1
S
tone Barrington closed his three suitcases and called down for Fred Flicker to fetch his luggage. Fred was quick.
“I’ll have the car around in five minutes, Mr. Barrington,” he said.
“Thank you, Fred.”
Fred hustled the three cases onto the elevator and disappeared. Stone turned to Ann Keaton, who was sitting on the end of his bed, fully dressed and ready to go to her job at the New York City campaign headquarters of Katharine Lee, the Democratic nominee for president of the United States. Ann was her deputy campaign manager.
“Are you crying because I’m leaving?” Stone asked. “I
mean, you’ve known for weeks that I have to go to Paris for the opening of the new hotel, l’Arrington.”
“No,” she said, “that’s not why.”
“I’ll be back in two or three weeks, and you’re going to be so busy with the campaign that you won’t even notice that I’m gone.”
“I’ll notice,” Ann said. “I have something to tell you.”
“Just a minute,” Stone said. He buzzed his secretary, Joan Robertson. “Ask Fred to pick up the Bacchettis, then come back for me,” he said. Then he returned and sat next to Ann on the bed.
“All right,” he said, “tell me.”
“I’m crying because I won’t be here when you get back,” Ann said.
This was news to Stone. “And where will you be?”
“In Washington.”
“I don’t understand, Kate said you could work out of New York.”
“Kate changed her mind,” Ann said. “She wants me to work with Sam more closely. She wants us to meet every day, and Sam can’t come to New York.” Sam Meriwether, the senior senator from Georgia, was Kate Lee’s campaign manager.
“And this is until the election?” Stone asked hopefully.
“Only if Kate isn’t elected,” Ann said. “We’ve talked about what happens if she gets elected: I’ll be heading up the search operation for administration appointees, while remaining her chief of staff. And after the inauguration…”
“As the president’s chief of staff, you’ll be the second-most-powerful person in the world?”
“That’s what everybody says,” Ann said, then she renewed her crying.
“Ann, I can understand that if you have to choose between being with me and being the second-most-powerful person in the world, why you might not choose me.”
“And I hate that about myself!” she sobbed. “Why do I want that above personal happiness?”
“Because you’d be doing it for your country,” Stone said, “and, of course, because you’d be the second-most-powerful person in the world.”
“Do you hate me?” Ann asked.
“Of course not. I love you.”
“But you’re not
in
love with me, not anymore.”
“That’s a self-defense mechanism,” Stone said. “I know I can’t have you, so I can’t be in love.”
“I can understand that,” she said. “Everybody’s got to protect himself. Still, I wish
you
were the one crying.”
“I hardly ever cry,” Stone said.
“You should try it sometime, it’s good for you.”
“I’ll have to take your word for it.” He got up, took her hand, and pulled her to her feet. “Come on, let’s go down. I have to pick up my briefcase from Joan.”
They took the elevator down to his office, where his briefcase stood open on his desk, with Joan standing guard.
“I got you ten thousand euros,” she said. “If you need more,
you can just use your ATM card. The bank says it works in Europe.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Stone said. “But I don’t see how I can spend ten thousand euros in two or three weeks.”
“You’ll find a way,” Joan said, with a confidence born of keeping him in cash.
“Is the car out front?”
“Yes, everything’s ready.”
“Come on, I’ll drop you at your office,” he said to Ann.
“No,” she said. “I want to walk, get some fresh air and get over feeling sorry for myself, and that will take a few minutes.”
She walked him out to the car, where Fred already had the rear door open. He kissed Ann goodbye, got in, and kissed Viv Bacchetti on the cheek. Fred closed the door and got behind the wheel.
“Where’s Dino?” he asked. Her husband, the newly minted commissioner of police for New York, was coming to Paris with them, where he was attending a conference of high-ranking police officials from Europe and the United States. They were taking the Gulfstream 650 jet belonging to Strategic Services, Viv’s employer and the world’s second-largest security company. She was to oversee the security staff at the new hotel, until things were running smoothly.
“He’s coming in his car,” she said, “or rather his motorcade. He had to pick up the L.A. chief of police and the Boston commissioner. The only way the mayor would let Dino ride in a corporate jet was if the other two guys came along, too, and
Mike Freeman was okay with that. It’s a motorcade, because those guys are each traveling with two of their own detectives.” Freeman was the CEO of Strategic Services.
“Okay, let’s go, Fred.”
“You look funny,” Viv said.
“Funny queer or funny ha-ha?”
“Funny queer.”
“I just had to say goodbye to Ann.”
“Well, she’ll be here when you get back.”
“No, she’ll be in Washington, very likely for years to come. Kate wants her there to work more closely with Sam Meriwether.”
“I see.”
“Yeah, so do I, but I don’t like it much.”
“Maybe it’s not such a bad thing, Stone, maybe it’s time for you to be a free man again.”
Stone didn’t know how to reply to that.
—
AT TETERBORO
they were let through the security gate at Jet Aviation and Fred drove them to the big airplane. There was a line of black SUVs already there, disgorging men in suits and their luggage. Mike Freeman was greeting them at the airplane’s door and turning them over to the two stewardesses, who would settle them in. Someone got their luggage out of the trunk, then Stone followed Viv up the stairs and to their seats. Dino made the introductions, then the three of them
occupied seats together, along with Mike Freeman. The moment everyone was buckled into a seat, the airplane was taxiing. With no delay, they were on the runway, then down the runway and climbing.
“Paris awaits,” Mike said.
“Are you looking forward to it?” Stone asked.
“I always do. By the way, Stone, you won’t be driving into the city with us.”
“Why not?”
“Because I had a call from Lance Cabot this morning.” Cabot was the director of Central Intelligence. “His people will be transporting you.”
“That’s very weird,” Stone said.
“I thought so, too,” Mike replied.
And then they were eating a big breakfast.
2
S
tone stepped out the door of the Gulfstream 650 and, from the top of the stairs, viewed what seemed a whole lot of badly parked SUVs. They were there to transport the occupants of the G-650 and their detectives, bodyguards, and the police officers who had come to greet them. One vehicle stood out: a white Mercedes van that was bigger and taller than the usual van. Leaning against it, grinning, was one Richard LaRose, known as Rick, who was the newly appointed Paris station chief of the Central Intelligence Agency. As Stone walked toward the man he caught sight of a Gulfstream 450 being towed into a nearby hangar, and he saw something familiar painted on an engine nacelle, a symbol he had seen before.
“Stone!” Rick yelled.
Stone turned and waved, then pointed out his luggage to a lineman, then pointed at the big van, then he strolled over and shook hands with the grinning Rick, forgetting the Gulfstream. “Rick, how are you?”
“Better than fine,” Rick replied, “and I rate better transportation these days.” He jerked a thumb toward the van. Rick’s former transport had been a battered gray Ford van that he had done terrible things to.
“Congratulations on the new job,” Stone said. “Lance mentioned it.”
Stone’s luggage was stored in a rear compartment, then Rick slid open the door of the van to reveal an interior that was more jetliner than van: four seats, two abreast, facing across a burled walnut tabletop. The cabin was swathed in soft beige leather. On one of the seats sat Lance Cabot, director of Central Intelligence, offering Stone a small, cool smile.
Stone got in and shook hands. “What a surprise to see you in Paris, Lance,” he said. He always was wary around Lance, today no less so.
“In my line of work I try to surprise,” Lance said. “When people expect you, bad things can happen.”
Rick slid in beside Lance and closed the door, then rapped sharply on the bulkhead behind him. The van moved smoothly away
“What brings you across the pond?” Stone asked, genuinely curious.
Lance gazed out the window at the passing scenery. “Oh, I
thought I’d come over and help Rick get settled into his new office. And into his new job.”
“And that is very much appreciated, Lance,” Rick said, somehow avoiding sounding obsequious.
“Also, I wanted the opportunity to speak with you privately before you reach your new hotel,” Lance said.
“Well, here I am, and this looks private to me. Assuming we can trust Rick, of course.”
“Of course,” Lance said. “Stone, your arrival in Paris coincides with two notable gatherings in the city: one is the meeting of that group of important policemen, now called the Congress of Security, or in the way of the world these days, CONSEC. Although many of these gentlemen have met at one time or another, this is the first time all of them have met at once. The importance of that meeting is indicated by the place of their conference, the Élysée Palace, which, as you know, is the seat of the president of France.”
Stone nodded; he knew that much, at least.
“The other gathering, which will not be publicized, is of a criminal nature, though it will appear to be a conference of business executives. This is an organization of Russian oligarchs, most of them former KGB generals and colonels, who have grown rich and fat in their new, so-called democracy. What was formerly a loose network of old chums, colleagues, and enemies has now gelled into a more formal entity, which they call the Cowl, as in the hood of a monk. The apparent head monk is Yevgeny Majorov, the son of a very, very important KGB general, now thankfully deceased, and the brother
of another decedent, Yuri Majorov, in whose death they suspect you of having had a hand.”
Stone raised a finger. “I deny that,” he said.
“Deny it all you like,” Lance replied. “The fact is that Yuri wanted you dead because you would not accept him as a partner in your hotel business, and he had brought with him to Los Angeles a feared mafia assassin, who sometimes worked freelance, for the express purpose of ensuring your demise.”
“I believe I heard something about that,” Stone said.
“Yuri, as we now know, departed Los Angeles in his private jet, bound for Moscow, and arrived in that city, having apparently expired of natural causes en route.”
Stone shrugged. “These things happen.”
“Yuri’s death coincided with that of his hired assassin, in his bed at the Bel-Air Hotel, and his killer used a little something from the gentleman’s own pharmaceutical supply to off both the assassin and Yuri.”
“There’s a certain poetry to that,” Stone observed.
“Yes, and that standard of ‘poetry’ is rarely found outside organizations such as the one I head. In fact, I believe this particular ‘poet’ to be a former member of my flock, one Teddy Fay, but I can’t prove it, and that fact alone causes me to suspect Teddy. That and the fact that Teddy’s name, photographs, fingerprints, and DNA test have recently vanished from every intelligence and law enforcement database in the United States and its possessions, along with the databases of all those nations with whom we share such data.”
“I will have to take the Fifth on that one,” Stone said.
“There is only one way this could have happened,” Lance said. “Not even I could have engineered it, and I can engineer almost anything, if I try hard enough. No, that action originated far, far above my pay grade. One, and only one, personage could have initiated it, and he, coincidentally, is a friend of yours. But, for reasons of both decorum and self-preservation, I will say no more about that.”
“Thank you, Lance, that is a relief.”
“Good, but you have little else about which to be relieved, Stone.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“It means that Yevgeny Majorov has made some of the same deductions I have made, and he believes you, in one way or another, to be responsible for both his brother’s failure to penetrate the ownership of your hotel group and for his brother’s untimely demise.”
“The man must be delusional,” Stone said.
“Nevertheless,” Lance said, “while you are in Paris you are going to have to watch your ass—or rather, Rick and his coterie are going to have to. Do you understand and accept this fact?”