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Charley Middleton held the gun, Tesla a letter opener she had found in the suite’s desk.

“Nora, we really should get you to a hospital,” Middleton said.

“It’s mostly stopped bleeding. We’ll go to the hospital soon enough, but we’ll have to figure out what to do with her first.”

Tesla set down the letter opener, removed the gag from the assassin’s mouth and quickly stepped away. She picked up the letter opener once more.

“So,” said Tesla, “perhaps you will tell us who wants Ms. Middleton and why?”

The woman looked up at both of them, her eyes dark with hatred and contempt. In French, she said, “There is no amount of pain I cannot endure.”

Tesla met her gaze. “Let’s find out if that is true.”

12

P. J. PARRISH

A
whimpering sound drew Tesla’s eyes to the corner. Charley was slumped against the wall. The Hawlen 9mm was still in her hand, but the barrel, with its long silencer, was pointed at the floor.

“Charley!” Tesla said sharply. “Keep the gun on her.”

Her eyes came up, brimming with tears. When she raised the gun, she had to hold it with two trembling hands.

Tesla turned back to Jana, who was seated on the floor in front of her. Her dark skin glistened with sweat and her breath was coming so fast and shallow Tesla could actually hear the whistle of air through her lips as she struggled to keep calm.

For the third time, Tesla snapped a flame from the lighter and positioned the blackened tip of the silver letter opener over it. A slither of smoke curled from the blade—not from the char of the silver, but from the sear of the tiny bits of flesh that clung to it.

As she reached toward Jana’s face, a memory flicked into her head. The beach at Cap d’Antibes. Harold questioning Balan in the same manner he questioned all suspects, no matter how vile their crimes.

Respectful, measured interrogation. There was no point in abusing prisoners, he said. It was counterproductive.

Tesla pushed Harold’s face and words from her mind. That was him, not her.

Tesla held the letter opener in front of Jana’s face. The woman’s eyes filled with defiant tears. Her dark hair was matted with blood from the gash inflicted when Tesla hit her with the chair. And her lip was swollen from Tesla’s fists. Nothing had made her even flinch. Until Tesla had brushed the red-hot metal of the letter opener against the smooth olive skin of Jana’s finely sculpted cheekbone.

Vanity. That was the key to unlock this woman’s tongue.

“Why are you trying to kill Charley Middleton?” Tesla demanded.

Jana shut her eyes.

“Who are you working with?”

Jana pressed back against the wall, trying to get away from the letter opener.

Tesla warmed its tip again, holding it to the flame until it glowed red. Then she pressed it against Jana’s cheek.

Jana jerked to the side and screamed.

As Jana slid to the carpet, a cell phone fell from the pocket of her trench coat. Tesla saw the woman’s eyes skitter to it. She snatched it up and tossed it out of reach.

“Who are you working for?” Tesla demanded.

“I never tell you,” Jana whispered in English through gritted teeth. “I never betray him.”

“Betray who? The Scorpion? Your father? He’s dead.”

“Dead,” Jana whispered. “You to be dead soon.” She looked to Charley. “Her too.”

Tesla pressed the letter opener to Jana’s cheek again. She screamed again as the smell of burning flesh filled the room.

“Stop!” Charley Middleton screamed.

Tesla’s eyes spun.

“Stop it! Stop it!”

Charley had wedged herself in a corner, covering her mouth with one hand. The gun dangled from the other.

“Charley,” Tesla said evenly.

But she wasn’t listening. She was sobbing now. Tesla stared at her, debating whether to go to her or make her leave the room. But the bullet wound in her own shoulder was throbbing and even with Jana bound and weakened, she didn’t trust herself to handle things alone right now.

And she had promised Harold she would keep Charley safe. That was the last thing he had asked of her as they parted in London. He told her of his plan to get into Russia and when she insisted on going with him, he had asked her to meet Charley in Paris instead.

Nora, I can’t lose her.

Late that night, as Tesla had lain curled against his sweating chest, the sheets damp with their lovemaking, she had felt a rawness, a sadness, in Harold Middleton she had never felt before. His guilt was palpable over putting his beloved daughter in jeopardy over what he called “this quixotic crusade.” In the dark, she had held him and promised to protect her.

“Poor little Charlotte.”

At the sound of Jana’s voice, Tesla’s eyes swung back to the dark-eyed woman pressed against the wall.

“Shut up!” Tesla hissed.

Jana managed a swollen smirk. In French she said, “The daughter does not have the courage of the father.”

“I said shut up!” Tesla swung and hit Jana hard with the back of her hand. The cut on Jana’s lip ripped open, spraying blood on the wall.

“Stop it!” Charley cried. “No more, Nora, please!”

Tesla stared at her. What was this? Where was this coming from? For the last fifteen minutes, as Tesla had interrogated Jana, Charley had been quiet. Even as Jana’s moans of pain had grown deeper, Charley had not moved, not made a sound. Now, suddenly, she was coming apart.

“No more, Nora,” she whispered. “Please. Please. I can’t take this. I can’t do this anymore.”

Suddenly, Tesla knew. For all her bravado, Charley had never witnessed anything like this—the interrogation and torture of another human being. A woman, no less. Despite Harold’s willingness to let Charley play around the periphery of the Volunteers, he had never brought her into the violence of its world. Charley Middleton had hacked computers, done research. Her reality was virtual. Her hands were clean.

But her own past was clouded with violence. The brutal murder of her mother by her father’s enemies. The betrayal and death of her husband. The loss of her baby.

Another thought flashed through Tesla’s head. Yesterday, in a café, Charley let her guard down long enough to talk about her mother’s death and what she said after.
I know you and Harry were lovers and I used to hate you for that but I don’t now. I admire you, Nora.

And second flash of memory. The threat she had made to Ian Barrett-Bone yesterday in the taxi as Charley listened:
I’ll kill you for the sheer pleasure of it.

Charley’s sobs filled Tesla’s ears. She glanced back at Jana, whose dark eyes glittered with hatred.

“Poor little Charlotte,” Jana said, her voice almost maternal. “Death is around you. Mother, husband. Your baby cut from your—”

Tesla spun and smacked Jana hard, sending the woman into a spasm of coughing and spitting blood.

A soft thud. From the corner of her eyes, Tesla saw Charley slump to the carpet.

One second of diversion but it was enough. Jana brought her bound wrists up in a quick jerk, catching Tesla under the jaw and sending her reeling backwards. The letter opener went flying.

A second blow hit Tesla in her wounded shoulder. White knives of pain sliced through her body. For a second, the room swirled gray-going-black and she felt herself drop down to her knees.

Jana was just a blur, flailing and pulling against the electrical cord on her ankles.

Tesla fought back the waves of pain and nausea, one thought in her head.
Gun . . . get the gun.

Tesla threw herself toward Charley’s body. The dark barrel of the gun was just visible beneath the blue of Charley’s running suit. Tesla grabbed the Hawlen, jerked to a kneeling position and leveled it, finger curled on the trigger.

She blinked the room back into focus.

Nothing. Just a flash of black boots and white trench coat disappearing behind the open door of the hotel room.

Jana stumbled down the stairs but when she hit the hotel lobby, she froze. A large man in a green windbreaker and ball cap was standing at the desk. His face was red and he was banging the bell on the desk.

“Hello? Hey, anybody here?”

From her vantage point, Jana could see the shoes of the dead clerk behind the desk but the American could not. A commotion at the door as a fat woman tried to drag a huge suitcase through. Beyond the window, Jana could see the open trunk of a taxi and the driver, letting loose a stream of crusty French as he pulled out more luggage.

The taxi was double-parked, blocking her limo. And there was no one behind the wheel.

Where the hell was her driver?

Then she spotted the Moroccan across the street buying cigarettes at a tabac. Jana cursed as she gently touched a finger to her seared cheek.

A sound behind her on the stairs. The bitch was after her. There was no time.

She bolted down the narrow hallway to the back. The tiny kitchen was a blur as she threw open the door and stumbled out into the cold morning air. A quick look told her she was in an impasse with one exit.

No choice. She would have to take her chances on the street. Jana began to run.

In the lobby, Tesla quickly assessed the situation. Body behind the desk, two bewildered and bedraggled Americans. But no Jana.

Holding the Hawlen at her side, Tesla scaled the mountain of luggage blocking the door, ignoring the American man’s yelling. She slid to a stop on the street.

Tesla mentally clicked through the options with computer-speed.

Taxi? You couldn’t hail one on any Paris street and there were no cabs at the nearby stands.

Metro? The nearest was George V, a good five-minute hike.

No, Jana would try to contact the person who had sent her.

Tesla gave the street a quick scan. Even at the busiest times of day, rue Pierre 1er de Serbie was a staid street of stone-facade apartment buildings. Now, at seven on this cold October morning, there was only one café owner out, the crank of his unrolling shutters breaking the quiet.

Except . . .

A lone figure in white just disappearing around the far corner. Tesla took off in pursuit.

But when she reached the corner, she came to an abrupt stop.

A swirl of motion, sound, smells and people.

Damn. Saturday. Market day.

Tesla started down the narrow aisle, eyes darting between the overflowing stands of vegetables, fruits, fish and cheeses. The crowd pressed close—young women pushing strollers, old women toting straw baskets, boys on mopeds. Tesla was careful to keep the gun down, hoping her loose slacks offered some cover. The last thing she needed was a panicked crowd.

She pushed on, her eyes raking the crowd for Jana. The woman couldn’t go unnoticed for long. Her face was a pulpy mess and her white trench coat was covered in blood.

Where the hell was she?

Tesla grimaced in pain. She caught a glimpse of herself in a café window. Wild hair and a fresh stain of blood on her blouse from her seeping shoulder wound.

Her reflection was framed by orange and black crepe paper hung from the café window. Paper skeletons and black cats. Halloween. Today was Halloween, a holiday the Parisians had just recently appropriated from Americans. Tonight the Champs d’ Élysées would teem with drunken kids in vampire teeth and theater blood.

Two women stumbling down the street drenched in the real thing would hardly get a glance today.

Twenty yards away, a flash of white amid the riot of color at a far stall. Tesla reached the flower stall just as Jana disappeared again. To the left was a narrow alleyway, just like the impasse back at the hotel. Tesla made a quick choice and raced to the open door about half-way down.

Kitchen. Deserted.

A brush of a heavy drape and she was in the bistro’s small dining room. A thin man in a white serving coat had been folding napkins but now was just staring.

“Where did she go?” Tesla demanded.

The young man’s eyes widened when he saw her gun.

“
La femme dans blanc! Où est-elle allée
?”

“
La bas
.” He pointed to a spiral staircase.

Removing the silencer, Tesla drew in a shuddering breath and started down the narrow stairs.

She quickly searched the two small toilets. Nothing. There was a third door. It opened into a small dark storage room. Tesla slapped the cold wall and her hand found a switch. The small room came to life under the single hanging bare bulb. Rough stone walls, a cracked tile floor. Piles of old tables, broken bistro chairs, boxes and crates. It was filled with junk, except for a path leading to the wine rack that stretched across the length of one stone wall.

Tesla swept the gun slowly across the shadows. She knew Jana didn’t have a weapon but she wasn’t taking any chances. She crept through the debris, her two-handed grip on the Hawlen tight.

She stopped and stood perfectly still, listening for any sound.

Nothing.

But then she felt it. A hard stream of cold air at the back of her neck.

She spun and leveled the gun toward the bistro chairs. She approached carefully, her eyes alert for any movement behind the ten-foot-high tangle of legs and shredded rattan seats. The stream of air grew stronger.

Tesla grabbed a leg atop the pile and gave a sharp pull. The top chairs clattered to the tile, one clipping the hanging bulb, sending it swinging wildly.

Jesus.

A small open door in the stone wall. With each sway of the bulb, Tesla could glimpse what lay beyond.

Tunnels. Not stone but some rough gray-white material. A low curved ceiling not more than six or eight feet above the dirt floor.

A dusty stench poured out.

What was this?

But then the odd smell registered. Chalk?

And with that came a flash of memory. Harold . . . that night five years ago when, in the highest heat of their affair, he had brought her here to Paris for a weekend. Dinner at Taillevent, a three-hundred-euro Haut Brion. And to impress her even more, a trip to the restaurant’s wine cellar. There, the sommelier told them that the sleek vault used to be a dank cave, part of a network of tunnels below Paris that had once been the city’s thriving chalk quarries. The tunnels ran for hundreds of miles below apartments, cafés and shops. All but a few had been abandoned and boarded up.

Tesla drew in a breath and stepped into the darkness.

The swinging bulb offered up moving slices of black and white. But beyond thirty feet, all light disappeared.

Tesla stood perfectly still, senses pricked for the slightest sound of movement. The drug-rush of adrenalin had dulled the pain in her shoulder.

She advanced slowly. With the dying sway of light, she could see now that the tunnel ahead branched off into two others.