “We were paid enough not to.”

“What about this time?”

“We were just supposed to pick her up and take her to Cauchon.”

“Whether she wanted to go or not?”

“Whatever force was needed, that was what he said. Just get her there alive.”

“Where were you supposed to take her?”

“We were to call him when we had her, and he’d tell us where we needed to go.”

“And the police have the phone?”

Another nod. Roux admitted that he’d been fortunate to get access to Dugarry without any trouble, but the odds of him getting a look at the phone were pretty slim. Thinking on his feet, he gambled. “That’s a shame. Cauchon uses a variety of cell phones as I’m sure you can appreciate. I could have warned him to destroy the one used for this job if I knew the number.”

“Oh, that’s easy,” Dugarry said, and rattled off a string of digits. The thug smiled. “I’m good with numbers.”

Pain tore through Annja’s shoulders as she tried to move.

Her wrists were bound together behind her back and her ankles were tied together, too. The ground was cold and hard beneath her. In the near-darkness she had no means of knowing where she was.

She tried to move, but all she did was make the pain worse.

“There’s no point in struggling.”

It was a woman’s voice.

Annja tried to twist her head to get a look at her.

All she could make out was a dull light in the corner of her eye and a shape behind it. Just a shape. It was impossible to get a good look at her captor.

“What do you want?” she asked, feeling the numb heat of pain on one side of her face from where she’d been slammed against the wall. There was no way it had been the woman who had taken her out, which meant someone else was hiding in the darkness. “If it’s money you’re after…”

The woman laughed. “Money? How little you understand… This has nothing to do with money,” she said.

“What, then?”

“That’s not for me to say. I am simply doing my job. I was told to keep you here until the time is right.”

“Right for what?”

The woman didn’t answer. Annja heard the click of heels on the hard stone floor. She put the woman from her mind. Right now, she would be better served spending her time trying to work out where she was, rather than worrying about why she was there.

The floor was cold and damp against her face. There was a familiar smell. It took her a while to identify the chill mustiness. Her eyes became gradually more accustomed to the meager light. In it, she saw the evidence that confirmed her suspicions.

“A crypt,” Annja murmured, without realizing she’d spoken the thought aloud.

“Most perceptive,” the woman said.

The light began to move. It was an oil-filled lantern. The woman placed it on top of a large sarcophagus close to where Annja lay.

Annja tried to move her head again. She managed to get a better view of the blonde standing in front of her. Early thirties, maybe, but the light wasn’t flattering. She was well toned but not muscular, which confirmed that she wasn’t the unwashed mountain of muscle that had caught up with her in the hotel room.

She pushed against the pain, and by sheer force of will managed to get into a sitting position, propped up against the wall; only it wasn’t a wall, it was a stone sarcophagus. The carvings dug into her spine. Annja tried to move her shoulders, working the muscles against the discomfort.
It didn’t help. If anything, she only succeeded in making it hurt worse.

“I sincerely hope my friend was a little rough with you,” the woman said.

Annja managed a bleak smile. “I like it a little rough,” she said. “How long was I out?”

“Four hours, nearly five. You must have the constitution of a horse. That dose should have put you down for the best part of a day. Unless he managed to mess that up, too.” The woman’s gaze flicked to one side for an instant, an involuntary motion. Annja knew that there was something there. She peered into the shadows. Between two sarcophagi lay a darkness that was even blacker than the shadows. It ended in a heavy work boot.

“Is he dead?” she asked.

“I should hope so.” She made the shape of a gun with her fingers and thumb and mimed putting a bullet through his brain.

Did this woman really value life so cheaply?

Annja’s blade had tasted blood often enough, but that didn’t mean that she would ever kill if there was an alternative. All life was precious.

“And me? Am I just another loose end to be put out of my misery?”

“You? Oh no, not at all. You are
far
more important than that. I am sure my brother will tell you all about it when you meet him.”

“Brother?”

“Enough with the questions. This isn’t a quiz show. One more and I’ll tape your mouth shut. You’re almost as bad as your friend.”

“What friend?”

“The pretty one. Garin.”

“Have you killed him, too?”

“Killed him? Certainly not, why would I? He’s vital to what’s happening. He’s been most helpful.”

Annja thought of everything Roux had told her about the midnight visit and the theft from the vault and muttered, “I’ll kill him.”

“That’s entirely up to you, but not until we’re finished with him.”

Garin woke with an irresistible urge to vomit.

His head was on fire.

The blood inside his skull pounded so fiercely against the bone walls he couldn’t bring himself to move.

The slightest roll set off a drill inside his head.

Garin squeezed his eyes shut tight to drive it away.

The only light, a thin gauze, came from the doorway that had to lead into the bathroom.

His mind was full of jumbled memories that made no sense and had no order.

There had been a blonde woman, that much he remembered. But any more than that he struggled to hold on to.

His mouth was dry, but the lingering taste of whiskey convinced him she’d slipped something into his drink.

“Monique,” he said, testing the word in his mouth. It came out as little more than a mumble.

Then he was hit with the last thing that had filled his mind before it had given up its grip on consciousness.

Garin fought against the nausea as he saw the shape of the body sprawled on the bed.

He had let his guard down, and the woman had taken advantage of the moment.

No.

She had engineered it.

It took a second for him to realize that she most certainly had taken the papers, and more pertinently, he had been tricked out of his finder’s fee.

Not good.

He cursed himself for an idiot, even though there was only a corpse to hear him.