Targets of Revenge (52 page)

“Nonsense,” Adina snarled.

“That so?” Sandor craned his neck around to have a look at him. “If you want to shoot me, go ahead, but I’m your only chance of walking out of here alive.”

Adina’s eyes narrowed. “And who would you be?”

“No one important, except that I can tell you what’s been going on while you’ve been waiting to fly back to a hero’s welcome in Caracas.”

Adina pointed the gun at Sandor’s forehead but said nothing.

“The attacks on the bridges and tunnels were prevented. Your two henchmen are deader than yesterday’s cigar. And all six cases of anthrax have been recovered.”

“What is that charming expression you Americans have? Ah yes, ‘Perhaps you did not get the memo.’ ” Then Adina reached behind the pilot’s seat and held up the seventh case of anthrax.

Sandor said nothing.

“Yes, I see in your eyes you recognize this custom-made luggage.”

“What do you intend to do with it?”

“That, of course, is my concern. For now, what I do not intend is to stand here and waste time when we should already be in the air.”

“Not happening, anthrax or no anthrax.”

“Once we tell them I have this case on board, they may not be so anxious to shoot down this plane and release a deadly cloud over the entire area.”

“And who’s going to tell them you have anthrax on board?”

“You are, of course.”

“Not me, pal.”

For the first time, Adina’s arrogance faltered. “If you are so certain they will shoot this plane down, why did you come aboard? You’ll die too.”

“No, because we’re not taking off. I came here to take you into custody.”

“You really do have a death wish.”

“Not at all. No one here is going to die, not this morning.”

Adina displayed his venomous smile. “So, why the ludicrous costume? I knew you were not a mechanic when I saw you coming toward the plane.”

“Not really my style, I admit, but I wasn’t sure how you’d react if I showed up in full military gear. I just didn’t want you shooting me before I got up the stairs. I needed to get inside so we could talk.”

“You’ve achieved that limited success.”

“The way I calculate things, you only have a few ways to go. You force these boys to take off and the Apaches will blow us all out of the
sky. Whether or not the anthrax is released, or how effective it will be in killing innocent people will no longer be our problem, will it? On the other hand, if you fire a single shot at any one of us, that sound will bring a SWAT team rushing onto this plane and you’ll be cut to ribbons before you take your next breath. But, if you hand me that suitcase and let me walk you out of here then you become a political prisoner.”

Adina nodded slowly, as if something had just become clear to him. “With diplomatic immunity.”

“Your old pal President Chavez will see to that, won’t he?”

Adina began to say something but stopped. Then his eyes widened slightly as he said, “You’re Sandor, aren’t you?” When he received no response he said, “Yes, of course you are.”

Sandor shrugged. “So what’s it going to be?”

“Why would you have come aboard and risked your life to do me this wonderful favor?”

“Because you’re better off to me alive than dead.”

“I could kill you right now and still walk away.”

“Would I be here if that were true?” Sandor shook his head. “No, I already told you. They hear a gunshot and they’ll move right in with six-shooters blazing. You may have diplomatic immunity from Venezuela, but I have my friends right nearby.” He got to his feet, not even looking at the pistol that Adina was still holding on him. “We also have a five-minute deadline before they shoot their way in here, whether or not you fire that thing.”

“How do I know I won’t be shot as soon as I step outside?”

Sandor shook his head with a look of utter disgust. “If we wanted to shoot you, twenty men would have stormed the plane by now.”

“I want to speak with my embassy. Right now.”

“Of course you do, and as soon as you give yourself up you’ll be afforded all of your rights.”

“The American way,” Adina said with obvious contempt.

Sandor ignored him and turned to the two young men. “Time to go boys. While Hamlet here does his Act Three soliloquy, no sense you getting nailed in the crossfire.”

They gave Adina a nervous look but did not move.

“Go ahead,” Sandor told them, “he’s not going to shoot you.”

After some tense moments of silence Adina said, “Go.”

The two crewmen got quickly to their feet and hurried out to the cabin, where they opened the hatch and leapt down the stairs.

“Well then,” Adina said as he and Sandor stood facing each other in the confines of the small cockpit, “how do you propose to ensure my safety?”

“That’s entirely up to you. If you like, you can use me as a shield when we walk off the plane.”

Adina sighed. “I have no doubt I’ll be taken alive, Mr. Sandor. As you suggested, I have knowledge of too many things your people want to hear about. They’ll shove me into a rat-infested hole in Guantánamo, or perhaps transport me somewhere overseas where your associates can ignore your laws and my rights.”

“You really think the State Department is going to risk that sort of diplomatic brawl with your pal Chavez?”

Before Adina could reply, Sandor lashed out with his left forearm, sweeping up at Adina’s gun hand. At the same instant, he drove the heel of his right hand hard under the Venezuelan’s chin, knocking him backward against the bulkhead. Adina lost his grasp on the case of anthrax as he fell, but he was still clutching the revolver. Leaving no time for the stunned terrorist to react, Sandor was on him, twisting the gun from his hand and pressing his left arm against Adina’s neck as he gained control of the pistol and held it to Adina’s temple.

Kneeling atop him, his teeth gritted tight, Sandor said, “I could have killed you as soon as I walked in here, but there were witnesses. And I just had to hear you whine about diplomatic immunity, at least once.”

Adina, gasping under the pressure on his throat, was barely able to answer. “You aren’t going to kill me,” he rasped, once again summoning that reptilian smirk. “You can threaten me, but without the fear of death you have nothing.”

“Well then,” Sandor replied with a flash of his own cruel smile, “you have sorely misjudged me.” He stood and stared down at Rafael Cabello. “But just so you know that I play fair, I’m going to give you the same chance you gave every one of those innocent souls you’ve taken.” Then Sandor reached under his overalls for his own gun, leveled the Walther, and fired three shots into Adina’s face.

S
ANDOR,
R
AABE, AND
Byrnes were back inside the situation room from which the task force organized by Byrnes had coordinated their efforts during that deadly night and morning, two weeks before.

Everyone involved agreed that the damage control had been extraordinary, given what had been put in place. Once again, however, Sandor could not shake the sickening feeling that he should have somehow done more.

The deaths of Adina, his two men, the five couriers from the Bronx, and the various drivers who had died that night were of no consequence to Sandor—they were the rightful casualties in a cowardly and pointless war of their own making. Yet innocent people had also perished on the bridges that could not be protected in time. Two police officers were murdered in the hotel. Countless others were injured.

And for what?

Sandor had been roundly congratulated for his role in preventing an anthrax attack the experts were now estimating could have taken more than twenty thousand lives.

Numbers,
Sandor told himself.
When will we learn that no one has the right to measure human life in gross numbers? Human lives must always be counted one at a time.

Jim Bergenn. Felipe Romero. Lillian Mindlovitch.

Two days after the task force stopped the worst consequences of the catastrophe Adina had planned for Manhattan, the DEA
seized the large shipment of Adina’s cocaine as part of a joint operation with the Coast Guard in the Port of Baltimore. They had also shattered the myth of the elusive Jaime Rivera; uncovered the mole within their agency, Joseph Cleary; had Alphonso Mateo still singing like a canary; and not only vindicated Dan LaBelle, but were arranging his promotion.

Sandor knew the part he had played in all this, but he was also mindful of the large pile of IOUs he had racked up along the way. Farrar and Hasani in Sharm el-Sheikh. Ferriello in Brooklyn. Greshnev in Moscow. Carlton in Curaçao. Vauchon in St. Barths.

There was also the expected dustup over the death of Adina. Sandor reported to Byrnes that he had acted in self-defense. He explained that once the crew left the plane he and the Venezuelan got into an argument, Adina threatened to release the anthrax and then waved the gun at him once too often. He had no choice but to protect himself.

To which the DD replied, “And I assume you’re going to stick with that story?”

“I am sir.”

“Three shots in the head was protecting yourself?”

“Can’t be too careful in a close-quarter gunfight, sir.”

“Anything else you want to tell me, Sandor?”

“Just a question sir?”

“Yes?”

“If a mass murderer starts sniveling about diplomatic immunity, does shooting him qualify as justifiable homicide?”

Byrnes was not smiling when he asked, “Is that going to be your full report, Sandor?”

“Yes sir. Except for the last part. That won’t be included.”

The usual diplomatic scuffle followed, but this time the suits at the State Department surprised both Sandor and his boss when they cast aside political considerations and told the powers in Caracas to go fly a kite. One of them actually said in a memo, “If it is their intention to idealize the murderous acts of a genocidal criminal like Rafael Cabello perhaps they can get Andrew Lloyd Webber to write a musical about him, but as far as we are concerned this matter is closed.”

When Byrnes gave him the news, Sandor smiled and said, “Go figure.”

Of all the things he had done in his career—good and bad, right or wrong—the removal of Adina from the living was something he would always be proud of.

————

At the moment, Sandor was concerned about one more piece of unfinished business.

He was standing shoulder to shoulder with Craig Raabe, Byrnes right behind them, as they studied a transparent screen display of satellite photos from the north shore of the scenic resort town of Agios Nikolaos in Crete.

It was late in Greece, after ten at night, and none of the three men spoke as they watched the outlines of two figures position themselves near the rocks beside the shore at the base of a large hilltop estate that rose majestically above the sea. A few hundred yards out, sitting at anchor in the Aegean, was a large yacht that Sandor knew only too well.

The two figures now lay very still among the rocks and remained that way for what seemed a long time.

“You should have let me do this,” Sandor murmured, as if to himself.

Byrnes placed a hand on his shoulder. “No way.”

They became quiet again as they watched a group of men and women leave the main house and walk down a long, winding set of stone steps that led to the shore. There they boarded a tender that carried them out to the yacht. Once the motorboat was tied off at the stern they began climbing up a narrow set of stairs to the rear deck.

Even in the gloaming, the name on the stern was clear.
Odessa
.

The three men in Langley continued to observe without speaking. Without any sound it was eerie as the minutes ticked by, infrared lighting allowing them to follow the images of the group climbing onto the large yacht as the two men near the jetty remained perfectly still. Suddenly there was a brief flash from where the two figures were positioned behind the rocks. Then, an instant later, the head of one
of the men boarding the yacht jerked violently, and he fell backward into the sea.

It was over.

Sandor took a deep breath, then turned away with a mixed sense of satisfaction and sadness, knowing that he had kept his promise to Farrar and a silent pledge to Lilli.

T
WO DAYS LATER
Sandor telephoned Bill Sternlich to say he was back home. Sternlich offered to meet him for a drink, but Sandor declined.

“Not today, Bill. I have something to take care of. Some other time.” Sandor took a cab crosstown to Manhattan’s Upper East Side. The building was a classic four-story tenement, no doorman, no elevator. Old-school New York. He had called in advance, spoken with the building superintendent and explained his business. He met the man out front, a squat, dark-skinned Hispanic wearing a tired expression and a stained gray T-shirt. The man did not seem all that impressed when Sandor flashed his federal ID, but he did give his full attention to the green and beige picture of Benjamin Franklin he was handed.

The super held out the key. Sandor took it and said, “She’s not coming back.”

The short man blinked. “That right?”

“I’ll have someone send the landlord a formal notice. Then you can clean out the apartment.” Sandor took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “We haven’t been able to locate a next of kin. You ever see her with anyone?”

The super shook his head. “Some different guys, you know how it goes with a good-looking girl in this town.”

“Nothing steady?”

“Nah. Nice girl, though. Always friendly.” He shook his head. “Gone, eh?”

Sandor nodded.

“Sorry to hear it,” the man said, but he did not ask how or why.

“Sorry to have to tell you,” Sandor replied. He turned from the super and climbed the front stairs, entered the building, and headed up three flights to apartment 3E. He paused there, key in hand, then unlocked the door.

The apartment was small, the sort of place he figured Lilli Mindlovitch would have lived in. The foyer was just large enough to accommodate both Sandor and the open door. The area that passed for a living room could barely contain a modern-looking love seat, a round-backed chair, and an étagère that held a television, some books, and an assortment of photographs .