going.”
Sandberger was still in the booth when Weiss called the second time. Since then the bar had filled up, and he’d switched from martinis to Bud Lite. Four of his people were outside watching the driveway, and Alphonse and Hanson were nursing their Cokes across the barroom near the door.
“He just left in a cab.”
“Which way is he headed?”
“I didn’t see.”
“Aren’t you following him, for Christ’s sake?” Sandberger demanded, his voice rising.
“It happened too fast. By the time I realized it was McGarvey in the back of the cab, it was out on the street and for some reason the stupid bastards at the barrier wanted to check my ID.”
Suddenly nothing was making sense to Sandberger, and he had a strong premonition that wherever Weiss actually was at this moment, McGarvey was there with a pistol to his head. Weiss was too good to have been taken like that, but he was also smart enough to give some sort of a clue if he got any opening. “Who was the lead man on the barrier? Was it Johnny Karp?”
Weiss had no reason to know the names of the contractors guarding the hotel entrance. They operated out of a small and not very well known company headquartered in Los Angeles.
“Johnny left around four, I don’t know who the hell this guy was,” Weiss said.
That was it, McGarvey was with him. “Okay, I want you to get back here as fast as you can. I think McGarvey’s probably going to back off for now, but I want to talk to you.” He motioned Alphonse and Hanson over.
“I think you’re right. He might even be trying to catch up with Tim and Ronni.”
“I’ll be in my suite,” Sandberger said. “Come right up.”
“Yes, sir,” Weiss said and the connection was broken.
Alphonse and Hanson slid in the booth across the table from him. “I just got off the phone with Harry. I think McGarvey got the drop on him and they’re on their way over. Alert our people outside — Harry’s driving a dark blue Mercedes C class — I want them both taken out. Then get upstairs and wire the east door. I’ll be in the suite with a little surprise.”
His two bodyguards got up and left the bar.
Sandberger finished his beer, laid a couple of twenties on the table, and went out to the elevators just off the lobby. He’d always been of the opinion that second-rate personnel were not capable of handling first-rate problems. Sometimes the only way to make sure that a job was done right, was to do it yourself.
The McGarvey problem would end tonight.
FORTY-EIGHT
They crossed the Tigris above the section known as Babil, and Weiss kept nervously glancing over at McGarvey. The Ritz-Carlton tower rose above most of the other buildings in the Green Zone and traffic here had dramatically increased. Baghdad wasn’t back to normal yet, but the city’s people seemed to want to head that way, and McGarvey hoped the lives we had given up to topple Saddam Hussein’s regime were worth the results.
“Look, you know you won’t get within a hundred yards of Mr. Sandberger,” Weiss said. “He knows you’re coming.”
“Your little play with the hotel guard’s name was obvious,” McGarvey said.
“I meant that Tim and Ronni must have called him by now.”
McGarvey shook his head. “I think they went back to their room in the new airport hotel, and they’ll be on the first United flight back to the States. Theirs was supposed to be an independent operation. With the deals on the table for Admin from State, your boss doesn’t want to take any chances of a shoot-out except in self- defense.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about the Friday Club, and I’m here for the answers. But I don’t think your boss is going to be very happy how I ask.”
“You’re crazy.”
“Certifiable,” McGarvey said, his anger in check, his level of awareness tuned to everything around him, inside and outside the car. He was going to have one chance to get Sandberger alone long enough to find out who had killed his son-in-law and Katy and Liz. To do that he figured he was going to have to either take down whatever assets Sandberger had put in place, or sidestep them if possible. Probably shooters in front of the hotel, on either side of the driveway. Maybe a spotter in the lobby. And certainly men in the eighth-floor corridor, at the stairwells and elevators, because he was pretty sure that Sandberger would have retreated to his suite where it would be much easier to defend himself than out in the open. The man would be treating this affair like a military operation. But all battles had losers as well as winners.
A block from the hotel McGarvey had Weiss pull over and stop at the curb. This close inside the zone traffic, most of it civilian, was heavy. “You have a choice,” he said. “I’m getting out of the car and you’re free to go. But if you want to try something stupid I will take you out.”
Weiss licked his lips but said nothing.
“If you do drive over to the hotel, I’d advise that you keep your head down, because I’ll kill anyone who gets in my way. My only interest this evening is Sandberger. Clear?”
Weiss nodded, but held his silence.
McGarvey opened the door and started to get out of the car when he felt Weiss make a sudden lunge. Dumb, but not unexpected. Sandberger’s orders would be for his people to take whatever opportunity came along.
“Bastard,” Weiss grunted.
McGarvey slipped out of the car and slid half a step to the right as he turned and brought his pistol to bear. Weiss had grabbed a spare pistol, another Beretta 9mm, from probably under the seat, and was raising it when McGarvey fired one shot, catching the man in the middle of his forehead and slamming him back against the driver- side door.
The noise, partially contained inside the car and muffled by the sounds of traffic, went unnoticed. None of the cars or trucks passing slowed down.
Slipping his pistol into the holster beneath his jacket McGarvey closed the car door, and headed down the street to the Ritz. Other people were on foot, some of them in western dress so he figured he wasn’t terribly obvious.
About fifty yards from the hotel’s sweeping driveway that led up to the entrance portico he pulled up and slipped into the shadows of a line of small shops, shuttered now, in the lee of what was probably a building containing some Iraqi government function. Such places were scattered all across the Green Zone.
He watched for a full five minutes as cars and cabs came and went, spotting a pair of men stationed in the driveway leading to the hotel’s entrance, and another pair on the opposite side for vehicles leaving. Dressed in the near standard contractor’s uniform of jeans, dark shirts, and Kevlar vests with a lot of pockets, they were waiting for Weiss to show up, presumably with his passenger, and their orders were to take out both of them.
It was a little risky to stage a shoot-out these days, but before the cops showed up they would probably plant some explosives in the car. They were simply doing their jobs, protecting the hotel from suicide bombers.
McGarvey moved back until he was clear, then ran down the street, keeping to the shadows as much as possible, until he found a service driveway that led to the rear of the hotel.
When he was out of sight of anyone on the road, he took out his pistol and screwed the silencer onto the end of the barrel.
Sandberger eased the door open and looked out into the corridor. Alphonse leaned against the wall a few feet from the elevator, which meant that Hanson was just around the corner from the east stairway door.
“Keep on your toes,” he told his bodyguards. “If McGarvey’s going to show tonight, it’ll be within the next
