through a throat burning with aspirated vomit. 'That depends how good a girl you decide to be.' 'I'll be good.'
'Wonderful. I'm here to find out about Ryan Bolt.' 'Who?' she said, not even knowing why she said it. He struck her across the mouth with the gun. She screamed as she felt her lip split open. Her mouth fille d w ith blood.
'What did you say?' he asked softly.
'Okay, okay, don't. . don't. .' And she started gagging on the blood flowing in her mouth.
'Where does Ryan do his banking? I went out to his condo on the beach; there's no financial records there. I need to know what charge cards he has. . who pays his bills. . stuff like that,' he said.
'Uh. . Who pays his bills?'
'That's right. Simple little answer to that question gets you home free, Elizabeth.'
'Uh. . uh, Jerry. . uh, Jerry, uh. .' She was beginning to hyperventilate.
'Slow down, take a breath. Jerry who?'
'Jerry Upshaw, his agent. They had like a business managing service where they'd do the bills and stuff for an extra five percent.'
'So, where's this guy's office?'
'He's in a private building called The Mayflower on Vine. Jerry dropped Ryan as a client. But he's still doing his bills until Ryan gets back in town.' She was looking at the redheaded man hopefully. 'Can I get out now?'
'Hell yes. We're through, and Elizabeth, I want to thank you for your splendid cooperation. It's really been a huge help.'
She struggled to get up. He waited until she was in a crouch and then fired the Ruger. The silenced automatic jumped in his hand. The bullet hit Elizabeth in the forehead. The back of her head exploded; and her brains flew up onto the tile splash. She reeled backward and hit the wall just under the shower head, then slid down and finally came to rest in her own vomit and blood.
The Ghost unscrewed the silencer and did a quick survey of the apartment to make sure he'd left nothing behind. He left by the front door, got into his car parked a few blocks away, and drove into the summer night.
Upshaw's office was on the first floor of The Mayflower building at Mayflower and Vine. The Ghost found the alarm in an outdoor utility box. Ridiculous, he thought. The alarm didn't even have a police dialer on it. He disarmed it and found a back window, worked it open with a screwdriver, and shinnied in. The computer he was looking for was in an office marked CLIENT ACCOUNTING. He turned it on and punched in 'Bolt.' Magically, there on the screen was Ryan's financial history. He moved quickly through the data bank until he found Ryan's credit card accounts. He started to scan them and then saw something that turned his mood black. Ryan had used his AmEx card in San Diego. He'd withdrawn ten thousand dollars.
'Damn,' the Ghost said. With that much cash, Ryan wouldn't leave a paper trail. He scanned the computer for Ryan's airline mileage card numbers and wrote them down. Then he shut off the computer and left the way he came in, closing the window and resetting the alarm.
Back at his small hotel in Hollywood, he went to the phone book and looked up airlines in the Yellow Pages. One by one, he would check them all.
The flight from San Diego landed at Phoenix International Airport. Ryan walked down the ramp without crutches. Lucinda was at his side. Kaz and Cole greeted them at the gate, and as they shook hands, the ex-fed and the ex-IR were amazed that Ryan could walk at all. Both Ryan and Lucinda were the color of walnut. They made a spectacular couple. With Lucinda's long black hair and Ryan's white-blond, they were turning heads in the airport as they moved down the corridor to the airline counter.
'I wouldn't' ve believed it if I wasn't seeing it,' Kaz said, looking down at Ryan's left leg as he walked with only a slight limp.
'I'm not gonna be making any sharp cuts over the middle, but I'm not bad if I move straight ahead.'
Ryan and Lucinda had packed only carry-on luggage, just one change of clothes and their toilet articles. They'd left the boat at a Mexican marina and paid the dockmaster to watch it for a month.
Kaz had the airline schedules in his hand.
'We take a two o'clock United flight to Atlanta and then connect with the El Al transatlantic direct to Tel Aviv,' he said as they moved up to the United Airlines desk, where Ryan paid for all the tickets with cash. The ticket agent found Ryan's name in her computer and automatically credited his mileage account without mentioning it. An hour later, they were boarding the first leg of the flight.
'United Airlines,' a man's voice said over the phone. 'You guys are screwing me on my MileagePlus. I fly on your airline and you don't give me credit?' the Ghost said. This was the fourth airline he'd called.
'Couldyou give me your name sir and your MileagePlus number? I'll get your account on the screen.'
'Ryan Bolt,' he said and then gave the number he got from Jerry Upshaw's office. He waited as he heard the computer keys clicking over the phone.
'Well, sir, I have your account here. This is odd. . We just credited your account with forty thousand miles.'
'That's impossible.' The Ghost grabbed for a pen on the nightstand.
'No, sir. . Four tickets from Phoenix to Atlanta and then continuing on from Atlanta to Tel Aviv on El Al Flight 2356. Is this Mr. Bolt? Where are you calling from?' The man was starting to get suspicious.
'My mistake.' The Ghost hung up abruptly.
Then he called El Al Airlines. 'You have a flight from Atlanta to Tel Aviv?'
'Yes, sir, Flight 2356, leaving at seven P. M. arriving at eleven A. M.' a man informed him.
'Can you get me out of LAX so that I can meet that flight in Israel?'
Computer keys clicked.
'Yes, sir. Flight 3476 leaves LAX at four this afternoon and arrives in Tel Aviv at nine A. M. That would be two hours ahead of the Atlanta flight. Do you want me to book you?'
'Yes, please. The name is Harold Meeks.'
The Ghost packed his small suitcase, then called a cab. Before he left, he placed a call to Mickey Alo on the scrambled line.
'I just found out they're going to Israel.'
'Really?' The mobster had left the dining room table to take the call. He still had his monogrammed napkin in his hand.
'Why would they be going to Tel Aviv?' the Ghost asked.
'Don't know.'
'There are four of them traveling together. Do you have any idea who's with them?'
'Just get it done. I thought you were the best. What's taking so long?'
'Mr. Alo, it's much easier for me to take care of it in Israel. I have contacts over there. People die unexpectedly in that country all the time. Don't worry, it's better this way.'
After he hung up, he dialed a man named Akmad Jam Jarrar in Paris. Akmad wasn't in, so he left a message in his hotel voice mail that said, 'I need to get the old crew together. Meet me immediately in Tel Aviv, the Hotel American. Same terms as always. The Ghost.'
Chapter 57
The passenger in seat 25B of El Al flight 3476 went into a convulsion at 7:37 A. M., just as the El Al flight attendants were beginning to set up for breakfast. His name was Leonard Greenberg, he was fifty-six, and he owned a jewelry store in Burbank, California. His legs shot out and kicked the seat in front of him; then he jackknifed forward and hit his head on the back of the tray table. The woman sitting in the seat in front woke up with a start, turned, and glared around the seat at him. What she saw immediately alarmed her. Leonard Greenberg looked at her with half-lit brown eyes and said, 'So sorry.' Sitting beside him were Leonard's wife, Hanna, and his sixteen-year-old daughter, Sasha. They were all going to Israel for the first time.
'Get the stewardess! Get a doctor!' Hanna Greenberg shouted at her daughter Sasha, who scrambled out of
