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“The timing’s right. They ran the number she called, but there was no answer. She called it twice in one hour.”
He sat back in his chair, rubbing his fingers along his chin, staring straight ahead, toward the cockpit. He was rotating his shoulder, trying to regain full motion. He needed to shave, not that it mattered, Mike thought, it enhanced the Don’t mess with me or I’ll twist off your head look down pat.
Nicholas jumped up from his seat. “Of course. The two calls she made, all that expert computer work—she does have a partner.”
She hated to rain on his parade, but they had to consider everything. “She could have been calling the buyer to let him know the diamond was on its way.”
“Why wouldn’t the buyer answer? Especially if he’d been waiting two years for this call.”
“Why wouldn’t a partner answer?”
He threw himself down in the seat again. “I don’t know. But a job of this magnitude, I know she has someone to work the back end. It’s very rare to have a thief, or an assassin, do a job without someone to facilitate—vet the jobs, h
andle the money, those types of things. It makes sense she would have someone behind the scenes, and of course she would guard their identity with her life.”
“But you said nothing in her background speaks of a partner. The Fox is known for going it alone.”
“Yeah, but I was wrong.”
Mike said, “Then we need to find out who the partner is and where he or she is. We can’t afford to be surprised again.”
He reached across the aisle and slapped her on the knee. “You know, I may have to steal Agent Wharton from you. He seems to earn his keep.”
“I won’t give him up without a fight. He’s one of the best in the FBI.”
Her cell phone rang again.
“It’s Zachery.” She put the call on the speaker. He sounded excited.
“Mike, divert the plane. The Fox didn’t go to Paris. Agent Wharton and the NSA got lucky. Using satellite footage of European airports within the plane’s fuel range, they’ve tracked the false tail number to a private airstrip in Megève, France. The French authorities have her pilot in custody. She’s headed for Geneva, Switzerland.”
51
Megève, France
Near the Swiss border
Friday morning
Kitsune slept through the plane’s approach and landing, which was just as well, because the small landing strip’s position gave the illusion the plane might fly directly into the side of the massive mountain Mont Blanc before it banked sharply and landed.
She woke when the wheels touched the ground and the engine fired into reverse. She yawned and stretched, and dug a warm coat out of her bag. It was cold out; she could see the snow on the Alps, cotton white, backed by the azure sky.
The pilot taxied to a stop and came out of the cockpit.
“Will you be needing my services again today?”
She thought about it for a moment. She’d planned to send him away, but to be safe, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to have him primed and ready.
“Do you ski?”
“Yes, ma’am, I do.”
She gave him a charming smile. “I will be a day. Enjoy the slopes. I will meet you back here on Sunday morning. Six a.m. Don’t be late.”
She descended the stairs to the waiting car. A black Mercedes sedan, as requested. The driver held the door.
When she was safely inside, he got behind the wheel and said in French, “We will be in Geneva in one hour, mademoiselle.”
