The Protectors Page 4

  It took him less than five minutes to make it all the way through the train to my car. Through the peekaboo hole, I saw him work through the aisle taking care to check every row for potential hideaways or sleepers. For two passengers whose faces were obscured like mine, he stopped and spoke briefly to each one. I saw them lower their papers and produce their tickets, to which he gave a perfunctory smile and nod before moving on. His substitute-conductor bit accomplished the goal with a minimum of fuss. In moments, he made his way to the end of the car: just me and my newspaper and no other passengers within four rows.

  “Die Fahrkarte, bitte,” he asked. A young voice, the words more of a challenge than request.

  I snapped my paper down fast, revealing the broadest smile I could muster.

  “Hi! How’s it going?”

  The look on his face was priceless. I could actually see awareness spread over his features, starting with his eyes. As they made their transition from cups to saucers, his mouth dropped open and issued a quiet exhale loaded with “Holy shit!” His face matched his voice; young, no more than thirty. For an instant, he paused, stupefied—two feet from a rogue asset and no clue what to do. Then his instincts took over, and he immediately made poor decisions. Sliding one foot back and turning sideways into a shooter’s stance, he reached across his body with his right arm and drew a Taser from under his sport coat.

  He was fast, too. Stupid, but fast. The arm with the Taser almost fully extended before I shut him down. As his unconscious body dropped, his hand involuntarily released the weapon, which sailed right at my face. I managed to catch the Taser but not the shooter. He crumpled to the floor of the train in a heap. No one saw the exchange, but several people heard him drop and craned around and above their seats to take a look. Part of me wished someone actually had witnessed the scene. Yeah, I felt the urge to show off a little. I’d been alone in a cabin for five years. Sue me.

  But the smarter part of me knew that any attention was bad attention.

  The other ten people in my car got sleepy in a hurry as I stared down at the Taser: the bane of my existence. Although the CIA couldn’t know for sure, electricity was my kryptonite. This quiet revelation had been the only productive part of my relationship with Blaster. His childish antic of injecting every handshake with an electric kicker didn’t make him popular with anybody, but it messed me up bad. Not sure why, but three weeks tearing through science books gave me a good guess: probably something to do with overloading my synapses and screwing with their electric potentials. Didn’t affect the rest of my body any differently than the next person, but even a small static shock took my powers away. The effect lasted only a few minutes, but I had to believe a full-strength Taser would be much, much worse. Maybe even permanent. I had no desire to find out. I removed the cartridge from the barrel and slipped it into my duster pocket.

  Threat neutralized, I turned back to the puddle on the floor. I lifted the bloodhound’s limp body into the seat directly facing mine, and even took the time to put the empty Taser back into his shoulder holster and buckle his seat belt. Took the liberty of lifting his identification, too, but it was as useful as any Agency-supplied cover.

  Stefan Kovac. Republic of Croatia. Right.

  The ID read “Croatia” but the guy cussed in American. I also found his CIA-issued mobile phone and tried to access it. As expected, the device was password protected, and would also have heavy encryption locks on any of the data functions. No matter—I would soon know everything I needed from faux-Stefan. I pocketed the phone and reached across the space between our seats. After a few light shakes, he began to stir.

  “Good morning, Sunshine,” I said.

  His confused, blinking look was familiar. It’s unusual to have your stream of consciousness interrupted while standing with a weapon, then have it turned back on and find yourself seated and empty-handed. He managed better than most, and it took only moments before his glower returned.

  “Sorry about that, but you didn’t give me a ton of options,” I told him. He remained stone-faced. “All right, let’s get started!” I clapped my hands together one time and leaned back in the seat.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Stefan,” he said with a smooth accent.

  “What’s your name, Stefan?”

  Again, he only stared back.

  “Seriously? The silent treatment? You know who I am, and I know who you are, generally speaking. Does your name really matter that much? Let’s at least be civilized. It’s not like I stripped you naked and left you in the dining car. Which I could easily do, by the way.”

  He sighed and his eyes went soft.

  “Fine. Rodney,” he admitted in pure American English. “I don’t get many chances to talk to a superhero, so what the hell.” The word superhero dripped with contempt.

  “Nice to meet you, Rodney . . . As I’m sure you’re aware, my name is Scott. See, not so difficult to be civil, is it?”

  I’d discovered over the years that fawning civility accomplished two goals when dealing with intelligence operatives: one, they got more talkative, and two, they got more pissed-off. Both goals suited my purposes.

  “Not difficult,” he started. “But annoying as hell. Talk all you want, but I’m not gonna tell you anything. You know I was sent to tail you, obviously. You know I’ve got a job to do, just like you. Nothing personal. Sorry about the Taser, but you surprised me.”

  I admired his honesty. He hadn’t yet mastered the art of talking in circles like an experienced operative. In another ten years he’d sound like Tucker.

  “It happens. And yes, I know you’re just doing your job, like me. Out of curiosity, do you know what my job happens to be?”

  He shook his head.

  “Don’t need to know, don’t care. My job was to find you after your disappearing act at the Rheinfelder, and I did.”

  “Excellent work, by the way. I was surprised anybody could get to the train in time. Unfortunately, my job—the one you don’t care about—is time-sensitive and cannot be accomplished with Agency surveillance in tow.”

  Rodney was unsympathetic. “It is what it is.”

  “It is what it is . . . ,” I repeated softly. “Truer words are seldom spoken,” I admitted, “but they don’t change what needs to happen next.”

  One of his eyebrows perked up. “Oh, really? What would that be?”

  “Well, Rodney, here’s the deal: the Agency has no idea I’m on this train yet. Heck, I could be on any of fifteen trains leaving Zurich, or maybe a bus. I’m sure they sent a few of your coworkers on similar jaunts. The Agency won’t know for sure until you tell them, or until enough time passes with no contact . . . in which case they’ll figure I was on the train and disabled you. Then in six hours, the Madrid train station will be crawling with Langley’s finest. You can imagine how much this unfortunate attention will slow me down.” I reached inside my duster and pulled out his phone. “Your earbud mike was out-of-range two minutes after we left the station, so this is what I assume you’d use to blow the whistle on me. Which brings us to the uncomfortable part of our conversation . . .”

  I slipped the phone back inside the duster, placed both elbows on the armrests, and touched my fingertips together in front of my chest.

  “. . . I’m going to need your password, plus any other codes necessary to send a text message saying I’m not on board.”

  He reacted as I predicted. A challenging smile followed by a chuckle.

  “And you actually think I’m gonna do this? Just give you access and let you fly off the reservation?”

  “Rodney, not only do I think you’ll do it . . . I know you’ll do it. One way or the other.” My tone was less civil now.

  “And those ways would be?” he scoffed.

  “Not to sound all cliché, but the easy way and the hard way. The hard way is difficult and painful, and the easy way
is the opposite. Low impact,” I promised, neglecting to mention that the hard way would be difficult and painful to me, not him.

  Rodney kept smiling, but the prospect of pain made him tense up. His fists balled and his torso pulled the seat belt taut.

  “Relax,” I said. “No need to do anything impulsive. You can’t reach me faster than I can shut you down. Let’s be calm.”

  He leaned back and pretended to relax.

  “Me? I’m plenty calm. I don’t mean to burst your bubble, but this is not the first time someone sat across from me and threatened me for information.” He lifted one leg and crossed it over the other, radiating ambivalence. “And with all due respect, Captain Sleepy, what exactly can you do? Make me well rested? Oh yeah, put me in the dining car with no clothes. Wow. Come on, man, be serious.”

  I took the opportunity to mirror his pose and relaxed a bit myself.

  “Rodney, I like you. You’re refreshingly candid and more than a little stupid. It’s a welcome mix. I’m sure we have a few minutes before alarm bells go off and your phone starts ringing, so let’s play a game.”

  “Seriously?”

  “I’ve lived alone the last few years. Humor me.”

  Seeing little reason to abstain, he agreed with a nod.

  “What’s the most valuable commodity on earth?” I asked.

  Staring out the window, he thought for a moment before answering. “Weapons-grade plutonium.”

  Surprised, I smiled and nodded. “Good answer. Incorrect, but good. If I’d asked for the most expensive commodity, you might have been onto something. But valuable? I think you’re wrong.”

  “Okay, smart guy, tell me what’s more valuable,” Rodney said in challenge while crossing his arms.

  “Oh, no question about it—the most valuable commodity on earth is time.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Holy crap, you sound like a freaking greeting card.”

  “No, no . . . hear me out. There’s an easy way to prove it. How old are you?”

  “I’m thirty-two.”

  “Thirty-two? I would’ve figured you for twenty-six, maybe twenty-seven. You’re aging well. You married, Rodney?”

  He squinted, trying to see my angle. “No. Why?”

  “You want to be one day, yes?”

  “Don’t see how that’s relevant, but yeah,” he muttered.

  “Of course you do. Young agent, in great shape, prime of your life . . . looking forward to meeting the girl, settling down, the whole American Dream. All in good time, of course. When you’re done chasing down assholes like me, obviously.”

  “Obviously,” he agreed. More wary now.

  “What if I told you in the same way you close your eyes at night and go to bed looking forward to the next day, your eyes could be shut longer? A lot longer. What if one minute you’re right there—in your seat looking at me—and your thirty-two-year-old eyes close, but when they open again, you’re forty-two?”

  Rodney frowned.

  “Think about it,” I continued. “In literally the blink of an eye, ten years gone. The ten years you would have met your girl, started a family, built a career . . . and then—”

  I snapped my fingers together.

  “Just like that, all of those dreams become . . . well, dreams, I guess. Or what if you shut your eyes right now and”—snap—“you were fifty-two instead of thirty-two? In a coma for twenty years . . . can you imagine?”

  The color drained from his face. I let it sink in for a few seconds.

  “Now, getting back to my point . . . let’s say you had a pound of that expensive weapons-grade plutonium, right there in your pocket, and I asked you to trade. Exchange the plutonium for twenty years of your life. Is that a trade you’d make? I bet it is. Because now you realize I was right.”

  I leaned in for effect.

  “Nothing is more valuable than time. And Rodney, I’m the guy who can shut your eyes.”

  As threats go, it was one of my better ones. He looked out the window and his jaw muscles clenched. A good poker face is awfully tough to maintain when the guy across the table has all the chips. When he turned back, I knew he was going to give me what I wanted.

  “Christ, man. If this is the easy way, I’d hate to see the hard one,” he said.

  “Trust me, I don’t want that, either. You might not see it right now, but we’re on the same side. We both want the same thing, but I need you guys out of the picture when I find her.”

  “Aphrodite?” he asked.

  “You know a little more than you let on . . .”

  “A guess. My section chief told me about North Korea. The same section chief that’s gonna ream my ass if I let you send that text message.”

  A little pushback, but halfhearted.

  “Rodney, I gotta be honest—you’re going to get an ass-chewing either way. The only question you should be asking is: do you want it tomorrow, or ten years from tomorrow?”

  I jiggled the phone in front of his face.

  “Clock’s ticking. I’d rather send the message before they call. Looks better.”

  He sighed.

  “Unlock code is zero-seven-seven-four-three-two.”

  I typed in the numbers and the phone blinked to life. I was halfway through typing the text when a thought occurred. I fixed eyes on Rodney.

  “Just so we’re clear: I don’t have to be sitting right next to you to turn you into Rip Van Winkle. If I get to Madrid and notice a team after I’ve left the train, I will assume you’ve lied to me,” I said, voice cold. “I detest liars, Rodney.”

  His eyes widened and he swallowed. He motioned for the phone.

  “You have to put my ID number at the beginning of the text or they’ll know I was compromised.” His voice was sullen, like a nine-year-old who realizes for the first time the world isn’t truly fair. He punched in a string of digits and then even did me the courtesy of typing the message. He handed the phone back and let me approve before hitting SEND.

  “All done,” I said. Rodney stared up at the ceiling before blowing out a long breath.

  “Well, there goes my career,” he said.

  “I wouldn’t worry. You’re not the first agent to bargain with me, and the others are still around.”

  “Great. I feel better already,” he said with precisely zero enthusiasm.

  He was pissed, and sure to get a first-class dressing-down from his section chief, but he’d live. I slapped my hands down on my thighs and he bolted upright in his seat at the noise.

  “Now comes the time for the good news/bad news portion of our program. The good news is you will be well rested when we reach Madrid. The bad news, unfortunately, your rest is mandatory.”

  Panic flashed over him, which I dismissed with a wave of my hand.

  “Don’t worry. It’s just for the duration of the trip. I swear I won’t do anything more . . . so long as I don’t run into more of your friends in Madrid.”

  The nine-year-old answered. “You promise?”

  “Yes, Rodney, I do. Trust me—I’m one of the good guys.”

  We listened to the thrumming of the train against the tracks for a long moment.

  “Y’know—if you have to tell people you’re the good guy, you’re probably not,” he said.

  I dropped him, and he slumped into his seat. The words stung, but all I could think of was how true they were. Knockout couldn’t fall asleep after that, which has to rank pretty high on the universe’s Irony Meter. Didn’t help to stare at Rodney’s snoring body directly across from me.

  If you have to tell people you’re the good guy, you’re probably not.

  “It is what it is,” I whispered to a train car full of unconscious passengers.

  Of course, getting the last word doesn’t really have the same punch when no one else can hear it.

  CHAPTER
6

  Rodney was true to his word—Madrid was busy, but uncluttered by Langley’s finest. After disembarking, getting truly gone was just a matter of avoiding security cameras and finding a train to Paris. Once in France, being outside Agency surveillance made travel ridiculously easy. All it took was being polite and asking for a ride to the coast. Well, polite, plus the power to render someone unconscious and borrow their car when polite fails.

  Henri didn’t seem to mind, plus I left a few euros on the dashboard for his efforts.

  A ferry ride to Dover and yet another train to London were all I had left, but over the miles I felt a gradual shift within me, and it wasn’t a happy one. It was easy to get involved in all of the CIA nonsense and focus on what needed to be done when I was matched against Agency types. Moving fast, feeling the pursuit, thinking on the run . . . it was invigorating and made me feel sharp—like knocking off five years of accumulated rust.

  But after the heat of the chase dissipated, the impending showdown with Lyla loomed large. My initial plan after talking with Tucker had been simple: I’d explain the larger ramifications, she’d understand the danger, and we’d come to an agreement. It had sounded brilliant in my cabin five thousand miles away, but when I came around the corner and stared at the awning over the St. Moritz entrance, I realized distance is a powerful hallucinogen.

  I’m seconds away from the most seductive, alluring, amazing woman I’ve ever known. Which is great, except for the whole “she can turn me into a leather-clad love slave with no more than a glance and a whisper” thing. Oh, and also—she hates me.

  I felt my entire body vibrate with nervous energy, and the crazy thing was, I couldn’t tell if it was the “I’m on a first date” kind, or the “I’m about to die” kind.

  She’d said 7:45 in her email, and I assumed she’d been coming every night since then waiting for me to show. I glanced at my watch: 7:30. No matter. When you have a dinner date with a goddess, it never hurts to be early.

  I shook my hands out and took a couple of deep breaths before reaching the door, which almost slammed into me as two patrons exited in a huff. They were complaining about being denied a table—apparently St. Moritz was in big demand tonight—but I entered regardless. The maître d’ took only a cursory look in my direction before it was clear that I’d be more fortunate.