know how I missed them coming in.
I shot down the stairs, punched the garage door opener and stood to one side, watching, as it rose at its usual pace. It made a noise going up. Needed oil.
No one in sight. I dove into the car, backed out smartly and got going down the drive. The gate was open. I slowed and looked into the guard shack.
I intended to drive on by, then thought better of it. Slammed on the brakes, jammed the transmission into park and turned it off. Took the keys with me, just in case. I didn’t trust Marisa far enough to throw her. The last thing I wanted to see was her and Isolde disappearing down the road while I stood there surrounded by corpses, looking stupid.
One glance into the guard shack was enough. The day man was facedown on the floor.
I got back into the car, jammed the keys into the ignition and lit that thing up. As we roared away, I got out my cell phone and pushed the 1 button. In about a minute I had Robin Cloyd. “Tell Grafton that someone killed Speedo — a bullet in the brain — and at least three of the Petrou household staff. I have both the Petrou women in their limo, and we’re heading to London.”
“I have been listening to the audio from the bugs.”
“Call the police. Maybe they’ll get lucky.”
“I’ve already talked to the admiral.”
“Where is he, anyway?”
“Here.” That would be Washington.
“Put him on.”
“He’ll call you in a few minutes.”
The connection went dead.
Marisa was watching the road and checking the rearview mirror on her side of the car. She had her purse in her lap, and the top was open. I grabbed it and glanced inside. Sure enough, she had that Walther in there. I took it out and put it in my pocket, then dropped the purse in her lap.
“I didn’t kill anyone,” she said.
“Maybe not in the last fifteen minutes, I’ll grant you that. And I certainly don’t want you shooting me.”
“I am not going to shoot you, Tommy.”
I adjusted the rearview mirror in the middle of the windshield to keep an eye on madame in the back. Maybe she poisoned her son and maybe she didn’t. She was biting her lip, looking out the windows … Once, when I glanced in the mirror, I caught her wiping her eyes.
“Honestly, I’ll feel better having the gun in my pocket,” I told Marisa.
“If you don’t slow down, we’re going to be killed in a car wreck.”
Those big Mercedes Benzes sure can roll. I let off on the gas and took a deep breath and tried to get my thoughts in order.
Poor Speedo. He was a dweeb, but still… to die like that.
I wondered if he even saw it coming.
Jake Grafton took the call from Robin Cloyd at Sal Molina’s desk in his tiny White House office. On the other side of the desk was CIA director William S. Wilkins, and he was in a sour mood. He knew far more than he had before about Huntington Winchester and his friends, and the president’s aide’s personal direction of this operation.
As the admiral listened to Cloyd’s summary of events at the Petrou chateau on the other side of the Atlantic, Wilkins snarled, “You’re a fool, Molina. I don’t give a pinch of rat shit what commitment the president made to Huntington Winchester. Involving the agency in a harebrained scheme like this — one that is bound to blow up in your faces — strikes me as a classic case of rotten judgment.”
Molina looked unperturbed. “In the president’s judgment — and mine — the possible rewards justified the risks. Yes, the risks are substantial, but we are going to have to take risks if we expect to have any chance at getting the terrorist masterminds.”
William Wilkins shook his bald head. “I’m not a fool and I’m not an optimist. I have spent thirty years assessing risks in covert operations, and believe me, this one meets none of the criteria for approval.”
He was wasting air, and he knew it. During the last twenty years the agency had lost the trust of many of the politicians in Washington. It had missed the impending collapse of Communism in the late eighties and early nineties, assured the establishment that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and been overly optimistic about the prospects for some kind of political settlement between the three major groups in Iraq after Saddam was removed, to name only three of its blown calls.
The agency’s record of penetrating terrorist organizations and combating them effectively was even worse. This was the unspoken fact that hung in the air now, although neither Wilkins nor Molina was willing to voice it, and was undoubtedly one of the factors in the president’s decision to provide support to Winchester’s quixotic quest. Knowing the political forces at work merely deepened Wilkins’ gloom. Amateurs mucking about, getting killed or scared and squealing to the press, weren’t going to get it done. Other than filling some coffins with their own corpses, their main accomplishment would be triggering another congressional investigation, destroying the president politically and throwing even more mud on the agency.
As he sat watching Grafton on the phone, avoiding Molina’s calm scrutiny, William Wilkins contemplated retirement. The hell of it was, it was his agency, and, by God, his country, too.
“I’ll call him in a few minutes,” Grafton said and hung up the telephone. He glanced from face to face, then told them of the events in the chateau and of Carmellini’s departure with both women.
“What is your recommendation?” Molina asked calmly. The man would wear that expression when they lashed him to a post in front of a firing squad, William Wilkins thought savagely, and wished that day would really come.
Grafton deferred to his superior. Wilkins was having none of it. He held out his hand to Grafton and opened it. “The floor is yours,” he said through clenched teeth.
“I think we need to inform the French government of what just transpired,” Jake Grafton said, “and get those two women out of the country. My recommendation would be to bring them to the States, collect the other members of Winchester’s group and put them in a location where we can trap whoever will come after them.”
“How do you know anyone will come after them?”
“Marisa Petrou told Carmellini that Abu Qasim plans to kill them all.” Grafton didn’t mention that Marisa had said that he, the admiral, was also on Qasim’s list.
“He’s doing a fine job, so far,” Wilkins said acidly.
“Not a safe house?” Molina asked.
“We want Qasim to find them. I was thinking the Winchester estate, in Connecticut. We’ll use some security, not too much. Qasim must see this as an opportunity, not a trap.”
“Has the thought occurred to you, Grafton,” Wilkins said, “that you may be doing precisely what Qasim wants you to do?”
“Yes, sir. I think it very probable that he wants us to gather all these people in one place so he can kill them in a spectacular manner.”
That comment caused Sal Molina to lose control of his face for a moment. He found himself staring at Jake Grafton.
“And you’re going to do it?” Wilkins growled.
“To kill a tiger, you need a goat.”
“What if this Marisa Petrou is a double agent?”
“If she tells Qasim where she is, that might be a plus,” Grafton said.
“The eternal optimist,” Wilkins said acidly. Sarcasm was a poor weapon, he knew, but he couldn’t help himself.
“Did she or did she not kill her husband?” Molina asked.
“She might have.”
“She might have killed Zetsche, or helped.”
Grafton nodded in acknowledgment.
“She might be an assassin,” Sal Molina said, eyeing Grafton carefully.
The admiral nodded again.
