“I don’t see why not.”
“Then why are we here, Nova? Why would someone want to buy the code if they can’t even use it?”
He stands there, rubbing his fingers over the stubble on his chin. Finally he shrugs and says, “I guess we’ll find out tomorrow.”
I wander into the bedroom with the tables and computers. I sort through the surveillance photos, the reports. Everything is written in French. Daily reports on Delano’s residence, on Alayna Gramont’s movements.
I sit down at one of the computers and pull up Google. I put in Roland Delano’s name. Over one hundred thousand hits come up. One site gives his background: a man born in Egypt but raised in America, a rich man who gave huge amounts of money to charities. Another site paints a darker picture: the arms dealer, the ties to known terrorists, the murderer.
Many of the sites refer to his death in Las Vegas. A mob hit, one site claims, while another points the finger at a competing arms dealer.
I bring up the website for Le Monde, one of Paris’s top newspapers. I search Delano’s name. The names that are associated I scribble down on a notepad beside me.
I try the same thing at another Paris newspaper site, then another. I keep scribbling down names. Out of the handful I have listed, only one sticks out.
I start searching the name. Looking at the sites that come up. Reading over the information posted.
At one point I yawn and rub my eyes. I look at the time in the corner of the screen and am surprised to see that two hours have passed.
I stand up, stretch, tilt my neck back and forth. My entire body aches.
I go out into the rest of the apartment and find only Philippe. He sits in a chair with a book opened on his lap. He has reading glasses on, and when he looks up at me he shifts the glasses down on his nose so he can look over the rims.
“I’m on watch,” he says. “Reed and Nova went in to sleep.”
“I found out his name.”
“Whose?”
“Xerxes.”
Philippe curls his lip, shakes his head. “That’s not even his real name.”
“No, it’s not. But that’s what he calls himself and what the rest of the world knows him as.”
“You look tired.”
“I know why he had your parents killed.”
“Go in and try to sleep for a few hours.”
“Your mother was a witness. She was going to testify.”
“Please, I don’t want to talk about this.”
“Of course Xerxes couldn’t have your mom testify, so he had her and your dad killed. Made it look like a random drive-by shooting, like they were just collateral damage. It was too obvious and the police took him in for questioning. But they had no evidence on him, nothing to charge him with. They had no choice but to let him go.”
Philippe slams the book shut. His face is red. Glaring up at me, he says, “That’s right. The man is untouchable.”
“Nobody’s untouchable.”
“Why do you care, anyway?”
“I’m just curious.”
Philippe continues to glare back at me. A long moment passes. Finally he takes a breath, shakes his head, and opens the book.
I leave him and slip into the bedroom with the cots. Both Nova and Reed are asleep, their snoring loud. Fucking great.
I lie down anyway. I stare at the ceiling. I try not to think about anything. I try to clear my mind. But somehow Karen slips into that empty void.
And then I’m asleep and dreaming and back in Iraq. Karen has already killed herself. I’m left with what she told me. I’ve already talked to my father. I’ve made my decision. And then I’m waiting in the porta potty, just waiting, and when I open the door I suddenly stop because it’s not the monster I’m expecting.
No, this is a completely different monster.
My father smiles and says, Surprise.
Thirty-Four
“She’s on the move.”
These are the very first words I’ve heard Boris speak, and as they come across the radio his heavy Russian accent is unmistakable.
Next is Philippe’s voice: “Reed, do you have a visual?”
“Affirmative.”
Nova is with Reed in a car parked two blocks down from Delano’s mansion. Boris is still on top of the building across the street. I’m nowhere close but still I can visualize it in my mind: Boris peering over the roof with binoculars, keeping Alayna Gramont and her entourage of guards in sight as they get into a car. The car will be something flashy, just like the mansion, if not a limo then maybe a Bentley. Once she is inside the car with her guards, they will be on the move. It’s eleven thirty and the buy is supposed to be in a half hour. Reed and Nova will follow in their car for at least three or four blocks, depending on Gramont’s direction, then they will pass it off to either Philippe or Boylan and myself.
Boris: “They’re getting into a black Mercedes SUV.”
Damn, I was somewhat close.
Boylan hasn’t spoken the entire hour we’ve been in the car. Just like his counterpart, he has broad shoulders and a strong face. In fact, they could be brothers if it wasn’t for Boylan’s reddish hair and green eyes.
Reed’s voice comes through the radio: “They’ve just turned onto Boulevard de Grenelle, headed southeast.”
“Keep on them,” Philippe says. “Boylan, get ready.”
Philippe is positioned ten blocks to the north, while we’re positioned ten blocks to the south. At Philippe’s word, Boylan starts the engine, glances once over his shoulder, and shoots us out into traffic.
Philippe: “Reed, status.”
“They’re taking their time, definitely in no hurry. Right now we’re turning onto Boulevard Pasteur.”
“Boylan?”
“Almost there,” Boylan says beside me. His hands are tight around the steering wheel as he maneuvers us around a slower-moving vehicle. Buildings and parked cars and pedestrians whip past us. I want to tell him to slow down but this isn’t my show; Nova and I are along for the ride, here just in case additional backup is needed.
Speeding past a hospital,
