The Descent From Truth (12 page)

She watched while he made a breakfast of pancakes and canned ham. “So, today you teach me things,” she said. “Tomorrow we get Frederick?”

Did she suspect he was stringing her along? That he had no intention of keeping his promise?
Did
he intend to keep it? He wasn’t sure. “We’ll work out a plan.”

Over a final cup of coffee, he showed her how to load and unload his rifle and the handgun he had taken from the guard at the Silver Hill office complex, a snub-nosed, .38-caliber Smith and Wesson revolver. He demonstrated procedures for cleaning the weapons and insisted that she practice. “You have to clean them whenever they get wet, or ice will jam the mechanisms.”

Firing the weapons became the first order of business after breakfast. Alex learned that she was already competent with a rifle.

“My father taught me,” she said. “Until he could get me to England, I was to be a rebel fighter.”

With the revolver, he advised against aiming. “It’s for close up.” He demonstrated a crouching stance, weapon extended, both hands grasping its handle. “You can hold it steady this way. Just point it and look down the barrel at your target with both eyes. If he isn’t armed, let him get close. Then put your rounds squarely in the middle of his chest.”

Cross-country skis were a bigger problem. “You’re better off sticking with snowshoes,” Alex conceded after half an hour of repeated mishaps. “Let’s take a break.”

While they rested, he lectured her on survival in inclement weather and on finding one’s way through uninhabited terrain. He showed her how to read a compass and explained about using the North Star to orient herself. “If you’re lost and all else fails, just go downhill. When you find a gully, follow it. The fringes of civilization, back roads and vacation cabins, are often built along waterways.”

After lunch, he demonstrated how to rupture an opponent’s eardrums by slapping both ears simultaneously, how to drive bone splinters into a foe’s brain by using the propulsive force of back and legs while ramming the heel of one’s hand under his nose. He insisted that she practice the moves over and over. “You’re so small, hitting with your fists will just make guys angry. You have to punch out their eyes, twist off their balls. Don’t be tentative or hesitant. You won’t get a second chance.”

By nightfall they were both tired. “We are going after Frederick tomorrow?” Pia asked as they prepared dinner, a replica of the previous evening’s fare.

“That’s the plan.” He was running out of time, exhausting ways to stall. He was going to have to commit or level with her about having strung her along. First, though, he needed more information. After dinner, he excused himself, stepped outside, and used his cell to phone the
Denver Post
reporter who had promised to check out Frederick’s substitute bodyguard. “You learn anything interesting?” he asked.

“Enough to wonder how you know someone like that.”

“Let’s start with his name.”

“David Kruger. He’s an Army vet, pulled a tour in Afghanistan—combat infantry. Decorated for courage under fire, then got charged with raping an Afghan teenager and slitting her throat. Not enough evidence to convict, but he got a year in the brig and a dishonorable discharge for related offenses. Settled in Chicago, questioned there a little over a year ago about what looks like a murder for hire. Bounced around South America for awhile. Been living in Peru.”

Alex recognized that as his moment of commitment. Whoever had put the thug on Variant Corporation’s payroll would have run a National Agency background check at least. So they knew what kind of man they were getting. And, as director of security and intelligence, Faust knew who was looking after his employer’s only child.

Feeling good about his decision, Alex thanked his reporter friend and rang off. Since falling out with his father after enlisting in the Army, he had drifted emotionally. The Army enforced direction, and working with his Special Forces teammates imbued him with purpose, but all of that had disintegrated after he’d been wounded. He’d felt himself swirling in a downward spiral. Helping Pia, and now his decision to protect Frederick, was giving him a new lease on life.

Back in the cabin, he suggested they go to bed early. “Getting Freddy is likely to be taxing. We’ll need to be well rested.”

His declaration put added sparkle in her eyes. “How will we do it?”

Alex’s military training had been action-oriented, but she seemed to view him as a master strategist. He wondered how badly he would disappoint her. “We’ll sneak in, look them over. Then we’ll decide. But we need to talk about what happens afterward.”

“All right. After we get him back, then what do we do?”

“I’ll be wearing a mask. And I can’t be seen with the two of you. If they can prove I was involved, I’ll go to prison. Maybe for the rest of my life.”

Silence for a long moment. “Frederick and I will be on our own?”

“I talked with a lawyer. On the phone at that bus stop. He said with DNA samples to prove you’re Freddy’s mom, you’ll have a good shot at keeping him. You should be able to get a restraining order to keep Faust away.”

“As I have told you, Theo does not worry about legal niceties.”

“The cops will watch over you. But there’s no way I can—”

She put a finger over his lips, quieting him. “You are taking great risks to help us. I am certain an American lawyer will do exactly as you have said.”

There was no discussion about sleeping arrangements this time. They simply spread their zipped-open sleeping bags before the fireplace and slipped between them. Nor was there hesitancy as he divested her of her long johns and slipped off his own. Their lovemaking, less frenetic than before, proved even more emotionally intense for Alex. Afterward, they cuddled and nuzzled in silence, and he wrestled with feelings that were both comforting and disturbing. How could he care so much for a woman he had known for less than a week?

Her eyes were closed, her breathing deep and regular. He ran his hands over her, ever so lightly.

She adjusted her position to press more tightly against him. Her breathing turned ragged, but she captured his hand with hers. “As you said,” she whispered, “we need to rest. Tomorrow will be a long day.”

Chapter 14

They headed out at first light, leaving everything in the cabin except weapons and survival gear. The cabin would be their base, the place to which they would return with Frederick. They reached the highway at mid-morning, and two rides hitched from passing motorists deposited them at a car rental agency on Grand Junction’s outskirts. Alex used his credit card to rent a mid-sized SUV. Faust would be able to trace the charge, but they would have made their move by then.

After a late lunch at a Black Angus restaurant, Alex rented a snowmobile so Pia could learn to operate it. “Since you can’t stand up on skis,” he said as he explained the controls, “we need a backup getaway plan in case they block the road down the mountain. Tourists rent these things on Silver Hill’s main street. We’ll rent or steal a couple if we have to escape cross-country.”

An hour of practice made Pia comfortable operating the machine. They returned it to the rental store and hit the road for Silver Hill.

Darkness had settled over the ski resort when they turned onto its miniscule main drag. Street lamps illuminated Pia’s face, and Alex saw her jaw muscles twitching. He rested a hand on her shoulder. “They aren’t expecting anything like this. It’ll be a cakewalk.”

“How will we find him?”

Her tone surprised Alex. She sounded tense but not fearful. “Faust told me the Koenigs were flying up from Denver. The resort has three luxury chalets. Hot tubs, saunas, the works. We’ll check all three, see which one they’re using.”

“I do not believe Frederick will be staying with them.”

“Why not?”

“Even an enormous chalet would be small compared with their mansion near Lima. Madam Koenig will insist on enough distance so she cannot hear him cry.”

“Isn’t she pretending to be his mother? You sound as if she doesn’t even like him.”

“She says he reminds her of a snail, leaving a trail of moisture and stench wherever he crawls.” Pia’s voice had turned tremulous, perhaps from remembering insults to Frederick which she had been powerless to refute. Her voice firmed once more. “If he is here, he will be in another building.”

“He could be in the office complex where they kept you,” Alex said. “Or in the lodge.”

The logical arrangement would be the lodge, he decided. It had child-care facilities and trained caregivers. He swung their SUV into the guest parking lot and studied the layout. “Freddy’s bodyguard won’t be expecting trouble. Our biggest problem is how to get away after we make the snatch.” And for me to avoid being identified, he thought.

“But we have this vehicle and our guns.”

“On our way up, I noted that they still haven’t cleared the back road where you got stranded. That leaves only one way in or out. If they spot us before we’re off the mountain, they’ll send a squad down there by helicopter to cut us off.”

“What should we do?”

“The unexpected.” Alex eased the SUV out of the parking lot and cruised the short main street again. “Mobility is their ace in the hole. Surprise is ours. We’ll create an impression that the place is under siege. That should divert the security force, delay their search. And if we can’t use the SUV to escape, we’ll go up the mountain instead of down.”

The resort teemed with revelers, so he didn’t worry about being recognized. None of Silver Hill’s employees had seen Pia, and they had seen him only with long, shaggy hair and a beard. Anyway, he had to chance it so Pia could learn the village’s layout. Driving slowly, he pointed out salient features: the power station, the road that snaked downhill, the office complex where she had been held.

They parked once more in the lodge’s guest lot and stared at the sprawling, three-story structure. “It is big,” Pia said. She spoke in a near whisper, as if afraid of being overheard. “How will we find him in there?”

“By registering as guests.”

Thanking his lucky stars that he’d decided to shave, Alex kept the scarred side of his face turned away from the desk clerk in case his description had been passed around. He registered them as husband and wife. Guessing that Variant Corporation had a section of rooms reserved for their own use, he asked for the same second-floor room he had occupied as Koenig’s guest. “I stayed in that room a couple of months ago,” he told the desk clerk. “Great view from the window.”

“I’m sorry sir, that room’s taken.” The clerk suggested a room in the same wing but on the third floor.

“That’s the top floor, isn’t it?”

“Yes, sir. The view’s even better there than from your old room.”

“How about a different second-floor room in that same wing?”

An impatient smile. “The whole floor on that wing is occupied.”

“Are you likely to have someone checking out? Maybe we could move down there tomorrow night.”

The clerk shook his head without checking his computer. “That floor’s reserved, sir. Shall I put you on the third floor, or the other wing?”

“Third floor. I want the view.” He was right, they had set aside the wing’s second floor for Variant Corporation’s use. If Frederick was in the hotel, that’s where he’d be.

* * *

“What is our next move?” Pia asked when the lodge’s bellman had deposited their backpacks in their room, pocketed a tip, and left. Her eyes seemed to glow.

“I take a shower. You do homework.” He kissed her forehead and pointed to a pad and ballpoint pen on the bedside table. “See if you can draw a map of the village. Label as many landmarks as you can.”

He luxuriated in the shower, alternating between cold, needle-sharp spray and near-scalding, massage-like pulses from the adjustable showerhead. Afterwards, wearing a bath towel around his hips, he checked the map Pia had drawn. “Good memory. You got most of it right.” He pointed out minor errors such as incorrect road curvature leading to the office complex, utility vehicles parked on the wrong side of the barns, and omission of the electrical transmission lines. Then he wadded the paper and tossed it into the trash can. “Try again.” He stood behind her with his hands on her shoulders and watched while she worked. “Perfect.” He kissed the top of her head. “Bathroom’s all yours.”

While she bathed, he paced the bedroom, muscles tense as he imagined her body under the shower, her hands soaping and caressing. The shower stopped, and his tension escalated.

She stepped out of the bathroom draped in a bath towel that covered her from the tops of her breasts to mid-thigh. He had turned back the bedcovers for her, but she sat in a chair by the room’s only window and stared at the slatted blinds as if she could see through them. Sitting so still, her eyes fixed on the closed blinds, she could have been a statue or a wax figurine.

“You need to get some sleep,” he said.

“I cannot. Knowing my baby is here, just a few feet away, is tearing me apart.”

Alex sat on the carpet near her feet, his back against the wall, and studied her. Her small frame, smoothly rippling muscles, and fluid way of moving reminded him of an Olympic gymnast. “You’re surprisingly muscular,” he said when she caught him appraising her.

“My father insisted on exercise. He wanted me able to keep up and carry my own equipment if we had to march through the jungle.”

They lapsed into silence and merely sat until the bedside digital clock clicked past midnight. “Time to get moving,” Alex said.

She slipped into the bathroom, and he pushed off the floor to begin dressing. As he laced his boots, she emerged fully dressed. He pulled the sheets from the bed and used his knife to cut holes in them.

“What are those for?” she asked.

“Camouflage.” He demonstrated by slipping his head and arms through the holes in a sheet. “Hunker down in the snow wearing this, and you’ll be invisible from more than a few yards.” He stuffed one sheet into her backpack, the other into his.

“What now?” she asked.

“Transportation. Then a diversion. And I have to go out the window.”

“The window?” Her face crinkled into a frown. “Why must you do that?”

“So I’ll have a stealthy way to get back into the hotel. I’ll meet you outside.”

The room had two floor lamps, each with a five foot, hollow metal stem. Alex disassembled them and, with slivers of the butchered sheets, bundled the stems to combine their rigidity. He knotted a loop in his rope, slipped it around the lamp stems, then raised the window and tossed out the rope’s other end. By turning the stems sideways and bracing them across the windowsill, he created an anchor. The lodge was at the upper end of Silver Hill’s short main street, and their window was on the back side, away from the parking lot. Unless he attracted attention by making noise, he was confident he could go down the wall without being noticed. He used the rope to lower their backpacks to the snow.

“While I’m going down the wall, you leave through the lobby. Outside, try to look casual but undecided. Turn right and stroll to the corner of the hotel. I’ll meet you there.” So that his feet would not thud against the outside wall, he removed his boots and looped them around his neck by their laces. With a wink that he hoped was reassuring, he backed through the open window.

When he reached the snow-covered ground at the base of the hotel, he looked up and saw her still watching him. He waved, and she disappeared from the window. Heading for the lobby, he hoped. He laced up his boots, tied the rope so it wouldn’t slap against the building if caught by the wind, and headed for the street. Glancing back, he saw that the rope, white against the building’s stucco facade, became invisible at ten yards. He watched for Pia from a position just inside the tree line. When she strolled by, he called her name and pulled her into the shadows.

Amplified music poured from all three of Silver Hill’s nightclubs, but the sidewalks had cleared of foot traffic. They slipped across the narrow main street and into evergreens on the village’s downhill side. The lot where the ski lodge rented out snowmobiles was empty, but Alex knew they were stored in the maintenance barn at night.

Their hike to the barn involved a steep and slippery descent. On the edge of a cleared area, just short of where maintenance vehicles sat in a row by the barn, he signaled a halt. There had been no night watchman when he stole one of their snowcats, but he guessed there would be now. Flanagan would want to make certain no one did that again.

Pia, so short she could walk under Alex’s arm without ducking, stood at his side. His eyes had adjusted to the night, and he could see her breathing deeply but rhythmically from exertion, the same as he.

“I’ll take a look inside.” He slipped off his backpack, leaned his snowshoes against it, and handed his rifle to her. “Wait here.”

He circled the barn without seeing anyone, but a watchman might have gone inside to get warm. A small window on the back door proved too dirty to see through, and the door was locked. There were two front entrances, a standard-size pedestrian door and a broad roll-up portal for vehicles. The vehicular door was probably locked, but if there was a guard, chances were the smaller one would be open.

A peep through the front window revealed a watchman, two of them in fact, sitting on the barn’s concrete floor and leaning back against supporting columns. They were drinking beer.

Snowmobiles were parked shoulder-to-shoulder, two-deep across one side of the shed. On the other side, a dump truck and a snowcat squatted with their hoods open. Engine parts were strewn over fenders and nearby benches. The dump truck would be excellent cover, and no more than ten feet separated it from the door. But how could he get across that gap without being spotted?

He headed back to where he’d left Pia, and she stepped from behind a tree, lowering his rifle as she did so. She had obviously seen him first and kept him in her sights until she recognized him. Could she actually shoot someone? Alex had seen soldiers with outstanding training records who couldn’t squeeze off a round with a human target in their sights.

He explained the problem. He needed a diversion so he could slip across that critical ten feet of open space inside the barn, and the guards had to separate so he could take them out one at a time.

She handed him the rifle, tiptoed to kiss his chin, and marched across open ground to the barn’s front entrance. At the door, she turned and stared at him while opening the front of her parka and unbuttoning the top three buttons of her shirt. Save for the thermal undershirt, her breasts would have been exposed almost to her nipples. Though nothing showed but white fabric, it was suggestive of a desire to be seen. She ran the fingers of both hands through her short-cropped hair and gave him a tremulous smile. Then she opened the barn door and stepped inside.