"Aw, no."

Alicia… no question about it… seven years old, maybe eight, the face was pudgy, but it was she. And the boy she was with looked about twelve, and he was unquestionably Thomas.

He let his head drop back and closed his eyes. He swallowed hard, afraid he'd lose his morning coffee.

When was the last time he'd cried? He couldn't remember. But he felt like crying now.

That innocent little face looking out at him as her brother…

The sheer monstrousness of it, the utter evil, the mind-numbing rottenness of a soul that could besmirch the innocence of any child like that… but your own daughter… someone who trusts you, looks up to you, depends on you for guidance and protection from the nastiness of the world… to take that trust, that responsibility and do… this…

Jack had run across the scum of the earth in his day, but Ronald Clayton took the prize. If he weren't already dead, Jack might consider correcting that situation.

This confirmed what he'd suspected about Alicia. Now he understood why she wanted nothing to do with her father or her brother or that house, why she'd looked ready to jump out of her skin last night.

What a thing to have trailing after you all your life.

"Are they all like this?"

"Yes," said the gunman.

"Poor Alicia."

"And these are all that you found?"

"Every last thing." He sure as hell wasn't going to tell him about the weird little Rover, even if it meant nothing.

"You would not lie to me?"

Jack fished the key out of his shirt pocket and tossed it onto the backseat.

"Go back and check yourself."

The gunman sighed. "No. That will not be necessary."

He's as frustrated as I am, Jack thought. And he knows more, damn it.

Which gave him a crazy idea.

"All right," Jack said. "Tell me what this is all about. What's so goddamn important about that house?"

What the hell? he thought. Can't shoot me for asking. Can he?

"I do not know."

"Come on. You've got to know more than me. How come it's a Japanese guy against the Arabs and not someone from Mossad? Tell me what you do know."

He watched the gunman's eyes as he stared back at Jack.

I'll be damned, Jack thought. I do believe he's going to tell me.

5.

Yoshio considered this ronin, this Jack-san.

Tell me what this is all about.

He immediately had dismissed the request as ludicrous. But the more he thought about it, the more he wondered whether it might be to his advantage to give this man some information. Not everything, of course, but Jack-san's purposes did seem to run contrary to Muhallal's, and that made him an ally… of sorts. A little information might make him a more irksome nettle against Kemel Muhallal's hide than he already was.

Above all, the important thing was to keep the Clayton technology out of Muhallal's hands.

"Very well," Yoshio said. "I will tell you. From what I have been told, it all began a few months ago with a most happy message to my employer from a trade delegate working with my country's mission to the United Nations."

"You mean the Japanese government, right?"

Yoshio hesitated. The answer should be no… but it could be yes… in a way.

What should he reveal? Certainly nothing about his employer. Kaze Group was a corporate entity with a shadowy board of directors that produced nothing under that name, yet had a hand in the manufacture of every part that went into every product produced in Japan.

Officially a holding company, Kaze Group had been founded shortly after the war and began buying shares in the companies that were leading the battered nation's economic recovery. As new companies came to the fore, it invested in those. It bought only the best. Kaze Group thrived during the economic booms, but it made good use of down times as well. It vastly increased its holdings during the recent economic slump, taking advantage of the tumbling Nikkei prices to snap up bargains. Through a web of dummy corporations it now owned controlling interest in Japan's "Big Six" keiretsus and most of the major corporations.

Kaze, Yoshio thought. The Wind. Such a fitting name. Keiretsus, the giant vertical and horizontal conglomerates that ostensibly ruled Japan's economy, were often compared to icebergs—a very small portion visible, the vast bulk hidden. But what determines the path of icebergs through the sea? The currents. And what dictates the currents? The wind… Kaze.

No, Kaze was not the government, but when Kaze Group spoke—always a discreet whisper directly into the ear—the government listened.

"Yes," Yoshio said. "That is correct." Better to let Jack-san believe he worked for the government. "And this trade minister was most excited. He said he had been contacted by a man who was most surely a messenger from God Himself, a man whose technology would make"—he stopped himself… he'd almost said Kaze Group—"make Japan first among nations. He claimed that the details were so astounding, so explosive—yes, that was his word—that he did not dare explain the details, even by diplomatic pouch. He said he was bringing this man directly to Tokyo to explain to the board in person."

"The board?" Jack-san said.

"Yes. The… National Board of Trade. But the plane carrying the trade minister and this mysterious man to Japan exploded in midair, killing all aboard."

"JAL 27," Jack-san said.

"Correct."

Yoshio was not surprised he knew. Alicia Clayton must have told him about her father's death.

"But what makes you think this messenger 'from God Himself' was Ronald Clayton?"

"We know from passenger records that he was seated next to our trade minister on the flight."

Jack-san nodded. "That would do it."

"And we also know…" Should I tell him this? Yoshio wondered. Yes. Why not? "We also know that the crash of the flight was not an accident."

Jack-san's eyes narrowed. "A bomb? But nobody's said anything about—"

"We have proof. Traces of explosive on what little floating debris we could find. We have chosen not to reveal what we know."

"Why the hell not?"

"Because we do not wish the people who planted the bomb to be aware of our knowledge, or that we have any involvement in this… situation."

"You mean…?" Jack-san's narrowed eyes widened now. "You're telling me the plane was blown up because of Ronald Clayton?"

"We believe that to be true, yes."

"But who? Why?"

"We have evidence that the bomber was Sam Baker, whom you have already met."

"I have?"

"I believe you broke his nose last week."

"Oh, him." Jack-san nodded. "Sam Baker… he bomb the lawyer too?"

"Yes. He is employed by Iswid Nahr."

"Who's he?"

"It is not a person—it is an organization based in Saudi Arabia."

"Ah," Jack-san said, nodding. "And I'll bet our friend Kemel is one of their top guns."

"Gun? No, he is a middle-level member."

"So what are they? Terrorists?"

"No, not at all. Iswid Nahr is an oil trade group."

"Like OPEC."

"Yes, but so very opposite. OPEC seeks to manage the flow of oil, tighten the spigot of production in order to secure price stabilization. Iswid Nahr wants to open that spigot wide. Its name translates as 'Black River.' It wishes Saudi Arabia to export oil at very maximum levels. Their thinking is that this will discourage development of foreign oil sources and keep the West—as well as my country—so very dependent on Middle East oil."

"Oil guys?" Jack-san said. "What's in this for them?"

"That is the question I was sent here to answer. Obviously Kemel Muhallal's mission here is to secure the Clayton technology at any cost."

"Obviously. But doesn't that go against your theory that this Iswid whatever blew up Clayton's plane?"