Alone (10 page)

THE CAYMAN ISLANDS HAD PROBABLY
never seen such a beautiful day. Even in a part of the world known for its endless succession of stunning, warm, lush
tropical beauty, this was a doozy. The sun glinted on the water, the air was the perfect balmy temperature, and the clouds looked like they had been hand-designed by Martha Stewart.

None of which mattered to Tom and Natasha. They were holed up in their hotel room with the curtains drawn, dressed in sweats and T-shirts, downing cup after cup of black coffee.

Notepads scribbled with numbers were strewn across the bed, and their two laptops were working overtime, straining their logic boards to keep up with the frantic pace of the two government operatives. This was more than just a question of national security. Tom was fighting for his daughter's life—and his relationship to her in it—and he was not about to be distracted by anything.

“We have all of these numbers,” Natasha grumbled, looking at the scrawled digits. “But how do they go together? What do they mean?”

“They've got to be the key to Loki's numbered bank accounts,” Tom responded. “Come on, keep feeding them into the system. We have to hit the right combination one of these times.”

Natasha gave a frustrated sigh and sat up tall, arching-her back to loosen the aching kinks that were plaguing her. “This is too time-consuming,” she said. “Give me a moment. I have an idea.”

Tom heard the pattern of her typing change—suddenly it was fluid, energetic, unlike the frustrated tapping of the
number keys that had defined the previous few hours.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“I am writing a quick program,” she said. “I can hack into the bank's internal server and design an input module that will try the numbers for us in different combinations, as if we were entering them ourselves.”

Tom watched Natasha's fingers fly over the keys as she entered a dizzying amount of code. She cursed a few times, glaring at the screen as her program tanked a few times and restarting the computer once when it crashed in response to her warp-speed typing. After about ten minutes, though, she gave a sharp cheer and clapped. He looked over her shoulder at a neat box in the corner of the screen. She entered the numbers from the notepads and hit a button. The box began spinning like a slot machine, trying every combination of the numbers, beeping as it rejected each new selection.

“Now we just sit back and let it work,” she said. “Much easier, no?”

“Much easier, yes,” Tom said. “I can't believe you just did that. You're better than the guys back at headquarters.”

“Indeed, I am much better than the guys at headquarters,” Natasha agreed. She stretched like a kitten and relaxed, watching the screen intently. It gave an angry buzz, and she cursed again.

“You're going to have to teach me some of those,” Tom told her.

“I think you are going to learn them before too long,” Natasha replied. “Damn, damn, damn. I thought the numbers he was playing were the numbers of the bank account. I thought for sure this was the case. But I've tried them in every combination, and they don't work.”

17. 24. 13. 36. 0. 34. The numbers danced, switching places at dizzying speed as she ran the program again, and still nothing happened.

“Wait.” Tom grasped her upper arms. “What was that thing he said? It wasn't the numbers, it was the relationship between them?”

“Yes. Oh. . . yes!” Natasha breathed. Her hands flew over the keyboard again, this time figuring out how many numbers stood between 17 and 24. . . 24 and 13. . . 13 and 36. . . . There was always a right answer, if you could just make it through all the calculations. That was what she loved so much about math. In a matter of minutes she had created all the possible combinations of the numbers Fenster had played and determined the intervals between them. . . and she fed those numbers back into the program.

The computer whirred for what seemed like an aeon. Tom leaned in close to Natasha, peering at the screen past the ghostly reflected images of the two of
them, praying at the altar of Macintosh for their numbers to come up.

Suddenly the computer gave a different beep and flashed its screen at them.

Welcome to Banco Mundial,
it said.
Please enter your password
.

Piece of cake: that had been given to them already, by another operative. Within moments they were elbow deep in Loki's money, freezing every one of his accounts so that his ill-gotten funds would be of absolutely no use to him.

It was such a quiet victory: no explosions, no gun battles, no helicopters, no handcuffs. Loki was nowhere nearby, yet Tom and Natasha had trapped him as surely as if they had him in leg irons. Because without his billions, Loki was helpless. The blinking cursor on the computer screen signaled his downfall.

“It is done,” Natasha said quietly.

“Nice work,” Tom responded. They glanced at each other, both understanding this was no time to rest on their laurels. Time was of the essence: they had to get back to New York to see how this would affect Loki in person. With the practiced expertise of two agents always on the go, they quickly packed their bags and left the room as pristine and empty of clues as they had found it.

Hell, they even remembered to tip the chambermaid.

HERE WERE SOME THINGS THAT ED
Fargo noticed as he strolled—
strolled!
—through the West Village on a beautiful afternoon. First of all, for two years he'd viewed everyone at crotch level, and it was really nice to be up and out of a wheelchair. Second of all, since his operation he had been so nervous about his crutches that he'd spent most of his time looking down, so while he had an intimate knowledge of the intricate patterns of his suede Vans, he had absolutely no clue what was going on in the neighborhood that had been home to him all his life.

So: First of all, the scaffolding was gone from the garden-enclosed library on Sixth Avenue. And the grime was already beginning to resettle on the brown bricks.

Second, there was a brand-new J. Crew where
the store that sold wigs, sequins, and size-sixteen stilettos to drag queens
used to be.

Third, it turned out that the annoying traffic cop that used to tower over Ed was only about five-foot-two.

It was amazing what came into view when you had your body back. He hadn't lost his eyesight, but the world looked totally new to Ed, anyway.

Another revelation was just how difficult it was. Walking was hard work! At least, it was when your
muscles were used to having some backup. But he was extremely pleased to feel them ache because it meant they were getting stronger by the second. Shinsplints—that was sweet.

Yet even as he maneuvered from corner to corner, Ed felt another weird feeling creeping up his spine and into his consciousness. A feeling that was definitely different from the joy, pride, and triumph that pervaded the forefront of his mind. What was it. . . was he feeling. . . guilty?

Yeah! That was it. He felt totally and completely guilty. He'd hoped for so long that he'd get the use of his legs back, and he was painfully aware that most of the people he'd been with in physical therapy were definitely not enjoying a late afternoon stroll right at this minute. And he felt like he was sort of betraying every last one of them.

As if she'd been sent by
some external form of his conscience,
a girl appeared out of the crowd, humming her way down the sidewalk in a motorized wheelchair. The throngs of midday pedestrians kept getting in her way, and a massive crack in the sidewalk was not helping matters. As one wheel caught, she leaned over, muttering and cursing at the useless chair she was in.

“Here, let me help,” Ed said, stepping forward to give the chair a shove.

“No, thanks, Boy Scout,” she snapped, slapping his
hand away. “I can handle this myself. Don't bother.”

“Hey!” Ed said, genuinely hurt. “I was just. . .”

“Well, don't,” she said. “See? I got it. Now back off.”

She ran over his foot with her right wheel as she—well, she would have been stalking off if she were on two legs. The chair made it kind of hard for her to finesse an indignant exit, but she was doing her best. The back of her head gave off a distinct aura of hostility as she headed downtown.

Ed wanted to say something. But what? “Hey, I used to be in one of those, but medical science did me right!” Yes,
Infomercial Ed would surely crack her exterior
. “Don't be mad at me—I'm not like everyone else on the street!”
No, I'm twice as annoying because I know how you feel, yet I still have full use of my legs
.

Nope. There was not a word he could say that would make a difference. And as he watched her bumping down the sidewalk away from him, Ed could discern one more emotion bubbling around in his consciousness: relief. Complete relief that he was not in that girl's unused shoes.

Gaia hit the floor with as much grace as a flounder landing on the deck of a fishing boat. She didn't even bother jumping up. She couldn't believe she'd been taken so completely by surprise by a girl half her size and with a quarter of her muscle.

She was lying on her back, staring at the ceiling, trying to put together what had just happened, when Tatiana's angry face loomed into her vision.

“Do you want another one?” Tatiana asked uncertainly. “Or are you going to keep your stupid accusations to yourself?”

Gaia was pretty sure she didn't want any more of what Tatiana was dishing out. And she had to admit, that had been a pretty good shot.
Lightning reflexes were no match for an angry Russian girl
defending her mother, apparently.

“No, thank you,” Gaia said “I'll take option B.”

“Good.” Tatiana relaxed a little, looking a bit relieved, even shocked at her own actions. She flexed her left hand, massaging it with her right, and grimaced in pain.

“You have to be careful when you hit someone with a fist,” Gaia said helpfully, sitting up and scrooching a few feet away from Tatiana on the floor. “You didn't have your thumb inside your fist, did you?”

“I don't think so,” Tatiana said, glaring down at her hurt hand. “Mostly I think I bruised my knuckles on your very hard head.”

“Good, because if you put your thumb inside your fist, you'd probably break it. And you're right. My head is pretty hard sometimes. Big mouth, hard head.”

“Yes. Well.” Tatiana sat on the floor and leaned against the wall, facing Gaia. “If I am going to be completely honest, I have to tell you that I have often suspected my mother of being some kind of agent. She is extremely secretive. When I was a small child, I would accept her explanations, but these days it's a bit difficult. Her stories are a bit—lame. I mean, why would an exporter of Oriental rugs need her on a plane at three in the morning? Or require her to carry a gun?”

“Okay, now, see?” Gaia exclaimed, throwing her hands in the air. “The gun is really the kicker.”

“But no! I do not take it this far,” Tatiana objected. “Whatever she is doing, it is not evil, and it does not hurt people. You do not know my mother. She has helped more people than you will ever know. I have seen her sacrifice her own happiness time and again to make sure others are safe.”

Gaia sighed. “I can think of a million cases in the history books—and the newspapers—where someone who seemed like a saint turned out to be more of a
devil. But I understand that you'd be crazy to accept what I'm saying at face value.”

“Listen to me, you do not understand,” Tatiana told her. “Before I was born, my mother—do you know this word,
refuseniks?
”

Gaia was aware that
the average teenager would probably think the refuseniks were a garage band from Portland,
but she knew the real deal: Back when Russia was still the Soviet Union, they'd refused their citizens the right to move out of the country—and made their lives hell while doing it.

“Yes, I know that word,” she said.

“My mother worked to help these people escape. Very hard, this job. Very dangerous. The state at the time was oppressive, and you want to talk about double-crossing snakes? They were everywhere. Someone would turn you in for a week's supply of bread and a bottle of vodka.”

“Yeah, but that doesn't mean—”

“And do you know about the Russian Mafia?” Tatiana went on.

Gaia sighed. Maybe Tatiana was beginning to grow on her, but did that mean Gaia had to put up with this little civics lesson?

“These are horribly dangerous men,” Tatiana told her. “They make your godfather, Marlon Brando, look like a pussycat. My mother stood up to them in
Moscow and barely escaped with her life. It is one of the reasons we are here now.”

“The other reason being my dad,” Gaia pointed out.

“Perhaps. Or perhaps he is just making the move much easier for my mother. Either way, even here she must be very careful.” She sighed. “That was the reason she gave me for the gun. But I still always wondered.”

“I found letters between them,” Gaia said. “They seem pretty convincing, but I have evidence that they have to be lies.”

“Well, I found a postcard that your father sent to my mother. He obviously trusts her. Are you saying that your father's a fool?”

“I would never say something like that about my father. But he doesn't have the evidence I have. I'm operating off a tip I got straight from a CIA agent,” Gaia finally admitted.

“Interesting,” Tatiana said. “And this ‘evidence' is. . . ?”

“Well.” Gaia paused. “Well, I don't know exactly. But George seemed very sure.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Listen, George has already proved himself to be trustworthy. He used to be my guardian before he. . . oh.”

“Yes?”

“Well, he sort of had this wife who turned out to be a double agent, too.”

“So he's not a particularly good judge of character,” Tatiana said.

“Look, I trust George,” Gaia said flatly, though she couldn't deny that Tatiana was making some excellent points. “If he says he has evidence, then he just does.”

“”Well, I would be very interested in meeting this agent for myself,” Tatiana said, sitting back and give Gaia a determined glare. “If he is saying my mother is making love to a man only to destroy him, I would like him to say it to my face. I must see this evidence for myself. From the horse's hoof, as you say.”

“Mouth.”

“What?”

“The horse's mouth. You want to hear it from the horse's mouth.”

“Yes. I want to hear this talking horse tell me what proof there is of this accusation.”

Gaia stood, shaking her legs to get the pins and needles out of them. She shook her head. “You are
so
not meeting this guy. Trust me, he knows what he's talking about.”

That clinched it. “You are wrong. I am
so
so meeting-this guy,” Tatiana informed her.

Gaia was about to object again when something caught her eye out the window. “What the. . .”

“What is it?”

“There's some guy out there messing with a lady,” Gaia said. As if in response, a bloodcurdling shriek blasted from the street below, followed by
a
wail of complete and total helpless misery.

The George conundrum was going to have to wait.