Finn stared at his mother in the mirror. He had never heard this tone of voice, seen this calm confidence before. Her Russian accent was completely gone. It was as though she had taken thirty years off her life. She was even sitting up straighter!

Lesya continued, “They may not know of my son’s involvement, at least not yet, but they will before very long.”

“How?” Finn asked.

“They will check the flights into the airport today. Match descriptions. It is a small place, it won’t take long.”

“I didn’t use my real name. I had a fake ID.”

“Video surveillance at the airport,” Stone said. “They’ll match your face to some database. I assume it’s in at least one.” Finn nodded. “Then your family may be compromised.”

“Call them, now!” Lesya urged.

Stone could see the enormous pressure the younger man was under as he gripped the phone.

In a shaky voice Finn spoke into the phone. “Please, honey, no questions now. Just get the kids and take them to a motel. There’s a cell phone in my desk drawer. Use that to call me. No one can trace it. Get cash out of the ATM. Don’t use your credit card or your real name at the motel. Stay there. No school, no baseball games, soccer or swimming, nothing. And don’t tell anyone. Please. I’ll explain later.”

Stone and Lesya could hear the woman’s frantic responses.

A bead of sweat slid down Finn’s forehead. His voice dropped still lower and finally his wife calmed. “I love you, sweetie. I will make this all right. I swear it.”

He clicked off and slumped back. Lesya slid a hand on his shoulder and squeezed.

“I’m sorry, Harry. I’m sorry for doing this to you. I… I…” Her voice trailed off. She removed her hand and eyed Stone.

“You say Gray knows you’re alive, Carr? He flushed you out of the grave, as it were. Do you have anyone he can use to get to you? To flush you out again? Because as I said, undoubtedly someone at the nursing home saw us leave and will already have given a description. He will know you are with us. He will know the easiest way to get to us is to get to you. So tell me, is there?”

“I do have people he can exploit, but I already warned them, before I went to the hospital.”

She shook her head. “A warning is meaningless unless it’s acted on with skill. They are capable people who can take care of themselves, follow orders, these friends?” she asked as she scrutinized him. “Don’t color the truth. We need to know exactly how it stands.”

“One of them is and he’s with another friend of mine. But there’s a third friend…” Caleb, please don’t do anything stupid.

“So that is the flank Gray will exploit. Tell me, how close do you value this friend?”

“Very!”

“Then I am sorry for you and your friend.”

Stone leaned back against the seat and felt the smacks of his heart. He hated what the woman was saying and yet he knew she was absolutely right.

She added, “And if it comes down to it, will you trade us for your friend?” Stone turned around to find her looking at him. He had never seen a more piercing stare than the one Lesya was giving him now. No, he was wrong about that. He had seen a gaze like that once before: on Rayfield Solomon, right before Stone killed him.

“No,” he said. “I won’t.”

“Then let’s work to ensure it doesn’t come down to that, John Carr. And maybe you can redeem yourself for killing my husband.”

She glanced out the window and said, “And I was the best agent the Soviet Union ever had. But Rayfield was even better.”

“Why?” Stone asked.

“Because I fell in love with him. And he turned me.”

“What?” Stone blurted out.

“Didn’t you know? I was working for the Americans when you murdered him.”

CHAPTER 76

JERRY BAGGER HAD BEEN WORKING the phones ever since he’d talked to Paddy Conroy. The casino chief had been thinking a lot in the last few hours and he’d arrived at a decision. Normally, in any confrontation, Bagger’s instinct was to trade blow for blow until he or the other guy fell down. He wasn’t going to do that this time, for a lot of reasons. Chief among them was the fact that he’d seen Annabelle in action. He knew how good, how convincing she could be. And there was a little tickle in the back of his brain that reminded him that a jab-jab-jab was a great setup for a left hook, a haymaker that had put many an opponent down permanently. He didn’t intend to be on the receiving end of one of those.

Yet he couldn’t bring himself to not go through with the whole thing, because the opportunity of getting his hands on Annabelle-in the event Paddy was playing straight with him-was too good to let pass. If he had a shot at getting the lady, he had to go for it. But you always had to have a backup plan, because the first plan almost never went perfectly. And sometimes it went so badly you weren’t sure if you were going to wake up the next day. Annabelle had taught him a valuable lesson by ripping him off. Unpredictability was a powerful thing.

He first called his money guy, instructing him to park a ton of cash in a safe place offshore with instant access for Bagger, and untraceable by anyone else. With money you could do anything. He had his jet fly back to Atlantic City to pick up some things for him, including his passport, and land back at a private airstrip in Maryland.

Next, he phoned another associate of his, a very trusted colleague who had one unique talent. He could make anything go boom. Bagger told him what he wanted and the man said he could have it ready in two hours, delivered. Bagger offered to pay his asking price and added a five grand bonus on top of it.

“You must need it bad,” the colleague said.

It was true, Bagger really did need the boom bad. Ironically, such devices almost always killed people, lots of people. Yet in this case, it might just let one person live.

Me.

“Okay,” Annabelle said to Alex and her father. “We need to get me to that van.”

Paddy stood and shook his head. “Afraid not, Annie.”

“What?” she said quickly with a sharp glance at Alex. He seemed as puzzled as she was.

“You’re not going to be in that van. I am,” Paddy said.

“That’s not part of the plan. Jerry wants me, not you.”

“I’ll tell him you got the better of me. He’ll buy that. He damn well knows how smart you are.”

“Paddy, I’m not letting Jerry near you.”

“You’ve got your whole life ahead of you, Annie. If something goes wrong and I’m the one who buys it, so what?”

“Why didn’t you tell me this part before?”

“Because I knew you wouldn’t go along with it, that’s why. Now we’ve gone too far to turn back.”

“Alex, talk to him.”

“Well, what he’s saying makes sense, Annabelle.”

“You’ll put me in the van,” Paddy continued. “I’ll buy some time with Jerry telling him how you outsmarted me, but I can still get to you if he lets me have another chance.”

“Paddy, he’ll kill you as soon as he sees you.”

“I’ve known Jerry a lot longer than you have. I know how to play the fella, you just have to trust me on that one.”

“I’m not going to let you do-”

“I have to do this. For a lot of reasons.”

She looked from her father to Alex and back to Paddy. “What if something goes wrong?”

“Then it goes wrong,” replied Paddy. “Now let’s get this show on the road. I’m not getting any younger.” He pointed a finger at Alex. “But one thing. No cavalry until the bastard admits to killing Tammy.”

The call came at eleven o’clock with the address. At midnight Bagger’s men went into the parking garage and found the white van on the second level. In the back, neatly hidden in a roll of carpet, was a person.

“Shit!” Mike Manson said as he shone his light on the person’s head. “It’s some geezer.”