work for you. Will you want to get rid of me, too?”
Zapata smiled. The sun was growing stronger. It felt good on his bald head. “Lots of people who’ve worked for me are still alive.”
“Hmm,” the Ukrainian pondered. “That is no answer.”
“I like this man, Kyle!” Zapata said. “You’re sharp, sir. But don’t worry, I have no intention of killing ev
eryone. Just do this job, get paid, and have a good life.” Franko nodded, picked up a brown paper bag full of cash, and walked away.
“He’ll do it, right?” Kyle said.
“You’re not seriously asking.”
Kyle laughed, amused and, more likely, impressed by Zapata’s confidence. “Have you ever been wrong?”
Zapata stared out across the beach. It was a fair question, an important question that merited a thoughtful answer. He considered his major decisions since the day he’d walked up into the hills and away from his identity. The tasks he had set for himself in the last few years, from Venezuela to Eastern Europe and the Middle East, appeared in his memory like so many bits of a Rubik’s Cube. One by one they had spun into place and yes, now and then he had encountered some difficulty — the Mossad agents who’d sniffed around his activities in Jordan, the national policeman who’d caught on to his alias in Buenos Aires — but always he’d foreseen it several moves ahead and simply shifted the puzzle in a new direction.
At last he said, “No.”
Such a significant statement to be summed up in one small word, Zapata thought without ego — and that was part of his genius, part of his success — that he had no ego. He had never been the victim of any government investigation in part because he’d never been the victim of his own pride. A good plan was a reflection of the realities on the ground, not a reflection of the planner’s genius. Zapata had always succeeded because he was brilliant, but also because he was clear-sighted.
All of this was lost on Kyle. Kyle Risdow was not a terrorist, nor was he an anarchist, and he lacked utterly the perspective and intelligence to appreciate Zapata’s genius. He was a much more common type of villain: a profiteer and opportunist. He had been making money from instability since Hurricane Andrew in Florida back in 1992, when his little grocery store had miraculously survived and he’d jacked his prices up one hundred percent.
“Good,” Risdow said smugly. “Then after today I should be even richer.”
Mark Kendall jogged around the Staples Center. The huge digital display on the side of the complex read “Professional Reality Fighting Championships Tonight!”
He had hours still before his real warmup began, but he was full of nervous energy. He felt more like a kid in his first fight than a veteran in what the odds said was his last. He wasn’t afraid of his opponent, but he was afraid of failure. He was afraid to hear his baby girl crying in the background on the next telephone call. He was afraid to hear the sadness in his wife’s voice, the pure, undiluted sorrow of a mother who cannot help her child. He couldn’t bear that. He didn’t care about the fight, but he couldn’t bear to let his family down.
And what if he did? What if he failed them? Kendall put a big hand on the pocket of his track suit. The envelope was in there. Was the little man serious? And could he kill someone?
The answer to the second question came easily. Yes, he could. For his daughter he could do anything. And he would do it if he had to, for his baby. He’d known that the minute she was born, when he held that tiny creature that had come through him and out of his wife’s body, and finally understood what all his size and strength were built for. They were built to protect that baby. And that’s what he would do now, no matter what the cost.
Slowly Kendall removed the envelope. He opened it. The writing inside was very direct, the same way the bald man had spoken. It told him about the bank account that would be activated in his wife’s name the same day he completed his task. It told him that the account would be closed if the authorities ever found out. And it told him who to kill.
Kendall read the name. He hadn’t heard it before, or at least he didn’t remember it. But it sounded important.
He felt fear — more fear than a man his size ought to feel. But then he thought of his baby girl, and he steeled himself to act.
Jack parked Talia Gerwehr’s car on Seventeenth Street, looking for the address Talia had plucked from her computer. The houses here were large, but run-down. This was a de-gentrified neighborhood that forty years ago had been an upper-class enclave overlooking downtown. But three generations of gang warfare had made the houses forget their past. They were old, sagging hulks now, occupied by a mixture of hardworking families who kept to themselves and gang members with too much time on their hands.
Jack found the house. According to the Federal anti-gang task force, it was the home of Ruben “Smiley” Lopez, suspected leader of the main L.A. branch of MS–13. It was a large, two-story Colonial-style house perched at the top of a long red brick staircase. The tumbled slope below the porch had once been landscaped, but now was nothing more than dirt and weeds. The house itself was dirty white, with several windows covered over in cardboard and tape.
Jack climbed the stairs, not sure how to approach, when he heard a scream and a soft puff — the sound of bullets being fired through a silencer.
15. THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 10 A.M. AND 11 A.M. PACIFIC STANDARD TIME
Jack pulled his weapon — the Para Ordinance.45 he’d taken from Peter Jiminez — out of his waistband and sprinted up the last few steps. He kicked the door hard, but the door held and electric shocks forked up his leg. As run-down as the house looked, the door was reinforced. Jack kicked again, hard, and this time the frame surrendered and the door swung inward.
Jack bobbed his head inside and then out again just as he heard the soft
The living room was big and opened up to the right of the front door, so most of its space was now behind him. To the left of the front door, now in front of him, the house opened onto what looked like a dining room. In between, and set farther into the house, was a staircase that climbed to the second floor. A hallway led to the back of the house and probably the kitchen. Jack glanced behind him to make sure his back was secure — there was nothing but another couch, a few chairs, and a fireplace. There were empty beer cans scattered on the furniture and floor, and the distinct smell of cannabis.
He stayed low, peeking around the side of the couch, across the parlor, and into the dining room. He saw nothing, but he heard a girl’s sob. Then the girl squealed, and two people appeared in the doorway. In front was a frightened Latina wearing a short cotton nightgown, sobbing and staring at Jack in terror. Behind her, using her as a shield, was a hard-looking man in a black leather jacket, most of his white face hidden by the girl’s shoulder. He had his left hand in her hair and his right hand on a mean-looking Smith & Wesson.
“Back off!” the man ordered in a thick Slavic accent. He moved himself and the girl toward Jack and the door.
Jack had no idea who he was, but the man clearly mistook Jack for someone who would hesitate in that situation. Jack raised up to one knee, steadied his weapon, and fired a hair’s breadth above the girl’s shoulder. The round was meant to go right between the taker’s eyes, but it had been a long night for Jack. The bullet grazed the man’s temple, drawing an angry red line from the corner of his eye to the back of his ear.
