tried bringing the gun up to fire, but the man was in the way, his hands tightening on Rubenstein's throat as the jeep swerved out of control.
Rubenstein dropped the Browning, clawing at the Cuban's face, getting his fingers into the man's mouth by the left cheek, then ripping as hard as he could.
The man's face split on the left side, the fingers released from Rubenstein's throat, and Rubenstein grasped the 9mm pistol. He snapped back the trigger, the muzzle flush against the Communist soldier's chest, the scream from the torn face ringing loud in Rubenstein's ears as the man fell back, into the mud.
Rubenstein cut the wheel right just in time, the left fender crashing into a row of packing crates that tumbled into the mud. The High Power clenched in his right fist, Rubenstein cut the wheel harder right, with less than fifty yards to go until he reached the main gate. A dozen guards stood by the gate shooting at him.
Paul jammed the Browning High Power into his trouser band, then fumbled on the seat for the Schmeisser. He buttoned out the empty magazine, balancing the steering wheel with his left knee again as he changed sticks in the submachine gun. He smacked back the bolt, bringing the muzzle of the weapon up over the hood, his left fist locked on the wheel again. He didn't shoot.
The distance to the gate was now twenty-five yards. He hoped he remembered what Rourke had told him about practical firing range. Twenty yards, the guards at the gate still firing. Fifteen yards and Rubenstein began pumping the trigger, two-round bursts this time, firing at the greatest concentration of the guards. One man went down, then another. The guards ran as the jeep rammed toward them.
Rubenstein kept up a steady stream of two-round bursts, nailing another guard. He punched his foot all the way down on the gas pedal as the jeep homed toward the gate, shouting to himself, 'Now!' The front end of the vehicle crashed against the wood and barbed wire gate, shattering it. The jeep stuttered a moment, then pushed ahead. Rubenstein brought the SMG back up, firing it out as he cut the wheel into a sharp right onto the road.
As he sped past the concentration camp, the noise of gunfire from behind him had all but stopped. He looked to his right, toward the camp. He could see men, women, and children; he imagined he saw the old man with the festering leg wound who had told him so much, the young woman with the dead baby. Rubenstein began to cry, telling himself it was the wind of the slipstream around the vehicle doing it to his eyes.
Every person in the camp compound was waving his arms in the air, cheering.
Chapter 30
Natalia stood under the water of the shower, the water hot against her body. She'd wanted to wash away more than the sand, she realized. She turned off the water after running it cold for a moment, then stepped out. She grabbed a towel and wrapped it around her hair, then another towel and wrapped it around her body. Her feet still slightly wet as she walked out of the bathroom, across the carpeted bedroom and to the double glass doors at the far end. There she stepped out onto the small balcony overlooking the sea. She was disappointed. She had missed the sunrise.
It was cold, but she stood there a moment, then walked back inside, toweling herself dry and pulling on an ankle-length white robe. She took a cigarette from the dresser and lit it, inhaling deeply. Then, the towel still wrapped around her hair, she walked back out on the balcony, standing by the railing, staring at the beach and the ocean beyond.
It had been a night she wanted quickly to forget. She understood why Diego Santiago was the way he was with a woman. She didn't think it was that she had so excited him. It was a problem that only a man could have, she thought. He had apologized, then fallen silent. She had rubbed his body, kissed him, tried to soothe him afterward. And she felt now that he trusted her, feeling somehow she knew a guilty secret.
She had washed her thighs three times, but the memory of what had happened to Santiago before he'd been able to do what he'd wanted to her still lingered. She would have felt sorry for him normally, she thought. But he was such a lie, such a fake, she thought. The 'macho' general was like a young boy.
She was glad nothing had happened with him-because she hadn't wanted it. In the days with Karamatsov she had sometimes used her body to gain information. But she had never liked it, even though Vladmir had told her he would not blame her for whatever she did.
When Santiago kissed her, she had thought only of Rourke, wished it were Rourke, and afterward known that with Rourke it would have been so much different. She hugged her arms about her against the chill of the wind, looking skyward, thinking it was perhaps going to rain.
'John,' she whispered.
Rourke had killed Karamatsov, but for her, as her uncle had explained it. Should she keep the vow she'd made and kill Rourke?
The uncertainty inside was destroying her, Natalia thought. But more than ever now, she knew, she loved the American. She wondered, absently, if he had yet found his wife and children. Somehow it would be easier to know he was with them. Then he would have no reason to think of her and she would know for herself that he was out of reach.
Natalia smiled, thinking of Rourke, knowing that if she were to fight something that lived only in Rourke's heart she could never win.
Chapter 31
John Rourke downed half the tumbler of whiskey, looked at his watch, then walked from the table and to the curtained window. He drew back the curtain, squinting against the sunlight. There were dark clouds on the horizon, but above them the sun was bright. He threw the curtains open, and light filled the room.
He walked across it again, snapping off the lamp which had illuminated the table through the night and early morning. He looked at Chambers, then at Sissy Wiznewski.
'I don't know which one of them is the Communist agent. The information in their files is too ambiguous.'
'It's all we have,' Chambers said, his voice sounding old.
'I know that.' Rourke nodded. 'I trust Reed. I don't think he's the traitor. Couldn't be just a small fish—
gotta be somebody with access to practically everything you do.'
'Why haven't they attacked here?' the girl asked. Chambers shrugged his shoulders. Rourke answered for
