Operation Heartbreaker (12 page)

When she was about to tell him exactly that, she realized he was crouching in front of her.

“Let’s try something,” he suggested and put on a pair of leather gloves. Then he produced a lighter and two photos out of an envelope and placed them onto the lounge table like a thimblerigger. The pictures were turned head down so she couldn’t see the surface.

“Pick up the lighter and tell me who you think it belongs to.”

She shrugged, took it and knew right away it was his. Rolling her eyes, she threw it at him.

“Alright, that was easy,” he remarked and flashed one of his rare smiles. The next moment his intense gaze was back when he asked her to identify the person in the first photograph.

It wasn’t the name of the guy that came to her mind, but a place. “He’s in San Diego?” she asked surprised. It was a guy, wasn’t it?

“Can you be more specific?”

She closed her eyes and concentrated on the good looking man–definitely a guy–with the friendly eyes. A Latino or maybe Mexican. Slowly she inhaled deeply and took in the energy of the fellow. Nope, he came from Spain. She sank deeper and deeper into his mind until she could see what he saw just by the force of his thoughts.

Trees, no, palm trees. A pond, a building. Large. Probably a church or cathedral. No, it was something else. A theater. It was surprisingly easy. Alarmingly easy. “Uh…” Ally hesitated. Though she’d never been there she recognized the old park from her history lessons. They’d covered the Pan-American Expo about half a year ago. “Balboa Park?”

When she didn’t get a reply, she opened her eyes and saw the looks David exchanged with Jean’s father. She seemed to have hit the bull’s eye.

“Seriously now?” Julie asked, appearing just as amazed as Ally.

Maurice turned his notebook towards them. On the screen was the same young man, but this time live and in motion. Ally tried to figure out the time of day in San Diego, but she was so confused she couldn’t count back the nine hours. On the live stream it looked as if the sun was just rising. Apparently, the man was filming with his mobile, the recording was kind of shaky. Still, she could make out the impressive
Casa del Prado
Theater in the background.

Dammit!

Ally pushed out the breath she’d been holding and sunk back into her pillow.

This couldn’t be real. It had to be a trick. Who knew how many famous places this Maurice had saved on his laptop? All he had to do then was copy this man into the footage, voila, there was the oh so amazing proof. This meant nothing.

As if he’d read her mind, Maurice said something in Spanish (Ha!) and the man pulled out a newspaper from under his arm. It was a current issue of the
San Diego Union Tribune
. The cover showed President Mitchel at a pre-election party in Detroit.

Shit.

Next to her, Julie gasped. Apparently, she wasn’t the only one impressed.

“Excellent, Ally, that’s great,” her uncle said and cowered back down in front of her. But unlike her usual reaction, she didn’t take his praise as a compliment. She felt more like a trained dog that had retrieved the ball. For a dog it might be okay, but it wasn’t for her.

“The third task might be hard to crack.”

“Why?”

“Well, the first round was easy, after all you know my energy. The next was more difficult. But nevertheless, Ramon, our man in San Diego, concentrated on you and blocked out possibly disturbing thoughts. That won’t be the case now. You have to really focus, because the person in the last photo doesn’t want to be found. Do you think you can manage?”

She shrugged again. What was there to say anyway? But internally she shuddered. Could she do it? And, more important, did she want to? For years she’d sidestepped the energy of strangers. And now David, who’d even given her meds, asked her to do the exact opposite of what she’d avoided all these years. Now she was supposed to act against her instinct, against all reason. Did this make any sense?

Her uncle pointed his head towards the third photo. “Where do you think the person in that picture is?” he asked quietly.

Ally inhaled deeply and leaned forward at the same time as Julie.

Did she really want to do this? Actually no. On the other hand she had the urge to find out what she was capable of. If she could really track down people would she then be able to find her dad? At the thought of it her heart began to beat faster.

Without thinking she picked up the picture and studied the man, who didn’t look as if he’d known about being photographed. The gritty black-and-white image was apparently taken by a security camera. She leaned closer towards the picture, her thumb carefully brushing over the blurry face, but she didn’t feel anything but the smooth surface of the photo. Eventually, she closed her eyes and covered the image with her palms.

It was like riding through a tunnel. First she felt nothing. After a while she noticed something similar to a pulsating light and drifted towards it.

As if with a faraway radio station she adjusted to the unknown frequency. After what felt like an eternity the impressions flooded over her as a frenzy of flashlights. Confusing emotions that made her feel seasick. It was like learning a foreign language within seconds. Even though she knew it weren’t her feelings, she was repulsed by the impressions that were leaving an energetic fingerprint on her. She felt stained.

But as a matter of fact, she was the intruder. She was entering the body of a stranger, his mind. Saw what he saw, not though his eyes, but with the help of his imaginative powers. She instinctively asked herself if one had to first comprehend something mentality before being able to understand it. But the more she tuned into the strange energy, the deeper she was pulled into his mind and her own awareness was pushed into the background.

He was reading a newspaper.

“
The Witness
,” she uttered. That had to be the name of the paper.

“South Africa?” Has she just said that out loud? Never mind. A name went through her head, but it made no sense. Nevertheless, she stated it if only to hold onto the thought. “KwaZulu-Natal.”

The room had gone completely quiet. So, she went on, going deeper into the thoughts of the man, who apparently was just scanning the regional section of the newspaper.

Harbor. East coast. A bay.

“I think he’s sitting in Richards Bay in a harbor café,” she said quietly, then the man dropped the newspaper. Someone was addressing him.

“He’s called Bangizwe,” she whispered. “And he… Oh, God!”

She screamed, fell forward and saw stars.

“Ally?
Ally!
”

Her head was pounding as if being worked with a sledge hammer. A cool cloth was put on her forehead and somebody sat her back onto the sofa.

“What happened?” Julie asked, her voice quivering.

Ally shook her head, her throat felt constricted. Within the fraction of a second she’d found out more about the man than she’d liked. Though he was a wanted terrorist and without a doubt a criminal, she couldn’t help but feel sympathy for him. The horrific atrocities he had to witness as a child were something nobody should have to experience. Especially not a five years old. His village had been burned down, his mother murdered, his sisters kidnapped. He himself had been abused several times by soldiers, and had later been trained as a warrior. His hate towards this world was so overwhelming that for a moment she felt the strong urge to throw up. But the dark energy was nothing compared to what happened right before the connection was cut.

“What’s going on?” Julie asked again. Her uncle was sitting at her side, pushing a glass of brandy into her hand. She reluctantly took a sip and was surprised when she actually felt better afterwards. Only now she noticed that her whole body was shaking.

Her glance wandered through the room and she found Maurice behind his desk. He was quietly talking into the phone without letting her out of his sight.

“If you want to find the man you can stop now,” she said in a flat voice. Inside she was screaming.

“Come again?” David asked in a biting tone.

Maurice let the receiver drop and looked at her in anticipation.

“I mean,” she began quietly, “that Bangizwe Sebuturo has just been shot.” In broad daylight.

The next moment she threw both her hands over her face and broke into tears.

11

They’d forced her to eat a little then put her to bed. She hadn’t touched the food, but the hot chocolate had suited her. Despite her exhaustion sleeping was impossible.

At some point Julie had snuck into her room and whispered her name, but Ally pretended to be asleep. She didn’t want to talk. She didn’t even want to think, but inside her mind was rattling like a clockwork.

Originally, she’d come to find her dad. Instead, she’d found out that she was the result of a large-scale government experiment. That not only the CIA was after her, but also the mafia in order to track down and eliminate unwanted competitors thanks to her abilities. Like Bangizwe Sebuturo. Except this time somebody had beaten them.

The thought of doing something like this on a daily basis made the hairs in her neck stand up. Finding people so somebody could kidnap and possibly torture them without a fair trial. Um, no thanks.

How had she gotten herself into this mess? And what did David have to do with it? He’d been Cole’s best friend, at least that’s what he said. But why should she believe him? And why the hell had he done these stupid tests?

Why now?

As long as she could remember he’d left her in the dark about her past. As soon as she was in Paris though he put her in a running wheel like a lab rat.

She swallowed a lump and all of a sudden her mouth went dry. She’d seen a man being shot, someone she’d tracked down the same time as somebody else. Who had he been and why did he have to die?

She took a shaky breath and got out of bed. The feeling of suffocation was overwhelming, so she went to the window and opened it. The first rays of the rising sun were dancing on the horizon, coloring the street with a golden hue. It smelled of fresh earth and roses, probably due to the hedge lining the property. She closed her eyes and let the sun warm her face. She’d been in Paris for three days and had barely seen anything of the city. Actually, she’d planned to visit the Eiffel Tower, the Centre Pompidou and Notre Dame. Instead, she was rushing through the French capital like a lunatic on the run.

She wished she could turn back time and start again on Friday morning. But that was impossible. All of it had started with the break-in and none of it could be taken back. Just as much as the truth about her origins. And, truthfully, did she really want to? Addicted to pills, in constant worry about feeling something?

No way. She opened her eyes, and after taking a few deep breaths she was feeling better. She couldn’t lose her nerves now. But she also couldn’t stay. She had to be alone and think. Where would she go from here?

If she stayed, David would take over. The thought was comforting. He’d know exactly what to do und would go for it. On the other hand she was sick of being constantly ordered around like she was mental. Since she could remember he’d fed her meds and told her it was for her best despite other possibilities, like telling her the truth and letting her deal with it. And it hadn’t been her wanna-be-uncle who’d made her aware of it.

That in fact she actually had a choice.

This time she was the one making the decision, not David. And not her father, either. Remembering their encounter in the lobby made her feel warm inside. They’d only had seconds, the blink of an eye, to make up for seventeen years. That didn’t work for her. Now that she’d seen him, she wanted more. He also was the only one who knew the truth. The entire, complete, unfiltered truth, first hand.

David kept showing her segments, little bits and pieces, in order to calm her. If that didn’t work, he lied. How was she supposed to ever trust him again?

She had to get out of here to think about it and make plans. While getting dressed she tapped her jeans for change for the Metro. When she reached into the pockets of her coat something poked into her finger. She hissed and fished out a sharp item–a pin. It was about two and half inches long, golden, with two initials at the end–CP. Cole’s initials? She frowned in contemplation. He must have put it there in the lobby, before disappearing. But why?

Suddenly, she heard voices in the hallway. Damn! She really couldn’t use visitors right now. She slipped the pin back into the pocket and leaned out the open window. First floor–bingo!

She quickly grabbed her bag and climbed outside. She needed an hour to herself, and she’d take it. The next Metro station was only a couple of walking minutes away. After reaching it she studied the stops on the train schedule. She was in an upscale part of town near the Trocadéro. That was also the name of the station. Her French knowledge was somewhere between awful and practically non-existent, so asking her way around wasn’t an option. All she needed was a reference point so she’d find her way back. Some stops seemed vaguely familiar, like Champs-Élysées or Place de la Concorde. With others she was clearly more comfortable, as the Musée du Louvre. Everybody knew the Louvre–Mona Lisa and stuff. At least now she knew where she wanted to go. One less thing to worry about.

Two subway stops later
You’re the one that I want
from
Grease
pierced the silence. Ally needed a minute to realize the ring tone came from her coat. As far as she remembered she didn’t have a mobile anymore thanks to Jean Lacroix. So, where the hell was this annoying
Uh Uh Uuuuh
coming from? After a brief search she found a black Blackberry in the inner pocket of her coat. That was definitely not hers.

“Um, hello?”

“Ally, mon cœur, how are you?” She would’ve recognized the raspy pirate’s voice anywhere. “Viktor?”

“Where you expecting someone else?”

The real question should have been how the phone had come into her possession and why he was calling her at six in the morning. “What do you want?”

“My employee took the liberty to furnish you with one of my newest acquisitions.”

“What are you talking about?” His deep laugh caused her goose bumps.

“I’m sorry. I was in Canada last week and bought into RIM, the Blackberry manufacturer.”

Did millionaires always talk like that? Instead of going shopping, they bought entire companies?

“Ally, are you still there?”

“M-hm.”

“I’d like to see you.”

She wanted that, too, more than she was comfortable to admit. But during their last encounter he’d made it crystal clear what he wanted. And it wasn’t her. She didn’t get why the list was so damn important to him. It was only names, what did that prove anyway? Nothing! Granted, the list concentrated on big cheeses from politics and business. But one couldn’t convict anybody by it. Unless, of course it was some kind of contract that every member had had to sign, but the thought alone was ridiculous. Who in their right mind would leave such evidence behind if the contract was about criminal acts? And the Special Skills program had been royally illegal. It violated more or less any known law, not to speak of human rights and the moral values that her country was so proud of.

Was it possible that an association like the CIA could call a project like that to life on their own accord?

Doubtful. First of all, such an endeavor cost an arm and a leg. Second, it would be highly impossible to keep something like that a secret for over a decade.

“Ally?”

“I’m still here,” she answered quietly. She couldn’t trust Viktor. He wanted the list, she wanted her dad. Basically, both wanted to get to Cole, only Viktor had means and ways to do so that she could only dream of.

She slowly pulled the pin out of her coat pocket and studied the initials. Slowly she wrapped her fingers around it until they formed a fist. Her eyes closed and she searched for the energy that was attached to the trinket. Considering that it was her dads it took surprisingly long until the contact was made.

When she opened her eyes she was smiling.

“Ally?”

Viktor could be useful. He might think he was using her, but he was mistaken. She would turn the tables. Cole was too clever to let himself get caught by Sergej’s twenty years old son. In the States he wouldn’t even be allowed to drink alcohol, how dangerous could he be? Jean had probably exaggerated things to keep her away from Viktor, because Mr. Telekinesis was also after Cole and the list. Strangely enough she trusted Jean even less than Viktor. Shouldn’t it be the other way around? After all they shared the same fate.

Anyhow. Viktor was waiting and she had to make a decision. “Okay, I’m dropping by,” she heard herself say and sounded more confident than she felt.

“Don’t bother!” The line went dead.

Confused she stared at the display while the Metro was entering the next station, Tuileries. One more stop and she’d be at the Louvre. But her destination had just changed. With a sigh she realized that she had no idea how to get to Viktor’s hotel. And what did he mean by
don’t bother
?

The doors of the Metro opened and Viktor Iwanow entered in all his dark glory. Even in the flickering neon lights he looked like a prince out of Arabian Nights. He wore a gray shirt underneath his black leather jacket, ripped jeans and biker boots.

In a way he looked like a gangster, but also as cool. What had become of the business boy wonder in his pinstripes? His jet black hair seemed moist as if he’d just taken a shower. Ally would have loved to put her nose into it and inhale.

He stepped towards her and extended his hand. “If you please…?”

She automatically went for it and let him pull her up to her feet. After they exited the Metro, she found her tongue again. “How did you know where I was?”

“Your SIM is easy to track,” was all he said. Like it’s no big deal to hunt her down. And what was it about SIM cards and locating anyway?

When she stopped and threw him an angry look, the corners of his mouth twitched. Remorse looked different. “Someone has to keep an eye on you,” he remarked unexpectedly gentle and ran the knuckles of his hand across her cheek.

Oh boy, if she didn’t watch it he’d wrap her around his little finger. The look of his deep blue eyes alone made her heart sigh and turned her knees into jelly. Was it really that easy to make a complete idiot of herself because of a handsome face and an adorable smile? Why would she throw her common sense over board for the son of Al Capone? She should never forget that he used his womanizer charm because she had something he wanted.

Reluctantly, she took a step back, but couldn’t escape him that easily. The very next moment his hand was on her back and he was leading her out of the underground into the Jardin des Tuileries. Though it was only fifty yards to
Le Meurice
, his two bodyguards, the same she’d already seen inside his suite, were waiting at the entrance of the Metro station. The shaven-headed and the wiry one with the bleach blond hair.

This time the hotel looked like a fortress. Viktor didn’t even try to hide or justify it. Gone was the homely luxury hotel. The lobby was populated by nasty looking fellas with guns, no kidding.

Ally swallowed hard, her throat suddenly felt as if she’d eaten sawdust. Had Jean been right? Was she making the mistake on a lifetime by entering the lion’s den? What was it again that he’d said? Without an army nobody could get her out of here? Hell yes, she could second that. Now it was probably too late to bitch about the details.

Viktor lead her into the same suite where they’d held the fake interview. If Renée only knew.

In her back, the shaven-headed bodyguard, Viktor called Kolja, entered the room. Goliath would have been a better fit, but she kept that to herself. The giant carried a tray which exuded a seductive scent. Freshly brewed coffee, croissants and–yummy!–crêpe. How did he know she had a sweet tooth?

In fact, she was starving. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d eaten solid food. As it seemed, her stomach couldn’t either. It let out a noise that sounded like she’d sat on a bagpipe. So. Not. Sexy.

Viktor didn’t bat an eyelash, though. He threw his leatherjacket onto a chair and gave Goliath a signal to leave. Then he sat down next to her and sipped his espresso, while she  stuffed herself with pancakes and puff pastry fresh from the oven. After she’d devoured everything, she leaned into the pillows and made a comfy sound.

That had been good. With her stomached filled, she savored her macchiato and noticed once more how much she was able to relax in Viktor’s presence. Even the shady guys down at the reception couldn’t pull down her energy. There was no explanation for it.

“So, you’ve met Jean?”

She almost choked. “Y-you know him?”

“Of course I do. He’s one of the few offspring of the SK soldiers.”

“How do you know about him?”

“Until you showed up he was one of the three known SK children. Though you can be sure there are more.”

More like her? The thought was comforting. She didn’t want to be the only one cursed. She wanted to belong and do things that were natural for others: going to the movies, popcorn and pajama parties. She didn’t even have her driver’s license yet. What, if she freaked out on the highway, overwhelmed by the aggressive driving style of others. She would never get to experience something like normalcy. Especially not now that she knew who she was–what she was. And what the government had done to her father.

Cole.

Automatically, the pads of her fingers touched the pin.