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Rashad reaches over, gently caresses her wrist. She nearly blushes. He says, “Again, please forgive me, but this…this all happened to your grandparents more than half a century ago, well before you were born. How can I be sure you will travel to Manhattan and make the delivery, knowing what will happen to all the innocents later—all because of something from history?”
Nadia is quick to reply. “My landlady is a dear old woman, Madame Juliette Therien. She is in her sixties, a widow, a grandmother with two sons and lots of grandchildren. She remembers my birthday, and Christmas, and charges me much less in rent than others in the neighborhood, all because she secretly thinks of me as her own daughter.”
“I see.” Impressive—very impressive indeed.
Nadia says, “If you wish, we can take a Metro train and be at my flat in thirty minutes. I will lead you to the basement, where Madame Therien lies dead on the cellar floor because she learned what I was doing. Instead of telling her a lie, or begging her to keep my work secret, I bashed in her brains with a hammer.”
For once Rashad does not know what to say.
Nadia asks, “Does that answer your concern?”
He smiles. A warm feeling of success swells within him. This will happen. This mad young girl is about to fulfill her destiny, and his.
Rashad touches her wrist once more. “It certainly does.”
Chapter51
IN HISsterile and tidy office, Ernest Hollister just sits there, contemplating what Tyler Pope has just told him.
Ernest says, “That was a fine briefing. Are you sure it’s good?”
Tyler says, “Ah, it’s the best I could put together based on—”
“Is it good?” he repeats. “Don’t fence with me, don’t parse words, for Christ’s sake, speak in plain English. I’m about to take this Cornwall matter to an entirely new level. So I need to know before I go ahead, Tyler, that your information is good. That it is reliable enough that I’m about to put myself into great exposure. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Is the information good?”
“It’s good, sir,” Tyler says.
“Glad to hear it.” Ernest points to a chair across from his desk. “Have a seat. You’re going to have a busy afternoon.”
His assistant sits down. “And the first thing you’re going to do is get me on a Company jet, heading to the UK, as soon as possible.”
With Amy keeping pace with him, Jeremy Windsor walks with assurance and coolness to the closest Land Rover Defender not damaged by the earlier blast. Amy says, “What’s the plan?”
This woman,he thinks. She has saved his life three times in the past few days, and if she’s been shocked or rattled by what’s happened—by the travel, the shooting, the desperate moments of being under fire—well, she’s very good at hiding it.
“Getting out of here is the plan so far,” he says. “Not much beyond that.”
He goes to the Defender. All four tires are inflated and in good shape. At the rear, on the pavement, are a used fire extinguisher, some clumps of bloody bandages and a crumpled-up balaclava, and a scattering of empty brass cartridges.
Perfect.
“Amy, I—”
“Hey!”
He turns, and a red-faced, sweaty French paramilitary officer is standing there, MP5 in his hands.
In rapid French the man says,“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“Just looking things over,”Jeremy replies.
The officer moves his head, his face angry.“Then come with me. My superior wants to talk to you and the bitch.”
Jeremy says,“Please, can you just give me a minute—”
