Korostin laughed.
“Fuck you and your blow job.”
With that Korostin clicked off, leaving Sy Wirth alone with his two BlackBerrys, half-dozen legal pads, coffee, mineral water, club sandwich, and unease.
8:20 P.M
Hauptkommissar Emil Franck turned his Audi down a service road near Tegel Airport in the last rays of warm summer-evening sunshine. Sunshine that, after the gray skies and drizzle of the morning should have cheered him a little at least. But he was in no mood for cheer. Apprehending Marten for the killing of Theo Haas had been one thing, but since the photographs and the rebellion in Equatorial Guinea had come into play it was clear that something far more complex than the murder of a Nobel laureate was taking place. As he had said on the phone, it would be a billiard game. Kovalenko was already in it. Moscow was watching. God only knew where it would go from there.
Ahead he could see a maroon Opel parked at the side of the road next to a security fence. All around was the thunder and whine of jet aircraft approaching or taking off from the airfield. He slowed, then pulled up behind the Opel and stopped. Two men were in it. Kovalenko and a driver. The Russian said something to the other man, then opened the door and got out and walked back to the Audi.
“So, our friend is now airborne and in a piston-engine Cessna,” Kovalenko said as he slid in next to Franck.
“Fuselage registration D-VKRD,” Franck said. “Flight plan filed to Malaga. They will have to stop for fuel at least once.”
“You’ve done well, Hauptkommissar. I know how valuable informants can be. I trust you will see that he or she is well rewarded.”
“Things have a way of taking care of themselves.”
Kovalenko smiled. “True, Hauptkommissar. It is-” Kovalenko’s voice was drowned out by the roar of a Lufthansa Airbus taking off. He waited until the sound died away and then continued. “It is safe to leave your car here?”
“Why?”
Kovalenko smiled again. “Nothing against Berlin law enforcement. It’s just that I have a driver. We’ll take mine.”
“To where? We’re leaving from here. From Tegel, yes?”
“No, Schonefeld.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I cannot think as Moscow does.” Kovalenko shrugged. “What can I tell you? You should see the hotels they put me up in.”
Franck studied him for the briefest moment. He didn’t like the sudden change of arrangements. Kovalenko was supposed to have arranged for a private jet that would leave from here, from Tegel. Now the plan had shifted to Schonefeld Airport in Brandenburg, south of the city. It would be a waste of time to ask why. He’d been through this kind of thing often enough in the past, in “the old days,” before the wall was torn down. One didn’t ask why, just did what Moscow ordered.
“Alright,” he said finally. They got out of the Audi, Franck pulled a small overnight bag from the rear seat, then closed the door and locked it. Thirty seconds later they were in the Opel and heading south toward Schonefeld Airport.
8:32 P.M.
51
CESSNA 340, D-VKRD, SOMEWHERE OVER
SOUTHERN GERMANY. CRUISING SPEED 190 MPH.
ALTITUDE 26,170 FEET. 9:35 P.M.
They had been flying for nearly two and a half hours, with Anne and Marten sitting impassively in plush leather seats behind the pilot, the blond, handsome Brigitte. Before they took off she had courteously filled them in with her full name-Brigitte Marie Reier-and a little of her history. She was thirty- seven and had flown in the German air force. She was a single mother of twelve-year-old twins. The three lived “temporarily” with her brother, his wife, and their two children, and everyone got along, more or less. And that had been that. Afterward she was back to the business at hand, telling them there was bottled water and sandwiches and a thermos of coffee in the pullout tray beyond the seats. There was a tiny toilet facility between the pilot and passenger compartments, she said, but if they could, they might be better off waiting until they made a fuel stop-or stops, depending on head-or crosswinds-and they could pee or whatever at that time. That had ended it. Immediately she’d helped them on board, climbed into the cockpit, then started the engines and taken off. Little or nothing had been said since.
Brigitte aside, it was Anne who had kept the silence, sitting back, hands in her lap, staring blankly out the window. When Marten had asked her if she wanted something to eat or drink she’d not even looked at him, simply shook her head in reply. His first thought was that now they were finally up and away and out of the immediate grasp of the police she was troubled by her promise to meet with Joe Ryder, show him the photographs-presuming they found them-and reveal the clandestine business workings of Striker Oil, Hadrian, and SimCo. To promise it was one thing because it was nothing more than a pledge written in air. To actually carry through and do it was something else because she not only risked publicly damning her father’s reputation but might well face a federal indictment herself. Both were cause enough for her to withdraw while she tried to find a way out of her commitment, yet for some reason he didn’t believe that was what was troubling her. It was something else entirely.
Then he realized what it was-Erlanger’s cold warning before they got on the plane and the silent, stony way he’d walked away afterward and driven off.
From Marten’s view it was hard to tell what it had meant to her. Maybe she’d been in love with him once, or still was, and had expected some kind of romantic good-bye. A kiss or an affectionate hug, or something in between, a physical gesture that would confirm that he still had feelings for her. On the other hand, there could have been more to it, something left unsaid that Marten didn’t understand, something that frightened her more than it upset her. Which, as he thought about it now, was more likely because the look in her eyes had been more fear than hurt.
“Mind if I ask you something personal?” he smiled gently.
For the first time she looked at him. “It depends what it is.”
“What Erlanger said at the airstrip just before he left. It affected you a great deal.”
“The Erlanger thing is past,” she said coldly. “Let’s drop it.”
Marten watched her. The Erlanger thing wasn’t past at all. Moreover, the abrupt way she’d answered and the look in her eyes when she’d done it told him he’d touched a nerve she didn’t want
