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She shrugged. “It says right on the birth control package, ‘Ninety-nine percent effective.’I guess we fall into the one percent.”
They’d talked about having kids almost from the day they’d met. They both wanted at least two, but Anna was in no rush. There we
re certain things she wanted to do careerwise first. Rapp looked at her carefully. “Are you okay with this?”
“Of course I am! Are you kidding me?”
He breathed a sigh of relief.
“Are you okay with this?” she asked a bit tentatively.
Rapp looked at her angelic face. He could see now that she was worried about his reaction. He reached out with his hand and gently held the side of her face. “I couldn’t be happier.”
27
VIENNA, AUSTRIA
A bel sat quietly at his desk. His office was on the third floor of a building built just prior to the start of WWI. The building, like much of Vienna, was a work of art. The immaculate baroque structure was made out of stone and marble. The roof was a patina covered copper and the fifteen-foot-tall plaster ceilings were decorated in ornate relief. It was well ordered, occupied mostly by business professionals. From his window Abel looked out onto Parliament and its monument to Athena, the goddess of wisdom and warfare. My, how mankind has changed in one century, he thought. No society that he knew of today would associate wisdom with war, let alone erect a statue in homage to the goddess of the latter. Abel continued looking at the golden-leaf headdress of the Greek goddess. Where was it all headed? he wondered.
Great civilizations rose and fell as surely as the tides. The Egyptians, the Incas, the Mayans, the Greeks, the Persians, the Romans, the Mongol empire, the Ottoman empire all came and went. The Austro-Hungarian empire, the French, the British, the Russians, and the Nazis would someday merit only a footnote. Who knew what waited for the Americans? The other superpower, the Soviet Union, had lasted less than a hundred years with their grand experiment of communism. A blink as far as history was concerned. If Abel had to guess, America’s preeminence on the world stage would last no more than another hundred years. The country had too many rights and too much wealth. Not enough sacrifice. Too much selfishness. The civilizations that had made their mark did so through brutality or great self-sacrifice by the populace, and often both. The Chinese would become the next sole superpower. They were hungry for change. Such long-range forecasts were always interesting to him, but in the here and now he had more pressing issues.
There was a certain Saudi prince whom he no longer trusted. Abel drew his attention away from the statue of Athena and looked at the documents on his desk. They represented his complete financial picture. Based on the papers before him, the assassin had been right in his assessment. Abel was not liquid enough. His real estate holdings in Switzerland and Austria were worth approximately $3,000,000. He had an additional $1,200,000 in cash and securities that he could liquidate without too much difficulty. It was not enough to live on for very long if he was forced to run. At least not with the lifestyle he’d grown accustomed to. What the assassin did not know, however, was that Abel was pocketing a full half of the fee. To add to the $1,200,000 in securities he now had $5,000,000 in cash. With that type of money he could probably disappear for a while. If the assassin succeeded in killing Rapp he would get another $5,000,000. Now he was talking real money, but still the thought of leaving behind his current life was not appealing to him.
Abel was facing a real quandary. As things sat now he had to prepare for three possibilities. The first was that the assassin would succeed and the Americans would start beating the bushes in search of Rapp’s killer. This was the best outcome. Abel felt confident that, short of capturing the assassin, there was no way the Americans could link him to any of this. He’d been very careful in covering his financial tracks. The second possibility, which he was not even confident that he could pull off, would be to kill the assassin after he completed the job. That approach could blow up in his face in a variety of ways, the worst of which would be the assassin not dying and hunting Abel down. So far the assassin had been ahead of him every step of the way. There was no logical reason for him to think that he could suddenly outwit this extremely capable man. The third contingency to prepare for was that he himself was already a target. It would be just like Prince Muhammad to have already hired someone to take care of him. Any feeling of loyalty he’d felt toward the prince, which was really nothing more than a professional obligation to perform the duties he was paid for in the best possible way, was now almost entirely gone. He had suspected it would someday come to this. From the very beginning he had known the score with the Saudis. Family and tribal members came first. It was time to part ways with Rashid. The trick would be to do it while still collecting the remainder of the fee and keeping his life. Beyond that he desperately wanted to hold on to his real estate possessions.
In the meantime he would have to plan for all three contingencies. First, he would see if he could get any more information from his old handler Dimitri. The former KGB spook had to know more about this assassin than simply a phone number and an e-mail address. If he could find out who the assassin was, matters would be greatly simplified. If the man succeeded in killing Rapp, he would be expecting another $5,000,000 for fulfilling the contract. Abel could probably get the Hungarians to kill him for $100,000, maybe $200,000 at the most. Abel could then pocket another $4,800,000 and sever his business relationship with Rashid in an amicable fashion. If he couldn’t find out any more about the assassin he would simply have to tread very lightly until things blew over. He reached a conclusion about what he must do in the meantime.
Abel swiveled in his chair and tapped the space bar on his computer to get rid of the screen saver. His Internet browser popped to full color on his flat-panel monitor. His fingers remained poised above the keys for a second and then he began typing his message. He was well aware of the interception capabilities of the Americans, so he kept his prose businesslike and to the point. For now he would keep his options open, but he would be a fool if he didn’t begin to take certain precautions. Once this e-mail was sent he would need to make himself scarce. Now was the perfect time to take a vacation.
28
WASHINGTON, DC
S he woke up before he did, and started for the bathroom. As soon as she stood up she noticed something wasn’t right. The room came in and out of focus, her steps were unsteady. She reached for the door frame to steady herself and then dashed for the toilet. She vomited once and then a second and third time. She sat there for a few seconds, leaning against the glass wall of the shower stall and holding her hair in a makeshift ponytail with her right hand. A thin layer of sweat covered her upper lip, but other than that she felt almost immediately better. So this is what morning sickness is like, she thought.
Claudia pulled herself off the floor and regarded her reflection in the mirror. She looked pasty white with a touch of gray. Not very flattering. When would she tell him? She had been so close, even last night, but at the last second something always came up. Now she was worried that she would distract him, and they could have none of that. He needed to stay focused and get this over with as quickly as possible. She looked at herself and struggled with what she should do. She turned on the faucet and doused her face with cold water repeatedly. She decided to wait until they were done with this job. Then she would tell him.
She brushed her teeth and took a shower. She felt almost normal despite the fact that she was famished. After wrapping herself in one of the plush white robes, Claudia opened the door and immediately registered the unmistakable aromas of sausage and cinnamon. She remembered that Louie had filled out the room service card for breakfast and left it on the door before they went to bed. He was now sitting on the couch in front of the TV with a large glass of orange juice in his hand. Claudia wasted no time parking herself next to him and grabbing the other glass of orange juice. She drank nearly half of it before she set it back down. The relief it brought was nearly instantaneous. She pulled the metal cover off of her breakfast and started slathering butter on her French toast. Next came the warm syrup and she dug in. Her focus on filling her stomach was so thorough she didn’t notice that Louie was watching her.
The local NBC morning news was on the TV. Louie was also wearing one of the white robes provided by the hotel. His brown hair had that bed-head look, and the front page of the Washington Post sat folded on his lap. He’d stopped reading the paper and the TV was nothing more than background noise. His undivided and very discerning attention was focused entirely on the object of his affection. Claudia finally noticed that he was watching her. She set her fork down and wiped her mouth. After taking a drink of orange juice she turned and smiled. It seemed a bit forced.
His eyes narrowed and he said, “Are you pregnant?”
Claudia blinked. “What?”
Louie noted that her response was defensive. “It’s not a difficult question.”
She tugged at the neck of her robe and then crossed her legs, draping her left arm protectively across her abdomen.
He watched her every move, knowing the answer without having to hear it from her lips. Gould reached out and placed a gentle hand on her forearm. He pushed from his mind any thoughts of personal hurt that she hadn’t told him and instead said, “If you are, it will make me the happiest man in the world.”
Gould tilted his head and watched her intently. Her bottom lip trembled ever so slightly, and then her eyes filled with tears. “That is, if the child is mine,” Gould added.
The tears spilled over and fell down the smooth skin of her cheeks. She let out a half laugh, half cry and swatted at him. “Yes…all those other men I sleep with. You’ll all have to take blood tests so we can sort the whole mess out. Of course it’s yours, you jerk.”
Gould laughed and pulled her close. He kissed her forehead and rocked her like a baby. He was smiling from ear to ear. In a soft, almost apologetic voice he asked, “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn’t want it to distract you. I want us to get through this and then we are done with this life once and for all.” She tugged at the sleeve of her robe and wiped her tears. “How did you figure it out?”
