The Coil (33 page)

He felt like himself again. After two intense orgasms, any man would. That was because of another, more pragmatic magic—the blue pill. He did not need it for one, but for two—yes, and well worth it.

His private cell rang. He rolled to the edge of the bed, but Cecily reached his suit jacket first.

“Stop!” he roared.

She froze, wide-eyed, staring with genuine fear. “Christian?”

Naked, he padded toward her. “Never touch it again.
Never.
” He ripped the cell from her hand, punched the
ON
button, and said softly: “Wait.” He pulled out his wallet and told her, “Get the rest of your clothes. I'll call when I need you.”

She picked up her remaining things, and he hustled her to the bedroom door, shoving euros into her hand. She lifted her face. He kissed her, again feeling the stirring that was so important to him. He lingered in the doorway as she stepped into her pumps, straightened her skirt, and flipped her golden hair back over her shoulders.

As she headed for the staircase, she gave him a happy wave. He knew her affection was fake. He had known it all along, and now that he was able to reenter his world, he no longer cared. He closed the door and lifted the cell.

 

“Ocean here. Is that you, Cronus?”

“Yes. We must meet tonight. Two hours, my place in London.”

“Tell me what the hell's going on with the Carnivore's files.”

“Not much new. We'll discuss it all then.”

“Damn right we will. This is a big waste of time. We have to get this problem solved any way we can. Do you agree, Cronus?”

“I should think so. But then, all of us want the files, don't we, Ocean?”

Aggravated, César Duchesne limped quickly back to his cab, carrying a strong cup of coffee. His walkie-talkie crackled as he barked orders and listened to the reports from his spies as they wheeled through Pigalle, picking up and dropping off customers attracted to the wild nightlife and drugs, the open sex and neon signs selling the illusion of fun. Increasingly, Pigalle was considered a hip neighborhood by the young. Fools.

“Guignot on the rue Duperré at Fromentin. Waiting for customer. Peugeot continuing on to Douai.”

“Trevale,” Duchesne instructed, his tone demanding, “you're close.”

“Got it.”

From south of the boulevard de Clichy up to the top of Sacré-Coeur, he sent one driver after another, following the wrong Peugeots. He'd had one report that was solid, a confirmed sighting of the sports car leaving Belleville—Childs driving, Sansborough in the passenger seat—circling around and down into Pigalle, where it had vanished off the boulevard de Clichy. Since then, nothing.

Duchesne climbed into his taxi, fired up the engine, and raced back into the stream of traffic. For a moment, he had a sense of other cabs, other cities, the excitement of love and purpose wrapped in the perfume of his wife. Berlin. Zurich. Rome. London. New York. Las Vegas. Los Angeles. So many cities. The names rolled off his tongue. He could see each in his mind, but superimposed over all was the face of his wife. The face of a past and joy that was gone, erased with her life, because of the Carnivore's files.

Langley, Virginia

Frank Edmunds shoved his fingers through his hair, frustrated, worried. His people had lost Sansborough. The chaotic streets and stream of humanity in Pigalle had dumbfounded his CIA team. By the time they reached the intersection where the last call from her had been pinpointed, the car was gone, and there was no sign of either Sansborough or Childs on the street or in the shops. Now he had ten men out, looking, on foot and driving, while he waited, helpless, railing. Soon he would have to report to Mr. Jaffa again, and he did not look forward to that.

Paris, France

The feet in the shadowy garage stairwell padded past and continued up toward the top floor. Simon and Liz slid out just in time to see the feet belonged to two men with assault rifles. In the lead was a man reading the screen of an open notebook computer.

“Malko!” Liz whispered angrily. “He's tracking the Peugeot again.”

Simon swore. “He must've planted a backup tracker on it!”

As they resumed their quiet flight downward, Simon reached back and took the Uzi from Liz. He listened with barbed pleasure to the frustrated shouts from above as the men discovered his car was empty.

Panting from their six-flight run, they landed at the bottom, where the enclosed area was irregularly shaped and lighted by an overhead bulb. No one waited in ambush, but there was no way out except through a closed fire door.

Simon cracked the door open. His back went rigid, and he closed it quickly. “Malko brought a full team. There are four men on guard, armed to the eyeteeth. We could try to fight our way out, but I should think our chances would be damn slim.”

“They've got the firepower to stop us this time.” Liz peered warily around a corner that seemed to lead nowhere. “There's another door here, almost out of sight.”

Simon followed, and she tried the knob. “Locked, dammit.”

Above them, voices debated heatedly. Feet descended the stairwell.

Simon had picklocks in his hand. “My turn.”

She stepped away. He tested one picklock after another as she ran around the corner, jumped, and smashed the light with the butt of her Glock. Darkness enveloped them, then Simon's flashlight glowed on. She returned, took it, and aimed the beam at the lock. His face was intent, completely absorbed. Picking a lock could not be rushed.

Above them, the feet veered off onto another floor, the men searching there. A reprieve, but it would be short. With a tinny rattle of metal, he finally opened the door.

“Perfect timing,” she breathed.

They hurried into darkness, but they could not lock the door behind them. The lock was rusted on this side. Simon dropped his gym bag in front of the door. Anything to slow their pursuers. Liz swept the shaft of light around what turned out to be a storage room, revealing haphazard stacks of brooms, shovels, and car parts. The place stank of dirt and grease, and there was no exit. Very bad. Still, she studied the walls closely. The room was far older than the parking garage. The wood paneling was black with age, and the red-brick floor had been pounded dusty pink by many feet. Like a cellar or—

Simon cursed and turned to sprint back to the door. “It's a dead end.”

Liz caught his sleeve. “Grab your gym bag and get back here!”

Somewhere beyond the door, people were conversing on walkie-talkies. She could hear voices and buzzes of static. The fire door in the passageway slammed open, and the noise of running feet grew dim, heading into the garage.

She took a deep breath. “There's not much time.”

“This is an act of unreasonable trust on my part. They'll be back.” Holding his gym bag, he returned.

“They won't find us if we're not here.” She directed the light over the wall to the left again and hurried around piles of bald tires to get closer. “I thought I saw something.” She inspected the floor and snatched up a rusted metal object, its bent shape resembling an oversize mechanic's grease gun.

He joined her. “What is it?”

She handed it to him. “You tell me.”

“Put the flash on it.” He examined it. “'Strewth! It's an ancient Sten gun.”

“That's what I hoped.” Liz rummaged again. Cheap, rapid-firing, and disposable, the Sten gun was the weapon the British had dropped by the cratefuls to the French Resistance during World War II.

Awed, he turned the rusty relic in his hands. “One of our better inspirations. This one's got a bowed barrel, though, so my guess is someone threw it away right here.” He looked at her. “You're hoping this was a transition point.”

She picked up a yellowed paper crumbling at the edges. “Damn right. Look, here's more evidence—a wanted poster in French and German for a
maqui
.”

“If you're right, we've got another way out.”

Liz peered carefully around. During the war, the maquis had created secret places throughout Paris, even in the catacombs and sewers, to meet and plan. Whenever possible, they set up another room first to look like a dead end, so the Nazis would quit searching before they found the real hideout.

Simon studied the ceiling. “Would concealed hinges help?”

She whirled. “Where?”

He was staring up. “See how fancy the ceiling is? Too fancy for a storage place.”

She aimed the light where he pointed. The ceiling had ornate wood molding in squares about two and a half feet diagonally. Like the walls and the Sten gun, the ceiling had blackened with time.

Simon took the flash. “Watch the line of the molding. See how it indents a few inches and then straightens out? Two hinges. The way it's built, the hinges are pretty much invisible. Reminds me of the music room in Oaten Place.” Oaten Place was in Kent, the family home of their grandmother Childs, née Oaten.

“The squire's secret bedroom? You're right.” The family story was that four generations earlier, Squire Oaten fell in lust with his children's music teacher. While his wife and children summered in Portofino, he'd had the clandestine love nest built.

Liz and Simon stacked tires beneath the hinges. She balanced the tires, and he scrambled up. He pressed the wood around the hinges until he felt more than heard the telltale click. He pushed up. The panel creaked and opened. Red and yellow light streaked down. He raised his head carefully.

She whispered, “What do you see?”

“Not much yet. Hold on to the tires. I'm going to jump.”

As she steadied the pile, he grabbed either side of the opening and sprang. Catlike and muscular, he pulled himself up almost effortlessly.

As his feet disappeared, she asked, “What's there, Simon?”

His face appeared over the edge, dirty and grinning. “This is good. You're going to love it.”

“I'll take that with a grain of salt.” She handed up their things.

As he aimed the light down to give her illumination, she rolled the tires back to the stack. Again she heard footsteps and voices in the stairwell. Growing louder.

She ran. “Here I come.” Swinging her arms back, she hunched and leaped straight up, her hands extended.

Simon caught her wrists with a strong grip and grunted with the strain.

She grabbed his wrists. Pain exploded from the wound on her arm. She blocked it.
Not now.
And felt that momentary queasiness and fear of empty space, as she dangled helplessly…off the sheer cliff in Santa Barbara. His face was strained, neck veins bulging, eyes closed as he pulled her up. She had never seen a prettier sight. With a sudden surge, he lifted her the last six inches and dragged her over the rim.

She flopped like a flounder. “Thanks, I needed—”

Breathing hard, he held his fingers to his lips, set the trapdoor back in place, and crouched. Gaudy neon lights flashed through the window and across his face.

She pulled herself up to her haunches beside him. Together, they listened.

Voices again, this time directly below. She held her Glock close and gazed at Simon. She recognized the same kind of old, cold fear she always felt while waiting. But as quickly as they had arrived, the voices disappeared. She heard no door closing, but that could be because the door was too far away.

He let out a relieved breath and wiped a sleeve across his forehead. It left a sooty streak. “That wasn't bad.”

“It could've been worse.” Her adrenaline pulsed like lava.

They looked at each other, exchanging a moment of complete honesty.

“Shit!” she exploded.

He released a pent-up gust of air. “Double bloody
damn
!”

“Shit! Shit! Shit!”

“
Christ,
why did I
ever
think I wanted to do this for a living?”

They inhaled several times, glancing at each other, locked in uneasy truth.

“It's been a long couple of days,” she said finally.

“You're telling me. And we still don't know where the files are.”

“Or Sarah and Asher.”

“What a bloody awful situation.”

She sank back and crossed her legs, feeling better after her tantrum. “You say
bloody
a lot.”

He collapsed beside her, stretched out his legs, crossed his ankles, and leaned back on his hands. “Only at times like these. You swear a lot, too. You may not have noticed.”

“Must be the situation. I need to eat and sleep and never think about death, destruction, and greed again.”

“Well”—he shot her a wicked grin—“you've come to the right place.” He swung an arm.

Her eyes moved first, then her head. Mirrored panes on the ceiling above the bed reflected its kingly size and its purple velvet coverlet. Little pillows in the shapes of various genitalia were arranged beneath the headboard, which sported a painted rocking horse, noticeably well endowed. Drawings of nude women and men in a multitude of provocative poses decorated the walls. A bidet and toilet were visible through one door, and a small kitchen showed through another, all illuminated only by the loud neon lights that winked in through a single large window.

Liz burst into laughter. “Who would have thought!”

“Imagine the delight of the
maquis
.”

“I'm not sure I'm capable.”

The trapdoor was beside an oversize dresser. She got to her feet.

He saw what she was doing. “I'll help.”

She put her hip into it. “No need. Women have been moving furniture for thousands of years.”

He leaned his shoulder against it anyway, and they shoved. When two dresser legs were resting on the trapdoor, Simon checked the bolt on the studio's door and hurried to the window, where he pressed back to the side, out of sight. His chin was brown with beard stubble. Dust coated his hair. His tan sports jacket was filthy. She suddenly wanted to ask how his nose got broken. Instead, she knelt beside his gym bag and took out the three oversize prints of the baron's photo wall.

“I'm going to snatch a bit of time to work.” She carried them closer to the window, where the light was best, and sat on the floor.